No actual rebuttal then, as usual.

What am I supposed to be rebutting?

Holiday's start in october now? :p?

Why does Nintendo never made a proper real big Pokémon RPG for the home consoles? I really don't get it. Surely, it would have helped to sell some more million N64's and NGC's. On NGC there was actually a Pokémon RPG but not one in the tradition of the handeld ones. There was also a Pokémon RPG for Nintendo Wii but like for the NGC, unfortunately, not a real one. Why does Nintendo renounced those millions? I actually don't play Pokémon games but I hope for the Nintendo Wii U that they finally make a proper one.

Because it would destroy mankind.

“I'm not dipping into the ethics black hole, but what you say about the Gamepad, the Wii U in itself and the casuals is a good segue into some of the points that I think is being overlooked.”

The ethics issue is a possible dead end and not something that is interesting for you and me to discuss anyway so that’s fine. It’s nice to hear your opinion on some other things though!

“First of all, the gamepad is often seen as the primary controller for the Wii U, but that is not really the case the way I see it.”

Hmm, it is the primary focus on nearly all picture ads I’ve seen as well as commercials, it is often dominating the console itself in images and to me it looks like Nintendo intends for it to be the main selling point and marketing feature. Not to mention that the Wii-mote isn’t even in the box and is an accessory you have to buy yourself. Surely; if the Wii-mote and Gamepad were equals as intended controllers, the Wii-mote would be getting a lot more advertising attention as well as actually being packed in with the box.

“It's the bundled controller with the system, but I don't see it as a game controller foremost.”

This might be true, you’re probably very fond of the Wii-mote from the Wii days, which is no wonder; it’s a really, really good controller but I still feel that Nintendo are emphasizing the Gamepad as the main character in the ensemble at almost every turn. It is also the primus motor for most of the new features while the Wii-mote is pretty doing what it always did. Besides; it doesn't make much sense to only include a device that wasn't primarily meant to be a controller with a gaming system.

“For many of the Wii U games the Wii Remotes are still the best option.”

I have no trouble believing that, in the same way; the classic controller was the best choice for quite a few Wii games.

“As everyone here knows, the Wii U is fully backward compatible with all controllers for the Wii. This is actually a great selling point for the Wii U to previous Wii owners, but it's not (yet) effectively communicated to the market.”

We all know this but, like you say; most people don’t, there even still seems to be a lot of confusion surrounding the fact that the Wii U is actually the Wii’s successor, to this day. And even if and when this is communicated in full to the market; will it make such a large difference? What is its market anyway? Many variables. Besides; the PS3 and 360 did very well even without proper backwards compatibility and the advent of the digital stores containing past hits on the previous consoles in the line lessens the impact on a disc-driven feature. At least for PS1 and PS2 games on PS4, that is, PS3 games will prove difficult either way since they are two different and largely incompatible architectures and the code is too complex to simply be emulated at low cost.

“When people say that the Wii U is the opposite of the Wii I think they miss what it really is.”

For my part; the main reason for sometimes calling them opposites is the very clear and effective market aim the Wii had as opposed to the somewhat bipolar Wii U concept. The Wii was a homing missile while the Wii U is attempting to be a cluster bomb. I know that John Lucas insists that all Nintendo consoles are built for everyone but even Nintendo themselves admitted to severely changing their demographics chase and focus with the Wii.

“The Wii U is a fully functional Wii, with added capabilities. The failure of the Wii U in the market is not because of a failed concept that people don't want. It's because Nintendo has not been able to show why it's the upgrade path people should take.”

That’s another thing though; the Wii clearly lost its appeal and actually peaked in the second full year on the market and suffered a historical decline. This, to me, would indicate that this is probably not a smart design path to keep following, regardless of added features. On the flipside; the PS3’s design philosophy seems to merit extension into the 8^th gen as it provided by far the slowest decline in the 7^th gen and is quite obviously still a viable route, for how long is hard to say though. And many of the upgrades revolve around features and implementation that the competition has as well. I believe the Wii concept and name ran its course in the 7^th gen, the same with most of the system driving software from the Wii (Wii Sports, Wii Fit etc.). For me, I have yet to see any reason to assume that the main problem lies anywhere besides the core design and appeal of the concept, there weren’t a whole lot of big games for quite some time, granted, but baseline weekly numbers as low as the ones we saw in 2013 must have a deeper explanation. I firmly believe that continuing along the Wii road is catching an elevator heading down at this point.

“The way I see it, the issues facing the Wii U are not related to unappealing hardware or features. After all, according to what Nintendo has said, their market research shows that people who have a Wii U are overwhelmingly happy with it.”

I don’t doubt that at all, who are these people though? I also enjoy a lot of things that most others don’t, that doesn’t really help the overall perceived value of them.

“The issue is that the value of the hardware is much more difficult to communicate than it was for the Wii.”

I can understand and appreciate that, but doesn’t that imply some fairly poor planning? It’s not a good idea to attempt to rekindle the Wii spark by presenting a product that is overly hard to present in a favorable light, especially if you want to entice the less informed market segments.

“Anecdotal as it is, I sort of see this first hand as a Wii U owner. Some of the things I enjoy the most about the machine are the things I didn't really care much about before getting it. Off TV play for example sounds pretty bland and firmly in the 'nice to have' category. Turns out it's a HUGE thing in our household.”

That’s pretty interesting, kind of ties in with what I said above though; it will be hard to convince consumers to go for a product with an uneven surface sporting some actually good features that are apparent only after the investment and some time spent with the hardware.

“In comparison, the main selling point for me, the move to HD has (so far) proved to be pretty much a non-factor.”

Not overly surprising. Personally, I’ve had high resolution games for a very long time on the PC and I’m more fond of high frame rates, to be honest, I feel it’s a more important aspect of game design overall. That said; the Nintendo 1^st parties do look pretty damn sweet on the improved hardware and I’m sure most people agree with that.

“Anyway, the nature of the Wii U means that people have to use it and feel it to get the appeal of it. When people do, I have no doubt that they many people will love what is on offer.”

Again, though, I’m wondering how one would go about managing the sale in the first place? If all these things aren’t eye catching and apparent from the get-go, you are very unlikely to have someone leave the store carrying a Wii U. I do think it will be a great console for Nintendo fans though, the added functions are certainly not a minus.

“For this reason, I think the Wii U will turn out to be a much slower burner than what people are used to and what many people predict for the console. I think it has huge 'word of mouth potential' and that it has the ability to go much higher than current sales would seem to indicate.”

“Much higher” is a matter of definition though; a 100% yoy increase is a significant improvement but in this case would still net mediocre-to low sales. Personally, I think that the Wii U will mostly thrive on the informed customer, the likes of you and me. I just don’t see the vast potential in the Wii U outside of that inner circle. You should note that I have never stated that I think the Wii U is a bad console; my issue is with Nintendo’s current market strategy and refusal to break tradition and I feel that they underestimating the importance of having things like good online while overestimating the selling power of the Nintendo brand alone today.

“I don't think that the 'casuals' have abandoned console gaming at all, they will move to whatever is the next hot item.”

That’s more or less what I believe, however, I also believe that the Wii U and the Gamepad are not the products to achieve such a result. Take Wii Fit U, for instance, like I mentioned in my post to death—something-wonder8; why would someone going after the convenience and “it” factor bother to hook up their training applications to the big screen TV in the living room and pay a relatively big sum for a board and an upgraded pedometer when they can download for free a software solution on your phone/tablet that you can check and utilize while making lunch in the kitchen and that is connected to a truly gigantic user base. Not to mention how much more these devices are capable of overall. I just don’t think Nintendo understands the modern and rapidly evolving market enough to produce a hit like this at this point in time.

“As Farmville and Zynga is a great exapmle of, the mobile crowd is as much of a transient market as anything else.”

They tend to simply jump onto a very similar service/platform though. The iPhone customers that jumped ship didn’t dive headlong into Blackberry; they mostly headed for the devices that were the most similar to the iPhone in most ways; Samsung and HTC phones. Perceived value and convenience factor are important here and when it comes to both those, there simply is nothing that beats a smartphone or tablet today in consumer electronics and this trend appears to be growing still.

“There's no reason why people won't move on to the Wii U, or PlayStation 4 or Xbox or Oyua or whatever if the proposition is right.”

See, I think there is; the above mentioned convenience factor and the crucial perceived value being the primary ones.

“The Wii U has a few things working for it: great brand recognition, a huge previous userbase from the Wii and it is easily the closest to that sweet $199 spot. “

Nintendo’s brand recognition is great, no doubt, but Sony’s brand recognition didn’t stop their console, TV, phone and hi-fi departments to take huge hits. The large Wii userbase is likely gone though, in my opinion anyway. I don’t know where and who that 199$ “mass market price” came from but I never did understand it, perceived value is obviously more important than the price itself, again we can see perfect examples in smartphones and tablets, it’s hard to argue that 930.000.000 units sold in 2012 isn’t mass market. Besides, there is the huge factor tying into one of my main arguments; a 199$ alleged mass market price point won’t do any good if the product itself is not fit for the mass market. Not to mention the lack of elbowroom for larger price cuts on the Wii U; they’re still losing money on it and are set to do so for quite some time, lowering the price further will only extend the period of losses and might end up costing them their hardware profitability for the better half of the 8^th gen.

Now, I’m not one to state things as facts but these are my beliefs. I’m not 100% sure of everything I’m saying, I’m not a professional by any means and I don’t want to give the impression that I think to have the sole subscription to truth but I have held this for some time, ever since the Wii U was first fully revealed actually. Here are some choice words I had to say back in June 2012, a few months before the Wii U launched;

http://gamrconnect.vgchartz.com/post.php?id=4619667

They seem to have more or less followed the recipe in that post, in my mind, and the results are entirely predictable. I do think that my past and current arguments really explain a lot of what is going and what it going to happen. Only time will tell though, 2014 will be the true test for the Wii U. Honestly though, all things considered; I’ll be very surprised if the Wii U sells more than 5 million units for 2014 CY and I won’t be at all surprised if it struggles to get past 10 million lifetime for 2014.

The Wii U will do fine this year. Wii U should sell 10.5-13.5 million consoles by the end of this year.

I agree with you on the range but I wouldn't call it good by any means. This will most likely be the WiiU's peak year with Smash Bros and Mario Kart releasing, so having roughly 5-8m sales isn't that great. 

With no price cut it could only dream of 8m. Price cut then maybe.

I really don't see them dropping the price again so soon. They're not going to want to make that big of a loss for minor boosts in sales. Right now I see it doing about 5-6m for the year. Of course that's dependant on Smash Bros and Mario Kart being big successes. If they end up like 3D World and fail to make a big increase in hardware sales then the system will only do about 3-4m for the year. I don't think that will happen but who knows? I couldn't have imagined WiiU's 2013 sales would be so low this time last year. 

MK and Smash selling 3m by years end (without bundling) on a 10m userbase is 30% attach rate, all those figures look likely to me. And I'm with you on that, I thought 7m just a month or so ago, nobody could have predicted these sales.