@tr4newreck: Nobody is splitting hairs or calling condemnation. The only implications they made is that "if you get caught red handed, don't expect empathy, you reap what you sew."
@tr4newreck: Literally NOBODY is saying that it is... Everyone with brains knows that companies steal from each other daily. The game of corporate law is to not get caught and not sign anything that's legally binding without covering your own ass. Corporations have the right to defend their own assets
@redonkkongulous: It's a matter of perspective and ones measure of success. The average number cruncher sees a "10 bigger than 9" and calls it money. Where as an investor or CEO would trap door so his marketing team so fast, you'd think it was an Austin Powers flick.
Point being that the Wii's sales chart would sport a quadratic slope so agressive that you'd think it was God's blueprint for Mt. Everest.
Wii's projected saturation point hit far too soon. Numerous publications between 09-12 spoke of the millions in stock and earnings Nintendo bled per quarter. That's more than 12 consecutive quarterly losses. I don't have the data proving wether or not Wii recovered it's overall production costs quotas from Hon Hai/Foxconn so I won't comment on that.
By 2012, both investor and consumer faith in the brand all but vanished. Their "we aren't in competition with Sony and Microsoft, we are our own brand" naive company vision would make a even a first year economics major cringe. Their name nor the value of their brand held enough strength to make ridiculous assertions of that sort.
It's as absurd as selling a below quality bar of soap which does a crappy job at removing germs and dead skin but smells very good. When asked about why competitor soap bar brands work more effectively, they reply "our aim is not to compete with those brands, we're trying to draw in liquid soap users who like nice fragrances". Their "not-competitors" retaliate by launching new brands of soap which smell nicer and are quality effective.
Success is a matter of perspective and the Wii U was a clear as day sign that Nintendo's marketing team had no idea why the Wii succeeded as a brand.
@cherub1000: I predict that the Switch will hit 2 million sales by summer 2017 partly due to Zelda Breath of the Wild being available at launch. However, I also predict that the Switch will not surpass 20 million life cycle sales UNLESS Nintendo successfully shifts 3DS users to the Switch. They would do this by porting and adding sequels to 3DS top franchises like fire emblem, xenoblade, pokemon etc... Making sequels Switch exclusive.
Lastly, I predict that once the PS4 PRO and the "Xbox Scorpio" grow a large enough install base, AAA games will get more power hungry than they already are, PC will lead the charge on that. Nintendo will in turn lose support they've garnered when porting becomes too difficult to pull off. Silver lining is that their install base grows so large that third party development studios begin to see profit by porting or making games for Switch.
@Tekarukite: That's precisely the key question here. Sadly, unlike the 2006 novelty of motion controls in your living room, the Switch is not so novel of an idea. Why? Because much like the appeal of the Wii U, Switch is another tablet like device. A powerful tablet yes, but a gaming focused tablet.
A consumer electronics census recently determined that 1 in 3 U.S adults own some form of tablet device at home while more that 50% own a smartphone. These are multi-feature devices where it's users may invest time in ton's of gaming software, do work, send emails, surf the web and browse social media.
So I can say with conviction that Switch will not find that wealth of appeal on the casual market as it did back in 2006. The Switch does however have a chance at being successful if it succeeds at drawing in the large 3DS handheld gaming fanbase to invest in a Switch console/mobile hybrid.
@redonkkongulous: Fair, but to even understand these numbers, you'd need to understand why the Wii sold so well to begin with. Wii's 100m to Wii U's 13m is quite the discrepancy. Long response so I pray you hear me out.
Nintendo stated in an interview back in 2006 that the core focus of the Wii is to draw in non-traditional gamers to the living room, which it succeeded at. At 249$, the Wii was not only ergonomic and attractive on the wallet, casual gamers and parents alike lacked an entry level gaming system. Hence, the Wii's success which was boasted by a market, absent of an occasional hobbyist gamer focus.
2008-09 arrives, Nintendo hit a drought. Wii had reached what economics call "market saturation point". The bulk of people who expressed any interest in gaming had already invested in a Wii. Third party devs could no longer afford the man power and resources to gimp the specs on their AAA titles. Nintendo's studios could not keep up with development quotas following the success of Mario Galaxy.
The wealth of casual consumers which made Wii such a success was as fickle as it came. Apple's iphone had just hit the market and the ipad was a year away, touch screen gaming and app store was on it's way in. The novelty of Wii's motion controls pretty much got overtaken by casual drawn free to play shovelware. The remaining folks who still expressed interest in motion controls were swept in by Nintendo's competitors which came up with their own motion control responses.
That leaves Nintendo's core install base. Coincidentally, the same install base which invested in a Wii U, the only install base that was even aware that the Wii U was a next gen console and not a Wii upgrade. You've probably heard it thrown around here and there that Wii U was poorly marketed, this is why.
Lastly, one of the major reasons, the 90+ million strong did not allow for a repeat performance with the Wii U was because by 2012, a touch screen handheld/console was no longer a novel idea compared to the tablets that were already on the market.
@Sepewrath: Right, but I'm not talking about just graphical capabilities. I'm talking about current games library, performance, experience, longevity and overall value. All of which are right now to the advantage of Nintendo's competitors. With a $300 price tag, Switch is not outright winning as a value proposition versus it's competitors. I predict based on these factors alone that Switch won't sell incredibly well at launch. The long term is too soon to predict.
@Dilandau88: My point is that Nintendo's fanbase isn't as big as you think it is. Many of the adults who grew up playing Mario games have kept their NES and used emulators but as for traditional gaming, they've moved onto other platforms. The Wii and Wii U's sales numbers prove that you can't run a successful console business on first party games alone.
The 30+ age demographic shops for consoles that can play both their favorite Nintendo franchises all while being able to play GTA, Battlefield, Call of duty and other big name titles on the same console. Nintendo's sales metrics have proven that the body of consumers who own multiple consoles isn't as large as once assumed.
@XxParasite: I kind of feel that given the recent success of pokemon Go, they should have had Game freak hold off on another 3ds pokemon title and focus all resources on a Switch HD pokemon launch title. That would have been a blowout of a launch title for sure.
bigcrusha's comments