I don`t think Vita and Wii U are doing bad for the same reasons.
My brother has a Vita so i got to play with it for a while and despite the great graphics... i don`t see anything else there.
Visually, it seems pretty much a different PSP (3DS suffers from the same thing to me); the menu is not on a par with a nex-gen handheld and it lacks that game, that must-have game. I thought Uncharted could be that game but after playing some hours it doesn`t come near the PS3 games.
Price could really be the biggest thing holding it back. People might be willing to pay a lot for some devices, but handhelds doesn`t seem to be one of them. Even Xbox 360 and PS3 suffered from high prices.
3DS on the other hand did start with something new: 3D and streetpass. And while 3D might not be a big deal now, at least there`s an option there and streetpass is very attractive, too.
Not to mention that 3DS is getting must have titles.

Wii U has Miiverse and Nintendo TVii as something new and unique. Too bad Nintendo isn`t pushing it and only cares to show, so far, the gamepad.
Wii U is also lacking a line-up of unique titles besides Mario, Nintendo Land and Scribblenauts. Even Wii had more Wii only titles when it launched.

Of course, as people mentioned: the economy!
Things aren`t as good as they were. Especially in Europe.
If PS4 and Xbox 720 release at the same price or higher than Wii U they will face the same situation Wii U is facing.

Actually, I had to agree with this, at least, in my experience. I find some games good or "espectacular", but nothing that push me to buy that console or that game. And looking at the market, it looks like it's the same case.

You can not judge a consoles long term success off of the first couple of months. Everyone thought the 3DS was a flop and was going to be destroyed by the Vita, and look what happened. I think Nintendo are going to use the same strategy as the 3DS with the Wii U. It will struggle until the fall when they will announce a price cut, and release a ton of huge games, building a ton of momentum.

People still don't get. It's nothing new for a console to sell like crap in it's first 2 years. PS2 dominated the 360/PS3 for 3years.

I think the new offerings from Microsoft and Sony are not going to fare any better than WiiU,simply because there are too many devices on the market at present, and some a lot cheaper.There is 3 HD consoles, 4 handhelds, Wii/Kinect/Move,PC,smart phones and tablets. Add that to a financial crisis, and WiiU sales probably seem quite respectable. I feel sales will be down right across the board in the next gen, due to the fact that people dont have the disposable incomes they had a few years back.

I work full time and owned all the consoles from the previous gen, however i shall only be buying one for the upcoming gen. I have invested in WiiU, that will be my sole gaming platform for the forseeable future, the days of owning multiple consoles are over for me. Every penny counts

I think it's due to partial decline. But partially dumb decisions.

But I also think the vita and wii-u were idiotic decisions by both sony and nintendo. (I think the wii-u can go to gamecube/N64 levels. I really don't agree with the way the implented it killing all their momentum initially. like sony did with the 600 dollar ps3.)

I also think the videogame industry isn't limited to this. But too many companies try to make Super hits instead of planning and being satisfied with 1-2 million. And when they fail they hurt companies tremendously. I think this is probably due to more videogame companies being publicly owned.

^ You are right. Too many consoles will only slow down the transition to a new gen.
I too think this time there won`t be so many people with 2 or more consoles. Especially if Wii U does get a good 3rd party support.

this is longer than my thesis on how nordstrom handle their marketing...

I understand there is a lot of pessimism about the home console business, right now.

But PS4 and X720 will do fine, it's Nintendo who screwed Wii U.

My thread was litterely the same as yours, but in short, I kinda agree with you, it does worry me.