Nintendo optical discs
|
|
| Media type | Read-only optical disc |
|---|---|
| Encoding | Digital |
| Capacity |
GameCube: 1.5 GB Wii: 4.7 GB / 8.54 GB Wii U: 25 GB |
| Read mechanism | Laser |
| Developed by |
Nintendo Panasonic |
| Dimensions |
GCN: 8 cm (3.1 in) Wii/Wii U:12 cm (4.7 in) |
| Usage |
GameCube Wii Wii U |
Nintendo optical discs are the optical disc format used to distribute video games released by Nintendo. This includes the GameCube Game Disc, Wii Optical Disc, and Wii U Optical Disc. The physical size of a GameCube Game Disc is that of a miniDVD, and the Wii and Wii U Optical Discs are the size of a DVD. GameCube discs can be used with the original version of the Wii and Wii Optical Discs can be used in the Wii U for backward compatibility. A burst cutting area is located at the inner ring of the disc surface.
The GameCube Game Disc (DOL-006) is the game medium for the GameCube, created by Matsushita (Panasonic), and later extended for use on the Wii through backward compatibility. The GameCube Game Disc is a 1.5 GB, 8 cm miniDVD based technology which reads at a constant angular velocity (CAV). It was chosen by Nintendo to prevent copyright infringement of its games, to reduce cost by avoiding licensing fees to the DVD Forum and to reduce loading times. This also prevents the consoles from being used as general DVD players.
One downside to the GameCube Game Disc is the relatively small amount of storage they provide. As a result, some games with large amounts of data needed to be placed across two discs, such as Resident Evil 4 and Enter the Matrix. Multi-platform games that fit on PlayStation 2 and Xbox DVD discs occasionally saw the removal of certain features in order to fit on GameCube Game Discs. Full-motion video scenes and audio are more compressed to fit on a single disc, reducing their quality. Prior to the GameCube, Nintendo consoles traditionally used cartridge-based media.
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