Long before the Wii U was officially announced, Wii owners everywhere were already dreading the seemingly inevitable reality of having to re-purchase their Virtual Console content on a new system. And ever since Wednesday’s Nintendo Direct conference, where the Big N laid out its plans for the Wii U’s solution to that service, the web has been in an uproar. It would seem the months/years of pent-up dread has finally come bubbling to the surface, and it’s definitely not pretty.

1.) You don’t have to rebuy your games. Stop saying that.

2.) It’s perfectly reasonable to charge for additional services.

3.) A dollar is a really fair price for what’s being offered.

4.) Babies Keep Getting Born

5.) You Are Not Entitled to Cross-Buy

Thing is - we don’t really have anything to complain about. At all. Read on for five reasons Wii U’s Virtual Console service is perfectly fair, and why it makes no sense to be angry.There seems to be some confusion about this fact, as people keep throwing around the complaint, “I can’t believe I have to rebuy my Virtual Console games for Wii U!” The problem with this complaint is that you don’t have to. Without spending a dime, or ever even setting eyes on the Virtual Console section of the Wii U eShop, you are fully able to play all of the retro games you bought for Wii on your new system. You do not have to rebuy those games to have them on your Wii U, what you’re being offered is the option to purchase an additional service (which I’ll get to in a moment).In other words, if you bought Super Mario 64 on your Wii, just transfer your data over to Wii U and you can still grab a Classic controller and access/play the game just as before (your save files will even remain intact). It’s understandable to be a bit peeved that you have to go into Wii mode to play these games, since that can be slow to load, but to say Nintendo is forcing gamers to pay twice for games they already own is simply and egregiously inaccurate.Look, I know all about being a petulant gamer who just wants all gaming companies to give me exactly what I want the moment I want it and totally free of charge. Having those thoughts is inevitable, especially for people who devote a large part of their free time to a singular hobby. But don’t confuse what you want with what you’re entitled to. Nintendo has the right to charge for the goodsand services it offers. It’s called the free market, and it’s a beautiful thing. As a company (read: a business out to make money, not a magical, game-making fairy machine only out to give you free happiness) Nintendo has every right to charge consumers for a new service they’ve conceived. And consumers have every right to elect to buy into that service, or to make the personal call that the cost isn’t worth the return. It’s all really simple. And all very fair.Basically, on a game by game basis and in exchange for a completely reasonable price (more on that in a moment), Nintendo is giving gamers the option to play their VC games on the GamePad, to use Restore Points, to not have to jump into Wii mode to access Wii content, and to have access to special Miiverse communities centered around these games. So we were all dreading having to rebuy those games, and it turns out we don’t have to. We all hoped we’d get to play them on the GamePad and have Miiverse functionality added, and they do - but for a trifling price. There’s absolutely nothing to complain about. Being disappointed is one thing, but it’s ludicrous to call foul play when Nintendo is simply offering goods and services in exchange for money. That’s just business, folks. Even the House of Mario is allowed to turn a profit.Okay, so we’ve already established that Nintendo’s Wii U Virtual Console “upgrade” service is both optional and reasonable - but on top of that, it’s also being offered at a ridiculously fair price. For just $1 per NES game or $1.50 per SNES game, you’re granted access to all those features outlined in the last section (GamePad support, Miiverse functionality, Restore Points, etc). For what you’re getting, that’s peanuts. You probably pay less to Super Size your lunchtime snack.Also note that there was nothing stopping the Big N from charging full price to re-download these games with the added Wii U benefits. That would have been infuriating, but they’ve done it before (a lot), and they could have easily done it again and watched the money stream in as many of us (probably including you) begrudgingly paid to download the original Super Mario Bros. for the hundredth time. To complain that they’re charging an extra buck to upgrade your games with Wii U specific features is just plain wrong.Besides, that’s cool if you disagree, but I will gladly pay a buck fifty to play Mega Man X on the GamePad before checking out a board full of Zero art and hearing all about people experiencing the game for the first time. Money well spent, in my humble opinion.I know this is a hard concept to swallow for those of us who grew up in the Golden Age of gaming with a D-pad planted firmly beneath our thumbs, but these old games are actually new to a lot of people. Gasp! You see… well, the birds and the bees… that is to say… okay, so let’s just say babies keep on getting born. Makes sense, right? What’s more, most of those babies were born after the NES/SNES/N64/GameCube came out (it hurts, I know), and so they’ve never played (and most likely have never even had access to) all these classic games. Furthermore - everyone who grew up in the time of the NES didn’t necessarily play all those games then. They maybe have had other things to do, other things to spend their money on, or even other (lamer) toys to play with. I swear to you, all of this is true.So why wouldn’t Nintendo continue to sell their old games when there’s still clearly a huge market for it (a constantly renewing and expanding market, at that)? The games themselves certainly haven’t diminished in value. In fact, many of them are still some of the greatest and most highly regarded games of all time - so charging a small fraction of their original cost to allow new and old gamers alike to partake in their awesomeness sounds pretty reasonable to me. And just because most of the world is used to buying throwaway experiences for a dollar on their iPhone doesn’t mean it’s unreasonable for Nintendo to charge more for these full experiences from its rich past. And why wouldn’t they? No one ever gets mad at Warner Bros. for re-releasing Casablanca in every new video format that comes out. No one would claim that a Beatles album isn’t worth downloading for $10 now that it’s half a century old. The same is true for games. And the fact that Nintendo is keeping Virtual Console pricing consistent with what it was on Wii, even despite the additional services being added, is actually really cool of them. Again, nothing to complain about here.To be clear, this next bit is sort of a side-note - but it’s intimately related and thusly important to note. Sony’s Cross-Buy service is really cool. In fact, I far prefer it to Nintendo’s approach, as for one purchase you can play a game on both your PS3 and your Vita. It kills me that I had to pay twice to have Metroid on both my Wii/Wii U and my 3DS. But while Cross Buy is a service I love and prefer, it’s not something I’m entitled to. That’s really awesome that Sony decided to go that route - and I hope one day Nintendo does the same - but again, there’s a difference between wanting something and being entitled to it. If Nintendo wants to keep the Virtual Console for Wii U and 3DS separate for the foreseeable future (though hopefully the arrival of Game Boy Advance games on Wii U will somehow change all that), that’s its prerogative to do so. Consumers can choose to either pay twice or just deal with not having those games on the go (a service they were never promised to begin with).In other words, just because I bought a movie on VHS, that doesn’t mean I’m automatically entitled to a DVD, Blu-ray, digitaland PSP version of the same movie. If I want it in any of those new formats, I have to cough up the cash. Why is this concept understandable for a two hour movie, but not for an eight to 100 hour game? While Cross-Buy is clearly the most attractive proposition, that doesn’t mean all gaming companies have to follow suit, or that it’s even okay to slam them for choosing the more traditional business model of actually charging for the content they created.

Understand that I’m not trying to tell you how to feel about this news or Nintendo’s new service. Given all the facts, if you’re still angry about having to pay to access your VC games without going into Wii mode, it’s absolutely your right to feel that way. But please take a moment to consider the facts before lobbying undue criticism at a move that is, in my opinion, actually quite reasonable when you really consider the facts.What are your thoughts on this subject? If you can keep your cool, we could all have a really great conversation about it in the comments section. We don’t have to agree to have a fruitful discussion, and I’d love to hear about all the sides of the argument I may not be considering. Chat on, and thanks for your time.

Audrey Drake is an Associate Editor at IGN and a proud member of the IGN Nintendo team. She is also a lifelong gamer, a frequent banisher of evil and a wielder of various legendary blades. You can keep track of her wild adventures by following Aminka on IGN or @GameOnAminka on Twitter. Game on!