3DS is cannibalizing Wii U

[Soundwave]

curl-6 said:

Soundwave said:

Actually I think they are internally more worried about their handheld business than their console one. 

The 3DS is not behaving like a healthy platform does, a healthy platform does not start showing year over year decline in what should be its peak and coming off its strongest software release schedule. 

Smartphones are like a slow moving cancer that slowly but surely are eating away at the handheld business pretty much unabated. Nintendo is desperately throwing everything they can at it (Pokemon, Zelda, 2D Mario, 3D Mario, Mario RPG, Mario Tennis, Monster Hunter exclusivity) and the situation seems to be growing worse, not better. 

To be honest I see it almost every day, kids overwhelming even prefer to play on an iPad versus a 3DS. I honestly think this scares Nintendo more than any challenge they have ever faced in the game business. 

They probably are, but 43m to date and 100k+ weekly are still pretty good numbers. It's not in struggle city like the Vita or anything.

The problem is though they haven't made any money during the 3DS era (three straight years of operating losses) and more importantly if the traditional handheld market is on a decline, then it has huge implications for how Nintendo has to do business going forward. 

In other words ... it's not really shocking that they are scrambling to find new business areas (quality of life). I think they are hedging against a full on collapse in the console biz combined with their handheld business declining to pre-1998 levels. 

I don't think smartphones are even near a saturation point yet either, I think as more time goes on, more kids will start to get their own phones at an earlier and earlier age. 

Really to your original premise how much of the 3DS' total is really coming at the expense of the "Nintendo console" concept as a whole? I'd say Japan has pretty much checked out of the console business for sure for example.