In general and for the future, I also said that the 3DS (and Vita) would be the last dedicated handhelds in the traditional sense. Looking at the Vita (ironically) being DoA and the 3DS needing more or less one hardware revision every year to stay afloat, it should be apparent to most by now that the traditional handheld format and design is no longer viable in the modern market, at least not in any way that anyone should wish for, profit-wise and concerning the relative cost.

This is abundantly clear, yes.

Japan is almost completely mobile, China is completely mobile, growth markets for traditional handhelds are flatlining, and young children in the USA are increasingly supplanting 3DS for mobile.

When companies invest in software production they look for markets that are thriving or remaining steady. Handhelds are undoubtedly in decline, so if you're looking at it from a profitability standpoint, who would ever want to invest in something that's going downhill?

It's the same reason why so many publishers refuse to port their game to the Wii U.

The way you approached it came across to me as crass and ungrateful. You didn't have to mention me...this topic isn't about me and shouldn't be about me. But nope...just had to find a way to criticize me, didn't you?

I already don't get any joy or satisfaction from sharing data and it's annoying to coordinate with NPD, so I don't respond well to criticism because it makes me wonder why I'm even bothering to do it in the first place.

I don't get why you all are ganging up on Zhuge and Aqua? I agree with their assessments about the console market in general and the handheld market specifically. Both markets are probably facing a decline (the portable is a matter of fact while the home consoles are probable), unless the console makers are going to shake up the business with every-second-year-iterations of their consoles, which would prolong the life span of the generation but also encourage fans to double dip (ike Nintendo is doing with their handheld consoles).

There should comes as no surprise that handhelds have lost market shares to mobile and that mobile is making tons of money. Why all the criticism towards Zhuge and Aqua?

Because the DS was the previous model? It's not "unfair", PS3 was compared to PS2 (which sold even more than DS), so it's a universal practice. Heck, even the PS4 is compared to the PS2. 

There were a handful of users in here who said that this would happen many years ago, around the time the 3DS was unveiled, the vast majority disagreed. I always saw the handheld space as more of a convenience gaming crowd, but most argued that they were entirely separate entities. I've written about convenience, entertainment nomads, fringe consumers and the change of pace in the entire market brought about by mobile/smart devices at some length elsewhere and also said that the 8th gen would have to churn out more revisions to keep up, especially since even more functionality has been added since the 7th gen.

I think the first time I saw the console market for real was during the years when I left it more or less completely and felt no personal investment in it, I think that a lot of predictions and arguments are cooked up out of desire and hope rather than any form of logic or analysis.

Incorrect, 3DS has sold double the software of the Xbox One, perhaps more software already than what will ever sell for the Xbox One.

Life time yes but thats only because of the 2 year headstart the 3ds has. According to Vgchartz as of May 23 the xb1 has sold 120 million in software.

As of September 21 2013 the 3ds sold 93 million in software.

Last year the xb1 sold 64 million games ta retail compared to the 3DS 46 million game. The xb1 probably sells more games digitally than the 3ds.

Considering this is including everything vs the 3ds I much like others find it a rather strange comparison, not only is it pitting a single console against 3 different OS's of Phone but also tablets from ios, android and Apple, it's not even like it's a single platform for games or apps, as in the argument can't be made that it's better to port to that mountain of portable gaming devices and not the 3ds when it isn't a single market or even OS that you would need to be creating content for.

Strange air of being owed something going on here though, I think Rol was direct with what he asked but the reaction of "if you don't want to play my game, I'm taking my ball home with me" seems so petty and childish really.

Meh

Even if this generation of dedicated handhelds (they're really not dedicated anymore since they have included multimedia/camera functions since the DSI/PSP) but still if they were the last of the traditional handhelds the 3ds would not be the last of it's kind to launch.... the Vita launched almost a year after the 3ds hit shelves, it should at least get the achievement of the last of its kind to launch.