Twice now.  Wii and Wii U. 

Though I think their vision has changed.  Sell cheap hardware wiith a unique gameplay style to make more money, even if said gameplay doesn't actually vary much from game to game.

It's a pointless topic. Of course specs matter, but for reasons that you aren't acknowledging. Games were always going to look nice; anyone trying to tell you otherwise was lying. The 360/PS3 produced some very nice looking titles. Despite its weak power, the Wii also had good looking games, so should we not make the next-gen systems more powerful? Of course not. Art styles can hide many flaws in hardware and can make or break a game's (subjective) visual appeal.

But power is important. You want to provide a means to give the developers access to their original vision for the game. Weaker power can limit scale and scope of a game. It's more than just fancier graphics - it's larger worlds, more processing behind the scenes, more enemies and entities on screen. And for Nintendo's case, it's about trying to reach the same ballpark as Sony and Microsoft to at least have the potential for next-gen ports without many compromises.

Miyamoto has already come out and said that one of the reasons for no-online play in Pikmin 3 was because of the low powered CPU. Right there, not even a full year into the Wii U's life cycle, Wii U's hardware is already limiting potential gameplay. That's not acceptable. That's not something any gamer should be satisfied over. More power is not a bad thing. It enables more creativity and more possibilities, and for that, should be applauded.

All the fanboy love in the world doesn't change the fact that the wii U doesn't have game i single game i want to play. And even after a whole year, i still feel the same way. Only when they finally release smash bros, fire emblem X Persona and the X project rpg, i'll be interested in buying it. The price dropping would also help.

source?

1. it doesn't have a single game that appeals to YOU, but it does have multiple games that appeal to others.

2.i think you mean Shin Megami Tensei X Fire Emblem 0.0

For the Pikmin 3 remark?

"The multiplayer is local only. We wanted to make it online, but partly, one of the reasons we didn't is we really wanted to use the full CPU power to really create this natural world. But also, the other thing that is important about the cooperative play in this game is that it's important for the players to really be able to communicate. So that's why local play is much better, because of the speed and the patience in which you're communicating about going after the apple or the other different items, and trying to approach the level in that sense." - Miyamoto

http://www.gameinformer.com/b/features/archive/2013/07/05/miyamoto-talks-zelda-pikmin-and-wii-u-development.aspx?PostPageIndex=2

As always, games are what matters. They can have the best graphics, but if they aren`t fun, people won`t care too much. But if they are fun, graphics won`t matter much.

And you don´t need to have the most powerful console to have a beautiful game.

you're only fooling yourself by claiming wii u to be a generation behind ps4k and xone in terms of specs.

wii was an overclocked gamecube, there's no denying that. ps360 can't dream of having either wii u/ps4k/xone specs, and that's also absolute.

graphics do matter, its the difference between having a game running on your system or not.

If a next next next gen game launched for extremely high end PC's, I wouldnt be able to play it (luckily no-one makes those games)
If a game is made for PC/PS3/360, the wii and handhelds are not going to get them (not a respectable version anyway)
however if a game is made for low end hardware, all the more powerful devices can still play them.

it comes down to how much you want to spend and where the developers are and most people are spending on the high end consoles and thats where most the developers are too.

Graphics matter to a certain extent. I dont think it matters for XB1, its still getting the same games as the slightly more powerful ps4, just a lower resolution. wii U however wont be getting the same game so it should be worried.

for handhelds, theoretically vita can have any 3ds game but 3ds cant have every vita game.

Specs don't matter to me. Quality games do. I will take a game that is inferior in graphics, but has marvelous music, gameplay, and story over some bland "cool looking" game.