The Nintendo Wii U is a homebrew beast. Here's why

The Wii U was a system that Nintendo would rather forget. But for modders, it's nearly the perfect console which can play the (almost) entire back catalog of Nintendo games that game before it - and many other emulators and homebrew. While modding the Wii U isn't anything new - in today's video we take a look at the most up to date homebrew environment known as Aroma that not only makes the Wii U easier to hack, but it also makes it the experience so much better. Let's check it out.

TimeStamps :

00:00 - 00:59 - Intro
01:00 - 02:33 - Sponsor
02:34 - 03:45 - The old method - HaxChi
03:46 - 06:27 - The new method - Aroma
06:28 - 06:58 - Region Free is easy with Aroma
06:59 - 07:54 - Pairing a PS5 Dualsense with Aroma
07:55 - 10:05 - Emulators/Homebrew
10:06 - 11:18 - Dumping Wii U physical discs
11:19 - 12:23 - Conclusion
12:24 - 12:43 - Outro


Social Media Links :

#WiiU #Aroma

[OneCentWonder]

The Wii U is very similar to the Vita, abandoned by their companies as soon as they released only to be saved by the amazing homebrew scene

[tijuanatacotoker]

Playing nearly every DS game (some exceptions like Pokemon Black/White and its sequels) on the tv is peak greatness.

[BossBelsham]

Wii U was one of those tech marvels that gave us a glimpse into the future. No doubt it was a prototype for the switch, but 10 years from now this will pop up again as a “must own” for niche gamers.

[itjustcrashed]

The Wii U was and still is something very special to me. It was the first game console I ever played. The first computer I was allowed to use. I remember sitting on my couch after school, booting up the Wii U, and jumping into a game of Splatoon. Miiverse was still there, so was TVii. I had gotten the Wii U for Christmas, and it was from my uncle. He was very caring, but I don’t remember much about him. He died in 2018, and that made it so I would never get rid of my Wii U ever. Not even if I could get a million dollars, I’m not getting rid of it. It means so much to me and it started lots of things in my life. My love for hacking. My knowledge of computers. Thanks, Uncle Kevin. Thanks, Nintendo.

[boredstudent]

I modded my Wii U, which I had since 2012. I also have a 2TB Western Digital external hard drive connected to it. It's hands down a great console these days.

[ferna]

Hey, speaking of the WiiU, there's a lot of people out there with a broken WiiU (broken nand). The vast majority of them are not aware they can work around the issue with a simple SD card nowadays that you don't even need to solder into the console! That's a cool video idea I think...

[Tayte]

The Wii U was not a terrible system, yeah it maybe wasn’t the most popular. But imo it’s one of the most underrated console’s ever

[NEConforti]

Wii is one family of consoles that showed up when I finally had the opportunity/skills to dive into modding. It came out right at that sweet spot in high school when I really started tinkering and had a little base to work from. The WiiU came along and I continued on the same path. My kids still play them to this day and we have 7 Wiis and 2 Us.

I have all of my consoles from the last 25 years and beyond, but something about firing up the Wii just hits different.

I have one I've recently picked up and I hadn't really tinkered with them since eShop went down. Glad to see a simple path forward for us "holdouts" lmao!

[Adam-Mei]

I also suggest you backup your SD card just in case it gets old like mine did and corrupts and you cannot play games added by your own account. Even if you do backup the NAND it can mess up while reinstalling and not recognize the old SD card but for some reason recognize a fresh one.

[Tsuroerusu]

A note on doing a full NAND backup: Even people who do not plan on modding their Wii U should absolutely do a NAND backup because of the issues with NAND chips dying. With a NAND backup in hand, if your NAND dies, you can use Voultar's NAND aid kit to replace it with an SD card, and your Wii U will come back to life.

[chumba]

I love it for the fact that it can output digital or analog signal. I mainly use mine for Gamecube games on a CRT

[MegaManNeo]

Another reason to use Aroma is Pretendo which aims to bring back Online modes to Mario Kart 8, Splatoon 1 and other games, including Miiverse.
Other than that, thanks for pointing out how to sync my other controllers via Aroma, MVG.
Felt kinda stupid while trying to do so :, D

[gerardoexber]

Bought one used in 2023. Played many games and enjoyed my time with it. USB died and with it my games & saves. Will set it up soon to continue playing from a disc drive this time.

[andysledge]

Bought a Wii U just for Nintendont to play gamecube games with the hdmi, insane

[mannduro]

These reacuring updates on moded consoles incl. Emulators are the best of this channel. Would like to see an update on NVIDIA shield capabilities.

[Flyzoola]

Oh, I remember when I got my Wii U in 2019 and used your video as a "guide" to install Haxchi cause I thought "maybe I'll sell it as some point"


NOPE. I still play it to this day, I love that console. Thanks for everything MVG!

Edit: I dont need to do any of this stuff anymore right?

[retromod]

A failed lesson in marketing with the name of the console “why do I need to buy a Wii U when my kids have a Wii already?”. It’s actually a cool system with some solid games - many of which that were simply rereleased for the Switch and became hits.

[nathanddrews]

Aroma looks like the mod I've been looking for. Launching everything from the main menu front end is perfection.

[TravisStamper]

I have been modding the WiiU for years and it plays any nintendo game I have threw at it. Thanks for the video and the deep dive Dimitri.

[StaticVapour]

Getting WiiU to run homebrew or backups has for sure gotten easier over the years. Good video!