If they drop early 3rd parties wont support it, if they maintain U they get no support.

They seem to be stuck to ride out this gen.

What would a new console really offer that the Wii U doesn't?

yes certainly

keep the current Wii u as a budget console and release a more powerful console with a normal controller

That's because Hello Kitty Kruisers is not out yet!

This is as bad as a Tbone prediction. Actually, it's worse. He at least has faith in the 3DS to hold on for more than four years without a successor on the market.

OT: Not within two years, either two years or more. If they release a new console any earlier than the end of 2016 or the beginning of 2017 it won't be good. They need to give the Wii U some time. It has the possiblity of increasing ever so slightly.

I don't see it in the way you think. What would be so different about another Nintendo console? It still likely would not get third party support and would not fare much better on the marketplace.

Nintendo I think is quite happy with Wii U's level of horsepower (see Mario Kart 8) and isn't going to themselves need anything better for a long, long time. I think they are ready to ride out this level of visuals for the next 8+ years like they did with the GCN/Wii.

I suspect Nintendo's next move game hardware wise is a portable that can run ported Wii U engines at a lower resolution (480p or 540p) with a few sacrifices.

The next "console" from Nintendo may be a micro-console IMO, like Amazon's new gaming device or Vita TV. It will be the same handheld chip, just overclocked or doubled cored so that maybe it can run games natively at 1080P (Wii U caliber graphics) with anti-aliasing or something.

They could sell such a micro-console for fairly cheap come 2016, think $169.99 or something. I think that is more in Nintendo's wheel house, I don't think they have any interest in PS4 level horsepower for a long, long time, Wii U level graphics are probably at a budget range that pushes Nintendo to the maximum that they are willing to spend on game development. Really even on the Wii U, Mario Kart 8 (a game that's a sure fire 4-5+ million seller) is the only one that's really pushing the Wii U so far.

3 to 4 years from now seems right

Yes release a more powerful console with a regular controller based on the pro controller by the fall of 2016. If people want something similar to what they have now I'm pretty sure that the successor to the 3DS will be well integrated with the next Nintendo system and can be used as a controller and portable screen.

2017 would be optimal, imo. Release both a Wii U successor (and for the love of god drop the 'Wii' brand) and a 3DS successor at that time, and make sure they can actually keep up with the competition, not drop behind once the PS5 or Xbox One 2 come out, even if it means selling ahead-of-its-time hardware at a loss (and make sure it's x64, or at the very least x86 to make developing games cross-platform easy and thus getting more ports). It's the only way Nintendo can stay in the home console business and win back third-party developers.

I remember before the Wii launched, Iwata said that if the Wii didn't sell considerably better than the GameCube that there was no point in Nintendo continuing to make consoles. They had hoped the GameCube would sell 50 million.

Well, now it looks like 2 of their 3 last consoles are going to sell in the GCN range or about 18-25 million.

I think Nintendo is gonna bail on traditional consoles, micro-consoles are just sooooo Nintendo and they would let Nintendo share the same games on their next handheld and console (just like iPhone and iPad do which is the *exact* example Mr. Iwata said).

I think that's their future.

If they have any interest in a "traditional" console, I think Nintendo honestly needs a full 2 year headstart. 1 year isn't enough for them to get revved up anymore. So if PS4 has a more traditional 5 year cycle, I think Nintendo in that case would need to be ready to go by fall 2016. Which isn't impossible, I just don't think the desire is there.  

That said I don't think Nintendo has much interest in this scenario or a PS4 level console in the next five years at all. Unless they are willing to basically give third parties *exactly* the hardware box that they want they will not get third party support either.