Will Nintendo ship less Wii U this fiscal year compared to last year?

[fleischr]

PenguinZ said:

fleischr said:
Nintendo's games tend to chart well over the long haul. Have you seen how many weeks the New Super Mario Bros. series and original Mario Kart Wii has charted in the top 100? DKC returns had a comparably long run too. There's enough high-quality 1st party Wii U games to keep the baseline hardware sales higher than what they were in 2013, especially when you add in Wii Fit U and DKC Tropical Freeze and speculation about MK8 and SSB (whenever they come out). There's been a quite a surge of interest in the Wonderful 101 following its price cut too.

I think the fiscal year end will put the numbers about even. In the spring, folks in the US have their tax return. Wii U is now better differentiated positioned as a "value" option compared to PS4/Xone whereas last year it was this oddly-high priced Wii/Xbox360 clone. It'll top all the kids' birthday lists this year.

I thought Wii U was a great value over the holidays with the bundles, but that didn't stop it from producing somewhat poor sales...

I think the 3DS is far more desired by kids than the Wii U, though I can only base this thought on: A. Co-workers with kids... and B. My younger cousins.

Integrating 3DS into the Miiverse was a savvy move on Nintendo's part to drum up interest in the Wii U over the long term. And I think that's another reason we could see higher hardware sales going into 2014.

I think we can all agree the Wii U's marketing going into the holidays was terrible. I think Nintendo has learned from their mistakes and they're ready (if not desperate) to turn the ship around. They have a game catalog that is certainly eye-catching whereas in june 2013 that really wasn't the case.

The question is: Is Nintendo ready to open the war-chest of marketing dollars to really make this happen? Seems to strike me they are very creative risk-takers in game design, but are too conservative in day-to-day business operations.