In the years leading up to 7th gen, reps from Sony and MS wouldn't shut up about how awesome their consoles were going to be and how they were going to dominate gen 7. Nintendo by comparison barely said a word. While it is possible in retrospect to look back at some of their quotes and take them as being a somewhat more esoteric version of the Sony/MS reteric, I think its fair to say that most people took Nintendo's reserved nature as a sign of weakness. I think that sign of weakness definately played a role in 3rd parties not committing to the Wii as hard as they might have.
Although Nintendo's whole corporate attitude seems to be a very reserved one, I think they took it to another level with the Wii. The only explination I can see for this is that they were trying to prevent the competition from copying them.
But I wonder, could a more over the top attitude have made a difference? If they had been doing non-stop publicity from the moment they unveiled the wiimote, would they have had more respect? If they had been canvasing 3rd parties saying "you can release one game on ps3 or five games on wii for the same cost; with way less risk" could they have gotten more love? How about if they had pounded hard on the similarities of the DS and wii?
So I guess I am asking two questions, did secrecy cost Nintendo, and was that cost worth it (ie. could/would the HD console have produced wiimotes)?
