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Plezbo on 01 March 2012
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archbrix said:
Plezbo said:
Its hard to repeat the rabid success of the Wii. Doubtful it will happen again. Remember, Wii was IMPOSSIBLE to get for the first 18 months of its life, they were NOWHERE to be found in the US. I was actually able to turn a nice profit on several that I lucked into getting.

They weren't impossible to find, just incredibly difficult.  I was lucky enough to get mine on launch day but my friends weren't so lucky.  Stores would receive very small shipments of units trickling in here and there, and people would be lined up outside before the store was even open that day.  One friend actually got his the week before Christmas of '06 by waiting outside of Best Buy the night before they opened the next day.  Unless you just happened to show up right when a shipment arrived, this was par for the course for that 18 months.

With the Playstation 2 here in the US, however, it was literally impossible to get one for months, as Sony unloaded their entire stock in the first 24 hours, with no more units available at all to ship/sell until they made more.

With WiiU, Nintendo may not have that absurd 18 months that the Wii enjoyed, but we will undoubtedly see a similar situation this holiday.  The insane demand is certainly possible throughout next year, but is dependent on two main things:  The right price ($299-$349 would do it), and, most importantly, Nintendo having the right games to make the craze happen.

 

Impossible of course being hyperbole, but yes, as you said, unless you were there before the store opened, or very close to opening, NO WII FOR YOU.  I also got mine at launch, camped out in the Walmart parking lot til 6am because this Walmart wasnt doing the midnight launch thing, weak. 

I remember the PS2 launch well, several friends went to Best Buy and marched through school holding that blue box above their heads as they marched down the hall.  As I also remember, that launch had a pretty weak line up, but the graphics were so good for the time we didn't care.  

I do hope that Wii U is a smashing success.  I love Nintendo games, and want to be able to play them as they are meant to be played, on Nintendo consoles.  Can you imagine Microsoft or Sony allowing Mario to come out unfiltered on their platforms?  There would be online multiplayer and Yoshi Armor DLC tacked on.  Really looking forward to E3 so we can finally find out all the juicy details about this new beast.