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Soundwave on 14 September 2013
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JWeinCom said:
Soundwave said:

I think Wii U is selling 28-30 million total. The amount of casual gamers coming back that you have is highly optimistic IMO, that ain't gonna happen.

Mario Kart 8 - 9-10 million
NSMBU - 7 million
Smash Bros. U - 7.5 million
Super Mario 3D World - 6.5 million
DKC: TF - 3.5 million
Wonderful 101 - 150k (sadly)
Bayonetta 2 - 300k

Wii Fit U - 800k



Personally I think Zelda is a declining franchise. Twilight Princess was inflated by the Wii's early success, the next Zelda is not going to have the benefit of that. Expect sales more in line with Skyward Sword or less unless they really do something with the franchise that's mindblowing.

Wii Fit Plus sold 200K+ this year alone.  With no promotion on a dead system when the game itself is a three year old remake of like a 6 year old game.  Bayonetta is going to sell less than half of madworld (I guess all the casuals on Wii made mad world a success?).  Wonderful 101 will sell about 4X what Need for Speed Most Wanted.  New Super Mario Bros U (745k ytd) will sell 7 million worldwide (guess it's not going to pick up at all with the holiday lineup). 

This of course is all based on the ridiculous premise that "Wii U doesn't sell when there are no games or marketing so it won't sell when there are games and marketing plus a price cut".  Ah well.  Silliness like this will make it more fun when sales pick up.


This isn't going to be a pretty generation for people hanging their hats on Nintendo's console business. The apologists can keep spinning it as a rosy situation, but there's always some excuse lined up for them (Nintendo Land was never supposed to sell the Wii U, no one buys a console for Mario ... in 2D, but they will for 3D! ... of course Pikmin 3 can't be expected to boost the hardware at all, etc. etc. etc.). I'll admit if I'm wrong if it happens, but so far the system has performed even worse than my most pessimistic predictions. 

If I had told people here a year ago the Wii U would be performing the way it actually is right now, I'd get attacked left and right by people on this board who would claim it impossible even with a few months of delays to Pikmin + Rayman. I'd be inundated with "no system with a new Mario game is going to sell worse than the GameCube, you're crazy! Have you seen Nintendo Land? It looks super fun! And it has HD Call of Doooty! And Zombi U looks way better than Red Steel! LOL, 30k a month in North America? That's Vita levels, you're crazy, never will happen!". Even in months where LEGO City + Monster Hunter 3G and Pikmin 3 + Splinter Cell: Blacklist have come out the 30k/month needle on the Wii U hasn't moved at all, which to me is concerning.

It's ancedontal sure (as is anyone's prediction) but of the 15 "casual gaming" friends I know that had a Wii, not even one of them has a Wii U or has expressed any interest in getting one even when I told them it has Wii Fit U in a couple of a months. Some of my predictions may be a tad low, but others are probably generous.