The sorry state of the Wii U

[C.Mongler]

monster hunter 3 ulti is the best big screen monsti hunt at this juncture too
pokken is aight imo
wolly yoshi is ok
i had fun with wonderful 101
nintendoland is fun if you actually have friends for like an hour

[rdl]

i got it in 2014, didn't open it until last year bc i was going to return it but then didn't

i have
mario 3d world
pikmin 3
donkey kong
rayman legends
nintendo land
zelda
super smash bros

ive played
mario 3d world
donkey kong
rayman legends

i beat
pikmin 3

honestly 7 games isnt bad, i think thats the same as the wii for me.the wii u has some of my favorite games in years on it, pikmin 3 was very, very good and zelda reminds me a lot of it in terms of heart. im ok with my purchase.

[Samus Aran]

Pikmin 3
Zelda BotW
NSMBU + Luigi U
Smash Bros.
Mario Kart 8
Yoshi's Woolly World
DKCR Tropical Freeze
Super Mario 3D World

Still need Bayonetta 2 at some point. Vaguely interested in getting Rainbow Curse sometime.

[Kalahari Inkantation]

i'd be curious to see your list of decent OG wii games
seems like it didn't have that many either

a few of the games in my library (star fox, nintendol&) aren't even decent, i only listed them because i happen to own them

the two 'hd' zelda games are bare minimum-effort ports that don't qualify as meaningful additions to the wii u's library in the least

breath of the wild itself, though originally intended for the wii u, is not exclusive and in fact now serves as the switch's flagship title, but i'll count it anyway because i will later include tp in the list of good wii games

so the full list of remotely decent wii u exclusives is as follows (metascores in parentheses):

mario kart 8 (88)
super mario 3d world (93)
breath of the wild (98)
new super mario bros. u (84)
super luigi u (77)
bayonetta 2 (91)
smash 4 (92)
hyrule warriors (76)
captain toad treasure tracker (81)
yoshi's woolly world (78)
kirby and the rainbow curse (73)
donkey kong country tropical freeze (83)
mario maker (88)
monster hunter 3 ultimate (82)
wonderful 101 (78)
splatoon (81)
pikmin 3 (87)
tokyo mirage sessions (80)
xenoblade x (84)
pokken (76)

and i am REALLY stretching the definition of "remotely decent" with some of those sub-80 metascore inclusions, as i'm sure most wii u owners would agree

20 games total, with a metacritc average of 83.5

stay tuned for my upcoming list of good wii games for comparison

[Kalahari Inkantation]

Tbh my favorite game out of the whole bunch was probably donkey kong, which is weird because I was never a huge fan of the series (this was the first DK game I actually played to completion) 

my personal favorite (botw excluded) is mario kart 8, easily

one of the highlights of the generation and arguably the best mario kart overall

[bluaki]

Around the beginning of Wii U's life, I was hopeful because of Nintendo's move into HD, modern-enough specs, and a seemingly classic/standard control scheme. I was somewhat wary of the GamePad's usefulness but expected I could just ignore it and use the Pro Controller instead, but it turns out they managed to shoehorn it into way too many things and (other than gyro use) the game is made worse for it every single time.

There's frankly not a single way any game developer can use the GamePad screen right as a complement to the TV; it only works as a supplement for either optional off-TV play (MK8, SSB, etc) or to the point of why bother targeting a TV console in the first place (Kirby, Mario Maker).

The only worthwhile Wii U game I can think of that wouldn't work better ported to Switch than on Wii U is Kirby Rainbow Curse. It depends on the stylus in a way that you can't get with capacitive screens unless you have something like the Note Pen or Apple Pencil. Not a single Wii U game would be made worse by losing the second screen; stuff like Splatoon's Inkstrike and Pikmin's "Go Here" would even be made better if moved to the main screen.

so for the six of you sorry saps who got suckered into buying a wii u, what does you final library look like

Captain Toad
DKC Tropical Freeze
Kirby Rainbow Curse
Wind Waker HD
Mario Kart 8
Pikmin 3
Pokken
Sonic Lost World
Splatoon
Mario Maker
New SMB U
New Super Luigi U
3D World
Smash 4
Yoshi's Woolly World

I don't own Twilight Princess HD yet but I'm sure I'll get it some day.

And some bad ones:
Animal Crossing Amiibo Festival
Mario Party 10
NintendoLand (it might've been good if I ever had a chance to play it with friends lol)

I also own Wonderful 101 but couldn't really get into it.

I don't regret the Wii U. My personal favorite games on it are Yoshi > 3D World > Pikmin 3 > MK8 > SSBU.

[TooB]

Supposedly the Switch MK 8 "deluxe" includes an actual battle mode.

[Kalahari Inkantation]

Tbh my favorite game out of the whole bunch was probably donkey kong, which is weird because I was never a huge fan of the series (this was the first DK game I actually played to completion) 

my personal favorite (botw excluded) is mario kart 8, easily

one of the highlights of the generation and arguably the best mario kart overall

yeah it was great if you ignore the battle mode. I don't know why they even included it if they were gonna make it so unplayable. For real tho the rest of the game was awesome and the dlc added a lot.

yeah, the omission of battle mode was its only major fault

but the dlc was fantastic compensation for that lol

regardless, i would have loved to have seen a third dlc pack that introduced a proper battle mode, but i guess locking away the battle mode we should have gotten behind mario kart 8 """deluxe""" is the more lucrative decision for nintendo

[Kalahari Inkantation]

Supposedly the Switch MK 8 "deluxe" includes an actual battle mode.

not supposedly, it definitely does

but that and a few character additions are the only things that make it """deluxe"""

i may love battle mode and dry bones, but absolutely not enough to buy mk8 a second time

[Hiro]

I'm unfortunately gonna have to buy Deluxe because with battle mode it will be the perfect Mario Kart game

but let's see here, I own:
Nintendoland
Mario Kart 8
Splatoon
Super Mario 3D World
Super Mario Maker
Super Sm4sh Bros

Then for VC games:
EarthBound
Legend of Zelda: A Link to the Past
Mario & Luigi: Superstar Saga

and Humble Bundle shit:
BitTrip.Runner2
The Fall
Guacamelee
OlliOlli
Sportsball
Steamworld Dig
Stealth Inc. 2

I still plan on getting a lot more games for the Wii U, either on clearance or used, over the next few years, because there's a good number of games I'd still like, such as Kirby Rainbow Curse, DKC Tropical Freeze, Wind Waker / Twilight Princess HD, Pikmin 3, Captain Toad, Bayonetta 2, and Paper Mario Color Splash

[Kalahari Inkantation]

so for the six of you sorry saps who got suckered into buying a wii u, what does you final library look like

mine:

nintendoland (pack-in)
mario kart 8
super mario 3d world
new super mario bros. u (digital, from the mk8 promo)
wind waker hd (digital, gift from tyler )
bayonetta/bayonetta 2 combo
smash 4
star fox zero/star fox guard
hyrule warriors
captain toad treasure tracker
yoshi's woolly world

and a handful of digital indies like shantæ

i still intend to get botw (of course), tp hd, kirby and the rainbow curse, new super luigi u, donkey kong country tropical freeze, and maybe mario maker or splatoon but eh

added botw and tphd to my collection

Around the beginning of Wii U's life, I was hopeful because of Nintendo's move into HD, modern-enough specs, and a seemingly classic/standard control scheme. I was somewhat wary of the GamePad's usefulness but expected I could just ignore it and use the Pro Controller instead, but it turns out they managed to shoehorn it into way too many things and (other than gyro use) the game is made worse for it every single time.

There's frankly not a single way any game developer can use the GamePad screen right as a complement to the TV; it only works as a supplement for either optional off-TV play (MK8, SSB, etc) or to the point of why bother targeting a TV console in the first place (Kirby, Mario Maker).

agreed, part of the wii u's problem is that the entire gamepad concept was inherently self-defeating from its inception

nintendo advertised (and i use that term loosely) the second screen as both an integral gameplay enhancer akin to the ds's touch screen, and alternatively as a supplemental screen for off-tv play

it can only possibly be either one or the other per game, never both, and the fact that the vast majority of games that use gamepad-enhanced controls also support off-tv play meant that it could only ever be used in utterly superficial ways, like basic menu navigation/map display/a freaking horn in mk8

kirby and star fox are perhaps the only games that actually strictly rely on the gamepad for gameplay reasons, and yet both of them actually suffer for it lol

kirby's use of the gamepad renders the tv completely superfluous, so it too needed just one screen

the gamepad just ended up being a near completely redundant optional accessory all around, and even nintendo got lazy within a year and just relegated the thing to being an off-tv display, which in itself is a perfectly useless feature in the developed world where the vast majority of households have more than one tv

i can't imagine what brilliant gameplay concept nintendo must have had in mind when it decided that each wii u absolutely needed to be shipped with a gamepad, elevated costs of an enormous touchscreen controller be damned, because whatever that idea was, it clearly never came to fruition

i don't understand how hardware engineers with decades of experience could ever have thought the wii u was a sane, rational concept, unless they did literally no basic product testing

I don't regret the Wii U. My personal favorite games on it are Yoshi > 3D World > Pikmin 3 > MK8 > SSBU.

ultimately, i can't quite say i regret it either, but library-wise it still sits near the bottom of my console rankings and it's certainly nintendo's worst system ever, barring the virtual boy

[Kalahari Inkantation]

i'd be curious to see your list of decent OG wii games
seems like it didn't have that many either

a few of the games in my library (star fox, nintendol&) aren't even decent, i only listed them because i happen to own them

the two 'hd' zelda games are bare minimum-effort ports that don't qualify as meaningful additions to the wii u's library in the least

breath of the wild itself, though originally intended for the wii u, is not exclusive and in fact now serves as the switch's flagship title, but i'll count it anyway because i will later include tp in the list of good wii games

so the full list of remotely decent wii u exclusives is as follows (metascores in parentheses):

mario kart 8 (88)
super mario 3d world (93)
breath of the wild (98)
new super mario bros. u (84)
super luigi u (77)
bayonetta 2 (91)
smash 4 (92)
hyrule warriors (76)
captain toad treasure tracker (81)
yoshi's woolly world (78)
kirby and the rainbow curse (73)
donkey kong country tropical freeze (83)
mario maker (88)
monster hunter 3 ultimate (82)
wonderful 101 (78)
splatoon (81)
pikmin 3 (87)
tokyo mirage sessions (80)
xenoblade x (84)
pokken (76)

and i am REALLY stretching the definition of "remotely decent" with some of those sub-80 metascore inclusions, as i'm sure most wii u owners would agree

20 games total, with a metacritc average of 83.5

stay tuned for my upcoming list of good wii games for comparison

anyway, i know you've all been waiting with bated breath for this, so here goes:

An Incomprehensive List of Good Wii™ Games

super mario galaxy (97)
super mario galaxy 2 (97)
twilight princess (95)
super smash bros. brawl (93)
skyward sword (93)
xenoblade chronicles (92)
metroid prime 3 (90)
donkey kong country returns (87)
new super mario bros. wii (87)
sin & punishment: star successor (87)
kirby's epic yarn (86)
punch-out (86)
super paper mario (85)
tatsunoko vs. capcom (85)
monster hunter tri (84)
no more heroes 2 (84) (i would include the first game too but it eventually lost its exclusive status to the ps3)
rhythm heaven fever (83)
warioware: smooth moves (83)
mario kart wii (82)
madworld (81)

so there's 20 games with an average score of 87.85

and this is just a list of good popular/noteworthy wii exclusives, and includes no sub-80s like the wii u list does, so if i really wanted to i could easily expand this to 30+ different entries and it would only be ever more clear that the wii was a far superior platform to the wii u

more obscure or lesser scoring games that have just as much a right to be on this list as anything on the wii u list include:

kirby's return to dreamland (77)
zack and wiki (87)
fire emblem: radiant dawn (78)
muramasa: the demon blade (80)
the last story (80)
little king's story (82)
boom blox (85)(let's ignore the n-gage port)
trauma center: under the knife (78)
trauma team (82)
mario strikers charged (79)
warioland: shake it (78)
excitebots (77)

etc.

i also deliberately excluded the entire "wii ___" franchise of games (wii sports (76), wii sports resort (80), wii fit (80), etc.)

so yeah, wii >>>>>>>>>>>>>>> wii u

the fact that i even have to make this comparison demonstrates that the wii is, unironically, one of the most underrated and underappreciated consoles of all time

[bluaki]

Sony recently announced that they would discontinue all production of PS3 consoles this month. Despite being a whole generation older than the Wii U, it lived later.

That said, PS3 probably got more good games last year (at least in Japan) than Wii U did.

twilight princess (95)
super smash bros. brawl (93)
donkey kong country returns (87)
new super mario bros. wii (87)
mario kart wii (82)

At least the Wii U got some successors to these games that outdid the Wii ones.

fire emblem: radiant dawn (78)
trauma center: under the knife (78)
warioware: smooth moves (83)
warioland: shake it (78)

The GCN and Wii Fire Emblem games are desperately in need of digital re-releases

Under the Knife is a DS game. The enhanced Wii port is called Second Opinion.

Why is Smooth Moves rated higher than Shake It?

[TooB]

Imo, because smooth moves was a lot more fun than shake it