WiiU:Creating Game Backups

Creating backup copies of games and media for personal use is a right granted only in some countries. It is your sole responsibility to stay up to date with the law in your respective country. The information provided within this wiki is solely educational and its editors take no responsibility for the use or misuse of this information.

To run your own games on your computer, install your disc games onto your console, or create mods, a dump of your games will be needed. There are a variety of file types that Wii U games can be dumped as, each with their own uses, and each with their own method of being dumped.

Method 1: wudump

This method will dump the entire Wii U disc as a WUD file. This file contains all of the contents of the game disc, including blank space, and will need 23.3 GB of storage free in the device you are dumping to. WUD files are the most complete versions of a dump, although they are the largest in size.

Requirements:

• A homebrewed Wii U with the Homebrew Launcher installed
• The latest version of wudump.
• A FAT32 SD card/USB drive or NTFS USB drive with at least 23.3 GB of storage free
  • Using a FAT32 SD card will add an extra step to combine files

Steps:

1. Download wudump.elf and place it in your SD card's /wiiu/apps/wudump folder
2. Take out any disc currently in your Wii U console
3. On your console, open the Homebrew Launcher and launch wudump
4. Once loaded, press the A or B button to choose your destination device. A for SD, B for USB
5. Wait for the prompt to insert the disc you want to dump, then do so. This step will take about an hour to complete.

If you used an NTFS device, you should now have a completed WUD file. If you used a FAT32 device (which has a maximum individual file size limit of 4GB), the dump will be split into multiple files that you'll need to combine. To do so, copy the folder containing the part files to a file system with large file support (eg NTFS), open a command prompt there, then copy the following command:

copy /b game_part1.wud + game_part2.wud + game_part3.wud + game_part4.wud + game_part5.wud + game_part6.wud + game_part7.wud + game_part8.wud + game_part9.wud + game_part10.wud + game_part11.wud + game_part12.wud game.wud

This will create the full game.wud file within the same directory. You can then rename and move it as you please, as well as delete the part files in the folder.

From here, you can either compress to a WUX file using JWUDTool, extract it for installing onto your console using wud2app, or used with an emulator such as CEMU.

Method 2: disc2app

This method was made combining wud2app and wudump into one app, directly giving you the encrypted content files in the form of .app, .h3, .tik, .tmd, and .cert files. These will be significantly smaller, only containing the actual game files and no empty space. They can be installed onto your console or used with an NUS content decrypter to view and modify the game's files.

Requirements:

• A homebrewed Wii U with the Homebrew Launcher installed.
• The latest version of disc2app.
• A FAT32 SD card/USB drive or NTFS USB drive with at least 23.3 GB of storage free. Note that a USB drive formatted by a Wii U to store games / saves / updates / DLCs is not using these file systems: you'll be able to install your dump to such a disk later, but disc2app can't dump to one directly.
  • The file size will be smaller that 23.3 GB for almost all games. Some titles, such as Xenoblade Chronicles X, do almost reach the limit.

Steps:

1. Download disc2app.zip and extract the wiiu folder to the root of your SD card.
2. Take out any disc currently in your Wii U console.
3. On your console, open the Homebrew Launcher and launch disc2app.
4. Once loaded, press the A or B button to choose your destination device. A for SD, B for USB.
5. Wait for the prompt to insert the disc you want to dump, then do so. The time for this step will vary depending upon the size of the game.

After this finishes, you should have a folder in your destination drive's install directory named after the game's product code (WUP-X-XXXX). This content can then be directly installed onto your console (or Wii U formatted HDD) using a WUP installer (after which it'll appear as a launchable icon on your console's main menu, and you may then remove the installation folder), or decrypted using a content decrypter to view the game's files.