Miyamoto gives his reasons for why Wii U failed

The PS4 seems to be doing fine.

it was a fad and it dominated like clash of clans or candy crush now dominates...had nothing to do with actual gamers

These are some of the nails that will seal the inevitable Wii U coffin.

1. Horrible marketing: to this day non gamers still think the Wii U is Fisher Price ad on

2. Under powered hardware and difficult to develop for architecture: scared away 3rd party developers quite nicely

3. Silly touch pad controller: added unnecessary costs and was never utilized fully

4. Nintendo's unwillingness to recognize their own hubris: too many things to list

Two many things to list, Nintendo is a shamble of a company, If I were them I would pay a third party like Valve or someone to design,build, do everything with the next console, hire EA or get Valve to do the online and store, basically be the name behind the hardware only, keep doing the software but stay the hell away from the hardware and its functions, be a third party games developer for your own hardware basically.

They have zero clue about the market, instead stuck in their own world trying desperately to preach to the masses "this is how gaming should be done!!".

Man I really hope NX has backwards compatability.

Make the NX nice Nintendo and let Doug Bowser and this video help you with marketing.

everything about that console is wrong....

how long are iwata and reggie going to keep their jobs? they are wasting soo much talent and ips with all the bonehead decisions.

Well the investors want Iwata to stay now so it looks like he will be able to keep his job for at least the next half-decade or so unless he retires or steps down himself.

That's mostly seeing things from his own perspective. There is more to it.

Basically Nintendo got cocky, they thought it would sell on it's own because of the name.. like the DS. Instead they created confusion for the basic consumer.

When I look at it in the stores, or watch the tiny amount of ads they have on TV, I still have to keep in mind that it's not just a tablet add-on for the Wii.

The fact that it's technically not on par (or at least close to it) with the other 2 systems, doesn't really help either. And that's where 3rd party support comes into play as well.

I think if Wii U was priced better(150) it would have sold.

There is a modicum of truth in what he says but it's a very political answer which ignores some stark truths.

The console does not provide the games most people want. 2D platformers on other platforms (PC, PS4, X1, other) are indie titles for £5-10, because their heydey is over. Cheap to make, smaller teams required. And they are often good. Games like Guacamelee, Spelunky. Nintendo is releasing these for full price. And they aren't even original. Same old mushroom kingdom/hyrule franchises. You can't even get crap like Dynasty Warriors without a 25 year old coat of paint. What did they announce at E3? Mario Tennis. Everything with the mushroom kingdom filter.

There are almost no action adventure/rpgs on the system, which is what is major today. The only ones to my mind are a couple of Assassins Creed games, released before Ubisoft followed suit to ditch out on them. Oh and a late Mass Effect game. Lacking the third party (which is Nintendo's fault and a huge hurdle the NX will still have to overcome) is massive in this regard. Massive. Oh and it's Nintendo's fault, I know the NDF will state otherwise, but it's every single company only out to make money vs Nintendo, it's obvious what's been going on. They told you the third parties were on board - a lie. They got a few only, with no long term plans, and they're done.

Losing the third party means - no official sports titles, which are a staple for many, missing out on action adventure/rpg games like Witcher 3 and Fallout 4, mass appeal titles. Missing out on whole genres. Nintendo doesn't provide diversity, so it's destined to be niche, with a flavour of the same 25 year old games, so it's their diminishing hardcore keeping them going.

He was of course correct about the price point. I stated it a long time ago. Remember - they promised it wouldn't be this way. You bought the console on a lie. They promised power wise it wouldn't be behind the playstation and xbox this time, that it could keep up. There aren't any games which show a superiority against the last gen, again. It's so far behind, third parties couldn't port their games even if they wanted to.

It's underpowered and they relied on a gimmick "tablet". The claim is, they were too late to cash in on the tablet craze. They didn't even try. @locopatho above has had some of the right ideas. They didn't provide the right games for it.

Another thing he missed out on was the bad faith Nintendo accumulated with the wii. They would have to admit defeat on that. Basically ditching the gamer for casuals, who ditched them in return. They failed to support it for a long long time to the end. It experienced massive droughts. Sound familiar? Lesson learned for many, who promptly bought the PS4 this time because Sony are still supporting the PS3 today.

Nintendo better not be making the same mistakes with the NX, but I have little faith. They're too insular, stubborn and slow. The only reality they believe is the one they create.

They keep on making mistakes. Maybe I'd be hopeful if they didn't make asses out of themselves on a continual basis, but they do. It's not like when this new system hits Nintendo will all of a sudden transform into some completely different entity that makes all different choices uncharacteristic of their past. It's going to be run by the same people, doing the same things.

As long as that doesn't change, I'm worried.

I might pay 100 € for a Wii U right now.

$349.99 for what is essentially last gen tech.

If it was $249.99 it would have sold much better.

For what the Wii U is under the hood, yeah, $350 was asking too much. That Gamepad jacked the price up big time. It's a really expensive controller. People are willing to pay a premium if they feel the value is worth it. I mean, the PS4 is selling at $50 more than the Wii U did at launch. The Wii U had poor value right from the get-go and many people didn't even understand what the **** it was. Nintendo failed on both technical and marketing fronts.

Nintendo it would seem like most Japanese gaming companies or most big companies in general just don't understand or see the writing on the wall. Things always change and you can recognize and adapt or you can stay the course and fail.

When Nintendo was an unstoppable juggernaut was during the NES-SNES era, when they made traditional consoles with equal or above power, a traditional controller, and the full support of 3rd party. Then along came the era of being slow to adapt with the N64 non traditional controller and failure to use CDs, GameCube weird controller for no reason, specialized discs to combat piracy, and no 3rd party support, Wii gimmick motion controls, underpowered console, total abandonment of 3rd party, no online multiplayer, no game chat, and finally WiiU horrible name, gimmicky controller, under powered system, high price, all aspects of online still far behind competition, and total abandonment of 3rd party.

Maybe Nintendo will return to their once prominent self, but 4 consoles of the same thing says otherwise. Maybe they'll learn when they're close to being another Sega story.

If it was expensive at launch, it's even more ridiculous now. That P.O.S. should be $199 or $149 to reflect it's obsolete status. The fact it's still $275-$300 shows even more clueless-ness on nintendo's part.

I don't think price was necessarily the problem, it just had more to do with how dated/cheap the hardware was relative to what you were paying for. The Wii-U tablet just looked like a P.O.S to anyone that had a proper tablet in 2012. Cutting corners might have been fine on the tablet, if the machine itself was far more powerful. But unfortunately the hardware and games were also last gen calibre.

Yes because it got games

Fixed.

It failed because nobody not even the knows why Wii was such a success.

I'm assuming marketing had something to do with it, like those companies that sell vacuum cleaners for >£200 by telling you it's the best thing ever, maybe Nintendo should have done that.

Let's see...

- Basically what amounts to zero fucking 3rd party support once again

- A woefully underpowered console in general

- The worst online of any of the platforms

- A clunky, gimmicky controller

- A totally non-existent advertising campaign

- Arguably the worst fucking name in the history of consoles

Those are some of the reasons that the Wii U has been a colossal failure. Not because "people didn't understand it".

It's clear as day that Nintendo just doesn't know what the **** they're doing anymore with regards to the console market. The NX will inevitably fail and then they'll go the way of Sega and just develop software for the other platforms.

I don't think people even debate that, there is a general consensus it is the worst name in the history of consoles.

True

Sad to see Nintendo reduced to this and be well on their way out, but it is what it is.

My problem with Wii U is the game pad, it is a must for the console, and even if I bought their controller I need to use the pad to start the games and what not. the Controller and Pad each has different charger...much hassle

I think that's been one of Nintendo's biggest problems for multiple generations now.

Trying to be too innovative with their controller designs.

The NES and SNES controllers were simple, straight forward and fucking amazing for their time.

Then starting with the N64 they started doing a bunch of goofy shit.

Meanwhile, Sony has stuck with the same base controller design since they jumped into the console market 20 years ago. And it's worked just fine for them.

You need take a break from SW and take a step out in the real world

This. Consumers love sequels. Nintendo seems to hate the obvious.

I think the gimmick thing has sailed. The Wii was the first console to successfully implement a gimmick to reel in the casuals, most past gimmicks have been niche or died. Microsoft and Sony jumped on board this train with Kinect and move, which first time around was successful for all companies.

Sony saw the backlash after Microsoft announced the Xbox One would come with Kinect and dropped the move, which turned out to be a great move. Microsoft have now clued up that the gimmick train has gone, but at least didn't integrate the Kinect totally and have hardware that can play the current games and has great third party support, so dropping the Kinect hasn't been a total nightmare, but certainly a blow.

Nintendo also went with 3D with 3DS which hasn't worked as a selling point because the 3D market at home died, so have had two gimmick failures. Both the 3D and tablet with WiiU was a big part of the system, so couldn't be dropped like Kinect. Maybe if Nintendo made a Wii Sports type title with the WiiU that would show off the WiiU it may have got it out the gate better, but terrible marketing and no Wii Sport type title to show off the system and even worse third party support than the Wii, mean it has been on life support since birth.

People seem to forget when Nintendo went for graphics they also failed. N64 and Gamecube anyone? Hardware power alone is not the answer. It never was. I know this is a prime opportunity to throw the kitchen sink at the Wii U but graphics never sold consoles. Games, price, and novelty do/did.

Gamers can't wait to point and laugh but trust me you don't want an industry with only Sony and Microsoft involved. We need that third console doing different things. Kids also need a family friendly option. Gaming without Nintendo is like movies without Pixar.

I think there were 3 main factors, and no, not because it is underpowered since power doesn't determine the success of a console, just look at the PS2, the Wii and the PS4 (compared to PC).

1.- Name....like many have said, the regular consumer didn't understood that it was a new console, that alone killed all the hype that could had at first since many weren't interested, of course i'm talking about the casual people because i think that most console enthusiast knew exactly what it was.

2.- Marketing...if Nintendo failed at naming their console, their Marketing team took that mistake even further, you know they were wrong when you see a marketing campaign saying, hey its a new console, sadly the damage was permanently done.

3.- Price...well yeah, maybe at first it wasn't that expensive, as we all know initial prices are all about getting back some of the investments, but by the time the newer consoles arrived they should have done a much more agressive cut.

And while there are more factors, i doubt any of them did more damaged than those, of course we had droughts, but that was because the console wasn't selling that much so no wonder developers weren't interested in putting their games on the WiiU.

The table, contrary to what many claim is actually a very functional controller that didn't made the console any worst, sadly it didn't made it that better either.

They're only failures if anything but #1 is a failure. Which is silly.

Nintendo has just brainwashed their fans (that still happily buy Nintendo stuff) into thinking they have to do something drastically different.

I mean, I think if they made something like a gamecube 2 it would do even better than the first one, since the market is bigger now. If the NX is $300 or less, has more power than Ps4, and has proper support, that's all they need. They can have some quirky optional stuff, i'd love to see them bring the Wii mote and nunchuck back but improved, but they need to get that foundation down.

You've nailed it all without needless hyperbole or the equivalent of dancing on Wii U's grave.

Nice to see an admission of failure and some honest reasons from his perspective.

Honestly I don't know what Nintendo could do. They can't shake that "kid friendly" image and their Direct press conferences do not help. They also sit on a lot of great franchises instead of packing a year full of spaced out, AAA quality exclusives that they were always known for. They could be giving fans a new and exciting game every 3-4 months if they wanted too.

Another thing is Nintendo needs to get the 3rd parties on board. Part of that is putting out a console that isn't significantly weaker than the competition and has a similar architecture for easier support. Drop the wannabe Xbox 360 and go x86 like the PS4 and Xbox One. Given the NX is coming out in 2017, it could actually be the most powerful console on the market yet still be affordable. That would be neat.

Without 3rd party support, it's really hard for non-Nintendo fans to care. Nintendo is going to have to ramp up their exclusive game if they want to get people interested. Exclusives that aren't gloried fan-services like Super Smash Brothers and Mario Kart. As a non Nintendo fan I don't really care about being able to beat up Nintendo characters or race them. That novelty is completely lost on me. What does interest me is that new Zelda game. Why isn't that out?

[I commented on that article yesterday so I'll just copy/paste]

Price wasn't the problem [well in my opinion on pricing] it was the lack of quality games that the Wii U had problems from the gek-go, Really miyamoto you fool, it's the lack of games that the Wii U had to suffer since arrival, not the damn price. The Tablet on the other hand, it's hardly an issue.

Edit: the Wii U name is also the biggest problem you fool.

At this point, Nintendo already burn the bridges even more on 3rd party this time around and by that time there new console comes out 2017 or so, Nintendo will still be far behind PS4/Xbox One so the best thing to do is come up with something we haven't seen before. And it's like you said a long time ago, 3rd party will always view Nintendo as second-rate the kiddy friendly gaming world and that's where Nintendo has a problem.

As far as why Zelda isn't coming out this year, I rather they take there time with it and I'm hoping it pushes the Wii U hardware to it's limits and I haven't seen any 1st party game able to push it.

they dont try to shake the kiddy image at all. they actually firmly reaffirm it.

they like to make their consoles kiddy. its who they are. some people like it (me)....some dont...

Well everything was dandy before Sony and MS started to talk about their next consoles and their specs. Blew my mind at the time and I knew Nintendo couldn't retaliate specs wise, they would have to do it with games, but then the 3rd party eventually left and then..... you get the picture.

I really don't see any way that the NX could become a good console. First off, let's assume the highly likely outcome that it will be equal or less powerful as the ps4 or xb1. Nintendo would still have to change their policies on third parties, and quite extremely considering that the NX would have a tiny user base since it is starting so late. In that reality we also have to think of the transition between gens for the ps5 and xb2, which would then outclass the NX. But let's then pretend that the NX would have an intriguing gimmick, and assume that the wiiu's tablet gimmick was just not as good as the wiimote and the NX gimmick would be a good one. In that reality, the NX would have all the same problems as the wii, and so we're talking about warm and fuzzy stock reports but not much in terms of games.

We could even pretend that maybe the NX will be a powerful beast in terms of hardware, making it more of a peer to modern PCs. There is even some opportunity to this considering that the ps4 and xbox1 were budget hardware at the time of launch even, made to be profitable early on because of the bad economy. What would this advantage get them? Third parties would rather stay low with the ps4 and xb1 where the money is. There are very few PC-only games that Nintendo could take advantage of anyway, now that most PC devs cater to consoles anyway. Nintendo is also a company that doesn't make games that really benefit all that much from 4k visuals. The returns are limited.

Why do i think it was that Nintedo droped the 3ds price 6 months after it came out almost 50%/40%?

Thats the reason why i don't have a WIIU now , waiting for that 40% price cut.

he is right in a sense.

given what we know about the wiius library now...it probably would have been better to just stick with a traditional controller and either sell it cheaper (to compete with the PS3/360) or put the freed up finances into better internals...or maybe split the difference and put half in an upgraded wiimote and nunchuck and half on better internals :P.

nintendo do not have any good ideas on how to use the second screen. the warning signs were there with the DS but maybe, just maybe, in a console they could do more. well they wouldnt.

so the controller offers little value over a cheaper standard controller. this makes the console needlessly expensive.

if nintendo had the right games to justify the gamepad then it would have been a hit. with the wii nintendo had the follow through...they had the wiimote and they had the games to show it off. they only had half the package this time ( in fairness the gamepads integration into the wiiu is absolutely top notch...cant fault them on that).

thats one of the big reasons sony are doing so well....the PS4 is excellent value (or percieved...it could be argued that the PS3 at launch offered even more value but it tanked until price cuts came in and didnt retail the PS2s throne. it tanked at launch because, like the gamepad, most people didnt give a toss about the PS3s extra features). it will play the biggest games on the market better than any other console currently available and it costs the same, or less than, its main competitor. thats a nice sales pitch....a nice clear message to send out.

i dont think nintendo should stop doing their own thing but the most important questions they always have to ask themselves is "are our games going to benefit from this?" and "will people get it?".

PS4 had this weird thing called third party support.

In terms of doing everything? No. In terms of doing a lot? Yes. Of course the Wii U has Miiverse but I have always felt the Wii offered more connectivity in terms of social interaction and a world outside of just playing a game. One of the first things I'd do when turning on the console would be checking the news channel and then the weather channel. Do you remember how fun it was to have a Metroid Prime 3 preview channel and being able to click on that weekly show where the guy and girl (Allison?) would talk about upcoming games, tips, etc..,? How about taking those surveys about the most insane topics?

People here claim the name is what did in the Wii U. Nonsense. Look at the competition and how they name their consoles. What did Nintendo in was the complete lack of marketing. The proper media blitz could have put many more consoles in homes but Nintendo assumed name recognition alone would do the job. Two and one half years on the market and I have YET to see a commercial for the console but I have seen a few commercials for a few games.

I think Nintendo got too confident with the Wii that they failed so hard with the Wii U. Not to mention 3DS didn't live up to being better than the DS. Nintendo has a grim future now that Japanese market is going mobile. They will have to focus more on the outside world in which they have little experience on understanding and catering (incompetent online infrastructure, no connection with Western devs aside from Retro, inferior hardware technology, etc.).

But WiiU had this thing called first party support that's actually worth a damn.

...if 2-4 Mario/party games a year is all you need for your gaming-needs so sure, enjoy !!!

More than Bloodbornestation4, even if mario games were the only games on WIiU.

Why it actually failed:

1. Poor marketing.
2. The name was awful. A lot of people weren't even aware the Wii-U was a new console.
3. Underpowered and thus gets almost no multiplats.

How come the majority don't realize it's all about hardware specs and graphics?

How many times do companies have to go through such failures to understand this?

Apparently not since the Wii U crashed and burned.

Ps4 doesnt need any 1st party games, multiplats alone is enough to make it so much better than WiiU