Take a very, very close look at the round-edged Wii U proprietary discs

Engadget: There's something immediately striking about Nintendo's Wii U proprietary disc format that's hard to notice in photos -- it's got rounded edges, both outside and in. It feels different than any other disc we've handled before; Tim swears he's seen a round-edged disc in the wild, but we've never seen such a thing ourselves. It's as if the folks at Nintendo took sandpaper to every edge of every disc, making them all the more friendly to the touch. It's a little detail, but it's a nice one.

[Y_5150]

Talk about attention to detail!

[FamilyGuy]

I've held many round-edged disc before, I thought nothing of it. Didn't know this was special :/

[OhMyGandhi]

blockbuster used to print their own shiny labels over their game discs, and often, the label would fold over the edges...

[ALLWRONG]

Nintendo has always done a pretty good job at that. Probably comes from being in the business for so long.

[wishingW3L]

do they have the coating that makes them scratch resistant like with the blu-ray discs?

[Snookies12]

Let's hope so! Blu-ray discs are amazing in that aspect.

[jc48573]

you see this is what i really hate. It's like Nintendo expects us to guess or something if it's scratch resistant or not. Just tell us already.

[karlowma]

Would that really change how you handle them? Take care of your shit. :P

[PS-ADDICT]

Alot of my PS2 DVDs sre Cracking From the Middle cause i Have To Click them into place and it puts alot of stress on that area, thinking about Buying A PS3 with backwards compatibility. My Launch 60 lazted 2 years then mynephews disconnected it while i was playing and it YLOD on me .I was soo pissed

[FamilyGuy]

lol jc, that just sounds hilarious. I'm not sure if you meant to be funny or not though. It's like "Geez nintendo, let us know every single detail there is about it!"

Also, don't they all have some form of scratch resistance? Blu ray disc have a much stronger/thicker coating cuz of the sensitivity or something like that.

[Moncole]

Do they need scratch resistant? If you took care of your stuff and kept it away from kids there is no reason for a disk to get scratched.

[hellvaguy]

Kids wont be kept away from Nintendo products. Obviously you don't have kids and have been on a drinking bender for most of your adulthood if you think you could keep kids in your home away from Nintendo crack.

[jmc8888]

There were things like the xbox 360 scratch disk problem where the system scratched discs.

Ruined a bunch of my games, and of course no one would honor the warranty, not even if you bought an extended one! So don't buy extended warranties for your games folks.

Don't think the Wii U will have that problem, only the Sega Saturn and Xbox 360 have had that problem that I'm aware of (and both happened to me).

So it would be nice, but I'm not sweating it. Though usually that would make the disc look different as it would have a layer of something over it, and with the PS2 it was black. Don't really see it, so I wouldn't expect it.

[SilentNegotiator]

Have you ever actually owned a DVD or CD?

They practically scratch from being put in the tray. You can treat them like the King's royal disc and it still gets little scratches that lead to bigger scratches over time.

I take them out, put them in the tray, and take them out and put them in the case when I'm done. Do they still manage to get scratched up? Absolutely.

[f789790]

Funny. I managed to never scratch my discs as a child.

My brother on the other hand pulled on a disc in a case that required you to push down on the center. It exploded.

[QuebecSuperstar]

Well apparently, they have.

http://www.gamefaqs.com/boa...

[MxRBrobaFett]

Did I miss a point in time where discs were cutting people to death?

[Dovahkiin]

The disc cutting deaths of '72, it was horrific.

[jmc8888]

Or the disco demolition night at Comiskey park.

[from the beach]

This is to stop people slicing their wrists when they discover there's no achievements system

[dredgewalker]

You see gamers are becoming a violent breed, so in order minimize the casualty rate of gamer victims Nintendo made the edges of the discs round so it won't be used as weapons of murder......

[hazelamy]

can't really see much difference myself, maybe the feel of the rounded edges is more noticeable, but that's not something that you can show in a picture.

[Somebody]

A physical DRM method perhaps?

[PygmelionHunter]

Lol @ the comments on the article

"Does Apple also have a patent for this kind of rounded edges?"

BTW more than being attention to detail, this seems like a nice addition to hold back piracy a little longer, though pirates will still figure a way out of it.

[Nevers0ft]

Finally!

It's about time the reign of terror of DVD's and Blurays came to an end. How many of us have lost a limb or a loved one in a freak disk-based accident? How many of us are sat in a room littered with disks stuck in the walls and ceiling, strewn about like a careless Ninjas shuriken? How many of us now resort to only handling disks using padded tongs to mitigate the danger?

ALL OF US!

Thank you Nintendo, now I can safely stab myself in the eyes eith Wii U games. What will you think of next?

[rpd123]

This guy.

[TotalSynthesisX]

lol smartass. xD

[NeoTribe]

Wow that's the deal breaker there. Gettin wii u day 1 now.

[kupomogli]

A deal breaker is something that prevents you from purchasing something.

[chukamachine]

But sony did have blu-ray first:) No scratched discs. and massive storage.

who gives a toss about edges,lol

[PS-ADDICT]

I Love my Blu-Rays they Are really Unscratchable. My 2006 games still scratchless when my bros 360 Disk from 2012 got some light scratches , thanks to them for going the extra mile. Why are we still on disk and not on Chips?

[millzy102]

technically chips are dated tech what's in NES carts, a massive chip but a chip never the less. althogh thinking about it flash memory would be good medium as its now got a high memory density but easy to loose.

[sdplisken]

oh may god finally!
ive cut my fingers so many times with these sharp discs
they hurt to pick up theyre like jagged razors!

[claud3]

Its just a disc

[Kidmyst]

Slow day at Engadget I guess when rounded edges is worth writing about. Maybe it's aerodynamic and allows the disc to spin up faster for faster load times, Nintendo's way to revolutionize disc spin! I kid.
Still waiting for something that'll make me want to buy the Wii U and not have it sit 10 months out of the year like my Wii.

[AWBrawler]

why the hell is this news? lol

[TemplarDante]

It isnt a blu ray, it is proprietry..
So, my 2 cents, its 1)there to make it harder for pirates to replicate.
2) There to charge devs more for Ninty to manufacture.
3)Maybe it reinforces the disc further.. which wouldnt make much sense...as its not like the disc is spinning 500rpm in there lol

[DivineAssault]

Its different which is good but such a minor change means nothing.. Not like chilidren will get CD cuts or anything from them

[TuxedoMoon]

I'm sure there is some sort of hidden reason as to why the CDs are softer. Maybe it really is a weird ani-pirate thing?

[one2thr]

Thats nice and all, but is it as scratch resistant as a blu-ray disc?
(Legit question)

[Braid]

Ordinary CDs were perfectly fine, and obviously not dangerous to anyone unless you have the IQ of a ham sandwich.

There has to be another reason to this, and the only reason I think we'll all guess is that these CDs must be more "difficult" to replicate. That's all.

[fatstarr]

thats nice I cant wait to touch it

[Bay]

Why's this even something special? Last I checked people didn't pay attention to how their discs were shaped, only how much space and if it scratched easily.

[leonlion]

ive seen round edge disks with a lip on them so if you place them face down they are less likely to get scratched, and round edge on the inner diameter will help to prevent the disk cracking

this is nothing new

[zugdar]

Is this a troll article? Move on.

[oakshin]

wow sorry for the spam but wow

[ziggurcat]

way to innovate, nintendo...

/sarcasm

[Plagasx]

Oooo nice and round I just wanna put my finger through that nice hole.

[josephayal]

Next Gen is here

[jonli1]

is this what has come down to look at disk edges is this article for real or what u got to be kidding here

[defenceofgames]

answer to W3l: nintendo has never had scratch resistant discs i know because i have scratched many nintendo discs before and a lot of nintendo games are on cards

[defenceofgames]

answer to W3l: nintendo has never had scratch resistant discs that i know of i have scratched many nintendo discs before and a lot of nintendo games are on cards