Hardware Playing games from USB HD possible?

[gene0915]

Been searching for 48 hours now and haven't seen this question asked or answered. (Or maybe I suck at searching?) But, with the day 1 system update to the Wii U, is it possible to copy games like Mario Bros. U to an external USB HD and PLAY it from that USB HD?

 

[DiscostewSM]

Doubtful, because of the implications of "install game to USB and sell physical game". Only way you can have those games on your USB drive is if you bought them digitally.

 

[gene0915]

Doubtful, because of the implications of "install game to USB and sell physical game". Only way you can have those games on your USB drive is if you bought them digitally.

So I can only store games I >download< to an external USB drive and not copy over store bought games to an external USB drive??!?!?! That freaking blows. They should do what MS does.... allow you to copy store bought games to your hard drive and when you want to play the game, it spins up the disc drive to verify you still own it then reads everything from the hard drive. Since I don't plan on buying any digital games from Nintendo (prefer physical media).... I see no point in getting the deluxe model. I'll save my money and go with the basic one. (Plus, I can't stand how the deluxe model is a finger print MAGNET with that black, glossy covering. It looks like crap.) Makes sense now why Iwata was wearing white gloves when he did that video of him opening up the deluxe model.......didn't want to show off their poor decision of using a glossy black color.

So you have a Wii U and can verify this 100%? If not, can anyone with a Wii U set the record straight on this? Which brings me to another point, why in the f*ck is Nintendo being so secretive with the specific details on the Wii U's capabilities? (Like being able to copy store bought games to an attached USB drive and whether or not you can play them from that USB drive.) I didn't know Nintendo was operating under super top secret Majestic level security with a console they want the public to buy. Get the freaking details out to the public!!!!!!

 

[Hells Malice]

you're upset because you can't copy games from your game disk, and then run them with the game disk still in the WiiU...but from the hard drive? (meaning you'd still need to insert the disk any time you wanted to play the game)

..really?

....really?

The Deluxe console is for people who plan to digitally purchase shit...of course you have no use for the damn thing if you don't plan to. Get a standard.

 

[Devin]

you're upset because you can't copy games from your game disk, and then run them with the game disk still in the WiiU...but from the hard drive? (meaning you'd still need to insert the disk any time you wanted to play the game)

..really?

....really?

The Deluxe console is for people who plan to digitally purchase shit...of course you have no use for the damn thing if you don't plan to. Get a standard.

Well as I agree that isn't really much to complain about. On the 360 reading the games from the HDD greatly increases the loading times. Not sure if it would apply here, as the connection is USB rather than a special connection like the 360's.

 

[Hells Malice]

Well as I agree that isn't really much to complain about. On the 360 reading the games from the HDD greatly increases the loading times. Not sure if it would apply here, as the connection is USB rather than a special connection like the 360's.

I know I know, I love the feature on my 360. But all the same, I could live without it. He's treating it like the god of all features. It's minorly convenient...and I kind of doubt he has load times in mind when he says all this.

 

[gene0915]

you're upset because you can't copy games from your game disk, and then run them with the game disk still in the WiiU...but from the hard drive? (meaning you'd still need to insert the disk any time you wanted to play the game)

..really?

....really?

The Deluxe console is for people who plan to digitally purchase shit...of course you have no use for the damn thing if you don't plan to. Get a standard.

Yes?! Yes?! If you can't answer nicely, go fuck yourself. Yes, I would LOVE to copy my store bought games from optical disc to an attached USB hard drive and play them from there because I have these things called CHILDREN. The less times they have to handle any type of optical disc the better. Loading from USB is faster than loading from an optical drive and to me, this is a god-like feature. Leave it to Nintendo to half-ass everything they touch.

 

[Devin]

Yes?! Yes?! If you can't answer nicely, go fuck yourself. Yes, I would LOVE to copy my store bought games from optical disc to an attached USB hard drive and play them from there because I have these things called CHILDREN. The less times they have to handle any type of optical disc the better. Loading from USB is faster than loading from an optical drive and to me, this is a god-like feature. Leave it to Nintendo to half-ass everything they touch.

It's not possible. It would allow people to copy the game over to the USB HDD, and then sell the disc to someone else. Who could do the same thing. If you have children I recommend either buying games using the eShop, or putting a parental lock on the WiiU so that your children can figure out that in order to play a game they will need you to input a password. So every time they want to switch games they will have to ask you anyway. Making it so only you would handle the discs.

Or simply telling them not to touch the games works just as well. I have heard some loading times on the WiiU were pretty terrible, but nothing too bad.

 

[DiscostewSM]

gene0915,

Yes, I do have a WiiU (using it right now to reply), but even if I didn't, a little research would show why disc copying isn't needed. For one, the games are going digital, so you have that option already. Another thing is that the average speed of USB 2.0 is only slightly higher than the WiiU's own disc drive (which runs at ~25MB/s). MS had the install approach because the disc drive was much slower than the speed of the HDD, and yet, they still require that you have the disc on-hand for verification. Nintendo doesn't need their method with what they have available.

If discs are too bothersome, then go digital. Simple as that.

 

[Deltaechoe]

Too many TL;DR posts here so I'll give the answer.

No, you cannot copy from an optical disk to a hard drive and play them

I hope that was concise enough

 

[gene0915]

It's not possible. It would allow people to copy the game over to the USB HDD, and then sell the disc to someone else. Who could do the same thing. If you have children I recommend either buying games using the eShop, or putting a parental lock on the WiiU so that your children can figure out that in order to play a game they will need you to input a password. So every time they want to switch games they will have to ask you anyway. Making it so only you would handle the discs.

Or simply telling them not to touch the games works just as well. I have heard some loading times on the WiiU were pretty terrible, but nothing too bad.

How the Xbox does it doesn't allow people to install the game to USB then sell the game. Every time you launch the game from your hard drive it asks for the physical disc to verify you still own it. I'm sure Nintendo could do the same. People with basic models will run into a wall with DLC/game patches eating away from the limited internal storage before Deluxe users but eventually, we'll all be in the same boat no matter which Wii U you bought. If the eshop games were cheaper than the physical game discs, I'd probably go that route but they're the same stupid price and you can't sell electronic versions of games after they've been played out. Never understood why digitally delivered games were the same price as physical games bought in a store but that's another topic for another day.

I'll explore the parental lock thing but going on past history, it seems my kids hunt me down to swap discs every 5 minutes because they're bored and want a new game.

Can't wait for Wiiflow to hit the Wii U scene.

 

[DeadlyFoez]

Another benefit to be able to officially install your games to a USB HDD is that it saves on wearing down your laser. IIRC, with the 360 you still have to have the game disc inserted for the game to run off of the hard drive, and hey do that in that way just to make sure that you don't just load it on your drive and then sell the game.

 

[Devin]

How the Xbox does it doesn't allow people to install the game to USB then sell the game. Every time you launch the game from your hard drive it asks for the physical disc to verify you still own it. I'm sure Nintendo could do the same. People with basic models will run into a wall with DLC/game patches eating away from the limited internal storage before Deluxe users but eventually, we'll all be in the same boat no matter which Wii U you bought. If the eshop games were cheaper than the physical game discs, I'd probably go that route but they're the same stupid price and you can't sell electronic versions of games after they've been played out. Never understood why digitally delivered games were the same price as physical games bought in a store but that's another topic for another day.

I'll explore the parental lock thing but going on past history, it seems my kids hunt me down to swap discs every 5 minutes because they're bored and want a new game.

Can't wait for Wiiflow to hit the Wii U scene.

Is the main issue here the game loading time, or that your kids aren't to be trusted handling disc media?

The Xbox 360 checks initially that the disc is in the disc drive, and after that it just reads it off the HDD. But if you were to per say, open up the Xbox and then start the process of playing the game. You can remove the disc from the 360 after if verifies it and it will still be running. This doesn't apply for the newer games that have random checks for the disc of course, but a friend of mine has tested this with Halo: Reach. Starts it up in one console, takes the disc out, and then puts it in another. (The process needs to be restarted if you dashboard, or turn off your Xbox.)

Maybe game installs will be implemented in the future, but for right now it isn't possible.

 

[Cyan]

I understand their concern about selling the physical disc once it's stored on the HDD
but I like having my collection stored on USB; for ease of use : boot, select a game from the list.

I could buy the games from eShop, but my internet speed is very bad, even more if the WiiU doesn't have a "background download" thread, like PS3 has.
If you need to keep your WiiU open to the progress bar for 20 hours (for 5GB), it's very bad
Playing a game while another is downloading would be great

 

[Shuji1987]

AFAIK WiiU can update games while you play other games. So it will most likely support background downloading too.

 

[Cyan]

Ah, that's a good news then
I've read that you were stuck at the download screen for firmware update, so I thought games were like that too. (unless it was added in v2.0.0)

 

[Pong20302000]

if you want to run games digitally you buy them from e-shop
if you want a physical copy you have a disk

you cant have both for the cost of 1

 

[Issac]

How the Xbox does it doesn't allow people to install the game to USB then sell the game. Every time you launch the game from your hard drive it asks for the physical disc to verify you still own it. I'm sure Nintendo could do the same.
I'll explore the parental lock thing but going on past history, it seems my kids hunt me down to swap discs every 5 minutes because they're bored and want a new game.

I can't help but think you are trolling, or just a hater.
You don't want your kids to handle the discs? So you want to install on HDD? But then nintendo could do it so that the wiiU checks for the disc before launching just like the god almighty xbox 360 does... then they'd have to handle discs anyway!
I don't see your problem! To me it seems like you want to copy the discs over to the HDD, and sell the games, to get more games. The speed of the disc reader is much fasyer than the x360 so that reason is not a biggie.
Like DeadlyFoez says, wearing of the laser would be one good reason to do it like the xbox does it... but thats all I could think of.