Fans who have purchased libraries of old games will not lose their downloaded game titles when they decide to upgrade to the new system, a decision in line with how Apple’s iTunes store operates regarding digital downloads of game apps. Moffitt said that there will be a bit of restructuring of how their login IDs/accounts work with the Wii U; he told us, “You will have an individual account based system. Each member of your family might have their own account.”

Each player will have saved gaming preferences, but it is unclear how Wii Virtual Console collections will be assigned to an account for ownership transfers on the Wii U eShop at this point. If this backwards compatibility continues through the next generation of systems, fans may never have to repurchase old games again. That may change if games are reintroduced in high definition (Wii, unlike its competitors, produced standard-definition video), but Nintendo has said nothing on that yet.