Well, if you are making the list about a games quality, variety and quantity, then it's pretty much a good list. Of a sales or market strategy point, I would probably rank the N64, GC and Wii U a bit lower and the NES at 1st since it was a genius move.

Tagging, will work on my list later.

While not fully hating OPs lineup, I'd agree more with Rol's line-up here solely due to SNES being a better launch than OP gives it credit for.

I often wonder this myself.

Either way, I fully agree with everyone who put Wii at #1, it had a great launch, Wii Sports and Zelda day 1... Plus everyone and their mom knew about it, the marketing was spot on (even though a bigger reason for its success may be word of mouth).

Well, I guess this depends on how you view a launch. To me it was always a launch period of roughly 3-4 months. It was not until the Dreamcast that a massive launch day happened, and in my view has not been matched since (not that it saved that system).

These are all through the lens of personal opinion.

To me, the Gamecube was the best Nintendo system launch I remember. I know Smash Brothers was a bit after launch (a month?) but that was all my friend sand I played that holiday season. The system was affordable, had several great games (remember that awesome Star Wars game?!) and was varied (Pikmin and Luigi). The only knock I had was no Mario game which was a tradition.

Next is the SNES. Maybe it is psychology, but $199 with a great game didn't seem like that much and the games blew my child mind. This was the future and remember Mario, Castlvania and Final Fantasy were near launch games.

Middle of the pack go to the NES and the Wii U, the former I don't remember as I was 1 and the latter was an average, but not spectacular launch.

Below average goes to N64. This is largely because Mario 64 did nothing for me and their was a massive drought after launch. I didn't get the appeal at all and was not until Zelda years later that I saw potential in the system.

Worst goes to the Wii for me. The biggest title was Zelda and I bought it on the Gamecube (still prefer that version to this day). Wii Sports was a bit of fun with a group, but I was never crazy about it. The whole system underwhelmed me and I found motion controls to be more frustrating than fun. I just felt disappointed in Nintendo with it.

These views on launches mirror my view on the systems as a whole

Tier 1: SNES, NES and Gamecube
Tier 2: Wii U (could move up or down)
Tier 3: N64 and Wii

Just the first day on the market. Otherwise, I'd be ranking the SNES and GameCube higher and the N64 and Wii U lower.

I really like the SNES and its game library. If we were to count all of latter 1991 as the "launch window," then games like Final Fantasy 2/4, Final Fight, UN Squadron, Actraiser, and Super Castlevania 4 would have pushed it a bunch of spots ahead. And though I'm not as big a GameCube fan, if we were to include Pikmin and Super Smash Bros Melee as part of the launch lineup, it'd be ahead of the NES IMO. However, I was only counting launch day. And back during the SNES and GameCube launches, a lot of the biggest and best games came out weeks later.

And to everybody saying I got the NES price wrong... I'm not counting the 1985 limited release that only happened in New York City. From what I can find, a roughly $100 bundle with SMB was available by the time the NES launched nationwide in 1986.

No problem. To be honest, I expected a lot more rage for that ranking.

I'd probably put GC at number 1. That is the console I remember having the most fun with day 1 with SSBM, Luigi's Mansion, Super Monkey Ball and Rogue Squadron 2.  Sure SSBM wasn't available at launch but it released that holiday season (I got GC for Christmas).  So it was launch for me.  I hardly ever buy systems on official launch day.  I didn't get the Wii till Smash and Kart came out.  I probably should have held off my Wii U purchase till MK8 but I've used my Wii U decently (not lately since working so much).

Actually, the SNES is my favorite Nintendo console too. I just think the actual launch day was lacking. Virtually every other day after launch day offered great and amazing games, but I just focused on the launch for the purposes of these rankings.

Wii u is clearly the worst was suppose to have all these big games then all the silence starting appearing and then there were crickets