Have nintendo really lost the casuals?

[Salnax]

I think this is the wrong question. "Casual" is almost as broad a term as "hardcore." It encompasses essentially every game that requires a minimal amount of time invested in a game.

Let's take a look at what big casual games the Wii had.

Sports Minigames: Wii Sports, Wii Sports Resort, Mario & Sonic, etc.
Arcade Minigames: Wii Play, Carnival Games, etc.
General Minigames: Mario Party 8/9, Wii Party, WarioWare, Cooking Mama, etc.
Fitness: Wii Fit/Plus, EA Sports Active, Zumba Fitness, etc.
Racing: Mario Kart Wii, etc.
2D Platforming: New Super Mario Bros Wii, etc.
Dance: Just Dance 1/2/3/4, etc.
Semicore: 3D Mario, LEGO games, etc.

Out of those categories
Sports and Arcade Minigames have yet to appear in force on the Wii U, save for a crap game from Ubisoft
General Minigames are still a big deal, if Nintendo Land sales are any gague.
Fitness Games have yet to appear, though Wii Fit U will soon change that
Sonic Racing is the 5th most popular game on the Wii U, indicating the genre is still big, especially for a relatively unpopular title across platforms
2D platforming is still big, as shown by NSMBU
Dance Games seem to have declined a bit, seeing as Just Dance 4 is only at #7. Still, these are decent numbers for a game on a young platform.
Semicore games may include Scribblenauts Unlimited, which has done well.



So, in short, casual game genres are either still doing well on the Wii U or simply haven't been introduced yet.

"But Salnax, what about the Angry Birds crowd? The Fruit Ninja crowd? The Bejewled crowd?"

None of those genres or styles of games were ever on the Wii, save for the occasional WiiWare game. They're native to the Flash gaming scene, which has in fact seen a major decline in recent years.

So, in short, Nintendo hasn't lost the casuals. They just haven't put much of an effort into contacting them yet.