| RolStoppable said:
We were talking about Nintendo handhelds, so where does "only going to buy casual games and Nintendo titles" even come from? Stuff like JRPGs and other longliving series have always sold well enough. There wasn't any good reason for concern that games wouldn't sell. As for the other portion of that paragraph of yours, growing comfortably beyond the sales numbers of the Wii U with a me-too approach wasn't likely because the GC already struggled big time at lower price points. Additionally (and this goes for your second paragraph), a third place finish isn't good enough. Why should Nintendo be satisfied with such a result? Likewise, the goal for NX can't be to merely outsell the Wii U. NX (the home console variant alone) needs to sell multiple times more than the Wii U. Nintendo has to have the ambition to clearly outdo their results for the eighth generation. The main reason why the Xbox brand grew last generation is that Sony messed up really hard. We are seeing very different results this generation where Microsoft is basically a non-factor outside of the USA and the UK, and even in their strongest markets they are forced to undercut the PS4 just to keep up. If success for Microsoft requires a Sony that messes up really hard, then this in turn means that success for Nintendo with a me-too approach would require both Sony and Microsoft to mess up; because if only one of them messes up, the other will be the first choice as alternative, so there won't be much left for Nintendo. Placing your bets on factors that are completely outside of your control is an asinine business decision. It's like building your entire strategy in a football match around the hope that the other team scores an own goal while you park the bus for the entire game; well, except that in football the chance for success would still be higher than in the video game business. |
Oh thought we were talking about early expectations of the Wii U. With the 3DS its even more simple, they weren't making games for the handheld market and instead of investing into exclusive 3DS experiences which would be out of their comfort zones, costly and a risk. They'd rather focus on consoles where they could maximise they're profits with exitsing successful franchises in their existing aesthetic/game design, with money going towards DLC, ports, bigger dev teams/faster development etc. You mention JRPGs and I'd add platformers, both would do well on 3DS but what western studios are making those on any platform? The games that were well suited for the 3DS like lego etc actually came to the platformand 3DS has plenty of JRPGs in Japan and support from square and capcom, so I don't see any anti-nintendo sentiment there. Where exactly did you expect support and not see it?
With the me too approach, if you feel that the gamepad was a better system seller in 2012 then a console vastly more powerful then the PS3/360, I won't argue with that (I obviously disagree), but I will just reinforce that said approach would have/will likely be more effective in 2012 or 2017, then it was in 2001 where the most powerful devs had already signed allegiance to PS2, developing exclusively for the platform from day one and ignoring both the gamecube and xbox. The highest selling games of the generations; GTA, Tekken, Metal gear solid, Final Fantasy and Kingdom hearts either never touched the other platforms or arrived on them well after the PS2 had already semented its dominance. That is simply not how third parties operate in todays industry, especially with the cost of development being so high. Beyond that the gamecube arrived a year after the market leader, 2012 woud have been the reverse and so will the arrival of the NX, both instances Nintendo has the headstart. Imagine the Xbox 360 arrived a year after the PS3, it would've been a completely different story. 360 of course benefitted from sony messing up but that wasn't the only reason why the xbox brand grew. Solidifying an 6m audience and third party support before the arrival of the PS3 certainly helped.
Finally, if Nintendo have a plan which will boost the sales of their console to multple times that of the Wii U then great, that would imply a gimmick , I can't think of one they could easily sell and gimmicks often involves their own costs, like the gamepad or VR. My point is that simply being a cheap Nintendo console will not earn them sales multiple times that of the Wii U, it will not earn them anything more then what the gamecube earned them. If people were interested in secondary consoles just to play mario and zelda, gamecube at $99 would have sold 30m+.
At least if the system is capable, like the gamecube, there is potential for them to consolidate their core audience (18m-22m core Nintendo fans) whilst trying entice fringe fans like myself who would take Mario/Zelda over Uncharted or Halo but then Final Fantasy/Mass Effect/Eldercrolls/Battlefront (essentially 3rd party support) over Mario/Zelda. They could try to eat into the PS5/X2 pie as NX will launch first, getting a headstart (unlike the gamecube) and benifit by other favourable changes in the industry like aligned architecture (unlike 2001), and the reality of devs having a system where they can easily port superior PC versions of their games to (unlike the Wii U) in 2017/18 when the PS4/X1 are highly dated. Worst case scenario Nintendo would be in the same position they're in with a $199 box, low selling but profitable hardware, at no point am I implying that Nintendo should sell at a loss btw. But it is what it is, all hypothetical and informed by perception bias... Nintendo can go any number of routes and they'll be fine. They just need to sort out their software and remain below $399.
