How do you think the Wii U will do its first 3 months? Based on what we know now.

[archbrix]

kain_kusanagi said:

The Wii is an anomaly. The N64 and the Gamecube were primarily owned by Nintendo fans/Core gamers. The Wii on the other hand had a huge non-gamer user base. Mario Kart Wii was heavily bundled and bought by soccer moms who probably just wanted Wii Sports and Wii Fit.

Mario Kart Wii was bundled, but the vast majority of its sales didn't come from that.  So the soccer moms have already bought a Wii for Wii Sports, Wii Fit and now Mario Kart.  Let's not forget NSMB Wii as well.  Face it, the soccer moms you seem to be hung up on are but one demographic that bought the Wii... certainly not the only one.

 

No touch screen gimmick is going to trick those soccer moms to upgrade the system they either don't use or think is all they will ever need. The people who had never played a video game before the Wii are not gamers and I don't believe they will ever play another game on any platform. The Wii is a fluke, and it's a fluke I don't think will repeat. At least not untill true virtual reality gets invented, then I can see non-gamers jumping in again.

Your responses are beginning to become desperate.  Whether or not the WiiU can repeat the success of the Wii, there is still a good chance that Nintendo can offer fun experiences with its new controller, particularly where a family experience is concerned as I mentioned in an earlier post.  Touch interfaces are incredibly intuitive as well.  You are relegating fun experiences to gimmicks as opposed to seeing them for what they are:  Fun experiences.  If Nintendo can deliver, the WiiU's sales will show it.  If they don't, they won't.  And everybody was a non-gamer at some point.  Saying that the Wii and virtual reality are the only instances where a game system can become a mass-market hit seller is absurd.

 

My point is without soccer moms and their like the Wii U will be like past Nintendo consoles, not the Wii. Meaning it will do fine, but not gangbusters.

Here we go with the soccer moms again... why do you think they and their like bought the Wii in the first place?  Besides being affordable, it was also, most importantly, FUN.  If the games for the Wii weren't fun, do you really think these people would have bought it just because it featured motion controllers?!

The N64 massively lacked 3rd party support because of the cartridge format.  The Gamecube fell in line too much with its competition and did not differentiate itself at all.  Both were late to market and neither even had 2D Mario games, which is Nintendo's iconic franchise and which always sell well.  Nintendo made a lot of mistakes with these systems and the sales show it.  Once again, it's quality software that will sell WiiU; and other very important factors such as a uniqueness, price, and launch timing are on its side as well.

 

Nintendo fans will stay where they are and MS/Sony fans will stay where they are.

Finally, something I can largely agree with.  However, I already addressed this:  Nintendo doesn't need to focus on courting the majority of MS/Sony loyal core fans.

 

... I think those without brand loyalty will stay where they are too and not cause much of a difference. Unfortunately for the Wii U, MS and Sony have people addicted to their gamer scores and trophies. Even if they have no deep seeded loyalty to a company they aren't going to buy a Wii U port of a game they can bolster their achievement points on Xbox 360.

If WiiU does become popular, the majority of people with no brand loyalty are not going to pass up the next big thing for gamer scores and trophies (those would be the Microsoft and Sony fans).  And who's to say that Nintendo won't deliver similar types of achievements, or something even better?  Nintendo could easily attract these majority consumers; same way Sony did with the PS/PS2, same way Microsoft did with the 360.  Why?  Because they aren't brand loyal.

You clearly want to believe Nintendo can do anything.

That's because they can, including fail.  But it's much of your reasoning that's so easily refutable.  I'm not claiming WiiU will have the outrageous success of the Wii.  However, you seem to believe that they are incapable of enticing any users they had before that aren't Nintendo fans because those people bit with the Wii and are now done playing games forever until we get holodecks...

Furthermore, you assume that the non-loyal gamers will not give WiiU the time of day, and that its userbase will solely be made up of only the userbase they had in an era where they made a lot of blatant mistakes.  If they were repeating exactly what they did with the Gamecube, I would agree with you, but clearly it's a different situation on many important levels and hopefully you at least realize that by now...