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czecherychestnut on 24 May 2014
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Jizz_Beard_thePirate said:
binary solo said:
Jizz_Beard_thePirate said:
I think the wiiU will do fine. I still think it will make 20 million by the end of its life at the very least but again, I wont fully know till mk8 comes out

20 million for the whole generation and "will do fine" are not compatible. 20 million coming off a 100 million gen is an unmitigated disaster. The only reason people have re-set themselves to ~ 20 million is fine is beause Wii U is staring down the barrel of a sub 15 milion generation.

Wii U should do 20 million at the very least but to achieve a level of sales that qualifies as "fine", IMO, requires lifetime sales of 30+ million. N64 level sales is "fine" GC level sales is not.

Well... GC was profitable for them, they didn't lose much money but they weren't selling buildings either... With the wiiU, they were losing money but now, they are breaking even and it should be all profit from here... If the wiiU is a profitable investment for nintendo at 20 million and they dont suffer much losses at alll like they did with the gamecube, then I consider 20 million being fine. Its not great, its not good but its not bad either... I think Nintendo tries to do new things by taking some risks and when the risks don't pay off, they get something like the wiiU but if they pay off, then its something like the wii

I hear this a lot, that the GC was profitable for Ninty, but where does this come from? Nintendo were making so so profits during this period, despite GBA selling massive numbers of HW and software, which to me would imply that the GC was at best cost neutral and more likely not profitable as a whole. Second, the Wii U may be profitable now, but thats assuming Nintendo don't make any further price cuts, and if they don't make any price cuts then how are they going to reach 20 million? At its current avg sales rate it will take another 5 years to reach 22 million, and thats with the highly unlikely assumption that sales don't drop off as time goes on, particularly with 3rd parties abandoning the Wii U as gen 7 winds down. 

I just can't share many people's optimism in this thread, not with the facts at hand. Wii U is very unlikely to be a success, because 1) it isn't likely to be profitable as a whole (given the amount lost so far and future price pressure from PS4/XB1) and 2) Nintendo would have lost an unprecedented amount of marketshare, mindshare and industry clout in the process. It does had the potential to become a second console, but then so did GC (particularly when it hit $99) but look at how much that helped (not very). The marlet for multi-console owners is much smaller than many people here seem to believe, so I don't think that will help drag Wii U away from its current trajectory.