How Nintendo’s Greatest Failure Led To The Switch

The Wii U had some amazing games. Xenoblade X is the best example I can think of where the devs bled everything they could out of the system and made great use of the Gamepad. Still waiting on that one to come over.

Virtual Boy was Nintendo's greatest failure. Wii U actually had some decent games.

Bit of a shame really, the Wii U had massive potential.

I have always been very curious to have some sort of study into exactly how successful the Wii really was. We have all seen the numbers of consoles sold and no doubt it is impressive, however, we have always also seen that console sales are not the greatest factor to a systems success. Most consoles are sold for a lose and are not money drivers for the company. Instead the amount of video games you sell for that console is generally considered to be the best metric for success. The Wii didn't sell large numbers of games as many third party supporters skipped it entirely and on top of that the large market on non traditional gamers that Nintendo tapped into didn't regularly purchase games either and instead used it mainly as a gimmick to play Wii tennis or other simple games. Perhaps these traditional metrics don't apply as much to Nintendo since they mainly focus on first party games but I wish a more comprehensive look at the success of the Wii would be available than simply consoles sold.

People here mentioning the Virtual Boy as the biggest failure, but as least people know about it, and it's part of the social consciousness.

Here I'm thinking the Game Boy Micro, forgotten piece of hardware.

Virtualboy was the worst nintendo failure. I wouldn't even say the Wii was that great of a success neither, sure they sold well but most people I knew who had bought them played them for a very short time and then let it gather dust.

Actually it was not a bad Console. I was not marketed correctly and graphics were not much of increase from original Wii.

Virtual Boy?