| CaptainExplosion said: I wonder what the specs would be if it did release at $300 on launch, and if it launched in 2016 or 2017. |
Try to reconcile this point:
Many gamers on this site and elsewhere online would call the NX a failure if it barely matches XB1/PS4 level of hardware considering it'll be 3 years by the time the NX launches since the launch of current gen consoles. At the same time, most people aren't willing to pay much more than $299 for the NX and think $299 or below should be NX's price. Chances are MS/Sony will have a lot higher bargaining power with all component suppliers compared to Nintendo's brand new console, and it'll be much easier for MS/Sony to justify $299 PS4/XB1 in 2016 due to making up profits in software sales (i.e., huge userbase by then) and extra $$ from online services.
Question: how is Nintendo going to sell a $299 console that will satisfy the expressed needs of most gamers (innovation and/or good hardware) without taking big hardware losses?
Something doesn't align with the pricing predictions vs. the expectations of gamers regarding NX's innovative features/hardware. You cannot expect a truly innovative and a decently more powerful console than PS4 in 2016 all for just $299. There could be other factors of course such as MS/Sony making $$$ off hardware and the $299 price for them in 2016 could be far more profitable than Nintendo pricing the NX at $299 and making $0. Still though, at $299, it doesn't leave Ninendo with a lot of headroom to introduce much more powerful hardware. Nintendo has also expressed that the NX will be completely differnet to the current gaming concepts but how do you do that with only a $299 price? Such a low price makes it way too difficult to incorporate VR or any type of innovating control mechanics. Chances are when they discussed innovation they were discussing software, not hardware. The NX home console hardware is probably going to be basic with a traditional hardware to keep costs low. More likely than not it won't be anything exotic other than either an ARM CPU cores + GCN graphics or even simpler an X86 APU desing similar to XB1/PS4.
Why would Nintendo want hardware somewhat more powerful than PS4? Since they are launching mid-cycle, their NX console will not only be competing with XB1/PS4 but also with XB2/PS5 which are bound to launch by 2020 at the latest (some rumors have it for 2018 or 2019).
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The biggest risk here is EVEN IF the NX is $299, it's launching at the wrong time - no man's land. It's going to lose the popularity vote as most gamer's friends will have already purchased XB1/PS4, implying that some new gamer is more likely to buy a console their friends/family alreayd owns to play similar games online and share games. At the same time the NX is going to be crushed in performance by next gen PS5/XB2 consoles in 2019 or 2020 at the latest.
Nintendo's biggest issue is strategy. Even a $299 price and hardware beating PS4 by 50% may not even be enough since literally everything is against the NX.
The idea that you can play cross-platform titles on the NX and NX handheld creates a synergy might fly for some gamers but not many. Why? I sure as hell have 0 interest in playing PS Vita games on PS4 or PS4 games on the Vita. Sony failed miserably with this approach. This is because the types of games that work very well on handhelds (DS/3DS) are FAR simpler games - they are easy to pick up with a small learning curve. While a lot of home console games are way more complex and would allienate MANY handheld owners.
