Brought my Wii U over for Thanksgiving, but we couldn't play Sketch (which is our favorite Game and Wario game) because the television blanks out.
After we start Game and Wario and go to the Sketch game, we select the number of players (3 or 4) and start taking photos. Around this time, the television begins to cut in and out, though the gamepad continues to work just fine. The TV is actually becoming unresponsive, as trying to navigate menus with the TV remote is hampered because when the TV cuts in, the menu is cleared. It's not just the screen going in and out. We'll see the game pop on the TV for about two seconds, then cut out for five, then appear again for two seconds, rendering the game completely unplayable. What's weird is that it only happens when playing Sketch, and sometimes very briefly during Islands on Game and Wario (for about five seconds, once or twice during a roughly five minute game).
Pressing the home button once to bring up the menu with "Close game" causes the problem to cease. The television displays the screen just fine. Pressing home again to return to playing Sketch causes the television to start blacking out again.
This only happens on the television at my parent's house. When playing Sketch on Game and Wario (or any other game) at my own home, the game and television run just fine. I am using all the same cables, including the same HD cable.
We played several other games at my parent's house on the same tv with no problem. We played Game and Wario for about an hour (playing through the first four games, plus a round of Taxi and Pirates). We played The Wonderful 101 for about two hours without problems. We played Super Metroid from the Virtual Console with no problems.
I cannot figure out why that one specific part of Game and Wario would cause this problem. We tried playing Sketch, giving up, playing something else on the Wii U for an hour, then going back to Sketch. Every time it has the same problem, and every time it vanishes if we push Home or go play something else. I assume it's something to do with the television, but we haven't got a clue how to diagnose something like this. It just doesn't make sense for one part of the game to cause a problem to the TV, and the rest of the game to not. We fiddled with a few settings on the TV, but nothing seems to help.
I can't find anyone on the internet mentioning anything like this. Any recommendations on what could cause this would be appreciated, to help figure out what settings on the television might need to be changed.