Why Does Nintendo Fail at Creating a Brand?

[DerNebel]

I think you can divide the Nintendo hardware brands into 2 groups, the pre- and post Wii/DS era.

Pre Wii/DS the brands were Nintendo (though the GC is kind of headscratcher) and Gameboy which were then ditched for Wii and DS. Those brand changes signalized changes in Nintendos whole hardware philosophy, which up to that point was about making powerful but affordable machines (which for the Gameboys meant low power consumption as well, which is why they weren't as cutting edge as other handhelds). It then became more about delivering something different and unique with the hardware, ignore the power aspect and be different.

Worked wonders with the Wii and DS, not so much with the Wii U and 3DS, one isn't catching on at all and the other certainly isn't selling because of its unique hardware feature (3D).

So Nintendo doesn't really fail at creating a brand (you could say that they fail at keeping one relevant, though the Gameboy brand would probably still work just as well as the DS brand nowadays) they just decided to change theirs because it didn't fit with their new philosophy (and in the case of home consoles the brand wasn't really working anymore) and I wouldn't at all be surprised if they do the same thing next gen.