With the Switch being as big of a hit as it is, you wouldn’t expect Nintendo to pay as much attention to its less successful predecessor. But, true to form, Nintendo surprised everyone by releasing an update for the Wii U — bringing the system to version 5.5.2.
While Nintendo themselves claim that the update is simply for “stability purposes”, under the hood there appears to be a more meaningful reason for the update — the end of Miiverse.
This may well be a thing of the past soon.
Dataminers digging through the update have found a few interesting things pointing to Nintendo’s intentions with this patch. First of all, the new update blocks the most popular method with which users could hack their Wii U. Modders are hard at work trying to find a workaround — but for now, hackers are just not updating at all.
Most importantly, though, the 5.5.2 Wii U update includes the following text:
“The Miiverse service has ended. Miiverse and any software features that make use of Miiverse are now unavailable.”
Your days are numbered, Miiverse drawing of Yoshi.
If this turns out to be legitimate, it’s a turnaround for Nintendo, — who, back when Miiverse was new, claimed that they wanted Miiverse to become a social media giant not unlike Facebook or Twitter. Years later, with Miiverse not coming to the much more successful Switch and this new message dataminers have uncovered, it seems Nintendo is abandoning that dream.
Could Nintendo try something similar to Miiverse on the Switch? Or is the Miiverse dream truly dead? We’ll just have to wait and see. In the meantime, keep posted to Gameskinny for more news on Nintendo updates and the future of Miiverse.
