Wii
Developer: Nintendo Publisher: Nintendo Released in JP: December 2, 2006 Released in US: November 19, 2006 Released in EU: December 6, 2006 This game has unused graphics. This game has unused text. This game has regional differences. This game has revisional differences. This game has a prerelease article

The Wii is Nintendo's second disc-based home console, and the first to have fairly in-depth online capabilities, plus a sophisticated updatable operating system. The Wii shares much of its base hardware with the GameCube, and thus most models are backward-compatible with GameCube discs and memory cards.

To do: The console allegedly had some early plans for the Virtual Console. Maybe there's more hidden things in the Virtual Console files?

Disc Channel Banner Files

To do: There also exists a reflection of the DVD Disc in the diskBann.ash file, this should also be uploaded. Also get an image of the DVD Disc showing on the Disc Channel if possible. The brlyt layout can be viewed with WiiLayoutEditor.

The system menu contains a "DVD" banner for the Disc Channel, which would presumably be displayed when a DVD was inserted. This, along with spotted functions in the code (specifically syscalls 50 and 51, which control DVD video-related functions), suggests Nintendo planned to include DVD playback for the Wii.

The Wii's hardware is capable of DVD playback, but it was scrapped likely because they had to pay a small fee with every console shipped for licensing issues (a similar situation occurred with the original Xbox, which required an add-on for DVD Video playback due to Microsoft accidentally omitting the DVD logo on its console).

The ability to play DVDs on the Wii can be "unlocked" through Wii homebrew software, but this does not work on some newer Wii consoles due to the drive chip being changed.

In diskBann.ash, the brlyt files show that the DVD Disc is actually still in the Disc Channel's banner, but invisible and also to the left of the Wii Disc but is slightly off-screen. The same is also true for the reflection image of the DVD Disc, and a Shade for the DVD also exists, but is incorrectly named "DVDSahde" and is still invisible.

It is possible to get this image to show up, but you will need to edit the .brlyt file manually since Wii Layout Editor cannot save .brlyt edits correctly.

These images remain in all known and datamined versions of the System Menu, including Korean 3.5 and the vWii menu. The Wii Mini menu has not been dumped in a decrypted form, and as such it is unknown if it remains in it.

If all images are set to Visible, the DVD icon and reflection will appear in the Disc Channel in the positions mentioned earlier, but the DVD icon only performs the default animation for when no disc is inserted and doesn't seem to have any other animation assigned to it, as the DVD and reflection icons do not spin when a disc is being read, and do not stop and fade out when a disc can't be read. Interestingly, the reflection image for the DVD icon doesn't perform the default animation.

Two SD Card Slots

Two SDIO devices and references to 2 SD card slots are present in the Wii's IOS. While there is a second SDIO device in the Wii used for other functionality, there is pre-release evidence that the Wii was intended to have 2 SD card slots; http://www.justhomeelectronics.com/revolution.php "2 Front-loading SD memory card slots.", and this string in IOS: "...SDIO SLOT 1: Cannot init!!!...." (slots counting starting with 0) in addition to the length of the pre-release Wii SD card flap. This relates to the below mention of being able to manage data on the Wii that is gigabytes in size.

Unused Text

Wii Menu 1.0 has some unused text, shown below.

Watch DVD

This would probably be shown if you were going to watch a DVD on your Wii (before the idea was scrapped).

Reading the disc...

The Disc Channel does not display this text when reading a disc, although it may be a leftover from the Nintendo GameCube. In later versions of the Wii Menu, the locations of these strings still exist but are blank.

Channel Time Remaining: 

Less than a minute

These strings would have been used if a Channel has a time limit, and would display on the Channel's banner, but is unused since it never got implemented.

The period of use for this 

Channel has ended.

Even if the time limit option was implemented, the system uses the limitOver.ash file and doesn't use the text string.
These strings link in with the unused time limit option for Wii Channels.

Please connect a Nunchuk to the Wii Remote.

Originally, games could have had a flag for controller requirements set; The Wii SDK includes a package for banner mastering; in its release notes, a note dated September 2006 mentions the removal of this flag, which was present in the game's banner.

Please connect a Classic Controller to the Wii Remote.

While the Classic Controller isn't required to be connected in order to use the Wii Menu, it can stil be used as an optional means as a way of using the Wii Menu. It is possible that originally games could have a flag read by the Wii Menu to determine their controller requirements, however this was never implemented. The Wii SDK includes a package for banner mastering; in its release notes, a note dated September 2006 mentions the removal of this flag, which was present in the game's banner.

What's a Wii Number?

What's a nickname?

What's an e-mail address?

These strings aren't used and probably because people actually do know what a Wii Number, a nickname, and an e-mail address is.

GB

MB

KB

The Wii does not use byte sizes to determine space on the System Memory or the SD Card, and instead refers to 'Blocks'. GB is particularly notable, as the Wii's NAND is 512MB in size, and non-savefile data cannot normally be transferred between an SD card and a Wii or directly launched (the SD Card Menu copies to NAND); as such, this indicates that at one point in development the Wii had the ability to manage and directly launch files 1+GB in size, which means one would originally be able to have full Wii games or possibly GameCube games on an SD card. This matches up with pre-release material hinting at the possibility to download Wii and GameCube games onto an SD card (http://www.ign.com/articles/2005/09/12/igncubes-nintendo-revolution-faq?page=2, ""We announced the ability to download and play the best NES games, S-NES games, N64 games, in addition to Revolution games and GameCube games,"). This relates to the above presence of 2 SD card slots in the Wii.

Nintendo's Internet-based services

have not yet launched. Please check

back at a later date.

This was never used, even in Wii Menu 1.0, but the text seems to suggest that the Wii may not have launched with the Address Book or WiiConnect24 until Wii Menu 2.0.
Interestingly, this string still exists in Wii Menu 4.3.

Dear Tommy,



I have gone out to buy groceries.

Your ice cream is in the fridge.



Mom

This letter is from Grandma.



This is my neighbor's cat.

Isn't it cute?



Love, Grandma

Grandma



See you at Christmas!

These are some of the messages that were used to demonstrate the uses of the Wii Message Board at the Wii Channels conference on September 14, 2006.

Grandma

Dad's Cell

Michelle

These contacts were used to demonstrate the uses of the Wii Address Book.

Animal Crossing



-Notice-



The Flea Market is open for business tomorrow!

Visit other folks' houses and pick up gently used items for dirt cheap!

It seems that Animal Crossing: City Folk would have sent messages regarding events happening in the game to your Wii Message Board. However, it uses an in-game Bulletin Board instead for whatever reason.

Remote Control Functionality

This needs some investigation. Discuss ideas and findings on the talk page. Specifically: See if it's possible to get the HOME Menu to display on TV no Tomo Channel G Guide for Wii in case these images display on the HOME Menu. Also check the brlyt files, we might find where these images were supposed to be used, where they are located and if they're visible or not.

Within exBtn.ash are multiple files indicating that, at some point, the Wii Remote had functionality to act as a TV Remote, this may have also been from when DVD functionality was planned but was scrapped.

This feature would later be implemented in Japanese-only TV no Tomo Channel G Guide for Wii, and later on the Wii U's GamePad.

In Wii Menu 1.0-3.0, you can find a file called tvrc_DB.arc which has .bin files which probably were used to control the TV. TV no Tomo Channel G Guide for Wii also has this file.

In addition, in Wii Menu 1.0, the Wii Settings HTML files have an empty TV_Remote folder.

	Volume Control
	Power On/Off Change Input

rimocon_sousa.tpl shows the controls of said functionality.

rimocon_btn.tpl shows a sphere-like picture.

rimocon_btn_min.tpl shows a "TV" button.

Unused Icons

In board.ash, there is an image called Nigaoe.tpl ("nigaoe" translates to "portrait") that contains a small picture of Mario. This icon was also used in early screenshots and video of Mario Kart: Double Dash!!

Wii Menu 1.0 has a file called tanuki.arc, which inside it has a picture called okane.tpl ("okane" translates to "money") which has a picture of Tom Nook from Animal Crossing.

Early	Final

myLetterS.tpl contains an unused picture of a memo for the Wii Message Board, while myLetterS_a.tpl contains the final picture of a memo.

myLetterS_Game_a.tpl contains an unused Animal Crossing graphic used for memos regarding the game which was shown at the September 14, 2006 Wii Channels conference.

Early	Final

In letter.ash there are 2 Mii icon pictures: myNigaoePos.tpl, an early Mii icon used to select Miis on the Wii Message Board, and th_mii_icon_a.tpl, the final Mii icon with the same use above.

Unused Font

In Wii Menu v1.0, matDbg24.brf seems to contain an unused font.

Error Messages

Some early Wii executables have a variant on the standard error message, which is also present in sample disc error headers in the SDK. The "Startup Disc" placeholder System Menu has an even earlier message that mentions the Revolution.

Startup Disc

To do: Update this section if a Startup Disc rip ever surfaces. A NAND dump (mirror) of one of these early consoles exists and contains a few more things not yet documented here.

Wrong Disc	Insert Startup Disc	Checking Disc	Error

The first roughly 300,000 Wii units to be manufactured included an incomplete System Menu. Rather than re-flash all of these units before shipping, Nintendo included a "startup disc" that was required to be inserted to update the system's firmware on first-run. Most of these units were shipped to retailers for use in demo kiosks. These units would display the above screen instructing the user to insert the Startup Disc.

Early Wii retail boxes included a reference to the "Startup Disc" in the package contents, however, only a few actually incomplete units shipped to end consumers. Nintendo asked that users affected ship their units back to Nintendo for replacement.

The Startup Disc System Menu also checks if a Title ID of a Wii Disc is "RAAE" and if it is any other Title ID, then the disc is rejected. In any other version of the System Menu, if a Disc ID has "RAAE" then the disc is rejected. The Startup Disc Menu also accepts discs with Title IDs starting with a number, allowing it to natively run auto-boot discs such as the Wii Backup Disc and Movie-Ch Install Disc.

A error sound only present in the Startup Disc System Menu exists and does play, but is not in any other System Menu.
It is located at WSD/ERR/ with the filename "MSG".

Time Limits and Usage Periods for Channels

License Expired	Period of Use Ended	Channel Time Remaining

To do: This can be reactivated by modifying a game, see JMC47's article on Leoetlino's discovery.

In limitover.ash, there are some unused graphics indicating that you can't use a Channel after a certain period of time. This was most likely intended for demos. Each title for the Wii has an option for a time limit, but Nintendo never used this on the Wii. Despite this, this was still left in the Home Menu data from before the idea was scrapped. This feature would later find its way to both the 3DS and Wii U, which do have demos with a maximum play limit, but not the Switch. In the Wii Shop JavaScript files, there are references to title categories including subscriptions, rentals, and demos; this is most likely the intended use of this feature.

Wii Factory Tools

To do: Add more pictures of the different screens. And also see if this can be dumped.

When Wii's had their NANDs programmed in the factory, Nintendo would have used discs and tools to install boot2, and important system menu files. However, one of these tools was discovered by fluffy. These tools would be imported onto the NAND, and would then be deleted after they were no longer needed. However, one of these Wiis still had a factory tool on the NAND. The disc itself is known as "0002". What is known about it is that it can import files from an SD Card and then write it to the NAND. This application reads from a file on the SD card known as "all.ini", containing a list of DOL files launched from the SD card. Further investigation is required and being conducted.

Version Differences

System Menu 2.0	System Menu 3.0	System Menu 4.0

The following are differences between the 3 versions.

• System Menu 2.0 doesn't feature the clock which was added in 3.0 and onward.


• The Disc Channel icon in 2.0 has the Wii logo appear every few seconds. In 3.0, it was changed to have the Disc spin. The Wii logo also never appears.


• The Wii Menu text still appears in 3.0 and onward but is then faded out to show the clock.


• The slope in the bottom UI meant for the clock was made deeper to fit the clock. The gradient was also made more noticeable. Both of these changes are present in 3.0 and on.


• System Menu 4.0 has the option to access the SD card from the main menu.

Regional Differences

US	Europe

The warning symbol was yellow in Europe and white in US. The URL to Nintendo's health and safety webpage was blue in Europe and white in US.

To do: See if this applies to the European version as well.

US	Japan

In the home menus of each officially released game, the text showing each player and their number differs.