Nintendo is Suspending Netflix Service to the Wii

I received a very unfortunate message on my Wii when trying to play an episode of Star Trek the Next Generation using Netflix — Nintendo will suspend all video streaming services on Wii – including the Netflix Channel – after January 30, 2019. I don’t know how many people out there still use the Wii for Netflix but I have two Wii Consoles that do use Netflix… so there are at least TWO units out there…

Oh, I know, it only supports 480p… the console has been around for over 10 years, blah, blah, blah… I just find it irritating. It is a fine piece of hardware that satisfies my needs quite nicely, it’s still fun to play games on it but now I will have to source a solution fairly soon. I would have preferred to kick that can down the road another year or three.

The other option is that I would have to somehow become smart and create a solution. There is still a lot of good information out there for developing on the Wii. Chances are, I won’t have the time or energy to really understand what to do and I will just cave and put something else in its place.

As much as I like Nintendo and the shear creativity in gaming they have provided over the years, it further underscores the tragedy of closed source, closed ecosystems to consumers. I realize, it is not a viable economic proposition to continue to support the Wii but they COULD turn it over into an open source project to keep alive for generations to come.

Further Reading

https://devices.netflix.com/en/game-consoles/wii/

http://www.codemii.com/2008/08/10/tutorial-1-setting-up-the-environment/