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Soundwave on 27 March 2017
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mountaindewslave said:
Soundwave said:

It's too early to say anything. 

2 million for worldwide launch is what Nintendo is saying they have for the Switch launch, which is low. Both the Wii U and 3DS would've sold 2 million in a month as well with a worldwide launch, probably GameCube as well. My guess is they will ship just a little more than 2 mill so they can say "we overperformed our expectations with Switch!" it's a nice spin for the fiscal year end investor's report and will soften the blow that Mario Run didn't meet their revenue expectations. 

Since Nintendo is also conditioning their fan base to have to buy early due to shortages of many products they release (Amiibo, NES Classic, etc.), we're going to need to see stock normalize and oppurtinistic scalpers also get out of the way before having a clearer picture. 

The big advantage the Switch has is it's not relying on the unreliable Touch Generations/casual crowd, with a legit AAA game like Zelda, one of the best game's Nintendo has ever made, Switch has a huge advantage over 3DS which Nintendo banked on Nintendogs + cats being a hit with casuals, and it wasn't. Same with NSMBU and Nintendo Land for Wii U. 

blah blah blah.

if you're not going to actually use perspective than you paragraphs are useless. The Switch launched in MARCH, an extremely unusual time period to launch a system, and argubly spring is not a big 'gaming' period of time at all.

For the Switch to potentially sell as much in its first month as former Nintendo systems, or to sell out of its 2 million allocation, is an EXTREMELY positive thing. The Wii U comparisons are useless- it launched during the HOLIDAYS.

Obviously the Switch is off to a great start when a million or two have been sold and there still is a massive demand online, despite a limited library, to the point that scalpers are managing to sometimes sell the thing for over $400. Use your brain, that is something that never occured with the Wii U. It was on shelves everywhere from Day 1 not only due to being overshipped, but due to being unwanted. Make no mistake, given the time of year the Wii U launched its allocation amount wasn't really THAT insane. It just sold incredibly poorly (even at launch). If the Switch launched in November instead of March with, say, Zelda + Mario, it probably would sell like 4 million out of the gates easily. March is not even a fraction as busy as the holidays. The holidays invite loads of customers who otherwise wouldn't bother (i.e. family members randomly taking risks buying a loved one a game system on a whim)

When you have such limited stock (2 million works out to about 650k per territory) it doesn't really matter which month you launch in if you have a big Nintendo game that will bring out the Nintendo faithful. 

Wii U would've sold 2 million in March 2013 if Nintendo had launched it with Zelda: Skyward Sword. 

We know the Nintendo/Zelda faithful need their system, by June/July we will have a better idea of whether or not regular consumers are buying in huge numbers provided stock has normalized. 

This happened with Amiibo too, Nintendo undershipped initially, which then caused people to want them more because they couldn't get them, and for a while you had to line up or get to stores early in the morning to get any new Amiibo shipment, but after a few months once supply evened out we had a clearer picture of where Amiibo stands in the market. When you tell people who are kinda on the fence about something they can't have it, it tends to increase demand artifically for a little while. In any case all of these questions will be answered in due time one way or another.