Some great minds and Wii addicts have now made it possible to play Wii games on your PC and Mac!   There's an awesome emulator called Dolphin that will allow you to play Nintendo Wii and GameCube games in Windows (2000/XP/Vista/7), Linux and Mac OS X (Intel version). The Wii emulator runs a lot of Wii and GameCube games perfectly since most new computers are more powerful then the Nintendo Wii console itself. It's rare to see a "next gen" console be emulated while it's still selling which makes this emulator that much more awesome. Ok, enough geeking out.. here's what this thing can do and how you can play Wii games in Microsoft Windows and Mac OS X:

Check out this video of New Super Mario Bros.Wii running on the PC using Dolphin.

Ready to get started?

First, let's go through the checklist of what you'll need to turn your PC or Mac into a Nintendo Wii:

I tried it on a ATI Radeon X1600 and it was playable. But, I think it might be time for a video card upgrade. This nVidia card will definitely do the job: GeForce 9400 GT. Dolphin also supports real Nintendo Wii controllers and Nunchucks and it also supports the Xbox 360 controller.

Here's what you'll need to get your Wiimote and Nunchuck working with Dolphin on your PC:

• Wiimote Controller and Nunchuk
• Wireless Sensor Bar for Wii
• Tiny Bluetooth USB Adapter Dongle (Black)

Here's a video showing you how to use your Wiimote with your PC (and also the Wiimote and emulator in action):

This Wii emulator will not run out of the box (or at least it didn't for me). You'll need to tweak a few things on your PC to get it up and running. Here are a few issues I ran into and how they were resolved:

• PROBLEM: OpenGL problem - My ATi Radeon x1600 drivers did not have OpenGL and Dolphin was giving me this error:
                        "Can't create opengl renderer. You might be missing some required opengl extensions, check the logs for more info"

  SOLUTION: I used the DH Mobility Modder to enable OpenGL with the ATi Catalyst drivers. See instructions here.
                         (if you're using a nVidia card, use the DH nVidia Mobility Modder found here.)

• PROBLEM: When I boot up Dolphin build r4633, I get the following errors:
                        "Can't init any PAD Plugins" and "Couldn't init the core. Check your configuration."

  SOLUTION: Go here and download "Opencl-ati-rXXXX" if you have a Ati or "Opencl-nvidia-rXXXX" if you have a nVidia card.
                        Unzip the contents and copy the "Plugins" and "User" directory from the .7z file into your existing Dolphin directory.
                        Start Dolphin, Goto Options > Plugins tab. Select "Dolphin KB/X360pad" from dropdown
                        

That's about all the problems I ran into. Overall, this emulator is fricken SWEET! All I need is a better video card.

Here is someone playing New Super Mario Bros.Wii at 1080p resolution.