Although I dislike the GamePad controller as a means as a system seller for the Wii U, I'm beginning to see its benefit as a gamer little by little. One of these benefits is its off screen TV play. It almost makes the system a handheld, except it needs reception from the Wii U like how a TV remote needs to be near a TV. And like a TV, the only set up is a power outlet. This is great because you can play Wii U games in the airport, library, or an outdoor cafe that has outlets on the building walls. But that power outlet still limits its mobility.

So why not make the Wii U like a laptop or handheld and have its own battery with a charger? The answer is obvious. It will make its price even more expensive for the average consumer. But how much is that cost? And why not make a separate model?

I don't know if the Wii U was suppose to be a mobile and home console, but this can be another selling point (or gimmick for some people) it can boast.

Wii U is not meant to be mobile, as I don't think any Nintendo home console will ever be like that. This is because they make more money selling handhelds and home consoles seperately. If you want gaming on the go, just get a 3DS!

The Wii U consumes 32W during a game.

The Wii U gamepad has a 5.6 watt-hour battery.

If you wanted to run your Wii U for 6 hours without a recharge, you'd need 34 Gamepad batteries in the thing.

In other words: not possible.

I'm going to mutilate myself some math!

The Wii U uses 75 Watts of power. In contrast, the 3DS uses a 7 Watt charger, which charges the system slightly faster than the 3DS consumes it. So let's say the Wii U needs 12 3DS's worth of batteries to work for a similar length of time. The regular 3DS's battery is 1300 mAh. So let's multiply that by 12 to get about 15,000 mAh.

Meanwhile, when I go onto Amazon, I can see rechargable batteries of about 5000 MAH for $30. Assuming that plastic is free, we can triple that and call it about $100 extra for 3DS-like battery life.

The problem is, the entire console would have to be redesigned in order to accommodate the huge-ass battery(ies) in it. So maybe the entire unit would have to cost more, making it less portable. Alternatively, Nintendo could use smaller but more expensive parts to keep the size down.

Either way, I can't see a portable Wii U costing less than $150 extra, and still having the bare minimum battery life for a portable system. That's $450 minimum. Not an attractive price for a handheld.

450$ is expensive but still cheaper than PS4 plus Vita. Can you guesstimate how big the Wii U would have to be after getting this massive battery?

The 3DS battery is 1300mAh at 3.7V = 4.68W, because there's some losses in the charger.

Somehow, I knew that my math would no add up.

So even my $150 guess was about $50 short then?

In that case, I'd expect the Wii U to have to grow by 30 or 50% in volume to accomodate the massive battery.

And to think that this is an energy efficent console...