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Soundwave on 04 January 2016
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zorg1000 said:
Soundwave said:

Nintendo handhelds are losing popularity, they're really only "massively" successful in Japan, the erosion of their marketshare in the US and Europe is bordering on a full-on collapse if you study their actual hardware shipments in these regions and look at what even the GBA and GBC sold here (if you want to discount the DS).  

 

Actually "Others" (Europe, Australia, etc.) has not shown much of a drop from GBA to 3DS.

FY01-4.60m vs FY11/1212-5.29m (only available 2 weeks of FY11)

FY02-3.77/8.37m vs FY13-4.00/9.29m

FY03-5.00/13.37m vs FY14-3.56/12.85m

FY04-4.49/17.86 vs FY15-2.74 million/15.59m

Through roughly 4 years, 3DS is only down about 12-13% compared to GBA, it's really only America that has shown a significant decline compared to GBA.

Yeah Nintendo's success in Europe came a bit later, largely because they treated Europe like shit (lets be honest) for the better part of the 80s/90s. 

The drop in the US is absolutely a full on collapse though IMO and the loss of the DS-era Europe for Nintendo is still painful and comes at a very bad time regardless of "well you can't replicate the DS" ... well that really isn't something that helps the board of directors sleep any better at night. 

Nintendo simply cannot function in the same way if their handheld shipments going forward are going to be this low. 

In Japan the real reason it's holding steady is because the DS/3DS have *replaced* the home console as the effective lead dedicated gaming device. This will never happen in Europe or North America.