Why would Nintendo make their next console before Sony & Microsoft?

[Millennium]

Alby_da_Wolf said:

Millennium said:
Nintendo would release its next console before Sony and Microsoft if its current console were failing. But there is no sign of this occurring, and thus it makes no business sense to do so.

Then again, they're doing exactly this with the 3DS, and that fact muddies the waters considerably. One would think that Nintendo were smart enough to not cut the knees off of a system at its peak, but this throws the whole idea of Nintendo following common sense into question.

But they could do with portables what Sony did with home consoles, keep on selling the old model for some years after the launch of the next.

Maybe they want to give 3DS the lead in portable 3D, but they know that for some time they'll have to price it too high to be mainstream, maybe the overprice is modest but they know a consistent share of users won't be willing to pay it not caring for 3D, who knows...

If Nintendo is trying to do with portables what Sony did with consoles, then Nintendo is being even more foolish than I had thought. Maintaining the PS2 may well have kept Sony alive during the PS3's dismal early history, but it was also part of the cause for that history in the first place: it took away much of Sony fans' reason to upgrade. The 3DS will suffer similarly if Nintendo keeps the DS around. When you transition from one system to the next, the break has to be a clean one.