Have you been waiting for the right time to pick up a Wii U? Or more precisely the right price?
Kmart is currently running a deal for the Wii U plus a copy of Skylanders Swap Force for $179. With the Wii U, in my opinion, currently at the tipping point in terms of top quality games, this might be a good chance to pick one up.
It’s crazy to think but, objectively speaking, I’d argue there are more good reasons to buy a Wii U at the moment than a PlayStation 4 or an Xbox One. Super Mario 3D Land, Donkey Kong Country: Tropical Freeze, Nintendo Land, Mario Kart 8, Wind Waker HD, The Wonderful 101. The Wii U actually has a pretty compelling list of exclusives. Of course, if you don’t like Nintendo games this doesn’t apply to you, but if you are? This might be a good time to get on board.
Via OzBargain
Comments
56 responses to “Kmart Is Selling The Wii U At Pretty Great Price”
Except that no-one has stock.
Target has is for $189 as well, but no stock I can find either. Damnit.
This. Pretty sure that all the Kmart and Target stock was sold immediately to employees.
Agreed, last time they had a sale like this I went in the moment doors opened on the beginning day of the sale and was told they were sold out and only have the deluxe one in stock
I got one of the $178 Target stock and I am not a Target employee (and didn’t use a friend working there or whatever).
However, I did go in earlier in the week and they were happy enough to put one aside for me out the back with name/phone until Thurs.
I’m an employee at Target and we had quite a few in stock last time I checked. We had a bundle with Mariokart 8 a few weeks back and we sold out but we got more of the Skylanders bundles back in, presumably from our offsite. I don’t know any employees other than me that bought one so there should be more stock around if you’re willing to ring a few stores. The article also fails to mention that a physical copy of Nintendoland is also included in this bundle.
correct, they don’t have stock right now, but they will take rain-checks, and hold a console at that price for you until it comes back in stock.
I thought this yesterday as well, but asked at Big W anyway since I had to go there for other stuff. This was around 7-8pm.
Half a dozen available, walked out with my shiny new toy for $189 🙂
BigW is price matching K-Mart , so you can get it fram BigW for $179.
Get Mario Kart 8 for $57, and you get a free voucher with MK8 to be able to get another free game as well! Target also has Zombie-U (great game) for $10.
So for $276, you get a Wii-U, Nintendoland, Skylanders, Mario Kart 8, Zombie U and another game (Zelda, Donkey Kong, Monster Hunter, Pikmin 3 or a range of others)
I think people forgot that the Wii-U has more graphics grunt than the 360, the games look great.
6 games and the console for $276, who needs an XBOne?
And knowing you’re ready for Zelda U and Xenoblades X to drop among many others.
I managed to get the last one in South Australia 😛 I called up pretty much every K-Mart, Target and Big W in the state
Also, the same thing for $178 at Target.
Some places you can order online when the physical store is out of stock.
Hmm, was fortunate enough to grab an Xbox One with Kinect from K-Mart last week for $498.
Aww, I was thinking about getting a 2DS bundle with Pokemon.
Tempting… so tempting. To replay Mass Effect (for the tenth time) with touchy touchy controls. But… Do I need another console? No, that’s not a rhetorical question.
Grab one for some luigi stare
Get one!
I love it more than my PS4!
199 or less with mario kart 8 and I will cave in.
Mario Kart 8 standalone is like $68 as it is. Saw it in JB HiFi for that price yesterday.
If you picked up this bundle and added MK8 on top of it it only comes to $247 in total. If you don’t want skylanders, you could probably sell that on ebay or gumtree and make some money back too.
$58 at BIG W… screw JB
Even better.
At the moment there is a promotion for Mario Kart 8 and a free downloadable retail game which ends late July (don’t quote me on the date). There’s certainly a good selection of games like New Super Mario Bros, Pikmin 3, Windwaker, Monster Hunter 3 and Wonderful 101. Definitely worth a look imo.
Two awesome games for the price of one! Although having to choose is haaaard.
PS: you’ll need an external HDD to be able to download some of the free games on offer, not a big deal though.
This.
While the price of this is rather nice there are too many other costs involved.
Console $178, MK8 $58, external SELF POWERED HDD (you might get away with a usb but nintendo expressly wants self powered hdd’s)so you can actually download that extra game $50-100. Sensor bar $10. (Black skin? $10-50?)
So basically this console plus 1 game you (MK8) plus another you may want for free and all the stuff you need to actually use it comes in closer to over $300. Personally When I bought a 360 e with extra HDD for about $86 that was a good price, this isn’t considering the consoles prospects.
I’ve said before, I want to Premium (because black) with extra on board storage built in at $200 with nintendo land + game and whatever else they want to include.
If this bundle was 178 with mario instead of skylanders though I probably would have caved.
32GB USB stick, $15, and it works just fine.
You end up with 8GB more than the premium console, for a total cost of $194, with NintendoLand and Skylanders.
Is the basic one OK, or am I better waiting for a deal on the model with the larger storage?
I’m not particularly keen on it myself, but my wife has been salivating over the trailer for Yoshi’s Woolly World ever since I showed it to her. But I guess that’s not out for a while yet so no rush…
I’d personally go for the premium model over the basic one…not only do you get the extra storage but you also get a wiimote sensor bar (handy if you sold your Wii like I did but want to use Wiimotes on the Wii U), a gamepad charging dock, a stand for the console to stand it upright, and a sexy black colour (much better than the white IMO).
Each to their own though. Really depends on how much digital content you’re planning on putting on it.
I picked up the Mario Kart 8 premium bundle for $398 a few weeks ago (MK8’s release day) at Big W. Not sure if they still have that deal going or not.
Price-wise though with how cheap these are, you can make up for it easily. I had a number of friends come and ask me for advice on what to get recently what with all these upcoming sales, and it turned out to be better going with the basic. I mean EB had the cradle+dock pack for $9, and you could get Nintendo Land preowned for $19… most people have a Wii already so the lack of a sensor bar is no biggie. And while you’ll need more storage space for downloaded games, if you’re retrieving that MK8 freebie then chances are you’ll need external storage anyway. I think 8GB should be more than fine for game saves through the life of the console, I had a ridiculous number of Wii games and still have tonnes of space on there without ever having to use an SD card.
It was more of a question back at launch when the two units were much closer in price. In which case stupid ugly white loses for me every time 😛
I have a premium model and I’m actually regretting not getting the cheaper one instead. The extra storage is nice, but if you’re going to get more than 2 digital games over the system’s life span, then you’re going to need a hard drive ANYWAYS. And the sensor bar? You can find a third party wireless one for like 10 bucks. The stands are nice but also optional purchases for cheaps. In reality, I don’t think these things justify paying more than twice the amount for.
This is what I’m wondering too, although it sounds like no one has stock anyway.
The price is definitely right, EB is still selling pre-owned basic units for $250….pre-owned premium units are $300.
The basic has 8GB of built-in storage and supports SD cards and USB storage so I don’t think the size matters.
There’s a few extras in the box which are of limited use (wii sensor bar, stand for the gamepad thing) and it has a bit more storage space, but honestly even with 32gb if you go all-in on digital stuff you’re going to end up plugging in some USB storage.
You get 10% of your digital purchases refunded to you as bonus credit if you have the Premium one, but that only lasts until the end of 2014.
The other main differentiation factor was that Premium came with NintendoLand in the box, but these Skylanders bundles have it in the box despite being ‘Basic’ models so that’s a non-issue as well.
If it was going to be your primary console, splurging for the Premium SKU is probably worth it. If you’re wanting to do a lot of Wii stuff through the backwards compatibility in the system and you no longer / never owned a Wii, then you would want the Premium for the sensor bar, otherwise you’d have to buy a sensor bar separately.
However if the system is just there to play a few Nintendo games and your primary gaming platform is something else, I’d go for the cheaper one and use the extra saved toward buying some games.
I bought the basic as it was going cheap about a year ago and if the basic is noticeably cheaper it definitely worth getting. The stand on the premoum doesnt fit if you have a clear protective case so I didnt even use that as the case has its own stand which I bought for $2 at target. I had a sensor bar from my wii meaning I didnt need it bundled and I also bought a wireless one from EB which I use more anyway. I also happened to have a hardrive sitting around not in use so my wiiu now has 600g of data. Nintendo have made it very easy to move data between the internal storage and hardrive.
Nothing sits on my internal storage meaning that the larger storage space on the premium wiiu isnt needed. Also if you’re not going to download dlc or games you need not worry there’s plenty for save files.
Basically yes the basic wiiu is enough and I dont regret getying it over the premium. But in saying that if I found the premium going cheap I would buy one and give my basic to my girlfriend as she loves mariokart 8. The main reason is that I think the white gamepad might discolour over time. Wiiu is that good I would own two haha hope that helps.
Your feedback was very helpful. Thanks!
There’s a 24 hour Target In my area and they sold me this bundle with Nintendo land for $178 – I was there at midnight when the sale started
Bought an extra controller (the Wii Pro) for $57 at EB, bought Mario Kart 8 for, $57 at target (which has a free game download which I’ll use on the Wonderful 101) also bought Mario 3D for $57 from target, not a bad bundle 5 games, two controllers and the basic console for $349
bravo sir.
Yes!
That’s ridiculous value.
Don’t miss out on Donkey Kong Tropical Freeze too. It’s awesome.
I have a Wii U, and while shit, this isnt a bad price for a few of the exclusives
You do realise its ‘shit’ only due to its install base, don’t you?
Literally all of the perceived issues are caused by the small install base. If the Wii U was getting all the cross gen games the PS360 get but with slightly better visuals the Wii U is capable of….and Nintendo IPs…….it would be THE console to own at the present.
Buy mario kart 8 before July and you get a download code for 1 of 10 games too, zelda wind waker, or new super mario bros u are still $60 +
FYI for all the people scrambling around department stores, placing rainchecks, posting news stories about “deals”
JB HiFi’s standard price on these is $189
hear hear Bickles.
I bought a Mario Kart 8 bundle, got Wind Waker, finished both. Sighed loudly when new proper Zelda was announced but not out till Christmas 2015, bought new Super Mario Bros U, finished that. Now what? It’s as useful as my One and PS4…though with obsolete graphics. SIGH Nintendo.
Zombie U is awesome, the new Donkey Kong Tropical Freeze game is great, Pikmin 3, Wonderful 101, Little Inferno, Monster Hunter 3, Transformers, and then Hyrule Warriors in 2 months, just to name a few.
Was going to say finishing MK8 is really just the start.
Bought the last one @ Target yesterday for $178 (Bondi Junction, NSW).
Traded in Skylanders and Nintendo Land ($18.50) for Sleeping Dogs ($19).
So much win!
You mean Wiin?
Sorry I meant “weeeeeen.”
Tried to pick one up yesterday from my local kmart, only to be told they got stock in early, and they sold out before the deal officially started. They do expect to have more stock in at some point, though, so I’m going to have another go.
Need another mad Premium deal so I can get a black one :(. Not up for white consoles in my entertainment unit.
I’m fairly sure that under Australian Consumer Law, anyone who goes to a Kmart and is told “We only had 5 units shipped to us, sorry.” is able to submit a complaint for misleading advertising.
Sellers have an obligation to have stock of a ‘reasonable’ number of units for a product that they advertise/offer.
Kmart didn’t mention restricted stock in their advertising
In my opinion, definitely under valued but not under appreciated. Play the Wii U more then my ps4 which now seats there collecting dust. Nintendo has the best lineup of exclusive coming this yr & 2015 but MK8 was reason enough for me to buy a new big screen tv.
Annoyingly I got a bad performance review at work. I was planning to buy a Wii U, but I decided that I didn’t deserve one, and to defer it until I improved my performance. And now these prices! I paid for my poor work attitude *twice* 🙁
Saw a couple JB’s advertising the same bundle for 189. They might (MIGHT, don’t freak out on me) better at stocking these than target and kmart.
On a side note, I managed to pick up two (one from each retailer) for a couple of my friends. Stock were coming around as I checked with them the week before and they had none. They must’ve gotten stock from the warehouse the days before the sale.
Kmart Penrith sold me a Premium Wii U Mario Kart 8 Bundle for $179. They had an official “Customer Apology” document they were referring to in order to complete the sale.
Woah! That’s insane value.
I just bought that bundle for just under $400 during the ebay sale on Sunday. Enjoying it so far, but it takes time to get accustomed to the oversized game boy controller.
Glad to hear you can do away with the sensor if not using the wii motes!
Yeah, if you got that deal you got damn lucky. I went in Saturday afternoon and they weren’t supposed to be selling the Mario Kart bundle for that price unless they’d run out of their first alternative option – the Basic Wii U and a Skylander starter kit.
That’s still a damn good deal (the receipt put it at nearly 60% off), so that’s what I picked up. Traded the starter kit for credit at EB Games and was told I wasn’t the first person to do so 😉 and that they’d seen with a few people who’d gotten lucky like you and picked up the Premium bundle.
Anyone who hasn’t made their mind up yet, it might be worth waiting till the last day of the deal. If they’ve sold out of Basics they might be selling Premiums for that price if you ask.
Holy crap! How did you convince them to do that?!
New Zealander here!
JB HIFI had the wii u skylanders deal for $238 nzd, I was still making my mind up on whether i should buy it at this crazy price, when i finally noticed that nintendo land was included, i was all in, but after being on sale for only 2 days, it had sold out! I fear that there won’t be any more stock in with this message. http://shop.jbhifi.co.nz/game/wii/wiiu-skylanders-8gb-console-bundle/77224
So sad right now.
I’m surprised Kotaku didnt cover the $180 Wii U premium deal that exploded yesterday
https://www.ozbargain.com.au/node/151016