Mr playstation...,it's not right to use the LT numbers of previous Nintendo home console and the LTD number of wii u as of march 31 2015 for the comparison/number of the drop from gen to gen,this make wrong impressions,wii u still sells...
Seriously,change it,suppose where wii u can end,put a range,like 15m-18m or mention that the numbers you put is as of March 31th 2015...

As for the question,Nintendo must have learnt from its mistakes,plus it might follow a revolutionary route that be sure will make NX to be above Nes at least,you get what I'm implying if it's only something traditional,in my opinion,they have to control the extra costs in order to be doing price drops freely,without making any loss,that alone can definitely make the successor to sell more than wii u,which isn't a hard feat to be honest!
USA is the key,as wii u in Europe/Japan/ROW,is not very far from GC,the huge gap in the USA with gc is due to the big price cuts of gc in 2002 and 2003 which had a great effect although gc didn't end up with huge  numbers but it was just two million behind from the second and a great money maker,if it hadn't gotten them things would be worse,ps2 was a sweeper the price situation is a big factor in the USA,history tells!

There are many people who won't buy wii u,because for what it provides,it's expensive,it hasn't get any price drop and might won't ever get at least one!Consequently,that will be one of the many drawbacks of wii u,for me catalytic!
As for the decline,it's mainly success/appearance of new competitors or market shrinkage/remaining room size for growth more than just a decline!I mean that decline doesn't mean only that people jump to another ship,but that they also abandon the ship in general...

I doubt it can get any worse than the Wii U.

Well, actually I can think of one way.. Nintendo releasing a successor to the Virtual Boy, as their next gen console.

Please end the NX threads.

The implications are frightening.

Hope they can rise above the occasion and have an amazing E3 the year before it releases.

There's also a saying that Nintendo performs the best when their backs are pressed against the walls.

I think 240 million is more likely. 3rd time's the charm.

As someone that had bought every single piece of Nintendo Hardware since the Snes, if they don't do anything short of groundbreaking.... I will be dropping my support.

Something in the veins of the Wii, I will be giving them my money again, I loved the Wii.... The Wii U dropped the balls.

if nintendo releases early (2016) and without third parties it will certainly do worse. probably catastrophically bad.

wiiU is only convension when you try desperately to rewrite the history you want to believe in.  wiiU was introduced with a video of all the "possibilites" a tablet controller could do to "change the way you play".   of course you won't remember the 20 min before or after the EA "unprecedented partnership" was annonced because you know all everything nintendo and everyone else is wrong. 

https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=4e3qaPg_keg

oh, and the virtual boy wasn't convensional either.  

Agreed. Anyone really trying to say this was aimed 100% or even 70% at hardcore players ... lol. Look at the unveil video ... the first game shown literally is NSMB. Then Wii Sports. Then Wii Fit. Basically the big three Wii titles. And they're all shown in the "Wii element" (casuals at home). 

The issue was the tablet controller wasn't interesting because the iPad basically already could do all those things.

The Wiimote, Nintendo basically had a window about 4 years before anyone made a motion controller. The DS same thing they had a window of about 3-4 years before anyone else made a touchscreen gaming device aimed at casuals. 

Wii U was more like "oh hey, this is kind of like the iPad we already own". That's why casuals didn't gravitate to it. But it's also the risk in betting the farm on a control scheme for casuals. If someone else beats you to the punch, you're basically f*cked. 

Also I would agree the NES was basically a conventional console. The main difference between it and the Atari 2600 was the flattened joystick (the d-pad) and having two buttons instead one. That and the NES had massively more processing power than the Atari did so you could create far more complex games, games which scrolling worlds (vertical and horizontal), more expressive visual designs, smoother gameplay. 

The "gimmick stuff" for the NES were things like R.O.B. which they threw in to try and get stores to stock the machine, but really they were never integral to the NES they were just well ... gimmicks. The core part of the NES is still the same basic console layout that continues to be used today by Sony/MS. 

don't know why we have a ton of NX threads, does people really just want to speculate that much and build hype and doesn't want to discuss what they are currently gaming? or they don't have anything to game hence always in a forum. lol