Switch sales are great also because of the flux of great games, but its also about the hardware, the console itself being interesting and Nintendo marketing it right. The console being exciting is very important, look to what happened to Wii U, great games but lackluster sales.

Also look to Xbox One, a great console, a promising line-up but everything was blown up because terrible business decisions that drove possible buyers away and even wtih loads of effort from MS it couldnt revert the initial damage. 

Wii U had no games.

Microsoft shot themselves in the foot with the original E3 reveal. No used games + always online connection + the focus on TV entertainment. After seeing how terrible the back lash was for the Xbox , Sony turned around, removing their always online requirement and allowed used games. After that they basically just rode the wave of good press.After the Ps4 began selling well, they also began funding good first party software. Along with great exclusives, in every possible genre.

Switch is a handheld that can display a picture onto a TV with an HDMI so it's great to be able to take your games anywhere. It launched with a Zelda game, something everyone had been waiting for Non Wii U and Wii u owners alike. That initiated the spark. Than they rereleased MK8 which a lot of people who had bought the Switch didn't have a Wii U + the Wii U owners were willing to double dip. Finally you have splatoon 2 which just sells like hot cakes in Japan.

The fact that Nintendo is now focusing on one device is better than having 2. They no longer have to separate development resources, and can focus on one type of hardware without having to separate dev teams to make games for 2 different consoles. I'm to lazy to continue typing up more , but hi and bye ;3

I disagree! Wii U had major software problems through year one, and that's the year where expectations for your console are set. The launch appears to be amazing with close to 40 games, but as you look closer, you find:

- At launch, Nintendo's biggest game was New SMB U - key series, but the NSMB games were very formulaic by this point.
- The Third Party support was mostly last year's hardcore leftovers, with a handful of current games. Anyone with a PS3 or Xbox 360 had little reason to buy Wii U....Zombi U?
- Then, after launch, things really go south. Lego City Undercover is your biggest game for 4-5 months? Terrible.
- Eventually Nintendo gives us...Pikmin 3? I LOOOOVE Pikmin, but who thought GameCube sequels would create console sales?
- Finally at Christmas we got Super Mario 3D World and Wind Waker Remake - more GameCube-like software, plus Wii Fit U and Wii Sports Club, which I'd call "too little too late".
- Third parties had all pretty much jumped ship by the end of year one.

As for Xbox One, I can't speak too much about the year 1 software in practical terms, but I will say the system unveiling was more about TV than games. That was a mistake.

Edit: Hardware does still matter, I think weird hardware choices were a huge hurdle for Wii U...but if Nintendo had offered a brand-new ambitious Mario or Zelda game in the first six months like they with Switch?  I think it would have gone a  little different.

The Wii U took about 2 years to hit 7M, and the Switch reached that mark without even entering the holiday season yet

I wouldn't say the Wii U lineup was strong, anyways

Sony noy even once  gave even a glimps that ps4 would  be connection  required, always  online  noo used software  crap.

Never  understood  where that weird rumour came from >.>

As a video game magazine reader, I've been reading this same rumor since before the PS2. It never happened, though. Xbox One was the closest we ever came before the change of direction.

https://www.wired.com/2013/02/playstation-4-used-games/

https://kotaku.com/5896996/the-next-playstation-is-called-orbis-sources-say-here-are-the-details

That's just one Google result, btw. It's a hard subject to search for. Too many results that don't match what I'm looking for.

At the beginning maybe..... but ultimately... games sell hardware.

If the NS becomes software starved for like 2 years watch its sales numbers plummet.

This software sells hardware is a concept that MS just doesn't seem to be able to understand. MS has always had a very heavy focus on 3rd parties, those sell consoles too.... but its the people that bought the console for the exclusives that go around telling everyone willing to listen that their console is the best thing in the world.

The biggest mistake was by far the marketing and naming. For years people thought it was a tablet add-on for the Wii. And next to no advertising, with that advertising making it look like a kiddie machine. I feel like 20M-25M was achieveable had the name been different.

Half a year in, Switch has two legitimate contenders for game of the generation. Wii U still doesn't have that...

I thought the same thing.

What do you think would have happened with the WiiU if it had launched with Breath of the Wild.  Do any of you think that would have been a game changer? Enough of a spark to get word out about the console and for the people that did understand what it was to forgive the gamepad?