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Soundwave on 15 January 2014
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Nem said:
Soundwave said:

Financially though it makes sense too.

Nintendo badly needs something to sell an additional 10-15 million hardware units + software for them, and if the Wii U can't cut it, then something has give, this is a business, not a sentimental art class.

I think if a new Nintendo portable/tablet wasn't already fast tracked at Nintendo given the rising problem of iOS, it almost assuredly is now once Nintendo got a whiff of those underwhelming Wii U holiday sales in the West and the likely possibility that 3DS sales may have peaked already (look at Japan it's been down YoY for quite a while now). 

If they have already chosen their SoC design, they can begin software development fairly quickly.


It does not make much sense financially either. First, i dont know if they already recouped the R&D cost for the Wii U and they would have another big R&D cost in the short term.

Not only that but i garantee you that a new Nintendo home system that comes out in the next 2 years will fail massively. Why? As i told you, consumer trust. The same problem SEGA had. The consumer will not be willing to get your system cause you might just launch yet another one after 2 more years. This would affect not only the home console market but all future Nintendo systems. There is just no way to let this happen.

The good business for them now, is to either keep doing what they are doing, wich is to keep making great software for it and bite it for another 3-4 years, or to exit the home console market completely and focus on their portable.


They made so much money off the original Wii that I think the Wii U R&D is largely immaterial to them. 

Their larger concern is likely that an unsuccessful Wii U radically limits sales of games like Mario Kart 8/Smash Bros/Mario 3D World/DKCTF etc. which probably would've sold 3-4x more copies on a Wii sized userbase than what they're going to get on the Wii U. 

That probably burns them a lot more. If the Wii U still gets those games as first run, but they are later brought to say a Nintendo tablet, I don't see a big problem. I didn't see any Wii owners throwing a hissy fit because the 3DS got DKC Returns. 

Some people are just never going to buy a Wii U (possibly a lot of people), but more people seem amenable to still buying a Nintendo portable.