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Soundwave on 28 September 2014
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Shadow1980 said:

The NES utterly dominated the 8-bit era and brought console gaming back from the brink of death. The SNES did very well, coming in first overall in the 16-bit era and garnering just shy of 50% global market share (the Genesis/Mega Drive was at about 40% and the TG-16 at about 10%). The N64 did very well in North America (at least as well as the SNES) despite losing considerable market share and numerical sales in Japan. The GameCube, despite underwhelming sales, was supposedly profitable in the long run, not to mention it had by far the best software attach rate of any Nintendo system, which put software sales nearly on par with those of the N64 despite selling a third fewer hardware units. Finally, the Wii was for a while the fastest-selling system ever and is only the third system to sell over 100 million units. Even the Wii U, which is on track to be their worst-selling console, will likely be profitable over the course of its whole life cycle despite early losses.

So, you were saying?

EDIT: Oh, and this rumored "Fusion" thing would be a bad idea. What's that old adage about putting all your eggs in one basket? If such an inconventional piece of hardware flops and is the only piece of hardware Nintendo has next generation, then maybe they will end up like Sega. Having separate console and handheld hardware has worked for them so far. No reason to change the status quo in that regard.


Except it isn't working for them anymore ... they've lost money for 3 straight years now and probably will again this year. 

Their eggs are in all in one basket whether they want to admit it or not ... they are so irrelevant in the console business that really all they have left is their portable side which is also under heavy assault from the rise of tablets/smartphones. 

When you are in a war and you have two fronts, with the main front losing ground and the other front just getting slaughtered it makes more sense to combine your forces into one stronger front IMO. At least you have a chance then. 

Besides "Fusion" doesn't literally mean 1 hardware device. Does Apple only make 1 hardware device? No, they have iPhone, iPad, iPod Touch. Some people only have one, some people have two. They have a central ecosystem though where you can play the same apps/games between them, you can't do that with a 3DS/Wii U ... if you want Mario Kart 8 and only have a 3DS, you have to pay another $300 to play that game. A lot of people are just not bothering.