Wii U Basic Only Has 3GB of Space for Game Downloadeds

By Catherine Cai
published

The amount of usable storage space available on the Wii U is hardly sufficient.

The Wii U internal storage options aren't exactly its strong points: the Basic and Deluxe editions only hold 8 GB and 32 GB respectively.

Unfortunately, these figures don't account for the preloaded data that ships with the system. After formatting, the Basic Edition actually only has 7.2 GB of data available for use, with 4.2 GB used up by preloaded software, leaving only 3 GB available for downloadable games and save files. According to Ars Technica, 3 GB isn't enough for an install of NintendoLand, which is 3.2 GB.

In the case of the Deluxe Edition, formatting leaves only 29 GB available for use. After accounting for the 4.2 GB used up, the Deluxe Edition actually only has 25 GB of storage available for use, which is still a paltry amount for AAA game installs.

Thankfully, the Wii U allows for SD cards and USB hard drives of up to 2 TB to be used to expand storage. Unless you'll be satisfied with playing only smaller games or repeatedly deleting games off of your Wii U's hard drive, it looks like this storage expansion option is a must.

Contact Us for News Tips, Corrections and Feedback

Catherine Cai
48 Comments Comment from the forums
  • nameon
    actually thats better, now you dont have to worry that im paying HUGE cash for less storage, you got your own storage B*TCH!!!!

    on another note, up until this point, when i look at the exclusive line-up, im not impressed, and also i question how much multiplatform this will be, how big of a contender is it against next gen xbox or PS....
    Reply
  • jn77
    They put all their money in controllers with LCD's in them to shoot the console in the foot..... nice touch.
    Reply
  • jn77
    nameonactually thats better, now you dont have to worry that im paying HUGE cash for less storage, you got your own storage B*TCH!!!!on another note, up until this point, when i look at the exclusive line-up, im not impressed, and also i question how much multiplatform this will be, how big of a contender is it against next gen xbox or PS....
    My PS3 has a 1TB 10,000 RPM drive in it...... this tech is about 10 years old.
    Reply
  • notuptome2004
    jn77They put all their money in controllers with LCD's in them to shoot the console in the foot..... nice touch.


    Controller with a touch screen LCD meaning 1 controller with this also while it may have little storage it is flasah storage and that is not 100% cheap these days still so it is fine and the fact ya can plug in any usb 2.0 or some 3.0 HDDs you want and use it is great so why yell and scream when there is a solution right there
    Reply
  • vitreoushumor
    jn77My PS3 has a 1TB 10,000 RPM drive in it...... this tech is about 10 years old.
    What "tech" is ten years old? The Velociraptor 1TB came out 7 months ago.
    Reply
  • jn77
    Who puts >30gb of space on the console unit these days..... the smallest PS3 was 40gb and that has been discontinued for how long? Xbox has always had more space than 40gb (deluxe edition). LCD's are not cheap, realtively speaking, so they put allot of money in a controller, but not the processor.

    I guess the whole Wii line is about the controller with a sup par processing unit.
    Reply
  • lpedraja2002
    Nintendo will still be the most profitable in the competition, AGAIN, due to this. It is obvious that they've become Greed itself.
    Reply
  • Ravyu
    jn77Who puts >30gb of space on the console unit these days..... the smallest PS3 was 40gb and that has been discontinued for how long? Xbox has always had more space than 40gb (deluxe edition). LCD's are not cheap, realtively speaking, so they put allot of money in a controller, but not the processor.I guess the whole Wii line is about the controller with a sup par processing unit.Ya heard of the 4GB Xbox??
    Reply
  • Ravyu
    lpedraja2002Nintendo will still be the most profitable in the competition, AGAIN, due to this. It is obvious that they've become Greed itself.As a company that has only gaming products to depend on, it would be stupid for them to loose $3bn Sony lost with their PS3 in the beggining. Also, the thing is selling at a loss, haven't you heard?
    Reply
  • hoofhearted
    They should just let you plug in SD for storage and that's it. Go totally bring-your-own-storage. But at least this is a step in the right direction. Makes more business sense too. Storage hardware is cheap and there is more profit to be made in digital content sales, so why put a price barrier for storage that would limit the consumers ability to purchase more digital content?

    Apple is stupid in this area in that they actually put several barriers (four I can think of) that could potentially stop a consumer from purchasing more 30% pure profittable content from their ecossystem. (1) Their market price points are based on hardware storage (16,32,64GB) and the markups way outprice the diffs for equivalent SD on newegg (2) No SD slot = Oh well, my internal memory is full, can't buy any more digital content (3) No replaceable battery, when device won't hold a charge, it might be time to switch to Android (4) forced obselescence, let consumers update old devices = more sales in the app store.
    Reply