Analyst firm says Sony is responsible for Nintendo's lack of third party content

[Zod95]

Shadow1980 said:

Let's apply your statement about this generation to the previous: "Now we have a console maker that chooses to launch 6th gen tech on 7th gen time period, arrogantly thinking they could be as successful as their competitors." Well, even though prior to the start of the seventh generation some thought it would only sell GameCube-level numbers, the Wii was immensely successful, outselling both the PS3 and 360 by a considerable margin for several years after launch and still with a comfortable lead over the others in global sales. It had the right combination of pricing, marketing, and games to make it a best-seller. The Wii U's problem is that first and foremost it didn't have the games it needed, and basically it had to subist off of NSMBU and Nintendo Land for 8 solid months, plus the fact that it was poorly marketed didn't help either. I personally think the "Wii model" of less powerful but more affordable hardware that relies on non-standard controls as a selling point is too risky, as illustrated by the Wii U. Without the proper ingredients, the recipe doesn't work. While the Wii showed that Nintendo can rely primarily on their own software output, the N64, GC, and Wii U have shown that they probably shouldn't. I do think Nintendo should play it safe and make a system on par with the PS5 and Xbox 4 for next-gen.

The statement suits perfectly to the 7th gen too. The fact that a company is arrogant doesn't mean it can't be successful. They were arrogant with the Wii and they had a pretty decent success. I wouldn't say "immensely successful" because less than 40% market share for a company that was used to dominate generations is not that much of a win.

Regarding WiiU, it had those 2 games like Wii had Wii Sports and Wii Play. The conditions are the same. The difference is that the casual market is unstable and most of Wii's clients moved out of the console videogaming as fast as they had moved in while others evolved into a more hardcore experience delivered by PlayStation or Xbox.

The point is that the console gamer is ever more demanding (he evolves as he experiences more complex games, and this is a continuous/non-stoppable process) so console makers must deliver ever greater offers generation after generation. Not doing so means failure in the long-term. Thus, any company that challenges this basic law of the market offering the same tech/price ratio as the last generation is being arrogant. It can be successful in the short-term when being innovative (which involves both talent and luck) but it can't certainly do it forever. Nintendo is the perfect case about this.

 

Shadow1980 said:

 

I beg your pardon? I'd appreciate it if you watched your tone. Not only are you wrong, you're projecting, making a personal attack by accussing me of making up my own definitions because I don't agree with your non-standard classification.

The generations I outlined are not my personal nomenclature. If you were well-enough versed in the history of gaming, you would realize that these categories have existed for a good while and are the consensus view on how to categorize each system. It's not purely about specs. Release timing is a big part of it as well. It was always pretty clear that Pong machines like the Odyssey released in the early to mid-70s constituted the first generation of systems, that the 2600 and other cartridge-based systems released from '76 to before the Crash of '83 the second, that the post-crash 8-bit systems like the NES made up the third, that the 16-bit systems made up the fourth, and so on. Even though the Wii was barely more powerful than the likes of the Xbox, it is still classified as seventh generations based on the fact that A) it was released alongside the PS3 and a year after the 360, and B) it is Nintendo's fifth console overall (e.g., the NES is 3rd gen, the SNES 4th, the N64 5th, the GC 6th, and the Wii 7th). Don't believe me? Here's a good place to start. And as always, Google is your friend.

And to be honest I never really heard of the Zeebo. In the list from my last post I was providing the major and/or more well-known systems as examples. I didn't bother including the Vectrex, Astrocade, Arcadia 2001, Atari 7800, Neo-Geo, Jaguar, 3DO, and various other also-rans to save time and space. In any case, the Zeebo looks like something that was released for a couple of years in developing markets, and will end up going down as just another historical footnote. But, Wikipedia lists it as a seventh-gen system, which is congruent with its release timing.

 

First of all, my tone is the same as yours. I haven't made any personal attacks (if you knew me you would know I never do such things, my focus is always on people's comments/behaviours, not people themselves) and my words have not been more aggressive than yours.

Second, while the generations you outlined aren't your personal nomenclature, mine aren't either. Tech is my criteria as it is for many other people. The only difference is that your nomenclature is the one that was adopted by Wikipedia (and I knew that already). And that's fine, each of us has his own view. But when you criticize my criteria because 2 Nintendo consoles are in the same generation, I feel free to do the same and show you that within yours 2 Atari consoles are in the same generation too...as I feel free to show you many other flaws in your nomenclature (incoherences between criteria and decisions) while mine is flawless (having tech as the only criteria creates zero incoherences).