FelmanX said:
If price was the factor, then why did the cube end up selling the least amount of hardware last gen? |
1. Horrible marketing. The purple lunchpail made it tres uncool among the socially conscious young males that make up a huge portion of the gamer market, and a stubborn refusal to "spin" the GCN's stats led to the still-persistant belief that the Cube was a child's toy compared to the "more powerful" PS2 and XBox.
2. Horrible marketing part 2: Replaced "mature" Zelda with "Celda", which, while an awesome experience, was never given a chance by many idiots gamers. Then there was Mario Sunshine, which was a solid game, even if not up to M64 levels, but completely hamstrung by a juvenile marketing campaign: http://youtube.com/watch?v=0WPteMFkI2k
3. Games: Never got that killer app. Yeah, SSBM rocked, but it just couldn'tget the attention that Halo and GTA3 earned during launch. And, for reasons discussed extensively elsewhere, it consistently got the worst version of third party titles, leading to lower sales, which lead to less overall support by third parties (who WERE originally anxious to change their relationship with Nintendo after the N64 era).
4. No DVD: When the 'Cube launched, DVD had been out for 3 years and had penetrated the mass consciousness. Everyone seemed to want one. With the low end DVD players at $100, that easily offset the price difference between the GCN and its competition. Moreover, leaving out the DVD and keeping the price low reinforced the "baby box" myth. Finally all 3 consoles cut price 6 months after the Cube launched, and that $100 advantage dropped to $50. It is no coincidence that in the US that price drop moved the XBox over the GCN in weekly sales from that point on (mostly, and usually by a narrow marin) (Note: The DVD explosion was unprecedented in the history of home entertainment. Those thinking that BluRay will move PS3's the way DVD moved PS2 are almost certain to be disappointed).
