November NPD 2018 Thread

[DonFerrari]

thismeintiel said:

DonFerrari said:

No it wouldn't.

N64 and GC didn't had droughts, they had competent HW and also were marketed and priced right.

It is purely speculation and wishful thinking. In real world if you look Nintendo had only been dropping on console world NES>SNES>N64>GC>WiiU ... Wii sales were mostly from non-gaming public. If Nintendo was able to sell 80M HH plus 50M consoles per gen why would they make the hybrid and cut themselves to a single market that will do around 80-100M?

The answer is quite simple.  They wouldn't.  Nintendo knows they couldn't compete directly with Sony on the home console market without a gimmick/hook.  The Wii succeeded in hooking in the more casual market with its motion controls, which helped it thrive for 3 years or so.  However, the novelty started to wear off, and a console many thought was destined to rival the PS2 ended up having to crawl its way across the 100M mark.  The PS3, Sony's worst selling home console, only sold ~15M less than it.

The Wii U was an attempt to recapture the exact magic of the Wii.  HW that was only slightly more powerful than the previous gen, a gimmick controller (this time trying to appeal to the growing number of phone/tablet gamers), and a price point lower than the competition.  Unfortunately for Nintendo, those casuals were just fine continuing to play on their mobile devices.  And the system was as pointless to the more core audience, as they were ready for an actual tech jump from their PS3s and 360s.  Nothing was going to change the outcome the Wii U saw.

So, Nintendo, realizing it couldn't compete head to head in the home console space decided to combine the market with one they were much stronger in, the handheld market.  Combining the two, they were able to appeal to the handheld gamer, while also having some presence in the home.  It's an approach that really suits them, while also seemingly allowing the PS4 and Switch to really have no effect on one another.  I think its the model they will continue to adopt, while Sony continues as a sole home console that strives to have a good price to performance balance.

Exactly. And a combination that made their HH more valuable by having console level game on the go, something cellphones still can't do. So if they released a HH only I would say they would get like 60-65M this time around and console only 15M. So it's quite possible that Switch by synergies of the fusion can do better than if Nintendo had 2 different devices (of course not talking about they making a full line of HH, Hybrid, console that play the same game... that is where they can really do big numbers with double dippers helping).