Tryklon said:
Yes, the 3DS sold 65 million in 6 years while being cheaper, but don't forget the Switch caters to the same crowd, plus, the players who have no interest in playing outside, but always wanted to play a Monster Hunter, or a Pokemon on their couch and their big TV. The Switch has a broader appeal, even to another group of people, the portable gamers, who went with Vita for example, because the 3DS was clearly behind in terms of portable graphic quality. I think they can have a real winner here, but only if they play their cards right. Mostly because the "smartphone's are enough for portable gaming" trend is going down fast, and most smartphone games are only F2P ad filled junk. People are returning to real gaming experiences, and this is the best mobile gaming option right now. |
How can you know all this? What happened to the rest of the DS' 155 million installed base? The 3DS should, logically, appeal to DS owners. The market has changed so much in the last decade or so, you can't simply think "all 3DS owners and all Wii U owners will buy a Switch" and then throw in the extremely unlikely scenario of mobile gaming losing its foothold.
Your last bit is just nonsense, mobile gaming revenue has been steadily climbing year after year and had 20% growth yoy between 2015 and 2016. To add insult to injury; PC/MMO and TV/Console gaming is losing marketshare in the overall gaming market, despite also growing (albeit more slowly), so the exact opposite of what you're claiming is happening. Tablets are the closest analog to the Switch in many ways, which could be bad news for the Switch since multimedia and overall multifunctionality is another thing the Switch severely lacks compared to most other mobile devices. The convenience factor is enormously important in the more casual markets, it's probably the main driving factor along with overall pricing strategy.
http://fortune.com/2015/01/15/mobile-console-game-revenues-2015/
http://www.businessofapps.com/app-revenue-statistics/ tied with this http://venturebeat.com/2016/10/05/newzoo-mobile-games-will-make-82-of-global-app-revenues-this-year/
https://www.emarketer.com/Article/Mobile-Gaming-Sees-Rapid-Revenue-Rise-Southeast-Asia/1015079
https://www.statista.com/statistics/256652/global-mobile-game-revenue/
Personally, I think Nintendo should be really happy to snag around half of the Wii U+3DS total installed base or thereabouts, that would likely put it just about on par with the Xbox One in lifetime sales. Of course, I could be wrong, but there are no logical market factors or signals to indicate another Wii like success with the Switch, the great launch window sales are not a proper indication of long-term sales, as everyone should know quite well if they've spent any time analyzing any market or even any amount of time in here on these very boards.
TLDR: It's just way too early to call 100 million lifetime sales for Switch and such a belief has no basis in available data, or any grounds in the current outlooks and movements of the market. Those who say "yeah, well, the Switch is something new and different so you can't predict based on past trends!" are also shooting themselves in the foot since that would indicate that they have just as little sense as to what's going to happen on the market as everyone who opposes these ideas and views (since no proper data exists that would extract any meaningful conclusions).
