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Soundwave on 27 November 2013
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RolStoppable said:
Soundwave said:

Not every system that sells like dog poop is objectively an awful system. 

The Wii U is probably top to bottom a better quality exprience than the Wii was at the same age. The online is better, the leap in graphics is the first for a Nintendo console since the N64 to GameCube 12 (!) years ago and its incredibly eye pleasing and refreshing. Miiverse is OK. 3D World holds up well against Galaxy and Nintendo Land is probably the best "mini-game" compilation that Nintendo's ever done. NSMBU, Pikmin 3, LEGO City, W101, Zelda: WW, Rayman Legends, are all solid titles too. 

Multiplats are alright if you don't have a PS3/360, Assassin's Creed IV looks just fine, so does Call of Duty, so does Dues Ex and Batman. Even with third party games the Wii U for now holds its own against the PS4/XB1, and while that probably won't hold forever, it's a nice improvement from the "holy crap, did Resident Evil 4 always look this bad?" feeling I got when I first booted up RE4 on the Wii using an HDTV set. Dat low-res brown/muddy look ... oh my. 

The Vita is a good system too. So was the Dreamcast. 

They're all marketing/design failures that are mismanaged by bad management and a lack of vision though, which is a different story. 

Those three systems may be good in the eyes of their niche, but all of them were meant to succeed on a broader scale. Lack of vision leads to bad design decisions, and bad design decisions lead to systems that are not perceived as being worth their money. I don't consider that a different issue, rather it's the root cause that leads to the failure in the first place. Bad management makes things worse, but lack of vision or a bad vision will inevitably lead to notable problems regardless of the quality of management/execution.


To be fair, Nintendo is in kind of a bad spot here. Because they kind of exclude themselves from competing for the hardcore gamer, convincing everyone else they *need* a dedicated home game console (or worse a *second* or third console) is always going to be tough, and with kids, you end up losing a lot of them by age 11/12 because they become obsessed with being "cool" and wanting to play the same games their older brother/cousin is playing. 

The fact, home consoles are best suited for people who want to play on their big screen TV for 5-10+ hours a week at the very least and want to purchase a large number of games. 

And the people that have that kind of free time, disposable income, and desire to invest that much time/money into games are males age 16-32 years old. And I just don't think that's changing ever. 

Games simply aren't movies, a movie is over in 2 hours and doesn't require anything but your attention. Women are always going to be an elusive audience for games, simply because they're smarter than men (lol) to not spend 10-50 hours playing a video game.