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Soundwave on 25 November 2014
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padib said:
Soundwave said:

That's your opinion, I think the mediocre numbers the Wii U has put up speak for themselves (both in software and hardware). 

If Sony's console userbase got whittled down to only 18-20 million users as Nintendo is tracking to, they would have the same issues too, so it's not just a "Nintendo thing". 

This is what happens when you go from systems that used to sell 33-65 million and collapse down to 20 million or even less (quite possibly) with the Wii U. 

You are left with an audience base that doesn't buy much of anything other than a very narrow grouping of software. Same thing happened with Sega on the Dreamcast, they could not get games like Jet Set Radio and Shenmue and others to sell, even though Sonic did pretty good. 

The mass market does not want a Wii U. 

I get that the online community for the Wii U is vocal, but just because they make a big fuss doesn't mean they can back up their talk with any actual action. NeoGaf is the biggest online gaming community, and even that is like 130,000 users (probably a lot of multiple accounts and about 1/3 of those people post almost exclusively on the non-gaming side of the board). 

That is nothing in the grand scheme of things. 

And this is your opinion. So what? The question is who is more right. I believe I am because I understand Nintendo better than you do.

The numbers today don't mean squat on what Nintendo can sell on the long run. Look at the PS3, it started horribly relative to the PS2 but it turned out all right. To say that Nintendo is absolutely incapable of creating a compelling library because U owners just buy Mario is the most stupid opinion I've read on vgchartz in a very long time.

So sorry if you think that's just my opinion, but I think my reasons to hold my opinion are more compelling.

Your online community argument is a strawman which has nothing to do with what I'm talking about. There are reasons to believe that the market is not purely consisting of Mario lovers and PSXB multi-plat lovers. There are many more gamers out there who for example buy the 3DS. Where are all those gamers in your market model? They don't exist because your model is broken.


My opinion is based on cold, hard data. 

Nintendo's performance is mediocre. 

The Playstation 3 was selling far better than the Wii U even at $500 (again look at the data) and was moving better numbers in third party software all through its lifecycle. Lets look at even the most recent NPD sales, the Wii U sold 69k for October, the PS3's equivalent month (October 2008) it sold 190k ... that's almost triple the Wii U number. That's not "close". 

I don't base my opinion on my personal gaming tastes/wishes. I wish Bayonetta 2 would sell 3 million copies. I wish DKC: TF was a big hit. 

But I'm not going to sit here with a straight face and say "yeah these are selling great, everything is fine". Everything is sure as f*ck not fine, the Wii U is pretty much a full-on disaster for Nintendo that internally they probably wish they could go back to the drawing board with but it's too late now.