I spent so many hours in island flyby as a kid combing over every inch of the island and reading all the i point descriptions. The mysterious ruins have always occupied a place in my mind. I was so convinced that if I kept exploring I could uncover the mystery of the ancient civilisation that built them.
For a few hours I thought I saw something inside of the ruins in the cave and I kept trying to crash my plane in just the right way that I could see into it
Wuhu Island could be subject to scale theory. That is to say, the island itself could be much bigger in reality and the version we see in the game is scaled down to accommodate development time and hardware restrictions. It's like how the 7000 Steps to the mountain monastery in Skyrim is actually only 700 -- the goal is to create the "feeling" of a long arduous hike while not taking up too much time and computing power. Wuhu Island could actually be the size of Hawaii or larger, but for the sake of time and resources, it's scaled down to barely more than a square mile
Another great example is red dead redemption 2. That game is meant to take place across 6(?) States but in reality the game map could never be that big
It wouldn't have taken more computing power to make the 7000 steps be actually 7000 steps. Just more disk space for the bigger map. Please trust me on this, I make mods for Bethesda games and have a working understanding of how the game's cells work. Strictly speaking, the engine's worlds can be as large as you want (to the 64 bit intiger limit anyways...) because you're only loading a few cells around the one you're currently in at a time. Its similar to Minecraft and its chunk system.
"Why would someone in the 1700s build a medieval castle." It actually was quite common for nobles between the 1700s-1900s to build medieval styled castles like this.
@@conviction_amp the Citadelle Henry Cristophe was commissioned by revolutionary Henry Cristophe after his triumph. It was built with the labor of more than 20,000 "freed" slaves (conservative estimate) who hauled each stone one by one up the mountain that the Citadelle now sits on top of.
Its crazy how all the grass in Wuhu Island has been mowed (as you can see from the striped pattern) - this suggests to me that the trees at 12:54 were indeed just planted there, if the modern day people are able to mow such huge landmasses
Why does Wuhu have cars and a massive bridge when it is only a square kilometer in size? We see that there are many bikes available to the residents but they only seem to use them for racing. Additionally, if we take the Mario Kart Wuhu races to be canon, we hear internal combustion engines in the vehicles that you pass during the race. This contradicts the Wuhu Island wiki entry which says only electric cars are legal, so this either suggests that the Mario Kart races take place prior to the events of Wii Sports Resort, or that for some reason Wuhu is going backwards and got rid of its electric cars some time after the events of Wii Sports Resort.
Or the electric cars have sound effects. Real life electric cars often have speakers that emit engine sounds to alert surrounding people and to provide feedback to the driver.
1 square mile is about 640 acres, even if all of the land in Wuhu island was arable and used in agriculture, 640 acres is enough to feed 1280 people if the ancient civilization was vegetarian as half an acre would be enough to feed one person on this fertile sub-tropical island. As impressive as 1280 people is at most, it is still a population prone to inbreeding and destruction from disease and famine.
We do have to consider extra food from fishing, and that there was probably islanders settled along the whole Wuhu archipelago, not just on wuhu island
A possible explanation for the absurdly perfect and impossible shape of Maka Wuhu would be that it is the crystallized husk of a magma chamber, jettisoned to the surface, similar to the famous Bear Lodge in the US.
It has such a pronounced conduit though, and it clearly has all the anatomy of a composite volcano just in the wrong proportions. If it is a composite volcano, then it should be part of a much larger arc, i.e. the Aleutian Islands or Japan. A basaltic shield volcano like Hawaii would look altogether different. Basically it's entirely inconsistent with any actual volcanoes.
The castle could have been real if Wuhu Island was settled during the Age of Exploration. It's also possible that the older and newer ruins were both made by the same civilization who lived on the island for thousands of years. The newer ruins have a Mayan or Greek aesthetic to them and they are found at the bottom of the ocean, so I think that's probably more plausible. There is anthropological precedent for keeping such ancient structures around for ceremonial purposes despite civilizational development around the world, such as some kami shrines, Celtic monoliths, Sumerian ziggurats, totem poles, etc. ETA: And what you call a waterslide is, I think, clearly an ancient aqueduct.
@@mattpace1026I appreciate that you find my interpretation to be more coherent, but I think head canon fan theories are mostly meant to be fan fiction since they're all compatible with the text but not implied by it. In reality, I doubt Nintendo has put much thought into the lore of the island at all. They haven't even kept its appearance consistent. It's just meant to be a setting for now, unless they need to invent a history later. Lots of interesting content in the video about geology, though!
I think his point was that those ruins and the castle would’ve had to survive a volcanic explosion in the prime condition that they’re in and it’s just not realistic
Wait, why would the two tribes have to coexist on the island? Did I miss something? Couldn't they have been two civilizations at different times? Maybe tribe A built the basic structures, then they died off, and then tribe B came along with better tech and built the temples, perhaps leaving or dying off, or perhaps being the ancestors of the current inhabitants. Also, it's not unusual for societies to forget important things. For centuries the west forgot how to make Roman concrete, still doesn't know how to make Greek Fire. The Egyptians don't really know how to make pyramids with the tools of the day supposedly, and the descendants of the Aztecs and Mayans have no clue how their massive stone structures were built in the middle of jungle. The Welsh (pushed west by the Anglo Saxons) don't know how Stonehenge was built even though they probably have some ancestors who built it. Especially being such a tiny island. Like imagine a seafaring people were wrecked on the island. They have knowledge of how to cut stone, so they make temples to pray to the gods, perhaps for a way home. But they have no continuing use for that knowledge once the temples are built and they're subsistence living. They have children for a couple of generations then an earthquake takes out the few remaining original settlers. Or maybe the island was seen as sacred to some semi-imperial kingdom nearby, who built temples on Wuhu before the kingdom collapsed, a la Bronze Age Collapse BC from the real world, cutting off supplies to the island within a single generation.
Exactly. I feel this guy is too in-love and biased towards the idea that the second set of ruins are fake. Besides, building structures underwater, and more importantly under the sea, must be REALLY hard. No matter how rich that resort is, i highly doubt they would have all the advanced tech and power to build structures at the bottom of the sea only with the purpose of being decorations for the attractions, and especially without the danger it would pose to build and maintain them (like sea currents). It makes way more sense if those ruins were genuine and the volcano eruption caused them to sink
You mention that the ruins weren't there during Wii Fit, but they definitely were, at least during the Wii Fit+ era. I have so many memories of cycling up to the ruins.
Personally I think the developers just thought: Oohh you know what would be fun? An island with a Volcano. Ohh and lets add some ruins. And some monoliths. And that's about it...
it's incredible how a wii sports resort theory video is one of the greatest theories videos I've ever seen, now I feel extremely confused because of this theory, all my entire childhood really changed in a 20 minutes video, congratulations man, you really deserve for the video
Wow.. it’s pretty amazing that 300 years after Suhummi originally discovered the island his grandson bought and renovated it into a resort. It’s true when they say that reality is often stranger than fiction ❤
Interesting theory. I have a different one though. I think that both styles of ruins were built by the same people at different times. Once the stone works were all created, the ancient civilisation just focused on living. I think they eventually developed more advanced technology, and then there was a new movement to create new religious structures like the ancient temples. As for the tunnel system you mentioned, I think a tube ended up forming naturally. The civilisation then built that shelf thing on the wall of it as a mine. It could have been used to get the stone blocks to make buildings, or even a metal mine for the coins that were mentioned. The castle is definetly fake. Adding on to your theory though, i think the "ruins" if they were a water park could be an abandoned water park. If it were being made, you would expect things being used for active construction. However, if it were abandoned, it could also have lead to the joke about them being "ancient ruins." Making a water park on the scale and complexity of that seems like it wouldn't be worth it. The island has alot to do already, and it also has lots of water. It just wouldnt have enough demand. Another alternative, is that the ruins are designed as something for people to explore, not an actual park.
I agree with you about both structures being made by the same civilizations at different times. The monoliths could have been kept for cultural reasons. In real life, we see a lot of ancient structures being kept untouched or even rebuilt as they were through thousands of years by the descendants of those who made them. A mine is plausible for the tube. I think it could also have been an aqueduct, although it could be an aqueduct that started as or was used as a mine, too. That's not unheard of. I don't think the castle is "fake." Genuine castles never stopped being built. They continue to be made to this day. There are a number of castles that were built during the Age of Exploration.
I’ve always loved Wuhu island. As a kid who couldn’t afford a vacation growing up, these games were the closest thing I got. Side note, I somehow got a crush on Miguel, the plane guide, when I was a kid. 😅
@@ChestersonJack If you think that's weird, as a kid I would do things like crash my plane on the beach on Island Flyover and switch to Swordplay Showdown, pretending I was struck from the sky and had to defeat the people who took me down. I was a strange child.
@@ChestersonJack As it adult, it still feels weird that I played make believe by myself. That feels like something better done with friends. Then again - when you have one game you really like, you get creative with all the ways you can play it to get the most out of it and extend your play time!
I specifically searched for “wuhu ruins” HOPING to find a video like this over analyzing everything and finding a conspiracy. And you did not disappoint, this was amazing. Have my like and sub good man.
Brings me back to fighting over the controller with the built in motion tracking so I don’t have to deal with the little dongle thing disconnecting mid game
The monoliths are easily explainable, it was the same Precursors that riddled the land of Jak & Daxter of course! It’s common geographical knowledge that Wuhu Island is visible from Geyser Rock
I'm not sure about this because I don't have the game. But doesn't the info about there being two different tribes come from Pilotwings Resort? Also Wuhu Island isn't a tropical island, there are seasons. As we can see in Wii Fit. A bit of headcanon I have regarding the eruption of the volcano 200 years ago. I think this eruption somehow destroyed the previous Mii settlement on the island. Then it was entirely rebuilt as Wuhu Town. The buildings all share a similar architectural style, meaning they were built around the same time, and they also look like the kind of buildings that would have been built a couple centuries ago in Europe. Also the castle was probably built at the same time.
I know this is all just a bit of fun but my brother in Christ, you really went balls deep in this “lore” for Wii Sports Resort ahahaha I can’t believe I just watched this. But hey I guess that’s the point, I still watched it
An ester egg that I found proves the theory of fake ruins wrong: the serpent’s cavern is haunted with ghostly singing at night (yes you can hear it in wii sports resort) so they must be genuine.
I would love to live on Wuhu island!! Sounds like a fantastic place! Especially when considering that you can discover the many hidden areas all throughout the island (e.g. the hidden cove, the ancient ruins, etc.). 🌴🌴🌴
This could also explain the i Icon that says that no one dares to explore the deep pitch in the ruins. Because it’s fake and leads to nowhere. Its a good theory.
I would love it if you would discuss the We Ski, We Ski and Snowboard and Go Vacation trilogy. Those games are absolutely fascinating and I think there may be some interesting stuff to dive into. Until then I will be watching the rest your content, seems like you're doing some interesting stuff here!
i'm a year late to the party but the "pine" trees could be norfolk island "pines" or another species of araucaria? after all, araucarias grow on tropical islands, including new caledonia and new guinea where they're native, and hawaii and the florida keys where they're not. and they look more like those conical trees than most true pines do. (we think of pines being christmas-tree shaped, but most pines aren't at all; those are mostly spruce and fir)
This is an interesting theory but also a cursed one. A very well made video to show the least. Both fortunately and unfortunately, Wuhu Island hasn’t been seen in many games, especially recently. Both Mario Kart 7 tracks were datamined for Mario Kart Tour, but that won’t affect the lore.
now this is the type of history lesson that I like 😌the wii universe and wuhu island are just out of this world (ps: as a chilean, seeing Rapa Nui in this video is funny as hell)
I'm pretty sure that even the castle lights up once you get enough i Points, and there are Miis who stand on the outside balconies. This corroborates your theory by proving that the castle is so well situated in the modern day that it has electrical infrastructure and Miis are likely already touring it. I don't know much about electrical work, but I feel it would be pretty difficult to energize an ancient structure so (relatively) far away from the main town/power grid... Unless the infrastructure for elecrical work was already present when the castle was built!
A little late, but the castle itself is also full of plot holes. I don't know what the geography looked like before the eruption, but there's 2 possibilities: 1. The eruption wasn't that severe and as such didn't change the island all that much. This is a possibility due to the fact that all 3 "ancient structures" (the castle, the underground ruins, and the mysterious ruins near the cycling road/lagoon) survived the eruption. If the eruption was that mild, then that would mean a few things. First, that would mean the castle was the only thing ever built by the so-called ancient civilization on that side of the island, which doesn't make sense. Why would a castle near ground zero of the eruption be the only thing that survives? The only alternative is that there was nothing else to survive, which is extremely unlikely. Second, the extreme lack of aged trees on the island contradicts this possibility, as mentioned in the video. Third, look at the position of the castle. To start, It's relatively far away from any agricultural potential. The forest nearby seems plausible, but it's already a cliff away from the castle *after* the eruption. To my knowledge, eruptions tend to smooth out islands, so if the cliff is that steep after the eruption, it doesn't seem plausible that a potentially much steeper pre-eruption cliff would be consistently traversable without modern technology. That's also assuming that the cliff-surrounded land would even be suitable for farming. Lastly, it's pretty high up on the mountain. It would be very unwise to build something like that so high up for a variety of reasons. I already mentioned how there's no nearby agriculture-supporting land and how it would be at ground zero of an eruption, but it could also potentially be crushed or damaged by landslides or avalanches, it would be eroded by the nearby water, and could possibly be destroyed if the cliff it's on falls apart. It's just way too unlikely that all of these conditions weren't present. 2. The other possibility is that the volcanic eruption was highly destructive. If that was the case, the castle wouldn't have survived, plain and simple.
It isn't impossible since they're coming out with their own theme parks. But they're going to need to get some Disney like money to buy (Or make) an island and develop it and make it cost effective.
actually it's the other way around. the simple rough cut stone pillars are made by the later civilisation, while the smooth cut temples were made by the first civilisation. the first civ was wiped out by the vulcano, the second civilisation are the people who survived the cataclysm and now have no more tools and nothing, so they start all over again, with a more primitive building style. clearly, because the island is just too small, the second civ sinply abandoned wuhu island and never came back. then, thousand of years later, the modern mii discovers wuhu and builds a sports resort on top of it. same happened in ancient egypt. the older the buildings get, the more advanced they are.
mouse cursor spotted in the corner at 6:58 Jokes aside, this video is really well-made! The one complaint I have is that the b-roll footage of the landscapes seems to... lack lighting in some way. The sky is bright in a lot of areas, but the island's landscape itself is unnaturally dark, leading to a weird contrast that feels like an incomplete or glitchy render
I of course can't just say "well it's just a game" because that takes the fun out of it.. Though it feels most clear to say it's a well thought out project from a group who wanted a story for tourism, and not a single bit further. With some corporate (nintendo) magic, we've arrived here! It's an in-between of it being a game, and it being a world. A world put together by someone rather than a game engine and some code
In Wii Fit U, there is a minigame called 'hose down' where, in the advanced level, you shoot water at muddy characters in (i think) Summerstone Castle, and in Super Advanced, you play in the ancient ruins. If these ruins and castles were real and sacred to the Miis, you would certainly not be allowed to play any resort games, involving water and mud especially, there. Also inbreeding.
The island to me as a kid always felt fake too. Like a park you go to with your parents on vacation like a theme park. The difference is: in real life you can tell its just a facade but in a videogame basically everything is a facade so we can never know what is 'real' or whats facade. It was really clever to do it that way so its a really organic and interesting place
The reason Wii Fit's Wuhu Island (Wii Fit Island) is different than the resort one is probably because well, Design. Wii fit island was probably just an earlier version of Wuhu Island
I always thought that the board game island from wii party was the original base for wuhu island. Then the winner (who won all the gold) developed the island from there
Now how do all the Wii series games fit together? are they on the same island? is Wii Sports and Wii Sports Club on the same island as Resort? Are Wii Sports, Wii Sports Resort, Wii Sports Club, Wii Play, Wii Play Motion, Wii Fit, Wii Fit Plus, Wii Fit U, Wii Music, Wii Party, Wii Party U, Wii Chess, and Nintendo Switch Sports all connected? How about the other Mii games? The Tomodachi games, Miitopia, Miitomo, and even the channels/apps on the Wii, 3DS, and Wii U that had miis like the Check Mii Out Channel, Swapnote, Streetpass Plaza, etc. Is this just all one big Miiverse?
I’d like to edit the “Two Civilizations” hypothesis to the “Two Tribes hypothesis” Basically: There seem to be religious differences on the further island. They likely had different gods. They probably shared gods. The difference came down to the Supreme god. Is clear that Wuhu island had the volcano itself as their god. Likely their god of fertility as the volcanic soils made good growing soil for the crops. The other tribe worshipped the sea god as the Supreme god. The giant carving shaped like a crab was probably their Idol that they worshiped. The monoliths were pretty clear it was for the volcanic god. So eventually the volcanic tribe tried to set up a monolith around Crab Island. The people got pissed and attacked the builders (hence only 2 stone pillars) and they went to war. The volcano erupts and kills most. The rest die of starvation as the crops would be burned up, and fish are poisoned by the volcanic acid.
Nintendo: "Let's slap on some ruins and a castle, that'll look cool." Nintendo fans scrambling for a crumb of story from a company that could not give less of a shit about story: "THE LOOOOOOOOOOORREEEE!" Jokes aside, great video, it was a fun watch, I do think it's fun to try and make stories from nothing but environments and context.
At some point, you’re going to have to address the idea that Wuhu Island in-universe is a bit bigger than presented in-game. Sort of like how a lot of open world games that supposedly take place in a large country or region are represented with the equivalent of a few square miles.
the phrase “indigenous Mii population” is the best thing i have heard all day
The fact that the same guy who thought the tennis court was a pool measured the exact size of the island in perfect precision
Aren't these videos jokes
@@elansleazebagannono they’re real
@@elansleazebagannono they’re completely true and serious
@@ceaseless246 lmao that's probably even funnier
What about that fact? You brought it up but never finished.
I spent so many hours in island flyby as a kid combing over every inch of the island and reading all the i point descriptions. The mysterious ruins have always occupied a place in my mind. I was so convinced that if I kept exploring I could uncover the mystery of the ancient civilisation that built them.
The nostalgia this comment brought back.. I wasn’t ready bro😭
Me too man 💀
me too 😭 i spent majority of my time playing island flyover to discover the island lore
For a few hours I thought I saw something inside of the ruins in the cave and I kept trying to crash my plane in just the right way that I could see into it
"around 20 years before the events of Wii Sports Resort" is the funniest sentence i've heard in weeks.
Wuhu Island could be subject to scale theory. That is to say, the island itself could be much bigger in reality and the version we see in the game is scaled down to accommodate development time and hardware restrictions. It's like how the 7000 Steps to the mountain monastery in Skyrim is actually only 700 -- the goal is to create the "feeling" of a long arduous hike while not taking up too much time and computing power.
Wuhu Island could actually be the size of Hawaii or larger, but for the sake of time and resources, it's scaled down to barely more than a square mile
Another great example is red dead redemption 2. That game is meant to take place across 6(?) States but in reality the game map could never be that big
It wouldn't have taken more computing power to make the 7000 steps be actually 7000 steps. Just more disk space for the bigger map. Please trust me on this, I make mods for Bethesda games and have a working understanding of how the game's cells work. Strictly speaking, the engine's worlds can be as large as you want (to the 64 bit intiger limit anyways...) because you're only loading a few cells around the one you're currently in at a time. Its similar to Minecraft and its chunk system.
I kinda like the idea that it is just a tiny island
@@MeepChangeling While this may be true, youve completely ignored the other two reasons. Development time and not wasting the players time.
And then there's Daggerfall
as a mii from this island i can confirm that he is right
WOW! for real? have you met the belloved sports god matt?
How’s life ?
@@casbremer7793 yep he's a pretty cool dude
wow thats so awsome! hope to meet him one time
@@Theofromwiisports
i think i crashed into you around 10 times on island flyover
"Why would someone in the 1700s build a medieval castle." It actually was quite common for nobles between the 1700s-1900s to build medieval styled castles like this.
"Who would build a medieval style castle without technology in an island?"
*Laughs in Haitian*
Can u explain please
@@conviction_amp the Citadelle Henry Cristophe was commissioned by revolutionary Henry Cristophe after his triumph. It was built with the labor of more than 20,000 "freed" slaves (conservative estimate) who hauled each stone one by one up the mountain that the Citadelle now sits on top of.
@@rafaelmontoya1454 Kinda sad that they were able to build anything of note only with 20,000 slaves, and with a tenth of them dying in the process.
Its crazy how all the grass in Wuhu Island has been mowed (as you can see from the striped pattern) - this suggests to me that the trees at 12:54 were indeed just planted there, if the modern day people are able to mow such huge landmasses
Now the real question is why are they mowing the little tiny islands
Why does Wuhu have cars and a massive bridge when it is only a square kilometer in size? We see that there are many bikes available to the residents but they only seem to use them for racing. Additionally, if we take the Mario Kart Wuhu races to be canon, we hear internal combustion engines in the vehicles that you pass during the race. This contradicts the Wuhu Island wiki entry which says only electric cars are legal, so this either suggests that the Mario Kart races take place prior to the events of Wii Sports Resort, or that for some reason Wuhu is going backwards and got rid of its electric cars some time after the events of Wii Sports Resort.
Or the electric cars have sound effects. Real life electric cars often have speakers that emit engine sounds to alert surrounding people and to provide feedback to the driver.
I forget which game, but there's one in which you can freely ride around (most of) the island on a bike.
well, to be fair the island is actually 2,7 square kilometers in size, the video only mentions its size in square miles
@@TOBAPNW_wii fit U
Going to say that the area calculation was incorrect?
1 square mile is about 640 acres, even if all of the land in Wuhu island was arable and used in agriculture, 640 acres is enough to feed 1280 people if the ancient civilization was vegetarian as half an acre would be enough to feed one person on this fertile sub-tropical island.
As impressive as 1280 people is at most, it is still a population prone to inbreeding and destruction from disease and famine.
Fish
@nicklanders5178 good point but still inbreeding is probably gonna happen.
We do have to consider extra food from fishing, and that there was probably islanders settled along the whole Wuhu archipelago, not just on wuhu island
@@nicklanders5178 Seafood isn't food. Only wierdos eat that shit.
@@Edge_Boye
Not to mention there could be other not so near-by islands and archipelagos that the old inhabitants could have regularly traveled to.
A possible explanation for the absurdly perfect and impossible shape of Maka Wuhu would be that it is the crystallized husk of a magma chamber, jettisoned to the surface, similar to the famous Bear Lodge in the US.
It has such a pronounced conduit though, and it clearly has all the anatomy of a composite volcano just in the wrong proportions. If it is a composite volcano, then it should be part of a much larger arc, i.e. the Aleutian Islands or Japan. A basaltic shield volcano like Hawaii would look altogether different. Basically it's entirely inconsistent with any actual volcanoes.
it's a video game it's not meant to be real
@@sogga_fan🤓
@@sogga_fanfake
The castle could have been real if Wuhu Island was settled during the Age of Exploration. It's also possible that the older and newer ruins were both made by the same civilization who lived on the island for thousands of years. The newer ruins have a Mayan or Greek aesthetic to them and they are found at the bottom of the ocean, so I think that's probably more plausible. There is anthropological precedent for keeping such ancient structures around for ceremonial purposes despite civilizational development around the world, such as some kami shrines, Celtic monoliths, Sumerian ziggurats, totem poles, etc.
ETA: And what you call a waterslide is, I think, clearly an ancient aqueduct.
And this is why you need to be careful with "theory" videos. A lot of them are just plain lazily put together.
@@mattpace1026I appreciate that you find my interpretation to be more coherent, but I think head canon fan theories are mostly meant to be fan fiction since they're all compatible with the text but not implied by it. In reality, I doubt Nintendo has put much thought into the lore of the island at all. They haven't even kept its appearance consistent. It's just meant to be a setting for now, unless they need to invent a history later. Lots of interesting content in the video about geology, though!
I think his point was that those ruins and the castle would’ve had to survive a volcanic explosion in the prime condition that they’re in and it’s just not realistic
@@crypticchaos8890They could have rebuilt it.
Wait, why would the two tribes have to coexist on the island? Did I miss something? Couldn't they have been two civilizations at different times? Maybe tribe A built the basic structures, then they died off, and then tribe B came along with better tech and built the temples, perhaps leaving or dying off, or perhaps being the ancestors of the current inhabitants.
Also, it's not unusual for societies to forget important things. For centuries the west forgot how to make Roman concrete, still doesn't know how to make Greek Fire. The Egyptians don't really know how to make pyramids with the tools of the day supposedly, and the descendants of the Aztecs and Mayans have no clue how their massive stone structures were built in the middle of jungle. The Welsh (pushed west by the Anglo Saxons) don't know how Stonehenge was built even though they probably have some ancestors who built it.
Especially being such a tiny island. Like imagine a seafaring people were wrecked on the island. They have knowledge of how to cut stone, so they make temples to pray to the gods, perhaps for a way home. But they have no continuing use for that knowledge once the temples are built and they're subsistence living. They have children for a couple of generations then an earthquake takes out the few remaining original settlers.
Or maybe the island was seen as sacred to some semi-imperial kingdom nearby, who built temples on Wuhu before the kingdom collapsed, a la Bronze Age Collapse BC from the real world, cutting off supplies to the island within a single generation.
Exactly. I feel this guy is too in-love and biased towards the idea that the second set of ruins are fake. Besides, building structures underwater, and more importantly under the sea, must be REALLY hard. No matter how rich that resort is, i highly doubt they would have all the advanced tech and power to build structures at the bottom of the sea only with the purpose of being decorations for the attractions, and especially without the danger it would pose to build and maintain them (like sea currents). It makes way more sense if those ruins were genuine and the volcano eruption caused them to sink
@@100lovenana Agreed 100%, that does make a lot more sense
Tbh I wanna live on this island who else does
Same
You mention that the ruins weren't there during Wii Fit, but they definitely were, at least during the Wii Fit+ era. I have so many memories of cycling up to the ruins.
That's the thing, I'm pretty sure they were in Wii Fit Plus only. Not the og Wii Fit. (I also remember going up there, biking was fun af 😂)
Personally I think the developers just thought: Oohh you know what would be fun? An island with a Volcano. Ohh and lets add some ruins. And some monoliths.
And that's about it...
Let’s be honest on the flying thing on resort we have all flew into the volcano
… and tried to land in the lava
After 80,000 attempts to line it up right...
it's incredible how a wii sports resort theory video is one of the greatest theories videos I've ever seen, now I feel extremely confused because of this theory, all my entire childhood really changed in a 20 minutes video, congratulations man, you really deserve for the video
Wow.. it’s pretty amazing that 300 years after Suhummi originally discovered the island his grandson bought and renovated it into a resort. It’s true when they say that reality is often stranger than fiction ❤
I love this video. Wuhu Island is a setting that just lives in my mind and I think about it way too often for a game that came out 14 years ago.
Interesting theory. I have a different one though.
I think that both styles of ruins were built by the same people at different times.
Once the stone works were all created, the ancient civilisation just focused on living. I think they eventually developed more advanced technology, and then there was a new movement to create new religious structures like the ancient temples.
As for the tunnel system you mentioned, I think a tube ended up forming naturally. The civilisation then built that shelf thing on the wall of it as a mine. It could have been used to get the stone blocks to make buildings, or even a metal mine for the coins that were mentioned.
The castle is definetly fake.
Adding on to your theory though, i think the "ruins" if they were a water park could be an abandoned water park. If it were being made, you would expect things being used for active construction.
However, if it were abandoned, it could also have lead to the joke about them being "ancient ruins." Making a water park on the scale and complexity of that seems like it wouldn't be worth it.
The island has alot to do already, and it also has lots of water. It just wouldnt have enough demand.
Another alternative, is that the ruins are designed as something for people to explore, not an actual park.
I agree with you about both structures being made by the same civilizations at different times. The monoliths could have been kept for cultural reasons. In real life, we see a lot of ancient structures being kept untouched or even rebuilt as they were through thousands of years by the descendants of those who made them.
A mine is plausible for the tube. I think it could also have been an aqueduct, although it could be an aqueduct that started as or was used as a mine, too. That's not unheard of.
I don't think the castle is "fake." Genuine castles never stopped being built. They continue to be made to this day. There are a number of castles that were built during the Age of Exploration.
World machine???
I didn't know there was so much lore behind Wuhu Island, I've been glued to the screen since I discovered your videos dude, fantastic job :)
There isn’t. I’m almost positive this is a joke.
@@Kong20012 no this is real
I’ve always loved Wuhu island. As a kid who couldn’t afford a vacation growing up, these games were the closest thing I got. Side note, I somehow got a crush on Miguel, the plane guide, when I was a kid. 😅
He *is* the only one with an actual voice, and it's pretty nice, so I don't 100% blame you!
@@hadesKIUHaving some validation makes me feel a little less embarrassed about following his guide plane around in Island Flyover so often, lol.
@@ChestersonJack If you think that's weird, as a kid I would do things like crash my plane on the beach on Island Flyover and switch to Swordplay Showdown, pretending I was struck from the sky and had to defeat the people who took me down.
I was a strange child.
@@hadesKIU Oh that’s a fun one! That just sounds like make-believe, doesn’t seem strange at all to me!
@@ChestersonJack As it adult, it still feels weird that I played make believe by myself. That feels like something better done with friends.
Then again - when you have one game you really like, you get creative with all the ways you can play it to get the most out of it and extend your play time!
This is the kind of videos I like to see at 4 am
I specifically searched for “wuhu ruins” HOPING to find a video like this over analyzing everything and finding a conspiracy. And you did not disappoint, this was amazing. Have my like and sub good man.
“oh cool a video about the lore of wuhu island that’ll be fun to watch”, sixteen minutes in: mii slavery
Brings me back to fighting over the controller with the built in motion tracking so I don’t have to deal with the little dongle thing disconnecting mid game
The monoliths are easily explainable, it was the same Precursors that riddled the land of Jak & Daxter of course! It’s common geographical knowledge that Wuhu Island is visible from Geyser Rock
Ah of course! You can even see Wuhu Island from the top of Gol and Maia's citadel at the end of the game! Mystery solved!
I'm not sure about this because I don't have the game. But doesn't the info about there being two different tribes come from Pilotwings Resort?
Also Wuhu Island isn't a tropical island, there are seasons. As we can see in Wii Fit.
A bit of headcanon I have regarding the eruption of the volcano 200 years ago. I think this eruption somehow destroyed the previous Mii settlement on the island. Then it was entirely rebuilt as Wuhu Town. The buildings all share a similar architectural style, meaning they were built around the same time, and they also look like the kind of buildings that would have been built a couple centuries ago in Europe. Also the castle was probably built at the same time.
This is such a classic game theory. We need to get Matpat on this!!
I know this is all just a bit of fun but my brother in Christ, you really went balls deep in this “lore” for Wii Sports Resort ahahaha I can’t believe I just watched this. But hey I guess that’s the point, I still watched it
An ester egg that I found proves the theory of fake ruins wrong: the serpent’s cavern is haunted with ghostly singing at night (yes you can hear it in wii sports resort) so they must be genuine.
that could be speakers put in like disney’s haunted mansion ride
I would love to live on Wuhu island!! Sounds like a fantastic place! Especially when considering that you can discover the many hidden areas all throughout the island (e.g. the hidden cove, the ancient ruins, etc.). 🌴🌴🌴
my theory is that during ww2 nintendo killed all natives and turned island into luxery resort.
This could also explain the i Icon that says that no one dares to explore the deep pitch in the ruins. Because it’s fake and leads to nowhere. Its a good theory.
I want to play Arma with this as a map. I love this island so much, and I think that would be hilarious.
I'm so glad I came across this channel when I did!
Archipelago pronunciation is driving me crazy
I would love it if you would discuss the We Ski, We Ski and Snowboard and Go Vacation trilogy. Those games are absolutely fascinating and I think there may be some interesting stuff to dive into. Until then I will be watching the rest your content, seems like you're doing some interesting stuff here!
Go vacation has some super fascinating lore!
i'm a year late to the party but the "pine" trees could be norfolk island "pines" or another species of araucaria? after all, araucarias grow on tropical islands, including new caledonia and new guinea where they're native, and hawaii and the florida keys where they're not. and they look more like those conical trees than most true pines do. (we think of pines being christmas-tree shaped, but most pines aren't at all; those are mostly spruce and fir)
Its crazy how I care more about Wuhu lore and history than actual human history lol
How did i end up here
This is an interesting theory but also a cursed one. A very well made video to show the least.
Both fortunately and unfortunately, Wuhu Island hasn’t been seen in many games, especially recently. Both Mario Kart 7 tracks were datamined for Mario Kart Tour, but that won’t affect the lore.
I shall patiently await the sequel! I didn’t realize that fucking Wuhu Island lore would become my new hyper fixation but here we are
You fixed the audio, let's go
3:47 Few seconds in and already something’s wrong, the vehicles on the island are electric.
now this is the type of history lesson that I like 😌the wii universe and wuhu island are just out of this world (ps: as a chilean, seeing Rapa Nui in this video is funny as hell)
woohoo island is nauru can’t change my mind
I think the fact that I live for this type of content is a strong sign of schizophrenia
Just got recommended this vid! Hope it’s on the rise as this is a very exciting theory and the editing was fantastic!
I'm pretty sure that even the castle lights up once you get enough i Points, and there are Miis who stand on the outside balconies.
This corroborates your theory by proving that the castle is so well situated in the modern day that it has electrical infrastructure and Miis are likely already touring it.
I don't know much about electrical work, but I feel it would be pretty difficult to energize an ancient structure so (relatively) far away from the main town/power grid... Unless the infrastructure for elecrical work was already present when the castle was built!
A little late, but the castle itself is also full of plot holes. I don't know what the geography looked like before the eruption, but there's 2 possibilities:
1. The eruption wasn't that severe and as such didn't change the island all that much. This is a possibility due to the fact that all 3 "ancient structures" (the castle, the underground ruins, and the mysterious ruins near the cycling road/lagoon) survived the eruption. If the eruption was that mild, then that would mean a few things. First, that would mean the castle was the only thing ever built by the so-called ancient civilization on that side of the island, which doesn't make sense. Why would a castle near ground zero of the eruption be the only thing that survives? The only alternative is that there was nothing else to survive, which is extremely unlikely. Second, the extreme lack of aged trees on the island contradicts this possibility, as mentioned in the video. Third, look at the position of the castle. To start, It's relatively far away from any agricultural potential. The forest nearby seems plausible, but it's already a cliff away from the castle *after* the eruption. To my knowledge, eruptions tend to smooth out islands, so if the cliff is that steep after the eruption, it doesn't seem plausible that a potentially much steeper pre-eruption cliff would be consistently traversable without modern technology. That's also assuming that the cliff-surrounded land would even be suitable for farming. Lastly, it's pretty high up on the mountain. It would be very unwise to build something like that so high up for a variety of reasons. I already mentioned how there's no nearby agriculture-supporting land and how it would be at ground zero of an eruption, but it could also potentially be crushed or damaged by landslides or avalanches, it would be eroded by the nearby water, and could possibly be destroyed if the cliff it's on falls apart. It's just way too unlikely that all of these conditions weren't present.
2. The other possibility is that the volcanic eruption was highly destructive. If that was the case, the castle wouldn't have survived, plain and simple.
The cars are electric according to their i point, the Castle might have some sort of sustainable power possibly from the waterfall
I feel like if Nintendo made this a real resort it would make BANK
It isn't impossible since they're coming out with their own theme parks.
But they're going to need to get some Disney like money to buy (Or make) an island and develop it and make it cost effective.
Man, My younger brain made those graphics look *so* much better.
Jumping to conclusuons the video
That was insane! I'm so hyped for the next Wuhu Island video!
actually it's the other way around.
the simple rough cut stone pillars are made by the later civilisation, while the smooth cut temples were made by the first civilisation.
the first civ was wiped out by the vulcano, the second civilisation are the people who survived the cataclysm and now have no more tools and nothing, so they start all over again, with a more primitive building style. clearly, because the island is just too small, the second civ sinply abandoned wuhu island and never came back.
then, thousand of years later, the modern mii discovers wuhu and builds a sports resort on top of it.
same happened in ancient egypt. the older the buildings get, the more advanced they are.
mouse cursor spotted in the corner at 6:58
Jokes aside, this video is really well-made! The one complaint I have is that the b-roll footage of the landscapes seems to... lack lighting in some way. The sky is bright in a lot of areas, but the island's landscape itself is unnaturally dark, leading to a weird contrast that feels like an incomplete or glitchy render
I really don’t think the developers chose those trees because of the lore behind the origins of wuhu island. It’s just the asset they chose lol
This is by far the best vid to watch high. Weirdly captivating
Me now
Great video, and great channel. Hope we get that part 2 soon.
I of course can't just say "well it's just a game" because that takes the fun out of it.. Though it feels most clear to say it's a well thought out project from a group who wanted a story for tourism, and not a single bit further. With some corporate (nintendo) magic, we've arrived here!
It's an in-between of it being a game, and it being a world. A world put together by someone rather than a game engine and some code
Neat analysis video! Thanks for uploading!
In Wii Fit U, there is a minigame called 'hose down' where, in the advanced level, you shoot water at muddy characters in (i think) Summerstone Castle, and in Super Advanced, you play in the ancient ruins. If these ruins and castles were real and sacred to the Miis, you would certainly not be allowed to play any resort games, involving water and mud especially, there. Also inbreeding.
this was great. This game was my childhood and even since then I knew something was off about it
This is some underrated stuff. New sub
The island to me as a kid always felt fake too. Like a park you go to with your parents on vacation like a theme park.
The difference is: in real life you can tell its just a facade but in a videogame basically everything is a facade so we can never know what is 'real' or whats facade. It was really clever to do it that way so its a really organic and interesting place
The Mii Bureau of Investigation will be in contact with you shortly.
excited for episode 2 :)
Some times an apple is just an apple. But i love the video it was fun to watch.
yeah i always assumed that the castle was fake but the idea of the temples being as well is new to me
Amazing video! One small thing:
Hearing you say Arch-i-pelago is killing me. The “ch” in that word is pronounced with a “K” sound, like “Monarch”
Sounds like a skill issue
7:39 i def agree. the monoliths might be earlier or a shrine
The reason Wii Fit's Wuhu Island (Wii Fit Island) is different than the resort one is probably because well, Design. Wii fit island was probably just an earlier version of Wuhu Island
"These are not real ruins"
Well, I didn't need a functioning brain today, anyway.
Do you know how long I have been waiting to find a video like this. I always new the island was hiding something
Glad to know I'm not the only one who overthinks Nintendo games! 👍
How can the monument in the vulcano still be there if he erupted?
This changes everything
I always thought that the board game island from wii party was the original base for wuhu island. Then the winner (who won all the gold) developed the island from there
I actually love this idea so much
Lets hear what this guy gotta say about my home
Bro. What are you talking about?
The history of Wuhu island
Now how do all the Wii series games fit together? are they on the same island? is Wii Sports and Wii Sports Club on the same island as Resort?
Are Wii Sports, Wii Sports Resort, Wii Sports Club, Wii Play, Wii Play Motion, Wii Fit, Wii Fit Plus, Wii Fit U, Wii Music, Wii Party, Wii Party U, Wii Chess, and Nintendo Switch Sports all connected? How about the other Mii games? The Tomodachi games, Miitopia, Miitomo, and even the channels/apps on the Wii, 3DS, and Wii U that had miis like the Check Mii Out Channel, Swapnote, Streetpass Plaza, etc.
Is this just all one big Miiverse?
I’d like to edit the “Two Civilizations” hypothesis to the “Two Tribes hypothesis”
Basically:
There seem to be religious differences on the further island. They likely had different gods. They probably shared gods. The difference came down to the Supreme god. Is clear that Wuhu island had the volcano itself as their god. Likely their god of fertility as the volcanic soils made good growing soil for the crops. The other tribe worshipped the sea god as the Supreme god. The giant carving shaped like a crab was probably their Idol that they worshiped. The monoliths were pretty clear it was for the volcanic god. So eventually the volcanic tribe tried to set up a monolith around Crab Island. The people got pissed and attacked the builders (hence only 2 stone pillars) and they went to war. The volcano erupts and kills most. The rest die of starvation as the crops would be burned up, and fish are poisoned by the volcanic acid.
Wuhu island battle royale when
Is there more of this???
dude we need a part 2 asap
the more you know🤔 thank you for this incredible insight. subscribed.
That’s enough internet for today.
20:06 “that’s unrealistic!” 😂
This place seems like a paradice
I'm surprised that there not a GMOD wuhu island RP server
2:45 Wuhu Island also appears in Rhythm Heaven Fever's Air Rally.
To give a idea of how small is Wuhu Island Manhattan is about 22.7 square miles so yeah you could put the whole island of Wuhu inside Manhattan.
Now this is content
Videos on back to back days? SeedButter is really grinding out content hard for us!
#grindset
Nintendo: "Let's slap on some ruins and a castle, that'll look cool."
Nintendo fans scrambling for a crumb of story from a company that could not give less of a shit about story: "THE LOOOOOOOOOOORREEEE!"
Jokes aside, great video, it was a fun watch, I do think it's fun to try and make stories from nothing but environments and context.
Love it!!
Shit, he figured it out boys
the possibility of Mii slavery is so bizarre
At some point, you’re going to have to address the idea that Wuhu Island in-universe is a bit bigger than presented in-game. Sort of like how a lot of open world games that supposedly take place in a large country or region are represented with the equivalent of a few square miles.