The Top 10 Wii U Games You Should Have Played

In a couple of days, the Nintendo Wii U will become the console of the past, as the Nintendo Switch will become the current Nintendo console. The 4-year lifespan of the Wii U, especially in the light of the 6-year lifespan of Wii, seemed kind of short. At some times, the Wii U felt like an HD version of the Wii. At other times, the Wii U game pad felt like an iPad with buttons. Together, the Wii U felt like an all-around disappointment. In the beginning, it had so much expected potential. It was supposed to have the most up-to-date graphics. It was supposed to have multiple uses online. It was supposed to attract 3rd party developers to produce more games for it. Near the end of its life, it didn't seem to deliver on any of them. By the time Nintendo caught up with 1080p graphics, PlayStation and Xbox began developing 4K graphics. The online uses felt slightly better than the Wii, but still worlds behind PlayStation and Xbox. Instead of attracting more 3rd party developers to Nintendo, more 3rd party developers dropped out of Nintendo, leaving the Wii U with the same 3rd party developers as the Wii. In fact, by the Wii U's 4th birthday, it had only 39 1st party games and 118 3rd party games, for a total of 157 games, an all-time low for a Nintendo console. With so few games in light of other consoles, owners of a Wii U might feel like owning a Wii U was a waste. I sometimes felt like that myself. While I was quickly impressed by my Wii HD with an iPad with buttons controller, my Wii U console quickly became a virtual console, as I only played the throwback vintage Nintendo games on it. If I wanted to play a recent video game, I went back to my Xbox 360. Still, I found 10 games that made me appreciate the Wii U for what it was, for the Wii U displayed the game in a way that only Wii U could and the PlayStation, Wii and Xbox could not. Here, I present you to The Top 10 Wii U Games You Should Have Played if you owned a Wii U console. As these games get reduced for clearance to make room for Switch games, if you do not own them, I highly recommend you take the opportunity to by them, so you can feel you got the most use out of this console. And of course, to make it dramatic, I will go in ascending order.

10) Fatal Frame: Maiden of Black Water

The Fatal Frame series is one of the scariest franchises of the horror video game genre. What makes it so scary is that, as the main "weapon" is a camera, the game forces the player to stare at the scary thing. The player cannot look away. What a better way to add player emersion than to make the Wii U gamepad the camera! Now not only does the player have to look the scary thing, he needs to hold the Wii U gamepad in front of the scary thing, looking at it closer to his face. It's a shame this game only made it to North America as a digital download. It used the gamepad in a way that did not feel gimmicky, but in a way that added to the game and made it better. It's almost like they made the Wii U with Fatal Frame in mind.

9) Super Mario Maker

When I first heard the announcement of this game, I wasn't a fan of it. It really did feel like that the Super Mario Bros. game designers had ran out of ideas, and now left the designing into the hands of the fans. After all, there were emulators out there that you could download to your computer and make your own Super Mario levels. Look it up, if you don't believe. What you'll notice when you look it up is how hard these fan-made levels were. This did not change when Super Mario Maker came to the Wii U. The fans continued making these hard levels, bringing new and innovative ideas to the Super Mario Bros. games. What a better way to do that with the Wii U game pad. Even if you're not the creative designer type, this game is perfect for the player for the same reason: it offers the player the chance to play these difficult levels. One criticism that I do have for New Super Mario Bros. U (spoiler alert: it appears later in the list) is that the levels were too easy because they were the same old, same old. It almost felt like you were playing the same old Mario game, just with graphics updated for the Wii U. Super Mario Maker provides an endless list of challenging and difficult levels. In essence, Super Mario Maker feels like the endless Super Mario Bros. game. No wonder why Nintendo brought this game to the 3DS as well.

8) Wii Party U

This might be a choice that might make you scratch your head. There wasn't much in the game. In fact, the game offered so little, it was available as a free download for pre-ordering Mario Kart 8. Why put this game on the list? Pretty much, Wii Party U is everything that Mario Party 10 (spoiler alert: this game appears later on the list) was not, but should have been. Although it had various game boards, the game boards felt more like game boards than Mario Party 10 (in fact, I would say the game boards reminded me of Mario Party 8). Wii Party U had more use of mini-games than Mario Party 10. Wii Party 8 fully utilized the game pad in order to "roll the dice" (that is, select the number of spaces to use) than Mario Party 10. Wii Party U even had some games which only utilized the game pad, making players face each other, just like Switch intends to do. Overall, Wii Party U was more of a Mario Party game than Mario Party 10! If I were to invite friends over to play Wii U, I would play Wii Party U with them over Mario Party 10 any day.

7) Splatoon

Nintendo must have found itself between a rock and a hard place. On one hand, it wanted to stay as the family friend gaming system it had been known to be over the years. On the other hand, Nintendo really wanted the attention of the hardcore gaming young adults, but they loved their bloody, gory shooter games way too much. Nintendo found the perfect compromise in paintball. Take the shooting of the shooter games, make it less bloody and gory with paint, and you get Splatoon. It's the perfect compromise. Besides, what adult doesn't like paintball, anyway? Go figure that this compromise was also a brand new idea, and not simply remarketing an old franchise. Splatoon is also one of the games that follows through with the online multiplayer Nintendo promised with the Wii U. Personally, what I like best about this game is that if shooters aren't your thing, you can be the guy on your team painting the battlefield with a paintbrush or paint roller. Not a challenging single player mode until the final boss, but the multiplayer is loads of fun.

6) Zombi U

Overall, Nintendo did not follow through with its promise that the Wii U would have up-to-date graphics, focus on online and attract 3rd party developers and hardcore gamers alike. One of the few games on the system that did make the Wii U look like it fulfilled the promise was Zombi U.  Zombi U had all of it. Leave it up to Nintendo teaming up with Ubisoft, my personal favorite 3rd party developer, to create such a game. This game was meant for adults, and I mean beside the M rating the game received from the ESRB. The game does a good job with the first person shooter mechanic. It would be very familiar to any FPS player. The graphics make blasting zombies into smithereens as real as it can possibly get. The survivor mode challenges the best of the best hardcore players to put their skills to the ultimate test. Even if they chose not to play survivor mode, I really like that idea that you play as a new player ever time you die, and that new player has to chase after your old, zombie character. If survivor mode is still not enough a challenge for those hardcore gamers, they can take it to multiplayer and challenge each other of like ability. On top of all this, the game utilize the Wii U gamepad well, especially using it as inventory bag. Even though this game eventually went to other consoles, it plays best on the Wii U.

5) Nintendoland

You might be scratching your hard at this choice, too. After all, this game is virtually a demo game. Well, I believe there are good demo games and bad demo games. Nintendoland is a good demo game. This game allows you to see all the things the Wii U can do, not just with the game pad, but the Wiimotes as well. What makes this demo game even more impressive is that it uses the famous Nintendo franchises, like Super Mario Bros., Yoshi's World, Legend of Zelda, Metroid and Pikmin to demo the Wii U's capability. It's almost like Nintendo is showing the fanboy all the potential Wii U games that could come out for the console. This game provides a wide array of game genres, which can be played as single player, cooperative multiplayer and competitive multiplayer. For the hardcore game, he has high scores and medals he can chase after. No wonder this game become a Nintendo Select, beside the fact it was the first game packaged with the Wii U. If you're only going to have 1 game for the Wii U, this is the game to have.

4) New Super Mario Bros. U / New Super Luigi U

I'm pairing these 2 games together because New Super Luigi U was more an expansion pack to New Super Mario Bros. U than it was a sequel. You also might be scratching your head on this one, especially after I gave it many criticisms earlier. Yes, at some points, it felt too easy. Yes, at some points, it lacked originality, especially compared to New Super Mario Bros. Wii. But that small difference between the Wii version and the Wii U version made all the difference. See, after playing the Wii U version, I went back and played the Wii version, for I played the bare minimum of the Wii version, and now I wanted to complete the game in full like I did for the Wii U version. Let me tell you, I noticed differences right away, and I missed the improvements of the Wii U version. At first, I didn't think the graphics would matter for a game that originally flourished in the 8-bit world, yet when I went from the 1080p of the New Super Mario Bros. U to the 480p of the New Super Mario Bros. Wii, I wanted to go back to the 1080p of the New Super Mario Bros. U! I noticed a big difference of the flight mechanic between the two games. There's a difference between the straight vertical flight of propeller hat versus the lofty glide the flying squirrel suit (you'll notice the different directly when you unlock the propeller hat in the bonus land of New Super Mario Bros. U. The final Bowser battle is much more challenging in the Wii U game than the Wii game. In the Wii game, after you grab the ax to cut the bridge, all the rest becomes a platforming  race. The Wii U version has Mario (and Luigi and the Toads if you're playing with friends) fighting Bowser directly head on. As for the other similarities and so-called "lack of originality," that's called nostalgia. It's supposed to remind you of the Super Mario Bros. games of old. The flying squirrel suit reminded me of the Tanooki suit of Super Mario Bros. 3. Then comes New Super Luigi U. While that had even less originality, if you see it as an expansion pack and not a sequel (like I do), it provides even more challenges, like racing a clock with less time on it. If you're still with Nintendo because you will like Mario 22 years later, you'll want this game.

3) Mario Party 10

You've probably gone from scratching your head to banging your head at this point, or at least giving yourself a serious facepalm. Didn't I just criticize it easier? Yes, yes I did. In fact, I would declare this the worst Mario Party game of the 10 games that have come out on the consoles. But this isn't a list of the best Mario Party games. This is a list of the best Wii U games. I'm not looking at what this game isn't, but what this game is. I'm not sure if you realized this, but this is the first Mario Party game that has 5 players. It's in the form of "Bowser Party" where 4 players using Wiimotes try beat Bowser, played by a player using the Wii U gamepad, to the finish line before Bowser takes all their points. Bowser Party utilizes each controller well, taking advantage of the capabilities of the Wiimotes and Wii U gamepad alike. If you don't like Bowser Party, but you liked Mario Party 9, Mario Party 10 brought it back in the form of what they call "Mario Party." If you don't like either Mario Party 9 or the Bowser Party in Mario Party 10, there's "Amiibo Party." Amiibo Party has the feel of the Mario Party games of old. You use your amiibo of choice as a game piece, moving it around the board, collecting coins, so you can collect  star. Yes, you have to pay extra for an amiibo so you can play this mode, but I liked it, for the amiibo really felt like the game piece of a board game. Besides, this is the only Mario Party games that came out for the Wii U, so if you want to have a Mario Party on the Wii U, this is your game.

2) Super Smash Bros. Wii U

Over the years, this game has received minor updates, and with each minor update, this game only got better. Without a doubt, I personally feel like this is the best Super Smash Bros. game yet. Yes, I do miss a story mode, but not that much. Yes, I do miss the Ice Climbers as a playable character, but I don't miss Snake (he felt out of place to me on Brawl). What made this game so great is that they had the Super Smash Bros. fanboys in mind. Probably the biggest evidence of such is that they knew how much the fanboys loved playing with the GameCube controllers that they added a GameCube controller port, and then they made brand new GameCube controllers to go with it. Super Smash Bros. Wii U best utilizes the amiibos, seeing that this game came from the idea of Nintendo figurines coming to life to fight each other. It's fun customizing them and leveling them up, although it would have been more fun to fight as them, not just alongside them or against them. This game had the fanboys in mind as it kept adding characters and levels in the form of DLC. I would highly recommend purchasing all the DLC characters and stages, even if together it cost the same as the game. This is one of the few games that actually shows off what the Wii U can do in terms of online multiplayer. It's fun fighting against people all over the world, and it became even more fun when later updates would allow you to talk to them. I easily logged over 100 hours on this game, and you will too because it has so many ways to smash. This is the best fighting game on the Wii U. This game alone should make you want to own the Wii U.

1) Mario Kart 8

This game underwent 4 major updates, so major that the Mario Kart 8 you're playing is version 4.0. Every update improved an already great game. Without a doubt, this is the best Mario Kart 8 out there. This 1st party game represents everything the Wii U is and should have been. Mario Kart 8 utilizes the 1080p graphics to fullest. This game will romance your eyeballs in the elegance of its design. This game is fun to single player, but it's more fun to play multiplayer, especially online multiplayer. Nothing beats shelling your Japanese opponent to beat them to the finish line for 1st place. Every CC is at the perfect level of easy, medium and hard, allowing the player to naturally enhance his skills. Even the Mario Kart fanboy, who thought that got 150cc down, will be surprised at the 200cc, where they actually have to use their brakes! As if the original edition of this game wasn't good enough, the game added DLC races, characters and karts to add even more to fun to the game. This game also gives you another reason to buy amiibos by providing suits for your Mii to wear. To me, it is no surprise that this game is the best selling Wii U game (besides the pre-ordering deal and packing with future Wii U consoles). It is the best racing game for the Wii U and the Mario Kart game out there. This game alone is a good reason to own a Wii U.

Just like the consoles of the past, the old Nintendo console end and the new Nintendo console will begin with the same Legend of Zelda game. Perhaps if Breath of the Wild came out earlier, it would have made the list. But no surprise to me, a lot of game announced for the Nintendo Switch are sequels to the games mentioned on this list. It's because that, even though the Wii U might have been an overall flop, these are the games that made it look like a success. I hope the sequels will bring more success to Switch than the Wii U ever had.