Topic: More Nintendo/Digital Distribution stupidity

[UncleBob]

Well, as most of you know, I'm well on record for disliking Nintendo's policies and methods regarding their Digital Distribution methods, but this is amazing...

Also, as most of you know, my original Wii died and was replaced by Nintendo - and all of my data on my Wii was lost.

So, back when all the crap when down, Nintendo was "kind" enough to transfer my Wii Shop account from my original Wii to my replacement Wii.  While this did transfer my Wii Points, download history and my ability to re-download every title, this did *not* transfer the ability to actually play the games I had already downloaded.  Any games I had saved on my SD card (which was all of them) could not be played - they had to be re-downloaded first.

Well, I've accepted this, all this time - and as I've wanted to go back and play the random title, I've just went in and re-downloaded them one-on-one.  So, this is how it works:

If the game is already saved on the SD card, I cannot re-download it directly to the SD card (duh), only to the system itself.  Then, I can launch it from the SD card or from the system.  Then, I've got the game on the Wii's system memory and the SD card - so, at some point, I have to clean out the fridge and delete the games from the system's memory.

Today, I had free time while watching some 60's Batman and I decided to go in and re-download all my games, so they'd be available.  It took quite a bit of time, but I did it - re-downloading every title that I purchased before my Wii died (as I had no idea which titles I had re-downloaded and the only other option would be to try to launch each and every title, one by one).

So, I went in, re-downloaded everything (occasionally having to go into Data Management to delete some titles in order to have room for the rest of them).  Once everything was downloaded, I spot-checked a few titles on my SD card to make sure the ones I re-downloaded would run - everything I tried worked perfectly.

So, one last trip in to Data Management to delete all the games from the system.  Then, back to my SD card to actually try to play one....

"This channel cannot be launched on this Wii Console."

This was one of the exact games I tested - that worked.

So, apparently, the games I had already downloaded onto my SD card can only be played if I also have them downloaded onto my system - and I can't copy the SD versions back onto my system either.

So, now, I have to go into data management, delete the individual titles, then go back into the Wii Shop and re-download them again-again.

Physical media - all the way.

[BlackNMild2k1]

So you need to delete everything and then re-downlaod everything to the Wii and transfer it from the Wii over to the SD card?

that sounds like a hassle. I still haven't re-downladed most of my stuff since my transfer and it's only 6 or so games. I can't imagine attempting it on the scale that you probably are.

How many DD games do you own BTW?

[UncleBob]

So you need to delete everything and then re-downlaod everything to the Wii and transfer it from the Wii over to the SD card?

Delete all the pre-crash games from the SD card, then re-download all of them directly to the SD card.

How many DD games do you own BTW?

Pre-Crash - 29.

[Shaymin]

I'm trying to come up with the correct word to describe how stupid this is, and my thesaurus is failing me.

[Ian Sane]

I'm trying to come up with the correct word to describe how stupid this is, and my thesaurus is failing me.

I think the best word to describe it would be... Nintendo.

[NWR_insanolord]

I'm pretty sure Nintendo specifically designed it to work that way as an anti-piracy measure. It's not enough that your Wii is licensed to play the games, they have to have been downloaded from that Wii.

[TJ Spyke]

I think Nintendo even said that, the games are tied to your system. That means the games on your SD card were tied to your old Wii, it would be like a friend bringing their SD card over and trying to play it on your system. Is it the best system? Maybe not, the Xbox 360 is similar (at least if you are not connected to Xbox Live).

[Chozo Ghost]

I like to be able to resell or give away my old games after I'm done with them, and that's something you can't do with downloaded content. I would always opt for physical media unless there was absolutely no other option, or if there was a very huge price difference.

[UncleBob]

I guess I was just completely confused as to how it all worked.  I was under the belief system that when you downloaded a VC/WW title, you downloaded the game itself and a "ticket" that authorized your system to play that game.  Thus, even if you popped in an SD card with games downloaded from another system, so long as you had downloaded the game on your system once (and received the authorization ticket), you could play them.  I see this is not the case.

But none of this explains why I can download the game onto my system memory, then launch the title from the SD card.

[Chozo Ghost]

Your Golden Ticket to the Nintendo Chocolate factory has been REVOKED!

[stevey]

Does deleting the old channel from the SD card and re-downloading it to the SD card work?

I was under the belief system that when you downloaded a VC/WW title, you downloaded the game itself and a "ticket" that authorized your system to play that game. 

You wouldn't have been able to download the channel if you didn't already have a ticket on the wii's flash or weren't buying it. The wii only checks to see if the ticket exist to download or copy it to the system; it doesn't create a new one or deletes the old one.

But none of this explains why I can download the game onto my system memory, then launch the title from the SD card.

Nintendo first checks if the game is in the flash first and loads that if it's found. Otherwise, its check if it's valid to copy, copies it, and launches it. Some thing happen with old versions of the homebrew channel.

Physical media - all the way.

QFTT

[Mop it up]

You should consider yourself lucky that Nintendo was even able to transfer over your Shop Channel account. When my friend called about getting her system repaired, which had corrupted internal memory, they said there was a possibility that they wouldn't be able to restore the Shop Channel account, among other more obvious things stored on the system memory like game saves and Miis. She ended up deciding it wasn't worth the trouble and bought a new system.

[BlackNMild2k1]

Did she have her shop connected to her My Nintendo account?

[Mop it up]

No, she never bothered with MyNintendo, and this was before Club Nintendo existed.