So what is Nintendos last option(s) to boost Wii U sales?

There was some belief smash would have a turn around that Mk8 wasn't able to do (for some reason) and the result is that the Wii U ended up under 300k, which actually shows a loss of momentum and it pretty much cementing the fact it will be tracking under the Gamcube. In fact, it's actually tracking behind the saturn world wide right now. But in NA the Wii U is Tracking behind the Gamecube, Behind the Dreamcast, behind the Xbox 1st, and it's software sales are front loaded into a few main games.

Now, it's too late to really make the Wii U have any significant impact. It's never going to get out of it's position. However they can still boost sales and eventually, maybe, make some kind of profit. Maybe even regain a slim amount of third-party support.

The real issue right now is price. Once they solve that, then their future may have a few rays of light in it. Do a Gamecube and cut shipments for a bit to get the ol' juice flowing. That will also cut lossese. Once they do that cut the price for some of their bigger games, have a few bundles maybe with 2 games (it came out in 2012, the early games should be worthless by now) to gain momentum.

The above along with on time releases of Starfox, Zelda, and others, with bundles, and decent advertising, can possibly change the Wii U's fortunes and it may be able to pull a LTD of 13 million sold to consumers. MAYBE.

Another plan is to do the Wii U like they are doing with the "new" 3DS. A different model with a few extra features and design changes to rebrand the console. but this probably won't happen. especially since Wii U never took off and had yet to make a profit.

zelda will save wiiu

#believe

and ur late already made a thread. beware of the incoming sheep defence force 'bu-bu we never hyped kart/smash!!' lmao

November was Nintendo's Biggest Month if I recall and This Holiday will be their Biggest one in a long time as well.

And With Amiibos I'm pretty sure Nintendo will end up fine.

They won't touch PS4 numbers that's for sure.

just make a recall telling concumers that they found a problem in the mainboard and have to return them to factory, them they replace it with a downclocked GTX960 GPU and a downclocked mobile i7, now you have a console to play 2014 games

@leandrro: You know Nintendo won't do that. They'd rather just send out "New" WiiU for maximum profitability.

Easy as that

Are you seeing the same numbers anyone else is?

Price drop. That is literally all they can do at this point

And it needs to be significant. Like $150-200.

Anyone who is willing to buy a WiiU for 300 has one already. With the lack of third party nintendo needs to embrace the second console motif and live off of software sales until next gen. When the Xbox one is only $50 more then I can understand why people weren't running out to get one this holiday.

The gc had a massive price drop and it really helped boost sales when it became much cheaper than the competition.

Nintendo has an amazing line up next year and we still have a lot to know exactly about how it'll go down. They can have a great year if they offer a ton of unique exclusive games at a low entry price and market themselves that way.

"So what is Nintendos last option(s) to boost Wii U sales?"

Come out with a new console and clearance those WiiUs that are only gathering dust.

$150 with at least a 50GB HDD is what I'm willing to spend on a Wii-U. $200 with a good game.

Nintendo lost touch big time during the last gen and I'm not sure the Wii-U will ever recover from it.

Mmmm, you know they are getting profit with anything they are selling right? (3DS, WiiU, Amiibos, Software). Like i said in other thread, they will be fine for the next years and they will do even better as more games get released.

what do they care? they got all that Amiibo money

I think the Wii U deserves better sales. It is the best game system and Nintendo makes the best games out of any developer. They focus on fun and innovation. I love all Nintendo systems the most!

Nintendo's doing fine.

Cheap 3DS bundle? 3 free first parties?

Yep, that's why they are refocusing, slashing projections, and panicking. because they are fine.

As a whole maybe, but ignoring the Wii u money sink is uh, silly, and even Nintendo is not doing that. Although they haven't really said much of any of those changes working they were talking about. maybe they gave up.

I've been saying this for months, they need a fraking price drop. Although it won't really matter for me since I'll be getting one next payday.

Price drop obviously, with some decent fucking marketing. At $150 I'd buy one, even though the system only has 1 maybe 2 games I wanna play atm.

Hope charizard1605 hits the lotto

Here we go with the price drop recommendations. In the world of electronics a price drop could actually make your device seem LESS enticing. High priced electronics have a value in the consumers eye. When you keep dropping the price you're basically telling them it's crap and they won't want it anyway.

So stop saying they should drop the price because it would have the opposite effect.

Nintendo is doing fine.

Their profit forecast for the end of the year has tripled (up to $306 million) despite selling the fewest consoles of the three companies. Meanwhile Sony, who is currently selling the most consoles, posted $1.2 billion loss as a whole. Their gaming division was their only ray of light, posting a $200 million profit. But that's still smaller than Nintendo's projected earnings right now.

So there is no need to talk "Last options" with Nintendo or hint at any panic button scenarios. They're not that kind of trouble what-so-ever.

Nothing,

yes xbox sales seem to have drastically slowed down after the price cut oh wait lmao

It's done now. No idea what they were smoking. I basically said their only chance to sell some hardware this Christmas was to drop to $199 and bundle 2 games. To basically not even have holiday bundles was essentially waving the white flag - the retailers barely featured Wii-U at all this Christmas, it was almost like it doesn't exist. Even that probably would have only brought them 500k sales, but that's still far better than 300k. Seems like Nintendo has given up on market share. Which is fine if that's what they decide, but that must also mean the Wii-U can't survive long. It's probably just a matter of timing at this point for when Nintendo can bring their next console to market.

Maybe they will do like the New 3DS, and make a stop-gap "enhanced" Wii-U to give them a short term boost with minimal R&D spend. Do something that finally has decent amount of fast internal storage (128GB or more) - and more RAM (2GB or more) to help improve some games. If something like that were $249 I'd buy it. Not sure they will want to segment the console market like that though - like they are doing with "new" 3DS. So who knows what their next move will be.

Take a class in economics please.

Some brands do want to maintain their "aspirational" status, which is why they face a dilemna to cut prices or not when sales start to fail (i.e nobody really gives a fvck, but they want to maintain the delusion of being an aspirational brand). But I think it's a leap to assign that "aspirational purchase" description to the Wii-U. In the case of video game consoles, there might not be a single instance where the item would actually sell LESS with a price cut. For Nintendo, it's probably more about preserving the price expectations for their NEXT console. There is no doubt that a drastic price cut would cause an immediate spike in sales. We've seen it time and time again with consoles, and even Nintendo just recently saw this when they took drastic measures with 3DS. It was struggling, they drastically cut the price... sales surged.

@TigerSuperman: Zelda and a new Mario Galaxy might boost sales a bit but not for too long ... maybe for 2-3 months max.

@2Chalupas:

Price drops aren't always good. Nintendo has already avoided it with wiiu. They introduced two skus so they could claim a 300 dollar price point. To sit aside this they coupled it with a "premium" model--essentially saying you are getting more than the base model. Instead of dropping the price, nintendo simply eliminated the base model and included everything else for free. Then there are the special game bundles. Nintendo has been doing everything they can to keep the price the same.

I would not be surprised if it drops to $250 next year, with a $299 Zelda bundle available.

Nintendo is now trying to make the best of things. They are waiting out the current fads, releasing solid products, and attempting to recoup missed goals by way of amiibo.

In direct answer to the op question in the subject title: Pokemon MMO

They are making big profits again, they are just fine. Their is no magic bullet to make Wii U hardware move a significant amount more, they know that, and people who are not morons in general know that. Sony is selling tons of PS4 units and their posting massive losses and have a shit credit rating. Nintendo is forecasting a massive profit spike, and as pointed out above, even if you just compare Sony's game division by itself to Nintendo, Nintendo is still making more profit. Stop fantasizing about it and learn how to deal with the fact that if you want to play Nintendo's top tier quality games, you need to pay the Nintendo toll and get their hardware.

Otherwise, just live with your half complete, disappointing, DLC delivery service scam games. Kthx.

I still can't believe someone actually bought this for $25,000. Shit, I would never pay that much for a figurine even if it was one my most favorite characters.

Nintendo is making profit on all front now...so continue to do what they are doing, I guess. They will roll with Wii U till their next system...announce it in 2016 E3 ...release 2017. :P

get it down t0 179.99 and package it with one killer app and release 2-3 must have exclusives a year and it will do well.

Good lord.

they dug their own hole....

stayed with cartridge on n64,,,not use dvds with gamecube....no graphics with wii but motion controls made up for it....and this gen no voice chat, notificvations, achievements, 3rd aprty... you name it...

they do it on purpose....its like they dont care about sales they want to make whatever they feel like.

i think with their handheld they try more to be cool.

And it's not stopping either, there are plenty of error amiibos being auctioned on eBay for over hundreds of dollars. Might as well start purchasing defective ones to auction them.

Stay the course as far as I see it. They're finally breaking even on it. Just leave it at that. I like that they're giving it great first party support, and that's mainly why I bought it. Adjusting price, or taking the tablet out, that won't do anything, everybody saying such shit will just move the goalposts if Nintendo appeases them.

Nintendo's focus in the coming year will be New 3DS related, that's their meal ticket, that's going to be their focus. Wii U sales have been said to start breaking even months ago, but declining 3DS sales over the last year need to be addressed first. Luckily the New 3DS was a huge hit in Japan. Hopefully it will be in other regions as well.

I don't see any major actions Nintendo can do really. Their whole gen strategy was laid out a long time ago. All they can do now is follow that path. Just release the software regularly with all the titles that their fans want with some new ones, make some deals with third parties, and make some cheaper/better SKUs of the console. None of that is new strategy.

The only thing they can do is change the content of the software. They are always bound to add to their old series, but imo they have to do the gamecube thing and add diversity to the game library. They need to produce this gen's Eternal Darkness or Geist. If the third parties won't make a lot of software then Nintendo has to fill some of those gaps.

Remove the tablet controller, drop the price by $150, and offer 2 free games.

Nothing and the best part is they do not need to care. They have great games and are making a nice profit. That is all you need outside of system wars land.

Franchise whoring at its finest. They could make toilet paper with Mario's face in it and the idiots would buy it cuz hey it's Mario.

Its a shame that for all that money they make and they still can't have an online service as good as Sony's, or Microsoft's for that matter. Nor are they getting Kingdom Hearts 3 or Tomb Raider Rises on a Wii U console.

Zelda, Starfox and Metroid will make WIiU sales skyrocket

Maybe they could create a Sanity pill for the people.

Wow, one of the only times I see you post something rational.

Congrats.

Anyway, Wii U is a lost cause. It started with the stupid name, most (non-gamer) people still think it's some sort of add-on for the Wii and not a new console...I mean there's so much wrong with the console...Sure you've got some good games on the console but that's not enough.

Defective Amiibos? Yeah, I hardly doubt that these are "unintended" manufacturing defects. It's only going to increase consumer interest in the hopes that people think they will score and be able to get rich.

Really would like a release date on it. I new itd be post holidays in the US, but dang...

$199 will save the WiiU.

They need to get Retro Studios to make another Metroid game, only this time it's gonna be a dating simulator that will feature Samus wearing nothing but a schoolgirl outfit and have it bundled with the Wii U. I guarantee you it will boost sales tenfold, and the ones who will buy it will be Nintendo fanboys who can't get girlfriends or get laid.