Will an Australian Wii work in the UK and with UK games?

December 5, 2006 4:20 PM

Hi, I am working in Australia for the next month, before going home to the UK, and then most likely moving out to Australia again in a few months for good. I would like to buy a Wii and get going on Zelda, but am struggling to find out if it will work back in the UK and with UK games. So far I know that: 1) Australia runs on similar voltage to UK, so no issues there 2) Australia and the UK are both PAL, so no issues there No-one over here seems to know anything about this - are the two countries in different 'Wii regions' (they are different for DVDs). Thanks Chris
posted by csg77 to technology (8 comments total)

Under Nintendo's system, all PAL territories are the same region.
posted by cillit bang at 4:38 PM on December 5, 2006

Also from what I understand, the games aren't matched to any region either. So a game will work on a PAL and NTSC Wii.
posted by bigmusic at 4:47 PM on December 5, 2006

Hold on, I'm wrong apparently.
posted by bigmusic at 4:50 PM on December 5, 2006

Wii games are indeed matched to regions. The real question will be, not if it will work, but if you will even be able to find one when you are there. They are in scarce supply, and will continue so until 2007.
posted by benjh at 5:23 PM on December 5, 2006

The Wii goes on sale in Australia in about, oh, twelve hours. I was told this past weekend that the only people who are guaranteed to get one are those who pre-ordered before Monday. So if you haven't done that... you may be out of luck anyway.
posted by web-goddess at 5:34 PM on December 5, 2006

The Kmart I went to 2 weeks ago was not taking pre-orders. If that is the case for all Kmarts you should be able to go to one early tomorrow and pick up a Wii.
posted by sien at 6:15 PM on December 5, 2006

The developer I talked to (he worked on Excite Bike) told me that the wii itself is region coded, but that first party titles will work in all regions. Third party publishers are free to use region coding as they like.

I haven't tested this with any first party titles, but given that a bunch of developers are pretty much guaranteed to be obnoxious I would not buy an out-of-region wii.
posted by aubilenon at 7:41 PM on December 5, 2006

Picked it up at EBGames in Richmond, Melbourne last night - they were selling them there with spare stock! It's a lot of fun - thanks guys!
posted by csg77 at 3:48 PM on December 6, 2006