EVERYONE WHO PLAYS SMASH FOR WII U, READ THIS!!

Damn...the strangest thing happened to me, this morning...

So I turned on my Wii U, to play some smash, but an error message pops up saying "There is a problem with the Sytem Memory. For help, make a note of the error code and visit support.nintendo.com - Error 160-0103".

I did some research and it seems many people are having this issue. Nothing works as of now, deleting system and save files don't solve it and trying to delete the update only results in the same error message. Every other game I have works fine, the console only has problems loading Smash. I have a video of someone having the same exact problem i'm talking about:

It's weird because i've played yesterday and it worked fine. It wasn't always turned on either, I did 3 playing sessions in total. I don't mean to cause panic or anything, but this is NOT an isolated issue. It's happening to many people and it's spreading, so everyone who plays Smash BE VERY CAREFUL! Do EVERYTHING you can to avoid possible file corruption:

- NEVER TURN OFF YOUR WII U WHILE IN THE GAME! Always close it, wait for the Wii U Menu and then turn it off.

- Never hook off your Wii U. If it's doing something, like deleting a file or updating or something, and it's taking longer than usual always wait for it to do something. It might be able to advance eventually, only if it doesn't you go ahead and unplug it.

- Blackouts cannot be predicted, but it's safe to say it can cause trouble xD

Wii U...you're great and all, you certainly have the best games by far, but your hardware is some of the worst i've ever seen :(

I just tested my game and everything work just fine. I always close the software before closing the consol for every game I have and I do the update when there is one ... so yeah everything is golden here.

do you have an external harddrive? is that where the smash file is? if you do then just reformat it on your pc....you will lose all your saves but it will work again.

if its not an external harddrive and its actually your system memory...then that is very bad and you need nintendo to fix it.

we need people like you to tell nintendo about this...so they can patch it later.

My copy sometimes freezes before it starts. It stays at that first title screen (at the :39 mark in your video) and never loads. One time only I did get that same error you did. But the other times it just stays on that logo scree and I have to hold the power button on the console to turn it off.

The same thing happens with my copy of Lego City, but not at start up. It'll happen during gameplay. I was considering trying another WIi U. But now I see that may not be the problem.

Thanks for posting this. That is strange.

I own SSB Wii U, but I haven't even opened mine yet...I will be keeping an eye on this.

Three Questions:

1. Do you have the 32GB or 8GB system?
2. Do you own a launch Wii U?
3. Do you have an external HDD you are using with the machine?

There are some HDDs that Nintendo does not recommend.

External powered HDDs (power cords) are recommended by Nintendo, I can't STRESS THAT ENOUGH!

It's just a guess, but I bet you are using the wrong kind of external HDD. Just because a NON-recommended HDD works sometimes doesn't mean you won't eventually run into an issue, which is what I suspect you have been doing. If you have been using the wrong kind of storage and it was working...you got lucky. You push that luck when you buy new games and problems eventually arise. Using the wrong kind of external HDD and since it was working on other games and even though it went against Nintendo's recommendations, you may have continued to use the wrong kind of HDD. There is a reason Nintendo listed the kinds of Storage/HDDs you should use. I do agree, I wish the hardware was better. I went to the settings last night after accepting an update and I hate the loading times moving around the system UI even offline. Hopefully this problem you reported and documented will get figured out soon enough.

Thank you for posting this. Interesting.

I own the 32GB model, it was purchased near launch.

I use a USB 16GB flash drive, where I keep a few digital games, but every update, save and system file is inside the internal HDD. I highly doubt it's the flash drive's fault, it works fine with everything else...2 years and counting! The only corrupted file is the SSBU update, which I couldn't delete. It must be that file!

Anyway, I sent it for repair today so i'm hoping they'll fix it quickly...

That's most likely your problem right there...

That's why I asked what kind of HDD he was using. I figured that was the problem. It's what I speculated before he answered. At least I narrowed down the probable reason for his problems.

I'm not using any type of HDD for my Wii U, but if I did, I already bought an External Nintendo recommended HDD with it's own power supply if the need should arise. Thankfully, I buy all my multiplats on other platforms saving space and saving me trouble having to attach an ugly external device in my living-room.

Of course, Nintendo is not off the hook, this error certainly can be on their end, but it's all food for thought.

@Xyekenvort: a bunch of articles came out yesterday, some say this error can make the game unplayable and break it.

heres one of the articles explaining it

http://www.nintendolife.com/news/2014/12/super_smash_bros_for_wii_u_facing_potential_error_code_nightmare

Very true it could still be on Nintendo's end as hardware is never 100% fault proof. However, Flash Drives don't typically have near the read speed to run video games like the ones we have today thus the reason you get frame skips and slower game and load speeds. Flash Drives should never be used for high end gaming.