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Buying Nintendo Wii in China

December 19, 2007 | Author: Carl Pei | Filed under: Shopping

I just got a Wii a few days ago. It was in Zhuhai, but you will find it in all Chinese cities. I bought the Japanese version modchipped with the new D2C chip together with two games for 2100 RMB (approx. $285 USD), and later got an extra controller and nunchuck for an additional 390 RMB ($53 USD).

The major advantage with buying a Wii in China is, after you buy the chipped console, future games will more or less be free. Pirated games go for only 4 or 5 RMB (around $0.6-0.7 USD) each. The bad part about buying a Japanese Wii is that the menus are in Japanese, but it’s not hard to figure out what’s what after some testing. There is a Japanese - English translation (PDF) you can look at if you’re really stuck.

I originally bought it because I felt that my daily tasks were getting repetitive and that I would need to do some thinking that only some well designed video game puzzles would give me. Unfortunately, I still suck ever as much at playing games so I’m still glued to the computer, checking for full step-by-step walkthroughs to play my games. Sigh…

This entry was posted on Wednesday, December 19th, 2007 and is filed under Shopping. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.

xygoxen

4 people have left comments

Hello Carl!

Where in Zhuhai did you buy your Wii? I live in Zhuhai too and saw some at the Gongbei underground shopping area but I was a little bit afraid to buy one there.

Regards,

Robert
(Another crazy laowai in China)

Robert Spearman wrote on January 20, 2008 - 6:31 pm | Visit Link

where did you buy your Wii? China or Japan? I am from the United States and have a friend going over to visit Hong Kong. He asked me about buying a Wii while he is there, to bring back to the U.S. Would games here in the U.S. work in a machine bought in Hong Kong?

Chad wrote on January 28, 2008 - 4:02 pm | Visit Link

Robert - I bought it at the “computer city” here in Xiangzhou. I’ve always thought the sellers in Gongbei were a bit shady. I could give you the address if you still need it.

Chad - Since this post was titled “Buying Nintendo Wii in China”, it most likely was China I bought it in. As the consoles on Hong-Kong are chipped, I think all games will work.

Carl Pei wrote on February 2, 2008 - 6:50 pm | Visit Link

Have you at all seen the Vii’s since then? Wondering how those compare.

Demerzel wrote on February 27, 2008 - 5:21 am | Visit Link

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