EMEAA July 24th UP!

[trestres]

Metallicube said:

Come on Wii, just hang in there until the holiday season :(

I think I've finally conceded the fact that Nintendo needs a new console next year. There are simply too many 3rd parties standing against the Wii, and they are killing it prematurely with their lack of support. I think Japan and Europe should get the new console in holiday of 2011, while Nintendo can probably hold off America until Spring of 2012 since it is its strongest market.

This will be perfect because this way they can release their new handheld late this year/early next year, and follow it shortly with a new console late next year/early 2012.

They would also be the first out of the gate with both their new handheld AND new console, as Sony and MS wouldn't be likely to release another anytime soon. So Wii's successor could build an early lead on the next generation of Sony and MS consoles and perhaps gather more 3rd party support to them. It's not like Nintendo would have to worry about supporting the Wii for much longer anyway because it is too far in first to be caught by Sony or MS at this point. MS and Sony would be busy in 2012 chasing Wii, while Nintendo's new console gets a huge head start in the next console race.

For a new home console to make any difference for third parties, Wii 2 will have to be much more powerful than either the PS3 or the 360. 3rd parties do not care about gameplay innovations, as this gen has shown. The money for them is where performance is better. So I honestly don't know what Nintendo is going to do.

Not releasing anything next year would be suicidal, since the console has virtually no more 3rd party support and Nintendo hasn't got many games coming up for it/ isn't willing to localize most of the games. PS3 and 360 could comfortably spend 2-3 more years on the market on the back of all the 3rd party support. Wii has hit the no-return point, from now on it's a downhill road.

But releasing a new console that's not very powerful would be dangerous as well. Third parties will give it the same HD games and that's it. With PS3 and 360 having hit a good price point and already having motion controls, releasing a beefed up Wii would be useless and will lead to massive losses.

The only thing they have left to do is release something truly, really innovative, but also really powerful. Innovative alone won't do it, as seen with the Wii this gen. But innovative and powerful also means expensive, something Nintendo doesn't want. So I think they are in a bit of trouble in deciding what to do next. It's not an easy decision and to really get 3rd party support on their side, they will have to consider these. That is unless they don't want third party support and decide that 1st party games can sustain the company, which is actually what's happening right now, but releasing so few games per year means sales will undoubtedly go down, and they also need to focus on their portable, meaning sales of their home console are indeed not getting help from that fact.

Nintendo will always lose when it comes to third party support wiht their home consoles. I think they must visualize a possible future scenario where their next console will have to sustain itself all by 1st party releases, which means they will have to invest heavily in new studios. Wii could have lasted so much more than 5 years, but lack of support was too much.