The Nintendo Wii has been met with overwhelming reviews of success from much of the general public, and while many diehard gamers remain cautiously optimistic about the gaming console, the system continues to sell at record pace. However, without a large quantity of new titles to hang its hat on at this point, Wii enthusiasts wonder if the console will run out of steam. While that is a concern, there is one driving force not often discussed that will drive the Wii to newer heights, and that is the Virtual Console.

The Virtual Console is part of the Wii Shop Channel that allows gamers to download classic games from the Nintendo 64, Super Nintendo, NES, TurboGrafx 16, and Sega Genesis consoles. Games range from 500 to 1000 Wii Points, with $1 equaling 100 points.

So far to date, 4.7 million Virtual Console titles have been downloaded, a rate that factors out to over 1,000 downloaded games every hour since the Wii was launched on November 19. While there has been overall success with the Virtual Console, a few titles have been considerably more popular than others. Nintendo is reporting its top five most downloaded games to be:

1) Super Mario Bros. (NES)
2) Super Mario 64 (N64)
3) Mario Kart 64 (N64)
4) Super Mario World (SNES)
5) The Legend of Zelda (NES)

This coming Tuesday, Nintendo will release its 100th title to the Virtual Console library, with Zelda II – The Adventure of Link, the fourth Zelda title to hit the Virtual console. Most recently The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time was released on Februrary 26 of the Nintendo 64 was added, joining The Legend of Zelda: A Link to the Past (SNES) and the aforementioned Legend of Zelda on NES.


Thus far Mario and Link have a stranglehold at the top of the download charts, but other popular titles such as F-Zero, Star Fox 64, Donkey Kong Country are also popular on the Virtual Console. For a complete list of all Virtual Console titles, go to the appropriate region
(North America | Europe | Australia & New Zealand | Japan)

Nintendo reported that roughly 40 percent of all Wii consoles are now connected to the internet, despite not a single game playing over the internet yet. Mario Strikers Charged is confirmed to be the first to offer this, releasing July 30 in the United States, already having been released in Europe this past week to strong reviews. Also using the internet channel will be Madden NFL 08, set for release August 14.

While Nintendo still has much growing to do to capture a long term audience for the Wii, early results have been positive. The Virtual Console has allowed long time gamers the chance to relive classic games and has given new gamers a cheap library of games to download that are simple and fun to play. There are still a lot of holes to fill in with the library, but a steady supply of Virtual Console titles hits the Wii Shop Channel each week.



If you are a Virtual Console or Wii fan, see some of the other content listed below for indepth looks at some of the top games to date.

Related: Top Virtual Console Games of 2006 | 2006 Game of the Year Awards (Nintendo)