In hindsight, would an Wii HD have been an good idea?

[JWeinCom]

Nope. First off, your estimation on price doesn't take into account things like shipping costs and things like that.

Secondly, the Wii was still selling. Kind of alot. In 2010 and 2011, the system sold about 30 million. This is 30 million consoles sold at a profit. What would have been the benefit of cutting themselves off at the knees by shifting focus to a non-profitable console?

Thirdly, a Wii HD would be more confusing to the market than the Wii U. Who is this thing marketed to? The motion control folks showed they care for an HD system with Wii controls with the Playstation Move. The Kinect fizzled out fairly quickly. What is the incentive for such a crowd to spend 400 dollars to upgrade their Wii? The crowd interested in higher end graphics might be interested, but third party developers would not be likely to create games using the hardware to its max. Considering the relative sizes of the markets, Wii HD games would be gimped to PS360 levels. If Nintendo decided to design games to these specs, they'd either ramp up development costs by having to create two versions for vastly different architecture, or would fragment their own base. When the PS4 and XBone were released, and developers were finally using the system to its potential, the Wii HD would be the weakest of the systems. So the sytem would appeal to the cross section between hardcore and Nintendo fans. Basically, the Wii U market.

From any perspective you look at it, this would be an awful idea. They'd cut the momentum of their current console significantly, fragment their software market, create a difficult marketing situation, would be releasing an expensive console aimed at a casual market, and just all around would be acting against their best interest.