> What is mind-boggling to me is that it includes an actual, physical, hardware Gameboy Advance CPU in it for when it's playing Gameboy Advanced games
Sony did similar things.
The playstation 2 needed a IO chip so Sony picked the PS1 CPU. Then pass execution to it when playing a PS1 game.
And if I remember correctly, in the first revisions of the playstation 3 they included a ps2 CPU and GPU. I don't think they served a purpose when not running ps2 games though. They later remove them in favour of emulation to presumable save costs.
The Wii U isn't just a faster Wii. It specifically contains 2 GPUs, the Wii U GPU and the Wii GPU. CPU is bigger and better but same architecture.
The Wii however was almost just a faster GameCube. CPU literally just clocked higher and a bit of a better GPU. Because the idea was for it to be super cheap to produce.
The Wii extended the life of Gamecube games nicely, with a Wii component cable (which are still available cheaply) you get good quality output on modern TVs. It also has the Gamecube controller ports, so your original controllers work.
The Wii can emulate N64 games as well, a few made it to the Virtual Console, and there are 3rd party emulators you can install via the Homebrew channel. The GC controller is not bad for playing N64 games.
It's such a small console that i still have it hooked up under under my TV next to the Switch.
> It's such a small console that i still have it hooked up under under my TV next to the Switch.
Same here kinda. I've done similar with a WiiU. The WiiU is backwards compatible with the Wii, it literally boots into Wii firmware! Meaning with a little homebrew it can be modified to load Gamecube games and run them without the need for emulation. Nintendont even supports a variety of controllers to play gamecube games including the WiiU gamecube controller adapter.
I dump my Wii and gamecube games on my actual Wii and can load them up in the virtual Wii on the and WiiU.
3 generations running (borderline) natively on the one console.
Sony did similar things.
The playstation 2 needed a IO chip so Sony picked the PS1 CPU. Then pass execution to it when playing a PS1 game.
And if I remember correctly, in the first revisions of the playstation 3 they included a ps2 CPU and GPU. I don't think they served a purpose when not running ps2 games though. They later remove them in favour of emulation to presumable save costs.