Wii U Transfer Tool

Immediately following up on the previous video, we have the execution of the Wii U Transfer Tool.

This... really doesn't require any actual explanation beyond what the instructions and warnings grant you, and most people won't even really need to bother with them. The point is that you can go forward with it... but you can't go backwards... and then it goes on to list all the affected and unaffected channels and their data.

The transfer will only move forward with whatever is in your Wii's system memory, including save data and channels. That said, channels are pretty big, whereas save data is not... and while it'll be inconvenient (to say the least, especially given my earlier difficulty trying to just download ONE channel for the transfer), since Wii Shop Channel account data is transferred directly as well, I can just download those later.

On the other hand, save data, even across all the ridiculously many Wii games (including Shop Channel purchases) I've played over the years still don't fill up the Wii's fairly tiny flash memory reserves, so this works out almost perfectly. (I'll still have to set aside time to redownload Virtual Console and WiiWare titles later, though.)

Anyway, as is probably known to you by now, Wii U owner or not... the bulk of the transfer process is actually set against an interesting visual element: it's Pikmin! Dutifully dragging all the save files from the Wii to be ready for "launch" into the Wii U! Neat!

2:55 is where the laden Pikmin-laden animation begins, in case that's the only part you'd be interested in seeing... or maybe you wanted to gawk at what kinds of bizarre save data I even had for transfer, which is okay, I guess... if you're really that obsessive and junk. Personally, I kept on watching the Pikmin and couldn't be bothered to read all of it as it very briefly scrolled on by.

Afterwards, you get a very brief summary of what it did... which is pretty much exactly what it declared its intentions to be, although it does specifically enumerate the non-save data differently than I expected, indicating that My Pokémon Ranch was transferred normally... as the only actual channel that would be allowed to do so, and the only reason why it's not on my SD Card is because it's not allowed to be moved in that fashion to begin with, if I recall correctly. (It also mentions the DLC from Mega Man 9, so it's interesting to see how it got lumped in with the channels rather than in with the save data.)

I will confess not having actually paid particularly close attention, but I'm a little surprised that it didn't mention the Mario Kart Channel during any of this process... although the fact that WiiConnect24 has been discontinued and isn't supported by the Wii U ...although why SpotPass can't be somehow jury rigged into being a functional substitute is beyond my ability to explain, particularly without knowing all the super corporate secrets behind both of them. Oh well...

At any rate, you'll notice that the Mario Kart Channel is still present, but My Pokémon Ranch is now missing from the Wii Menu, indicating that the first half of the actual transfer is indeed complete.