As Nintendo's Wii U FAQ makes clear, "a Nintendo Network Account can only be used on the console where it was created." Thus, any games tied to that unique online ID will only work on the first system they're purchased and downloaded to. This is in essence the same setup that Nintendo used to protect downloaded Virtual Console and WiiWare games on the first Wii, a setup that not only utterly failed to stop piracy on the system but also caused headaches for many early Wii owners with faulty systems.

Tying downloaded games to a single system means there's no way for a user to access those games at a friend's house short of lugging the entire system along (yes, the Wii is a lot smaller and lighter than other contemporary systems, but still...). It also means a game downloaded to the Wii U in the living room won't be playable on a second system in the kids' room, even if the same password-protected Nintendo Network ID was used on both systems.

It also means that if your system breaks down, you can't just go buy a new one (or borrow one from a friend) and immediately recover your content using your account. Instead, you have to go through Nintendo's official repair process, waiting up to two weeks for the system to be returned just to maintain the system-locked license data—a caveat I learned about first hand recently. And in the extreme case your Wii U is stolen, it seems there's no way to recover your purchased games (Nintendo has refused numerous requests for comment on its DRM scheme). Sure, you can back up purchases to a USB hard drive, but thanks to this licensing scheme, those backups are no more portable than the actual bits stored on the Wii U's internal storage.

If you have tons of content — game save data, Mii characters, and downloaded software — on your old Wii, you’ll want to transfer them over to Wii U. The process is about as convoluted as can possibly be. You’ll actually need to alternate between your Wii and your Wii U, which means either hooking them both up to the TV or swapping cables. First you have to get an SD card. Then you have to put it in your Wii U to “prepare” it for transfer. (You’ll need an internet connection to do this so Nintendo can transfer the digital rights to the software.)

[B]esides being time-consuming, there’s also a big missing feature. If you had games already stored on an SD card and not on the Wii’s system memory, you have to move them back to the Wii or else you can’t transfer them. But if you have games stored on the SD card in the first place, that’s probably because you ran out of memory on your Wii (not hard, since it only has 512 megabytes in there). So you are screwed. The transfer process will move over all of the digital licenses, but to get those games onto your Wii U, you’ll have to individually download every single one again from the digital store, which will take forever.

I signed up for Nintendo Network, Nintendo’s first (!) ever attempt to create an account-based online service for its players. I clicked through the Terms of Service, skimming them. As you do. OK, I’m not going to post anything offensive, no problem. I enter my details into my profile and throw Game|Life’s URL and my Twitter handle in there so people know it’s me. Big mistake. Minutes after I posted my profile, I got a message saying that I had posted prohibited content and that Nintendo had blocked my profile pending a change. The hell? Turns out that you are strictly prohibited from posting anything on Miiverse that might allow someone to personally identify you. It didn’t specifically call out Twitter URLs, but I guess those must also be banned. Nintendo clearly doesn’t want any stories in the press about harassment (or worse) stemming from people meeting on Miiverse. So it is doing everything it can to make sure its members do not know who each other actually is.

European Wii U owners are reporting being unable to buy or watch trailers for mature-rated games in Nintendo's Wii U eShop. Eurogamer reports that they are unable to access the pages for ZombiU or Assassin's Creed 3 during daytime hours, even with no parental controls set. Instead, they're greeted with the message "You cannot view this content. The times during which this content can be viewed have been restricted."

Dear customer, we would like to let you know that Nintendo has always aimed to offer gameplay experiences suited to all age groups, observing carefully all the relevant regulations regarding content access that are present in the various European countries. We have thus decided to restrict the access to content which is unsuitable to minors (PEGI) to the 11 P.M. - 3 A.M. time window.

• 7,796,116: Electronic equipment for handheld vision based absolute pointing system
• 7,852,317: Handheld Device for Handheld Vision Based Absolute Pointing System
• 7,864,159; Handheld Vision Based Absolute Pointing System.

The rejection of [...] applications — assigned to Nintendo Co. Ltd. — based on the ’116 patent is proof that the Nintendo defendants knew or should have known of the objective risk that one or more of their products infringed at least one claim of at least the ’116 Patent.