As we all know, Nintendo is in a pickle right now. They suffered from their first financial loss ever and had to frantically reduce the price of the 3ds very close after launch. I have a feeling that the Wiiu will have a similar effect on Nintendo and may drag them down to Sega’s level or possibly even(heaven forbid) Atari’s level. Don’t worry though, because with every problem I present, there is a solution that could be implemented by launch.
1.) Lack of Multimedia Functions.
As time has gone on, multimedia functions have become more and more relevant. Eventually, these functions became so relevant that Microsoft and Sony decided that this market was so lucrative, that they left the console market and made the 360 and PS3, the first multimedia device of their kind. Now look at the sales, after a while, they caught on, and even now outselling the Wii!
The functions of these devices set it apart from the wii. For example, the 360 has proven that people would rather listen to the Black Eyed Peas as opposed to music produced by the developer. Nintendo should take notice of this. If I were them, I would stop making music in my games altogether. This will lower the development costs, allowing them to sell it at a lower price to undercut the competition. Nintendo could then market their devices to the deaf! The deaf market has been proven to be a very lucrative market(in music at least). Look at Katy Perry, no nondeaf person would buy her CDs, so she markets them to the deaf and she keeps climbing the charts! The beauty of Nintendo games was always the gameplay, not the music right?
When talking about multimedia functions, one can not ignore the almighty movie. Movies are part of human culture now. Movies are clearly more popular than games, so Nintendo should capitalize on this. Add DVD or Bluray capabilities to your console. Even if you run into a shortage of games at launch, you can coast on that. The PS3 proved that. In fact, the PS3 proved that whenever someone is given the choice to play games or watch movies, they will choose movies most of the times. That’s why Netflix is more popular on the PS3 than any other device.
2.) Poor Marketing
I know what you are screaming. “The wiiu isn’t out yet! How can you fault it for that?” Well, if the past is any indicator, they will do it wrong and history tends to repeat itself. Nintendo needs to make a variety of commercials targeted at very specific minorities such as people who are allergic to milk or those afraid of spiders. People like when people make uberspecific things for their little group. This is shown by the stuff (insert certain group) say. For those who live under a rock or in a undeveloped country, those are videos targeted at specific groups, and despite being so limited in mass appeal, they shot off like wild fire. It is because everyone single person in that little group watched it.
Also, they are bound to have Japanese people marketing it. I am no Xenophobe, but I just can’t understand what they are saying sometimes. Look at the pre E3 Nintendo announcement. I couldn’t understand that funny little man on my computer screen. They could have at least included captions. This can be avoided though! Have Kanye West market the wiiu, he is the voice of our generation after all and his music is pretty cool too. I have yet to find a better song than Empire State of Mind.
3.) Lack of DS/3ds connectivity.
This is the most obvious flaw in the wiiu. It was clearly made to allow DS and 3ds ports to be made. Nintendo has become very hushed on this topic and I believe it is because they don’t want to admit it isn’t a feature. It’s a shame too. The DS is one of the best selling game devices of all time, second only to the iphone. Sony has proven this a feature gamers crave. For example, I could play a game on ps3 and then walk over to my kitchen and play the same game on my PSV. Nintendo should push this connectivity. In fact, every wiiu game should have a 3ds version and vice versa. Sony has proven how lucrative it is. It only makes sense too. You get to charge twice for the same thing! This strategy also fits with my first argument. No one listens to music on their handheld anyways! Everyone turns the music off to conserve power. This will not be easy to do though. In order for Nintendo to market this successfully and take advantage of the 3ds’ capabilities, they would have to make every game for the wiiu, 3d. Sony has been doing this for awhile though, but it has failed but they have been doing one thing fatally wrong. They give players the choice to play in 3d. I venture to say that people like being told how to play games, which is why quick time events and interactive movies are so popular. Nintendo needs to make every game only play in 3d. Any other strategy will lead people to claim that the 3d was “tacked on.”
4.) The Wiiu pro controller.
It is obvious which multimedia device the wiiu borrowed the design of their pro controller from. Quite frankly, I think they stole from the wrong company. They should have recreated the Dualshock. Why do you ask? Because the dual shock is one of the best controllers of all time! I polled some people at my local nursing home and only one of them knew what an Xbox was and I’m pretty sure he was lying in order to get me to talk longer with him. He was pretty lonely looking, but I was too smart for him. I ran out of their as fast as I could! On the other hand, I polled people at my local gamestop, and lo and behold, the Playstation was known by everyone(albeit everyone thought I was referring to the more successful PS2 not the PS3 but whatevs). By copying the dualshock, they could potentially sell these controllers to unknowing moms who are trying to buy their kids a ps3 controller because, lets be honest guys, people will buy the wiiu for the gamepad, not the pro controller. -_-
I know there are so many obstacles that wiiu will have to overcome to become successful, but these seemed to be the most important. Hopefully you will agree. If you have anymore worries about the wiiu, please feel free to post them because I am too lazy to cover them all.
"Everything we hear is an opinion, not a fact. Everything we see is a perspective, not the truth." -My good friend Mark Aurelius
