being 'unique' has cost nintendo every recent generation!!!!

[Johnw1104]

LuckyTrouble said:

Johnw1104 said:
I'd argue Nintendo's unique approach, while often preventing them from winning a generation for reasons quirky or economical, is the primary reason they're still around while all other non-giant-conglomerates have stepped out of the console business.

Nintendo is certainly no small company, but they're the only one left that's essentially a gaming/toy company thats still finding a way to stay involved and make money. I don't think going mainstream is necessarily the answer.

This....this makes no sense. The only console developers of note from the past thirty years that have stepped out of the console making business are Atari because they never fully recovered after the video game crash, and Sega because they screwed up and buried themselves.

It's makes perfect sense. Aside from the two you mentioned, many others have failed outside of your arbitrary 30 year limitation as well as your subjective measure "of note"... But this is a tengent.

So you feel they'd be better off trying to compete directly by creating more generic consoles against two giants far more capable of providing the typical console and absorbing necessary losses?

Nintendo has found clever ways to profit from their systems with rare exception since they got involved. They certainly make some puzzling decisions, but they're still in it, making money, and doing it their way. Even when I find the end result disappointing, I rather like that one of the big three is trying out unusual things each generation, and every once in a while they seem to stumble on something quite fun.