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WiiU

Nintendo Announces TVii is Coming to an End this August in North America

by Adam Abou-Nasr - July 24, 2015, 7:13 pm EDT
Total comments: 18 Source: Nintendo (via Miiverse)

The Wii U service never lived up to its potential, anyway.

The TVii service is no more.

Nintendo announced today via Miiverse that the Wii U’s forgettable TVii service will be discontinued in North America on August 11th, 2015 at 3:00 PM PST. The app has been sitting on North American Wii U systems since shortly after launch. The service was delayed in Europe for years and eventually cancelled.

TVii was marketed as a new way to experience television before the rise of Smart TVs and dedicated streaming boxes. Users could post to Miiverse or Twitter alongside the show’s synopsis, allowing them to comment on plot twists, sports plays, or awards shows in real time. A streamlined guide helped users view live shows or find programs on Nexflix, Hulu Plus, or Amazon Instant Video all in one place. TVii also had a built in IR remote for controlling televisions, sound systems, and set-top boxes. It’s unclear whether or not the remote functions will be discontinued.

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Talkback

rlse9July 24, 2015

The app was an interesting idea but not executed well, it was way to slow to bother with using the few times I tried it.


Having the TV remote function built into the Gamepad, on the other hand, was a great idea that I use regularly and I see no reason why they would change anything with it.

pokepal148Spencer Johnson, Contributing WriterJuly 24, 2015

If a piece of crappy, poorly made bloatware tv integration service is discontinued and nobody ever used it was the service really discontinued?

pokepal148Spencer Johnson, Contributing WriterJuly 24, 2015

If a piece of crappy, poorly made bloatware tv integration service is discontinued and nobody ever used it was the service really discontinued?

MythtendoJuly 25, 2015

It was a great idea and I wanted to use it, but could never get it to connect with my TV.

BiteThePillowJuly 25, 2015

I tried to use this app a few times and I could never figure out what exactly it was supposed to do. It seemed to not have any useful functions, or at least none that were clear to me.

broodwarsJuly 25, 2015

I'm just shocked that the most useless, unsupported feature of a console relatively no one bought is being shut down. I haven't felt loss like this since Sony shut down Near on the Vita.

ThePermJuly 25, 2015

They should just make a streaming video service. They have the platform to do it on. People are cord cutting, this feature is going to not get used because people would rather watch Netflix on their wii u than have cable.

It was really neat if you wanted to browse Netflix, Hulu, and Amazon at the same time, but I never had all three at once. I don't think it's very common for people to have them all and cable.

As long as the remote function still works, I'm good.

So will they be updating the menu to get rid of the Tvii Icon, or will it sit there forever like a link to a dead website?

ejamerJuly 25, 2015

I tried to get it to work. The idea seemed vaguely promising. But where we live it couldn't be configured to match our satellite settings, so offered absolutely no value.


Like lolmonade, also hoping that they finally remove that pointless icon from the Wii U menu screen after years of it being a waste of space.

BiteThePillowJuly 25, 2015

Quote from: ejamer

Like lolmonade, also hoping that they finally remove that pointless icon from the Wii U menu screen after years of it being a waste of space.

The logical next step is to replace it with Pokemon Channel HD  :D

pokepal148Spencer Johnson, Contributing WriterJuly 25, 2015

Do European Wii U owners have to deal with the tvii icon or did they remove it.

TOPHATANT123July 25, 2015

The icon has gone in Europe, where there was 6 is now 5.

ShyGuyJuly 26, 2015

Deader than Kinect.

necro909July 26, 2015

I was really excited for it at first. It appeared that there would be movies all the time and people could watch it together and comment together like some kind of Nico Douga. But then I tried it and I picked a movie and it was just a black screen. And no one else was watching. I still have no idea what the hell TVii is and don't really watch movies or TV outside of a very, VERY narrow range anyhow.

AVJuly 26, 2015

I used it a few times and wasn't too impressed.


Sadly the dual HDMI system that Xbox ONe used would have made this work better.


Having the TV options on the gamepad and the ability to watch tv on it, and play on the TV at the same time is something I would love, or even Netflix on the TV and a simple gamepad game on the bottom that would be cool too.


TVii was a decent idea, but it was too slow and didn't have killer features to make it worthwhile.


I wonder if the deletion of this will give me some extra harddrive space.

Mop it upJuly 29, 2015

I never used this and wasn't even sure what it was supposed to do.

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