The Wii and DS were the first Nintendo consoles to offer online play through the Nintendo Wi-Fi Connection. The service wasn’t exactly the best and it was more frustrating than anything what with players having to enter separate friend codes for each game. If you managed to get past all that, you might have found that titles like Mario Kart Wii actually offered a pretty good online experience. Now it’s all coming to an end.
Nintendo announced today that it’s shutting down Nintendo Wi-Fi Connection services on both the Wii and DS. In other words, the online portions of every Wii and DS game will be going offline in May. Online play won’t be the only thing affected as games that offered downloadable content, like the Professor Layton series, will also be going offline.
It’s explicitly noted that services like the Wii Shop Channel and the Nintendo DSi shop will remain online past May. After all, shutting down the virtual console on the Wii would anger quite a few people as the Wii U’s virtual console doesn’t have nearly as many titles on it yet. It goes without saying, but the Wii U and 3DS online services will remain unaffected as well.
Here’s a full list of all the first-party Nintendo titles that will be going offline in May:
Nintendo DS
100 Classic Books
Animal Crossing: Wild World
Advance Wars: Days of Ruin
Clubhouse Games
Custom Robo Arena
Diddy Kong Racing DS
Dragon Quest IX: Sentinels of the Starry Skies
Dragon Quest Monsters: Joker 2
Fire Emblem: Shadow Dragon
Fossil Fighters: Champions
Legend of Zelda: Phantom Hourglass
Mario Kart DS
Mario vs. Donkey Kong 2: March of the Minis
Mario vs. Donkey Kong: Mini-Land Mayhem
Metroid Prime Hunters
Personal Trainer: Walking
Picross 3D
Picross DS
Planet Puzzle League
Pokémon Black Version
Pokémon Black Version 2
Pokémon Diamond Version
Pokémon HeartGold Version
Pokémon Mystery Dungeon: Explorers of Darkness
Pokémon Mystery Dungeon: Explorers of Sky
Pokémon Mystery Dungeon: Explorers of Time
Pokémon Pearl Version
Pokémon Platinum Version
Pokémon Ranger: Guardian Signs
Pokémon Ranger: Shadows of Almia
Pokémon SoulSilver Version
Pokémon White Version
Pokémon White Version 2
Professor Layton and the Curious Village
Professor Layton and the Diabolical Box
Professor Layton and the Last Specter
Professor Layton and the Unwound Future
Star Fox Command
Style Savvy
Tenchu: Dark Secret
Tetris DS
WarioWare DIY
Nintendo DSiWare
Mario vs. Donkey Kong: Minis March Again!
Metal Torrent
Number Battle
Wii
Animal Crossing: City Life
Battalion Wars 2
Endless Ocean
Endless Ocean 2: Adventures of the Deep
Excitebots: Trick Racing
Fortune Street
Mario Kart Wii
Mario Sports Mix
Mario Strikers Charged
Pokémon Battle Revolution
Samurai Warriors 3
Sin & Punishment: Star Successor
Super Smash Brothers Brawl
Wii Music
WiiWare
Dr. Mario Online RX
Excitebike: World Rally
LONPOS
Maboshi’s Arcade
My Pokémon Ranch
ThruSpace
WarioWare DIY
All of the above games will go dark on May 20. That gives players a little under two months to get in a last few games before it’s gone forever. If it’s anything like the shut down of the original Xbox Live, we might just hear legends of a few brave souls who continued playing Super Smash Bros. Brawl online long after the shut down date. Well, that is Nintendo Wi-Fi Connection’s spotty service doesn’t kick them off first.
Image via Wikimedia Commons
