Mario is to blame for Nintendo's financial troubles?

[happydolphin]

I think the problem this author has is that his nose is a little too deep in the industry. Taking a quick step back, looking at it from a business POV, the market is gobbling up Mario, whether it's 3D or 2D, or even in spin-off Mario franchises such as Mario Kart, Strickers, itadaki street, Mario & Sonic at the Olympic games, or Mario Tennis to name a few.

What the author fails to realize is threefold:
1) Mario and new Nintendo IPs are not mutually exclusive.
2) Nintendo actually released a plethora of new IPs this generation. Only, they were mostly casual IPs, such as Brain Age, Nintendogs, Wii Series, Endless Ocean and many many more.
3) Core IPs rarely pass the 3Mil sales mark, unless they become hits (which is very rare). In other words, they don't sell all that much.

If this is about the financial perspective, Mario plays a fundamental role in Nintendo's success. However, there is a considerable share of non-Nintendo systems sold to audiences to which Nintendo is not catering.

For those 20Mil-some users, as well as the potential sales of peer software targeting that non-Nintendo core, Nintendo needs to either bring in 3rd parties (which it currently is), and maybe create non-Nintendo catering IPs in house (not necessary since 3rd parties can do the job). Whether it's in-house or from 3rd parties or partners, to obtain full Nintendomination, Nintendo needs to cater to the non-Nintendo core.

But other than that, Mario is anything but to blame. Rather, he is one of the very reasons for Nintendo's success this gen.