That would be assuming all re-sellers only bought one Wii U to re-sell, wouldn't it?  I know of some who bought 3 or 4, and I'm sure there were those who went higher than that.  There really is no way to know.  My point is, for all those sold to re-sellers someone else got pushed back on the waiting list.  It didn't fully create the outages, of course, but it did extend the demand beyond what it should have been.

Also, could some of those bought for re-sell have been returned, thus adding to the confusion of sold out/not sold out?  It just seems to me that this situation gets a lot more murky because of these parasites.

I'm not thinking too hard, I'm just thinking back. It was never considered a gimmick by any mainstream person as far as I remember. It was seen as the new way to play video games. That was the public perception, hence why it did so well. When Nintendo failed to deliver, many memories of people were rewritten, including mine and yours.

Again not thinking too hard, just thinking back. The kinect had a similar appeal to the Wii, it opened a new perspective to gaming for many people looking at VGs from the outside world. Not as significant as the Wii, but still.

I think you are pretty much spot on. The basic set was a bad idea. It doesn't even come with a sensor bar or charging station. It's pretty pointless. As for your prediction: I expect them to phase the basic pack out no later than next christmas and make the current 32GB premium model the standard at a $299 price point. They'll also bundle it with multiple games and it'll come in black and white. And to add something to the OP: Whenever I check amazon.de the basic model is in stock and the premium one jumps up and down from €349 - €499 depending on current stock.

Your point makes no damn sense.

There were 400,000... FOUR HUNDRED THOUSAND... sold during that initial time WiiU was sold out at launch and remained that way until just before Black Friday when the 2nd shipment arrived. Obviously a very significant portion of those were preorders. I was among them and among those who intended on selling an extra one on Ebay. I follow Ebay closely and there were never more than a couple thousand for sale on Ebay at any given time. I allowed my buddy to have my 2nd preorder for him to keep instead of attempting to resell because I realized it wasn't going to gain high profits as the couple thousand already on Ebay were making nothing.

Simple logic would dictate that if 400k were sold and "part of the initial demand...was heavily pushed by people intending to resell" that far more than a couple thousand would have been listed for resale. At most we're looking at 1% of what was preordered/bought at launch went to resellers. That's not a lot by any measurement and that is grossly high as in reality it is far less than 1%.

This analysis is very flawed. It assumes a 1:1 shipment ratio of the Wii to Wii U. Which we already know is not the case.

Some retailers are now getting daily shipments of Wii U units.

Goddamn, son, blow a gasket.  Seems like a minor thing to be an asshole over, but whatever.  I thought the 400k was first week, not pre-orders.  I was talking about perception of demand.  And saying "I saw only saw a couple of thousand on eBay therefore THAT'S ALL THERE ARE" is just bloody stupid.

Moderated,

-Mr Khan

You speak as if all the Wii customers were idiots who only wanted easier gaming.

I'm sorry, but if you $9000 for anything that retails for $599, you don't know (more likely don't care) how to bid in an auction.

Never said that, I said they want simpler gameplay. Think of it like pop music, whats simpler works for everyone. The Wii made that available for all. Most aren't ready for twelve to sixteen button controller. You Nintendo fanatics ake offense when you only need two eyes and one brain between the two. Kinect did the same thing, but as far as living room multimedia that is probably the way most people will scroll for their media in the living room.

A price cut will only help a little, what it needs is Games. A price cut for the Wii didn't do much until NSMB Wii was launched. The same for the 3DS, sure it helped but it hasn't been exploding in sales like the DS.

I agree that past December WiiU sales will drop, but cutting the price will be a mistake. First they need games and then more games, that appeal all kind of tastes. As some said, the Wii was a revolution in gaming, people were seeing it that way... when Nintendo didn't delivered it lost it's momentum. WiiU is completely different, nobody thinks it's a revolution as the Wii.

Personally I think Nintendo needs to try again with the Revolution idea, but apply it not only in Casual games like Wii Sports, but more serious games as well. If it works people will take notice and the WiiU will become interesting to a lot of people, right now it only appeals just to a small crowd of gamers.