Soundwave said:
Nintendo managed the magical combination of choosing crappy underpowered parts which are highly proprietary and therefor expensive. IE: a resistive screen, technology that almost no one else uses anymore, even if the screen is garbage quality, using eDRAM that's only manufactured by one factory in the world (which ironically got bought by Sony), using out of date IBM PowerPC components to ensure backwards compatibility, insisting on a ridiculously low 33 watt power consumption for no real logical reason, etc. etc. etc.
When it became evident the machine was a sales disaster, the parts manufacturers refused to give Nintendo a break on the costs because they weren't confident that the sales of the machine would pick up largely, so it wasn't worth it to them. Sony gets a large break from their manufacturers, because the manufacturers are confident Sony is going to sell millions and millions more of the PS4 in the coming years and don't want to lose that PS4 business, so they're willing to cut on cost, especially if Sony is ordering in such high bulk. Even MS gets the benefit of the doubt because they're selling at a considerably higher volume than Nintendo is.
And probably about 14-18 months ago, I think Nintendo quietly knowing all this made the internal decision that the only thing worse than a failed console is a failed console that also bleeds you a ton of money (see: Sega Saturn). So they decided not to employ price cuts to "save" the Wii U and to basically let it drown to death slowly. There's no life perserver coming to save the Wii U like the 3DS got early in its life with its huge price cut.
Basically those three reasons are why the Wii U is where it's at price wise.
|
with all that said. it makes a new home console in 2016 a no-brainer
