Virtual Console

The Virtual Console is a service available on the Wii, the Nintendo 3DS, and the Wii U. It allows players to download games that were originally for older consoles, such as Nintendo's own NES, SNES, Nintendo 64 (Wii and Wii U), Game Boy Advance, Nintendo DS (Wii U), Game Boy, and Game Boy Color (Nintendo 3DS). Sega has provided the Wii and Nintendo 3DS Virtual Console with Sega Genesis/Mega Drive, Sega Master System, and Sega Game Gear games.

Wii Points
Wii Virtual Console games are bought with Wii Points via the Wii Shop Channel. Wii Points Cards, which were once sold at most game retailers, each came with 2,000 redeemable Points on them. However, in Japan, cards were worth either 1,000, 3,000, or 5,000 Wii Points. Wii Points can also be purchased directly through the Wii Shop Channel with a credit card in blocks of either 1,000, 2,000, 3,000, or 5,000 Points.

As of March 26, 2018, Wii Points are no longer redeemable on the Wii Shop Channel. However, leftover points can be used to purchase software until January 31, 2019.

eShop Credit
Nintendo 3DS and Wii U Virtual Console games are bought with eShop credits via the Nintendo eShop. Nintendo eShop cards are sold at most retailers with the following values; $10*, $20, $35, and $50. In Australia and New Zealand, there are $15, $30 and $60 cards.

*Note: $10 eShop cards are only available at Wal-Mart, GameStop, Best Buy, and Target in the United States only.

Wii
While this pricing is true for most games, a few select games have been priced differently. Imported games such as Super Mario RPG: Legend of the Seven Stars and Mario's Super Picross in Europe and Oceania, and Super Mario Bros.: The Lost Levels outside Japan cost 100 Wii Points more than usual.

In the United States, retailers once sold 2,000 points cards for $20 apiece, at a price of one cent per point.

Similarly, in Australia, retailers only sold 1,000 points cards for $20 apiece.

*Note: Games released on the Virtual Console Arcade are automatically set to 500 points. However, most Virtual Console Arcade games are priced higher than 500 points.

Wii U
*Note: Discounted price if originally purchased on the Wii Shop Channel via Wii Mode.

Controllers
Various controllers are needed used to play Virtual Console games.
 * Wii U GamePad - Can play all Virtual Console games in Wii U Mode. Only works in both Wii U and Wii Mode (only displays screen) on the Wii U console.
 * Wii U Pro Controller - Can also play all Virtual Console games in Wii U Mode. Only works in Wii U Mode for the Wii U console.
 * Wii Remote - When turned sideways, it can be used as an NES substitute. It is also compatible with Sega Genesis/Mega Drive and Master System games. Works in both Wii U and Wii as well as the Wii U via Wii Mode. Can be used for Wii U SNES and GBA games if is held while the game boots.
 * Classic Controller - Can play any game. It is made to fit the design of the SNES Controller. Works in both Wii U and Wii as well as the Wii U via Wii Mode.
 * Nintendo GameCube controller - Can also play any game, but it is best compatible with N64 games. It only works for the original Wii console.

Wii
Note: The Donkey Kong Country series has been delisted shortly before the Wii U's release (except in South Korea), likely due to Microsoft's desire to renegotiate licensing agreements with Nintendo before re-releasing it. Yoshi's Cookie for the NES had been delisted in October 2013 (except in South Korea).

Nintendo 3DS
Games on the Virtual Console of the Nintendo 3DS do not have 3D capabilities, except for 3D Classics. They are sold via Nintendo eShop.

The following Mario games have been released on the Virtual Console of the Nintendo 3DS:

a. Available for free to participants who purchase Mario Golf: World Tour from the Nintendo eShop from May 2, 2014 to May 29, 2014. b. Available only to participants who registered their Nintendo Network ID before January 13, 2014. It is currently unavailable to the general public. c. The European edition of the Nintendo Direct December 18, 2013 reveals a promotion for Nintendo 3DS users, as those who registered their Nintendo Network ID before the end of January 2014 will be eligible to receive a free download code of Super Mario Bros. Deluxe from the Nintendo eShop on February 13, 2014. d. Available only to participants who registered Super Smash Bros. for Nintendo 3DS and one of Pokémon Omega Ruby or Alpha Sapphire with Club Nintendo from November 21, 2014 to January 20, 2015. It is currently unavailable to the general public. e. Available only on New Nintendo 3DS systems.

Nintendo 3DS Ambassador Program
All of these games are available as free downloads for consumers who purchased a Nintendo 3DS, logged in to their Nintendo Network account, and then restarted the console, for the original $249.99 price prior to August 12, 2011, where the price dropped to $169.99. For those who purchased a 3DS but did not log in before August 12, 2011, you could talk to a Nintendo Service Counter that you bought a 3DS before August 11, 23:59 PDT, but you didn't have time to log in to your NN account. The service counter will then ask for the proof of purchase date and price. If successful, Nintendo will then register the Ambassador Program to your account. If not, though, Nintendo knows you're sneaky and know which price tags and receipts are real and fake (e.g. you made one yourself), and will not activate the AP. The NES titles were first available in Japan on August 31, 2011 for these ambassadors, and available worldwide on September 1, 2011. The Game Boy Advance games were released in Australia on December 15, 2011, and worldwide on December 16, 2011. The Legend of Zelda became available in the Japanese eShop on December 22, 2011, making it the first Ambassador game released to the public. Currently, all NES titles offered by the Ambassador Program are available worldwide on the eShop. Nintendo has announced that GBA games will remain exclusive to 3DS ambassadors. GBA games have been released on the Wii U instead, and there are currently no plans for 3DS Virtual releases.

Mario NES games

 * Donkey Kong Jr.
 * NES Open Tournament Golf
 * Super Mario Bros.
 * Wrecking Crew
 * Yoshi

Mario Game Boy Advance games

 * Mario Kart: Super Circuit
 * Mario vs. Donkey Kong
 * Wario Land 4
 * WarioWare, Inc.: Mega Microgame$!‎
 * Yoshi's Island: Super Mario Advance 3

Wii U
Games on the Virtual Console of the Wii U can be played on the Wii U GamePad and Wii U Pro Controller. As with the Nintendo 3DS, they are also sold via Nintendo eShop.

a. Available for free to participants who purchase Yoshi's Woolly World from the Nintendo eShop from June 25, 2015 (Oceania)/June 26, 2015 (Europe) to July 23, 2015. b. Available for free to participants who purchase Mario Tennis: Ultra Smash from the Nintendo eShop from November 20, 2015 (Europe)/November 21, 2015 (Oceania) to December 17, 2015. * In the celebration of the 30th anniversary of the Famicom, Virtual Console titles were on sale at a reduced price of 30 cents until July 12, 2013 (Yoshi) and August 13, 2013 (Donkey Kong).

Wii

 * Super Mario Bros.: The Lost Levels was only available in Europe and Australia from September 15, 2007 until October 1, 2007. It was then still available to freely re-download for those who purchased it while it was initially available. On August 22, 2008, it was made available again, this time without any time restrictions.
 * This is also the first time that the NES version was made available outside Japan, having been remade for the SNES elsewhere. Thus, its title screen reads "Super Mario Bros. 2", its Japanese name, and on the Wii Shop Channel and Wii U eShop it is considered a import game.
 * Super Mario RPG: Legend of the Seven Stars was regarded by Nintendo as the 250th game to be released on the Virtual Console in North America. Its European Virtual Console release was the first official release of that game in the region.
 * Timed demos of several Virtual Console games are included in Super Smash Bros. Brawl, all of which star the game's various fighters. The only default Mario title is Super Mario Bros.; Donkey Kong, Super Mario Bros. 2, and Super Mario World are also included, but they must first be unlocked.
 * For reasons unknown, the NES version of Yoshi's Cookie and the entire Donkey Kong Country trilogy were de-listed in all regions except South Korea. While the reason for the removal of Yoshi's Cookie is unknown, the removal of the Donkey Kong Country trilogy could be due to legal issues with Microsoft, the current owner of Rare, who developed the trilogy before being completely sold over to Microsoft in 2002, although technically Nintendo, the original publisher, owns these games. The games remain available to be re-downloaded by those who had purchased them while available. The DKC games were restored to the Wii Shop Channel when they were released for the Wii U VC.
 * Transfer Pak functions and online N64 Tournaments like the Mario Tennis Ring Tournament mode are not supported.
 * N64 & Neo-Geo games don't support suspend functionality.
 * N64 Controller Pak functionality is not supported.
 * N64 games do not support the Rumble Pak functionality, despite the GC controllers having rumble features.

Nintendo 3DS

 * Only NES titles support multiplayer due to the GB, GBC, and GBA (Ambassadors only) games being too complicated to recode the games to add wireless features and there being no link port for multiplayer. NES games that have simultaneous multiplayer utilize 3DS Download Play, and Game Gear games, as well as Pokémon Red, Blue and Yellow, use local play while NES games that only have alternating multiplayer are played on a single 3DS. To alternate players when playing NES games, simultaneously press and  to display a pair of controllers in the lower-right corner of the top screen; press  while they are displayed to switch control between players 1 and 2.
 * This feature can also be used when playing Game Boy titles to change the screen color from gray to the classic green.
 * While loading Game Boy, Game Boy Color, or (Ambassadors only) Game Boy Advance titles from the HOME Menu, by holding or  the game on the top screen will be shrunk to its original resolution.
 * Game Boy and Game Boy Color titles will also display virtual versions of their respective consoles surrounding the screen to give the illusion of playing on the actual console. GBA, DS, and DSiWare games just shrink the screen to the screen size from the original consoles.
 * Many games (excluding the aforementioned Pokémon games) have been given the ability to create one save file each. This can be disabled or enabled by simultaneously holding, and.
 * GBA Ambassador games do not rely on hardware emulation; instead, they rely on hardware simulation with the 3DS booting into the GBA's firmware to play the games natively, the same way the 3DS handles DS backwards compatibility. Due to this, GBA games do not support Virtual Console features like Save and Restore Points, sleep mode, and Home Menu Access.
 * This occurs because the 3DS is not powerful enough to emulate the GBA in the same way it does other Virtual Console games. (This is also why GBA games are not available for purchase on the 3DS eShop.) Through hacking, it is possible to load GBA games into a regular Virtual Console emulator, but performance is slow and the ability to do this was removed in a later update.

Wii U

 * The player can create save states and remap controller buttons. For GBA games, there are options to change scaling, enable pixel smoothing, and view scans of the original paper manual.
 * The Wii Remote can be used for SNES and GBA games if is held while the game loads.
 * The NES games have a bilinear filter applied while the N64 games have a filter applied that doubles their resolution.
 * N64 games support Rumble Pak functions, but won't support Transfer or Controller Pak functions.
 * GBA and DS titles can only be played in single player mode.

Changes
Although Nintendo has claimed they will keep all Virtual Console releases true to the originals, they have made changes to various games:

Wii

 * Super Mario RPG: Legend of the Seven Stars
 * The attacks Flame Wall and Static E! are both recolored to avoid the risk of seizures.
 * For the PAL Virtual Console release, the offensive word "bugger" (used when Croco says "You're a persistent bugger") is replaced with the word "pest".
 * Moleville has a notably darker color scheme.


 * Super Mario 64
 * During gameplay, the drop shadows located at the top and bottom of the screen have been removed and can only return if Mario loses all of his Health Points.
 * Chain Chomp's mouth is purple instead of red, possibly because the game in general is made a bit darker.
 * The player can't put a small Block between and on top of a larger Block.
 * Vanish Mario appears purely transparent instead of flickering in dithered colors for unknown reasons.
 * All lag and loading times have been removed, and the game is impossible to crash.
 * The sound is slightly quieter.


 * Mario Kart 64
 * When Lightning is used, the flash that appears during the use of that item has been adjusted to avoid the risk of seizures.
 * The Kalimari Desert course's train has its wheels recolored from red to black for unknown reasons.
 * In Koopa Troopa Beach, the waterfall at the end of the shortcut is recolored blue from the original gray.
 * The game timer is spaced slightly further apart. This is most notable between "00" and between the " sign and the number preceeding it.
 * Saving ghost data is impossible, due to the lack of Controller Pak functionality.


 * Mario Party 2
 * When selecting the amount of players in a game, all four options appear at once, regardless of how many controllers are plugged in. In the original, only the options equal to the amount of controllers plugged in are shown.


 * Mario Golf
 * The Transfer Pak feature to transfer characters from the GBC version (Sherry, Joe, Azalea, and Kid) is removed, as are the extra four square boxes used for transferred characters on the Character Select screen. Consequently, said characters cannot be played as.


 * Mario Tennis
 * The Ring Tournament mode in Special Games is removed and cannot be selected, since the service is no longer supported after the official website was replaced with its sequel Mario Power Tennis in 2004.
 * The ability to unlock characters and courts via the Transfer Pak (e.g. Alex, Nina, Harry, Kate, and each characters' personal courts, except for Donkey Kong's) is removed. They still exist in the game coding, but cannot be played as during normal gameplay.


 * Paper Mario
 * The brightness of the light from the Super Block has been adjusted to avoid the risk of seizures.
 * The walls in the temple in Dry Dry Desert appear more curved.
 * The Crystal King's clones are more transparent, making it easier to spot the real Crystal King.
 * Monstar has stars surrounding it.


 * Donkey Kong Country
 * The blinding flash that occurs when Squawks faces the screen in Torchlight Trouble was removed to greatly reduce the risk of seizures.


 * Donkey Kong Country 2: Diddy's Kong Quest
 * The blinding flash that occurs when Glimmer faces the screen in Glimmer's Galleon was removed to greatly reduce the risk of seizures.


 * Donkey Kong Country 3: Dixie Kong's Double Trouble!
 * The lightning flash that occurs when it strikes the ground in Lightning Lookout has been dimmed to greatly reduce the risk of seizures.

Nintendo 3DS

 * Nintendo Entertainment System, Game Boy and Game Boy Color games
 * NES games include restore points and download play but Game Boy and Game Boy Color games don't support multiplayer. However, Pokémon Red, Blue, and Yellow allow players to trade Pokémon via Wi-Fi in place of a game link cable. With the exception of the Pokémon games, only NES, Game Gear, and TurboGrafx16 games fully support 2-player options. All ten NES games from the ambassador program did not gain these features until they were respectively re-released for public purchase. Original Game Boy games also include two switchable color palettes; black and white and black and green, in which the latter is a nostalgic approach to original "brick" Game Boy players since the first Game Boy model has a green-tinted screen.


 * Super Mario Bros. and Super Mario Bros.: The Lost Levels
 * The color scheme is noticeably lighter than in the Wii and Wii U VC versions.


 * Super Mario Bros. 2
 * The ground, sky, and waterfalls have a darker color scheme than in the Wii and Wii U VC versions.


 * Super Mario Bros. 3
 * The game's pixels appear more filtered and the background border is less dim compared to the Wii and Wii U VC versions.


 * Super Mario Bros. Deluxe
 * The game's print and trade features have been disabled due to the lack of a Game Boy Printer accessory and infared port.
 * In the Fortune Teller, all references to multiplayer features were removed, and replaced with duplicates of other existing text strings.
 * In the album, the pictures that are normally unlocked via the use of link and infrared features are impossible to obtain without hacking.


 * Super Mario Land 2: 6 Golden Coins
 * The lightning strikes that occur at the entrance of Wario's castle are toned down to reduce the risk of seizures.
 * The pipe glitch that was possible to perform in the Game Boy version was fixed in the 3DS version.


 * Mario Golf and Mario Tennis
 * Characters that could be unlocked in the Nintendo 64 version are omitted due to the lack of Transfer Pak functionality in the Wii VC versions and visa-versa in the 3DS versions.


 * Donkey Kong Land 2
 * In Lava Lagoon, Glimmer's Galleon, and Clapper's Cavern, the flashing that occurs in certain situations is slowed down to half of its original rate to avoid the risk of seizures.


 * Wario Land: Super Mario Land 3
 * The level skip glitch that was possible to perform in the Game Boy version was fixed in the 3DS version.


 * Wario Land 3
 * Various cutscenes, such as the one where The Steep Canyon initially becomes accessible, have altered color palettes to reduce the risk of seizures.

Wii U

 * NES, SNES, N64, Game Boy Advance, and Nintendo DS games
 * All games include restore points, Wii U GamePad off-tv play, and Miiverse support. Unlike on the Wii VC, N64 games support Rumble Pak functions which are replicated by the GamePad rumbling when needed. GBA, N64, and DS games also include their original instruction booklets.
 * GBA and Nintendo DS games don't support multiplayer. Nintendo DS games also don't include GameCube/Wii connectivity. Only a few DS games, such as The Legend of Zelda: Phantom Hourglass, support sleep mode. N64 games will not support Transfer Pak functions.
 * All changes made to Wii VC versions of games were retained unless stated otherwise.


 * Game & Watch Gallery 4
 * For the Japanese Virtual Console release, this game has been fully translated into Japanese, with its title being Game Boy Gallery 4. This game was originally unreleased in Japan.


 * Super Mario Advance 4: Super Mario Bros. 3
 * The Virtual Console version has all 38 e-Reader levels built-in the game, including the ones that were previously only released in Japan, and they can be accessed from the Data Select screen. Originally, this required the use of the Nintendo e-Reader to scan Level Cards, which is incompatible with the Wii U. Also, the original game could only support up to 32 levels at a time. This is also the first time these levels are released in Europe and Oceania, as the Nintendo e-Reader was never released there.