Virtual Console Offers 100 Games, 4.7 Million Sold

GameDaily reports on new numbers from Nintendo, discussing their ongoing success with the Wii's Virtual Console offering. According to the piece, there are now over 100 games available on the service, and some 4.7 Million downloads have been transacted since the system's launch late last year. "Nintendo has been updating the Wii Shop with new Virtual Console games every Monday. The top five downloads worldwide to date have been Super Mario Bros. (NES), Super Mario 64 (N64), Mario Kart 64 (N64), Super Mario World (SNES), and The Legend of Zelda (NES). 'With an Internet connection rate reaching 40 percent, Wii owners have more options than ever to find the kinds of games they love to play,' says George Harrison, Nintendo of America's senior vice president of marketing and corporate communications. 'Beyond the Wii Shop Channel, all types of people are getting connected and checking out the information and entertainment options available on the Wii Menu. Whether voting, creating a Mii or just checking the weather, everyone has a favorite channel.'"

Success?

[magicsquid (85985)]

This sounds more like success for Nintendo in general rather than success for the Virtual Console. Sure, as Nintendo did with the N64, they have the ability to basically support the VC on their own, but in order to make it a true breakout success, they need the support of third parties. The only way they're going to get more of that is if the third party games actually sell. Maybe third parties don't care as much because of the extremely low development costs. That's possible. I can't imagine a compan

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[Red Flayer (890720)]

in order to make it a true breakout success, they need the support of third parties

Define "breakout success". I don't see any way this can't be seen as a breakout success.

The only way they're going to get more of that is if the third party games actually sell.

What? From wikipoedia:

Banpresto, Capcom, Chunsoft, D4 Enterprise, Enterbrain, Irem, Jaleco, KEMCO, Koei, Midway Games, NCS Masaya, Netfarm, Paon, Rocket Company, Konami, Square Enix, Sunsoft, SNK Playmore, Taito, Tecmo, Takara, and TOMY are confirme

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[AKAImBatman (238306)]

The only way they're going to get more of that is if the third party games actually sell.

What are you talking about? Some of the biggest VC sellers are for the Sega Genesis and the TurboGrafx. Are you seriously suggesting that Nintendo produced those titles?

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[Maxwell (13985)]

FTA the top five are all Nintendo games. I bet the top ten are as well. So all those 3rd party companies, all 20 or so of them listed in GP, are fighting for spots 11 and higher. aka Scraps. When 3rd party titles dominate the top 5, THEN we can say they have good 3rd party support.

JON

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[Gulthek (12570)]

Explain how 3rd party support requires 3rd party popularity.

Are you suggesting that the 3rd party games are restricted/hindered compared to the 1st party games?

Should Nintendo go back in time and make crappy games so that 3rd party games will "dominate the top 5" in their classic game store?

WTF?

Re:Success?

[AKAImBatman (238306)]

FTA the top five are all Nintendo games.

This is because the Nintendo titles have greater mass appeal than the Genesis/TurboGrafx titles. That does NOT mean that the Genesis/TurboGrafx titles are doing poorly. In fact, Hudson originally announced only 5 TG-16 titles destined for the Virtual Console. Since then they've expanded the list to some of the best titles ever made for the system. This includes: Bomberman '93, R-Type, Military Madness, Bonk's Adventure, Bonk's Revenge, and Blazing Lazers.

While Nintendo and their partners have been keeping hush-hush on a lot of the VC sales data, Hudson's strong support [vc-pce.com] for the VC certainly suggests that they've been having good success with the service. Sega seems to be becoming similarly infatuated [sega.com] with the service.

It's also interesting to note that there hasn't been a strong Nintendo title released for the VC since Starfox 64.

I bet the top ten are as well.

I'm not sure I would be so quick to say that. Nintendo's games will always dominate simply because they dominated back in the day. (e.g. 3 of my 6 VC games are Nintendo titles.) But that doesn't mean that the third parties aren't doing exceptionally well. Sonic, for example, was exceptionally popular back in the day. I would be surprised if it wasn't on a top 10 list.

When 3rd party titles dominate the top 5, THEN we can say they have good 3rd party support.

That, I'm afraid, will never happen. The customers are Nintendo players downloading titles on a Nintendo system, and have fond memories of playing Nintendo games. Combined with the timeless reputation of some of their games, Nintendo's classics library cannot be beat. As I said, though, this does not mean that third parties aren't seeing wonderful sales through the VC.

Anecdotally, I have heard a lot of excitement from friends/acquaintances over TG16 and Genesis titles. (Though the 600 points for TMNT got a big 'WTF?') The only catch is that there's more of a spread between which titles they're interested in. Some like shooters, some like beat'em'ups, and some like platformers. Nintendo's appeal tends to be more universal.

Re:Success?

[Maul (83993)]

I've purchased TG16 and Genesis virtual console titles. In addition, I've purchased SNES titles that were 3rd. party produced, such as Castlevania 4 (Konami) and Street Fighter 2 (Capcom). The 3rd. party titles are there to purchase.

In my opinion, there reasons Nintendo titles dominate the top five are:

1. Purchasers of the Wii might have a bias towards Nintendo titles.
2. Many of the first party NES and SNES titles have withstood the test of time better than 3rd. party titles, in my opinion.
3. A lot of the popular 3rd. party titles can't make it to the VC due to licensing issues, or the fact that they've been rereleased on the GBA. (The reason you likely won't see FF4-6 on the VC is due to the GBA rereleases).

What were the most popular SNES games of all times? You probably can't track this info down anymore, but I would wager that if you asked a bunch of gamers who played during that era, they're answer is going to be a first party title or a Square game.

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[grogdamighty (884570)]

http://vgchartz.com/worldtotals.php?name=&console = SNES&publisher=&sort=Total [vgchartz.com]

That link shows all of the 1+ million sellers on the SNES. The top 10 has 8 Nintendo games and 2 Capcom games (Street Fighter 2 and Street Fighter 2 Turbo). #11-15 adds another 3 Nintendo games and Final Fantasy VI and Dragon Quest VI. #16-20 adds 2 Nintendo games, Final Fantasy V and Dragon Quest V and Chrono Trigger.

So you weren't far off... Nintendo games and Square/Enix are right behind.

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[_xeno_ (155264)]

(The reason you likely won't see FF4-6 on the VC is due to the GBA rereleases).

Plus, given that the translations for the re-releases were generally better (to their credit, they kept the "Spoony Bard!" line), it's probably just as well. The FFVI Advance release also fixed many of the bugs in the original game. (Evasion does something now! Shields have uses! Relm no longer crashes the game, making her simply useless instead of downright dangerous!)

About the only issue with the GBA FFVI re-release is that

I buy VC games despite owning the carts/consoles

[Vandil X (636030)]

Despite having access to the original consoles and carts (in boxes stored somewhere in the house) and emulators/roms, I still picked up quite a few VC games: Super Mario Bros. (NES), Legend of Zelda (NES), Castlevania (NES), Elevator Action (NES), F-Zero (SNES), Super Castlevania IV (SNES), Super Mario World (SNES), Sonic The Hedgehog (Genesis), Kid Chameleon (Genesis), and Splatterhouse (TG-16), so far.

I like VC games because I can play them when I am already in the mood to play a console game, and the

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[Guppy06 (410832)]

"The only way they're going to get more of that is if the third party games actually sell. Maybe third parties don't care as much because of the extremely low development costs."

But we already have at least one third-party that doesn't want their old games competing with their frequent and pricey re-releases.

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[NiK0laI (1012851)]

I'd say that the VC has been successful for Nintendo, I mean they are selling games for $5 minimum a pop, it's not like they spend any significant amount of time developing the games. At $5 a piece thats $23.5 million dollars they made doing practically nothing.

Blame me.

[MeanderingMind (884641)]

I'm one of those morons who ditched their old consoles with the advent of each new one. Now, Nintendo, Sega and the rest get to sell me nostalgia at top dollar.

I've purchased 4 NES games, 2 SNES, 2 Sega Genesis and 3 N64 games thus far. It's not an average, but assuming it is we divide 4.7 million by 11 and get 427,000ish people like me in the world.

Scary, eh?

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[AdamWeeden (678591)]

Well you are actually an anomaly. I've only bought 2 VC titles so far, and going by the sale totals [wikipedia.org] it looks like 7.4 million Wiis sold compared to 4.7 million VC downloads which actually mean that on average there are about 2 VC downloads for 3 Wiis.

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[maxume (22995)]

It'd be interesting to see how many people even have their wii hooked up to the internet. It wouldn't surprise me if it was less than 50%.

Re:Blame me.

[Tofystedeth (1076755)]

The summary said connection was approaching 40%

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[DrEldarion (114072)]

Fortunately, all you have to do is look in the article summary at the top where it says "almost 40%" :)

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[steveo777 (183629)]

Per the preview, about 40% of Wii consoles are online at the time, or have been connected. So that's 2.96 million consoles. That's actually 3 VC downloads to every two Wii's that are connected. I'm sure that will be attributed to about half the on line Wii owners trying out a title or two, with the GP poster and a small percentage of his buddies purchasing five or more. (Look, ma! I'm a statistician! Just like a real one!)

Re:Blame me.

[AKAImBatman (238306)]

I'm one of those morons who ditched their old consoles with the advent of each new one. Now, Nintendo, Sega and the rest get to sell me nostalgia at top dollar.

I have 8 to 10 classic game consoles at home, and yet I have purchased about 6 games from the Virtual Console. There are a variety of reasons for this:

• Convenience - It's a lot easier to boot the Wii and play a quick NES title than it is to pull out the classic console (which you lovingly repaired the pins), snake the cables behind the furniture, and hook it up to the television.
  
• Availability - I never had a Sega Genesis, nor have I ever felt the need to own one. The system didn't have much in the way of lasting appeal, but it did have Sonic. Now that I can purchase Sonic from the Virtual Console, I have even less reason to own a Genesis.
  
• Price - Believe it or not, TurboGrafix systems and games are not that cheap in the wild. $8 a pop is a pretty good deal for many of these games. Especially uncommon cult classics like Military Madness and Blazing Lasers. If the rumors of Nintendo adding Neo-Geo games turn out to be true, the value of the Virtual Console games will go through the roof! (Neo-Geo carts still cost upwards of $30 used.)
  
• Storage - I try to keep my games and systems neatly organized. Playing games on the VC allows me to do less to disturb that order, and can even save me storage space for titles that I don't necessarily want to invest in physical copies of.
  
• Authenticity - Playing games on the Virtual Console feels much closer to playing them on the original system than playing them on an emulator does. Nintendo seems to make an effort to replicate the experience as closely as possible. The NES-style controls of the Wii Remote and SuperNES/Playstation feel of the Classic Controller help heighten that sense of authenticity.
  

Nintendo may not have the most original idea with their VC service, but they've struck gold in terms of its implementation. :)

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[porcupine8 (816071)]

Even if you have the old consoles, the VC has a lot of appeal. I still have my SNES, but some of the cartridges don't work anymore, or only work sporadically. And if you want some rare games this could be way cheaper - have they released Earthbound yet? You're lucky to find that one for $30-40 on eBay, sometimes it's as much as $80. I bought one used SNES game from gamestop.com and it came DOA - but I couldn't return it in store and it would have cost as much to mail it back as the refund I would have gotte

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[Tofystedeth (1076755)]

They probably used open-source emulators

I wasn't aware anyone had written an open-source emulator for those consoles that runs on the Wii. It's far more likely that Nintendo simply used the emulators they already had on hand for dev/testing.

Original carts

[HalAtWork (926717)]

Too bad there's no program for someone with the original carts to enter into a program that allows them to download their games onto the Wii. Maybe someone could come up with a reader that plugs into USB for the NES, Genesis, TG16, N64, SNES, etc that allows you to use your originals. I like having all my games accessible on one system so I don't have to have them all set up, but I have a lot of games and paying for them all twice would suck, especially if the Wii's successor won't allow you to transfer them...

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[porcupine8 (816071)]

It's only pirating if you sell one of the copies. Making a copy for use and keeping the original as a backup is legal.

Though personally, I'm waiting for the opposite - a way to d/l VC games onto a cartridge for use in DSes.

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[AKAImBatman (238306)]

Making a copy for use and keeping the original as a backup is legal.

This is not strictly true. The decision in the Atari v. JS&A [patentarcade.com] case was that cartridges were not susceptible to accidental damage in the same way that magnetic media was. As a result, there was no need for an archival copy of the software.

A modern judge might see things different given the age of many cartridges, but you should be aware that they are currently NOT covered under the "archival" clause. (Now if only Nintendo would figure out

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[porcupine8 (816071)]

Really? Interesting, I didn't know that cartridges were treated differently. I think they would be hard-pressed to show that someone with original NES cartridges now (or even SNES, many of mine have worn out) had no legitimate use for a backup.

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[AKAImBatman (238306)]

Legally, a backup is different from a space-shifted copy. A backup for "archival purposes" as defined by copyright law is to protect against media failure. In the Atari v. JS&A case, the court referred to the original report that Congress used to draft the archival exception. The report had focused on the volatility of magnetic media as a key concern, and pointed out that copying of software could be done for nearly no cost in comparison to the huge cost of developing the software. Since cartridges coul

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[tuffy (10202)]

Though personally, I'm waiting for the opposite - a way to d/l VC games onto a cartridge for use in DSes.

Why bother with a cartridge? I'd like to use the DS' "Download Play" option to fetch VC titles directly from the Wii. There'd be little risk of piracy since they'd only be playable until the DS is turned off, and no extra hardware is needed. Nintendo would only need to write DS-based emulators and have a channel for sharing them out with.

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[porcupine8 (816071)]

only be playable until the DS is turned off

See, that's a major drawback for me. I do use my DS at home, but I play it a lot on the bus and I specifically got it to keep me distracted on airplanes (it has really helped my panic attacks). I do think they're more likely to do that first, though.

I know that there would be huge piracy concerns with a cartridge-based approach. I'm sure some heavy DRM would be needed. But I still want it. I'd take it, DRM and all. Well, I mean, once I get a Wii.

Speaking of...

[WED Fan (911325)]

Where's Phantom these days?

In home arcade.

[by Anonymous Coward]

One of the great things way back when home consoles became available was the ability to play until your heart's content without paying any additional money other than buying the console and the cartridge (hey, I started out with the Atari 2600). Of course I still would occasionally go to the arcade, but now I didn't have to.

Now that consoles (not just the WII of course) connect to the internet and there are shops (and advertisements) it's only a matter of time until someone rolls out a pay to play model. Of course there already are the online communities/games which require monthly subscriptions but c'mon, these companies can milk much more money out of us. It's only a matter of time before they do and it's very, very sad.

What goes up...

[spyrochaete (707033)]

The fantastic Retronauts podcast [1up.com] talked about this milestone recently. They determined that as ownership of the Wii increases, Virtual Console purchases per person decreases. They surmise that all the hardcore fanboys who rushed out to buy the console bought a disproportionately large number of VC titles. It will be interesting to see the numbers after a year.

Tried VC, haven't been impressed--

[Speare (84249)]

I don't know if it's a matter of my getting older and not remembering the feel of the controls of these ancient games, or if there's poor latency/response in the Virtual Console itself, but I found the Starfox64 to be pretty "syrupy" in the controls, and hard to jump on cue in the Mario64 as well. I'm not inclined to spend too many more Wii points if all of the Virtual Console suffers from bad latency.

I initially wished for the standard Wii-motes to play the Virtual Console games, but I fear those bluet

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[Boogaroo (604901)]

So far, I have Bomberman, Gradius 3, and Kirby's Adventure. Each of these are pretty demanding on timing, especially Gradius 3. I've not noticed any lag or delay in controls.

Bigger issue than most realize.

[Cyno01 (573917)]

Most people who (console) game on LCDs dont even realize theres any kind of lag because they get so used to it. For a couple of weeks at work we had a guitar hero demo set up with a 42" LCD. I played it every day on my lunch and had all the high scores, but then i tried playing at my friends house and i was terrible, coming in early on everything, because id learned to play on an LCD with a lag. This was one of the reasons i bought a CRT HDTV.

Re-Volt

[Richard W.M. Jones (591125)]

I really wish they'd release N64 Re-Volt. That game ruled ...

Rich.

Re:_nowhere_ does it say 'sold'.

[AbsoluteXyro (1048620)]

Yes but the Opera Browser and Everybody Votes are not Virtual Console offerings. This article is about Virtual Console offerings alone. Otherwise, surely the Opera Browser or Everybody Votes would have made it into the top five downloads... on account of, you know, being free. But they didn't. So it is clear to see that non-Virtual Console offerings have been left out of the tally.

How about right in the article's headline?

[Daverd (641119)]

Article Headline: Virtual Console Reaches 100th Game Milestone; 4.7 Million Sold

From Article Subheadline: "more than 4.7 million Virtual Console titles have been downloaded so far"

From Article text: "more than 4.7 million games have been downloaded by Wii owners".

So, unless you consider your web browser and Everybody Votes channels to be Virtual Console games, then yes, they have sold 4.7 million games. For money.

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[Echnin (607099)]

Except in the headline? "Virtual Console Reaches 100th Game Milestone; 4.7 Million Sold". From text: "more than 4.7 million games have been downloaded by Wii owners" (not other software: games). RTFA before commenting.

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[Bones3D_mac (324952)]

Well, if they get really desperate for new content, they do have the entire 18+ years of Gameboy titles all the way up to the GBA they can tap into. (Mario Land 2 would probably do pretty well, as would the gameboy versions of Zelda.)

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[syrinx (106469)]

I would go buy Link's Awakening (the first Game Boy Zelda) right now if it were available. Original or DX (for the GBC), I don't care either way. I hope it happens eventually.

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[porcupine8 (816071)]

I'm not sure "ballsy" is the right word - more like "small and desperate to break into the market." I don't know how much it costs to develop for the VC, but it can't be that much. It seems like the ideal place for a fledgling company to get in with some interesting 8- or 16-bit action. I know nothing about game development, so maybe I'm wrong and Nintendo makes you buy an entire Wii dev kit plus a several-thousand-dollar VC add-on, but I doubt it.

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[Wdomburg (141264)]

Erm, there's a fair number of Mario titles left:

Super Mario Bros.: The Lost Levels (orig SMB2 in Japan) (NES)
Super Mario Bros. 2 (NES)
Super Mario Bros. 3 (NES)
Dr. Mario (NES)
Super Mario Kart (SNES)
Yoshi's Safari (SNES)
Super Mario World 2: Yoshi's Island (SNES)
Super Mario RPG: Legend of the Seven Stars (SNES)
Mario Party (N64)
Mario Party 2 (N64)
Ma

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[spyrochaete (707033)]

Neo Geo is definitely forthcoming, and there's a very good chance many Commodore 64 titles will be added as well!

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[Rycross (836649)]

Square has explicitly stated they don't want any part of the Virtual Console. After all, they make a killing off of releasing the same games over and over for full price. I'd imagine they'd want to keep Secret of Mana off of the VC in case they decide to give it the same treatment as FF4 and FF6.

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[aesiamun (862627)]

If that is true, how come they have ActRaiser on the VC? While not one of their top games, I remember playing it back in the early 90s.

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[Tridus (79566)]

Except they haven't re-released Secret of Mana in any form. I mean we're on the what, THIRD rehash of FF4 now?

If they won't go out and re-release it as a seperate thing, the VC seems like a cheap way for them to do it instead. I can guarantee there's a market for the game, despite all the bad things they've done to it with stuff like Children of Mana.

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[falcon5768 (629591)]

while a Enix game, ActRaiser was released which is owned by SE now. Also none of the Dragon Warrior titles have been re-released on a system that is still currently supported (last re-release was on the Game Boy Color) so that leaves a good 5 NES titles open for the VC that would be guaranteed million sellers.

While they dont have plans as of yet (what with the 5 million FFXIII titles coming out, FFXI add-on, 2 FF:CC games, FFIV, and 2 Dragon Warrior games ot name just a few) Im sure they might be prepping

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[Omestes (471991)]

Oh god, if they release Shining Force... I was one of the few games that made me happy I owned a Genesis when I was young. Later when I discovered emulators I played through both of them back to back, at the expense of WoW and life. So enjoyable. We need more turn based strategy games. The only game that stands up to them is Final Fantasy Tactics, but that was rather drawn out, and dragged quite a bit (its Square, so its to be expected).

On the Genesis front they need Shining Force, Alysa Dragoon (stupi

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[Yvan256 (722131)]

That's not a problem, they have no Turbographix games on the VC.

TurboGrafx-16 games, on the other hand...

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[spyrochaete (707033)]

Allstars was a great package. It had the first 3 North American Super Mario titles, Super Mario 2 from Japan, and some versions bundled Super Mario World as well. Plus all the games let you save your progress so that you didn't have to start from the beginning every time you powered on the console. And of course the graphics were astounding!