This has literally come from nowhere, but it’s now possible to play Nintendo WiiU games on your PC using a new WiiU emulator that has been released.
The emulator, named ‘Cemu‘, is available to download now. It’s far from perfect, but according to the developers of the emulator, it’s very possible to run commercial games, albeit slowly.
For the time being there’s no gamepad support and you’ll have to use a keyboard for controls, but even still – wow. Here are some quick facts about the WiiU emulator.
- Can run encrypted Wii U images (WUD) and RPX/RPL files
- Internal resolution is 1920×1080 (if supported by game)
- For controller input see here.
- Contains basically no optimizations. Expect slow framerates and long load times.
- Windows x64 only (other platforms may be supported later)
- Requires OpenGL 3.3
- Tested on NVIDIA: Runs fine on most recent driver
- Tested on Intel: Garbled output but runs if OpenGL version is supported
- Untested on AMD
It should also be noted that audio is dead at the moment but the developers plan on adding more features every couple of weeks.
Emulation is a bit of a gray area: on one hand, it’s great for playing older games on a modern machine with all sorts of tweaks to enhance the experience. On the other hand, emulation tends to go hand in hand with piracy, something we at The Games Cabin do not condone in any form.
So if you plan on using the WiiU emulator, we recommend using your legally acquired retail discs to do so.
Here’s a video of the emulator running. Impressive, no?
