Nintendo Is Hurtin' In Japan, NX Really Needs To Be Out Sooner Than Later

[zorg1000]

Materia-Blade said:

Hiku said:

Materia-Blade said:

"just a few" japanese titles? ps4 has just received a lot of games over the past weeks, including DQ heroes. A boost was expected. it's the post boost baseline that matters.

None of those games are their main francises or even particularly big games at that, is what I was refering to. Dragon Quest Heroes is not a proper Dragon Quest game, but a Musou game. Yakuza has never been a system seller, etc. Also, hardly anyone bought FF Type-0 HD in Japan unlike in the west. (Because they've already played it on PSP, unlike us.) And yet we've been seeing impressive signs lately in spite of that. What will be really interesting is when games like Metal Gear Solid V, Final Fantasy XV, a main staple Resident Evil game, Persona 5, Kingdom Hearts 3, and other jrpgs start coming out, etc.
WiiU already released several of their main franchises released, while PS4 has yet to release even one. WiiU also had a price reduction, while PS4 has not.
Looking forward there's not a lot left for Nintendo to throw at Japan, and it will just get worse with time. Meanwhile Sony have pretty much everything left to play.

Materia-Blade said:

"The great irony in it all is that Japan was the one region where the most people were sure the Wii U had a chance at winning"

So far, it's winning, unless you want to include handhelds.

That's called "being in the lead", not "winning".
The one winning is the one on track to win by the end. And that does not look to be the case for the WiiU at all right now. It's getting outsold by PS3 at times iirc.

"None of those games are their main francises or even particularly big games at that, is what I was refering to"

they came in great quantity, one week even had 3 releases.

"The one winning is the one on track to win by the end."

Wii U is ahead (winning) and any "track" is uncertain for either. ps4 was in the low 10k before dragon quest heroes, what guarantee do you have that it won't go back there? at the same time, you are comparing it to wii u numbers when it didn't get a good release in a long time. we can't tell how big or small of a boost it will get from xenoblade, splatoon, yoshi...

Ya PS4 sales may go back down during slow periods but it still has alot of big games to release, the like of Persona, Metal Gear Solid, Final Fantasy, Kingdom Hearts are all big releases and their will of course be more because PS4 has strong 3rd party support in Japan, something Nintendo does not.

Of course games like Xenoblade, Yoshi, Splatoon, etc. can cause spikes in sales but big Wii U games are too far and few between to cause sustained momentum. The last week of April has Xenoblade+new bundle+Dragon Quest X expansion, we can expect to see a strong week for Wii U but in the following weeks, expect to see the baseline drop until it's back to sub-10k.

Wii U has peaked in Japan, that's not really worth debating, 2014 sold less than 2013 despite titles like Mario Kart, Smash Bros, Donkey Kong, Hyrule Warriors, Bayonetta, Fatal Frame, Captain Toad and this year is down about 25% YoY thru the first quarter and it's very unlikely that's gonna change anytime soon.

Don't get me wrong, I love the Wii U, it's my console of choice and I have had a blast playing it but at some point we need to take our Nintendo goggles off and accept reality, Wii U is not and will not be a strong performer. 3-3.5 million lifetime in Japan sounds about right based on its sales trajectory while PS4 will likely double or even triple that due to Playstation consoles historically having much longer legs and vastly larger 3rd party support.