Good point.

There are different degrees of competition. The PS2 had competition, but it was weaker.

The Wii had strong competition, but they compensated that by adding an additional target audience: the casual gamers.

The WiiU has a very strong competition: not only the PS4 and XBO, but also the well supported PS3 and 360.

It's just the games. 3DS sold terribly and even after Ocarina and Starfox came out it really was'nt doing great. Once the library had Kart,3D Land and a few others sales became very solid, and now with Monster Hunter 4 (Japan)/Pokemon/ and Zelda the system is as hot of the 1st DS was, even with the Vita out and Smartphones. We are already seeing the same thing with Wii U, except that it is in that "sales are up but still are not great" stage. VGX showed me once again that people are getting tired of the same kind of dark, graphic drive, cinematic games, and really just want something to play. The only thing I would have changed is that they should have shown a crazy hard level. I played a ton of games last gen and DKCR was up there in difficulty with Dark Souls, yet too many gamers ignore it because it has some color.

How are the PS4 / XBO bigger competition than the GC & XB? They are brand new more expensive systems with small library's as of today. Wii U not selling now has little to do with them. As for the PS3 & XB 360, they already have sold tons of systems and also shouldn't have much overlap with potential Wii U buyers. In all honesty, Wii U is selling poorly because consumers see little to no reason to pay $300 for it. That's it. 

The Wii was seen as worth the price of admission. People wanted the product and people bought it in masses. It's that simple. On this site, we tend to over analyze things a bit as to why things were / weren't successful. Wii U simply is not seen as a product worthy of $300 at this time to many.

The whole "aimed at casuals" argument is pretty pointless honestly because every console that has ever sold tons of units was "aimed at casuals.  NES (Duck Hunt) / Game Boy (Tetris) / PS2 (DVD Player) / DS (Sudoku/Clubhouse Games/Brain Age) / 360 (Kinect) / Wii (motion controls).     Its why I think that Xbone/ PS4 are going to struggle big time once the a launch period is over, because they offer nothing to the casual consumer that they dont already have.  The apps and new video streaming features are nice, but lets be real, your average person has no use for that.  As a gamer, PS4 looks like an awesome console, but it really reminds me of the Gamecube, in the sense that its going to be a graphic powerhouse,  at a decent price, with great games, but casuals will pass it over.  I still think PS4 moves about 55 million but the casual market is massive and I don't see why they will want it, expecially considering how amazing the new Mario Kart looks, which between that and Wii Sports are casuals favorite games.

Damn i like dr kawashima

Try bigger brands. GC was coming in off of N64 and Xbox was brand new. PS4/XBO have a lot more mindshare and brand than the 'other two' consoles in PS2's gen.

I would think that people who are buying 360s or ps3s or wii's even are doing so because of price. Just like the core people are the ones buying up ps4s and xbox ones rite now regardless of price. It will be fun to see what happens when the dust settles and the next wave of consumers comes in. That group will be large and will not be predetermined. Wii u will have a shot at allot of those people. Nintendo needs to make sure they keep talking to the wii crowd too, probably for the next few years, still cant believe how many parents i see grabbing up skylanders, infinity and just dance games for the wii! Theres allot of buisness there when these people are ready to upgrade

One thing I noticed about previous generations was that there was a big difference between Nintendo home and portable consoles.

GBC vs N64
GBA vs GC
DS vs Wii

In these 3 generations u had the primarily 2D handhelds and 3D consoles, also Touch vs Motion for DS/Wii.

Now with 3DS vs Wii U they are pretty similar, both have motion and touch capabilities and are much more similar im power than previous generations. Games like Ocarina of Time, Mario 64, etc werent possible on GB/GBC. Smash Bros, Metroid Prime, etc werent possible on GBA. Mario Galaxy, Wii Sports, etc werent possible on DS. But now u look at 3DS vs Wii U and the games are very similar.

Mario 3D Land vs Mario 3D World
New Super Mario 2 vs New Super Mario U
Ocarina of Time 3D vs Wind Waker HD
DKC Returns 3D vs DKC Tropical Freeze
Mario Kart 7 vs Mario Kart 8
Smash Bros 3DS vs Smash Bros Wii U

Also 3DS has other big franchises already like Pokemon, Animal Crossing, Kid Icarus, Fire Emblem. Price is a factor as well, 2DS-$129 vs Wii U-$299. If u have two 5-10 year old kids, buying two 2DS would be cheaper than getting a Wii U.

PS4 + XBO + PS3 + 360, not only PS4 + XBO... that's a problem, Nintendo created itself by leaving the hardware race.

The PS2 had first only to compete against the DreamCast. After SEGA has given up, and the new competitors arrived, the position of the PS2 was already very strong, the Xbox was a newcomer and the GameCube brought nothing new to the table, lacked DVD compatibility and had problems to get enough 3rd party support.