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Soundwave on 21 November 2014
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HylianSwordsman said:
Mr Khan said:
curl-6 said:

Announcing the next system at E3 2015 would be a huge mistake; their remaining loyalists would feel backstabbed, and hardware sales would plummet between then and release.

It would be late 90s Sega all over again.

Next handheld, not really. E3 2015 would be 4 years post-launch and 5 years from when the 3DS was actually announced, more time than the Game Boy Advance got. 

I'm with Soundwave on most of this. March/April 2016 launch for the next handheld, the home TV version of that handheld in holiday 2016 because there's little chance or reason for Nintendo to push Wii U past 2016 in the state it's in (likely the holiday '15 wave will be the last big wave of software, with a few scraps in early 2016).

You seem to have forgotten that the New 3DS exists. It's effectively the successor, will be announced next year in the west, and will extend the 3DS lifespan in the same way that the Game Boy Color extended the Game Boy's lifespan. I could see a true successor being released in 2018, but the New 3DS will need some time on the market. Unless it flops worse than Wii U, which it shouldn't, even in the US. Short of a catastrophe happening, Nintendo would be an idiot to release a handheld successor in 2016.


New 3DS is nothing special. It's the traditional "last gasp revision" that Nintendo did for both the GBA and DS. 

In fact it's timing hints strongly at a new Nintendo portable in 2016. 

The third and final revision of the DS was the DSi XL which launched in March 2010 in North America. The 3DS (the next-gen successor) launched in April 2011, 13 months later. 

I called a new Nintendo handheld revision this fall a while back, if they wanted to get one more model in before a 2016 Fusion launch they'd be launching it ... right as they are ... right on cue. Virtually the same schedule as the DS -- 3DS transition.

Keep in mind too that 3DS will still need to be stocked for years even after a hypothetical Fusion platform comes out. It will be the cheapo/budget option for parents, especially for kids who just want to get into the amiibo ecosystem.