Wii U lacks DVD, Blu-ray playback support
June 15, 2011 / 08:18 AM EDT / (@salromano)

Nintendo’s upcoming high-definition platform will not support DVD or Blu-ray playback. Speaking during an E3 Analyst Q&A Session, Nintendo president and CEO Satoru Iwata said that “it didn’t warrant the cost” to add the functionality to Wii U.

“Wii U does not have DVD or Blu-ray playback capabilities,” said Iwata.

“The reason for that is that we feel that enough people already have devices that are capable of playing DVDs and Blu-ray, such that it didn’t warrant the cost involved to build that functionality into the Wii U console because of the patents related to those technologies.”

Wii U launches in 2012.

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  • http://Flickr.com/mdemolish mdemolish

    :)

  • legendarydynasty1992

    I can understand no blu-ray but know dvd-support? O_O This is 2011 for gods sakes. The PS3 was great with dvd/bku-ray support because it means that i didn’t have to go out and buy another darn player for other formats. These news that keep coming out are not making the wii u look any better besides being more powerful than both ps3 and 360. Kinda make since now why nintendo didn’t talk alot of the hardware and specs at e3, they would have look even more bad.

  • rockman29

    That’s interesting…

    I think I like everything about Wii U so far, but lacking BD seems off.

  • http://blogeadorsolar.blogspot.com Palitococo

    Another Nintendo console that i wont gonna have, the bad news on the wii u just overshadow the good ones…so far.

  • TruTrini4LYFE

    So does that mean we gonna have 2-3 disc games

  • BizarreJelly

    I saw on another site all the fans were commenting “doesn’t matter, who even watches blu-rays/dvds on theirs consoles?”
    Uh, pretty much everyone who has them? Fans can be so retarded at times it’s pretty scary.

    I thought blu-ray playback would be the perfect oppertunity to take advantage of that gimmick controller watching back and forth. But no, that would be too interesting an idea.

  • http://www.youtube.com/tezchi TezChi

    My thoughts on this are quite a mixed affair. Firstly, Nintendo’s systems have generally not had DVD playback in the past; focusing on being a gaming system and not a multimedia hub. That said, many would expect such an addition with the Wii U, seeing as the system is different in both image and marketting than previous offerings (for example, a more XBOX Live esque online service).

    Speaking personally, the idea of DVD playback did not really cross my mind until now. I beleive a console should focus primarily on it’s core purpose, which in this case is obviously games. Yes, DVD playback is a nice and surely inexpensive adittion; which makes the stament of cost-cutting seem rather odd. Furthermore as stated by another commenter, the ability to watch a DVD on the controller is a good idea for those who may be ‘sharing’ a TV (as seen on the original advertisement).

    That said, I do not beleive this to be a major issue. The original Wii did not feature DVD playback, and it acheived nothing short of immense success. Personally, I have never watched a DVD on a console since the early days of PS2, but I understand that some may do. Again I think the idea of cost-cutting is a moot point here; surely adding DVD playback would not increase costs by anything noticeable. it is not though, a major selling point, and I remain very interested in the console and it’s potential.

  • Arcanenix

    I have a blu ray player, them using enhance optical disc will be a great new idea, they will be able to cut cost of consoles and have more memory than regular DvD disc.

  • camaro300zx

    Go Nintendo!!! A game console should only be “A Game Console”. If I want to watch a DVD/Blu Ray I have other machines to do the dirty work.

  • Sal Romano

    You’d figure if a console can play DVD game discs, it’d be able to play DVD movie discs. I thought that was pretty much a standard.

    No matter to me, though. I’ve got a PS3 and 360 for all my movies. I’m on Netflix most of the time, anyhow.

    • zerolegacy0

      That would be true, except Nintendo doesn’t use DVD game discs…

      They are using a proprietary disc format for the Wii U. Which helps them combat piracy and cut down costs on the console. Since they will be using their own encrypted discs they don’t have to pay to license the DVD format, which also makes it harder for pirates to crack them. It’s the same reason why the Wii was so cheap and it also couldn’t play DVDs.

      • Sal Romano

        You’ve educated me, zerolegacy. I had no idea they used their own format!

        Then again, I just recently bought a Wii half a year ago or so.

        • zerolegacy0

          Yeah I was also surprised when I found that out! lol
          BTW their new discs will have 25 GB of space which is the same as a single layer Blu-ray. I believe Sony uses dual layer Blu-ray which is 50 GB. Xbox 360 is way behind on disc tech, their DVD 9s can only hold 9 GB which is embarrassing these days. Thats why FF XIII was on so many discs.

  • DarthXehanort

    … Fail.

  • Zero

    I’m not surprised at all. zerolegacy made a great comment above, how they already did this with the Wii.

    I never imagined BD being a possibility, same reason Microsoft won’t go that route, they don’t want to pay Sony.

    It makes sense from a business point of view.

    I’m guessing they are totally banking on stream based formats on the wii u. Which hopefully means they intend to really focus on the online aspect of the console, and ensure it is top notch. Which is something they need to do, and probably more important at this point than adding dvd/bd support.

    Sony and Microsoft have a huge jump on them with XBL and PSN.

    Edit: Stream based for all video/movie watching.

  • AdamBoy64

    Not great news. But hardly surprising either.

    It’ll probably save them the equivalent of a couple of dollars per console – so many millions of dollars.

  • incredibilistic

    After giving it a bit more thought it’s not too surprising that Nintendo went this direction. It’s obvious they have no chance of competing with MS and Sony when it comes to being a media hub so why even bother trying.

    And with Netflix and Hulu being so popular there’s a good chance that no one will notice or even care. Remember when Apple dropped the floppy drive and went with CD-R only?