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curl-6 on 19 August 2019
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The_Liquid_Laser said:

I think it would have been about a 3 way tie, although I'll give the edge to Sony, since that is what actually happened between Sony vs. Microsoft.  Here are some factors to consider:

-As others have said, Nintendo does not get most of its new customer base that it would have gotten from Wii. 
-I agree with Bofferbrauer2 that the Virtual Console was something of a selling point, and "Wii HD" would still have brought in some old school gamers like myself.  
-Nintendo launches at a $300/$350 price tag means it is the cheapest HD console on the market.  That gives it something of an advantage as well.
-Third party companies were gradually transitioning to making their games multiplatform.  Microsoft was the main company championing this, but Nintendo would get some of the benefit.  This means that the "Wii HD" would have had a better third party library than the Gamecube, but not as good as PS3 & XBox360.  (Take the average of the Gamecube and PS3 library sizes and that is a decent estimate of the "Wii HD" library, and then add in Virtual Console games.)

In the end I think Nintendo steals a very large chunk of the XBox360 audience in NA, and it also steals a decent amount from Sony in Europe in Japan.  The "Wii HD" sells to 3 groups: 1) Gamecube fans who stay loyal to Nintendo, 2) People who just want the cheapest HD console (a huge selling point for the XBox360 originally), 3) old school gamers who return for the Virtual Console.  Put that all together and I think Nintendo sells about as much as XBox360 and PS3.  Perhaps they all sell about 60-65m each, and again I give Sony the edge.

Also, given the lack of a $250 console that appeals to new gamers, I'd say DS sales go up about 10m, which would end up putting the DS above the PS2 in lifetime sales.   

The Xbox 360 had a $300 USD SKU from launch, so Nintendo wouldn't have had any price advantage there.

HoloDust said:
curl-6 said:

Ah, yeah I should have clarified that; this isn't the same alternate history timeline as N64 using CDs in the other topic, for the purposes of this thread, let's assume Gen 5 and 6 played out as they did IRL. I'll add that to the OP, thanks.

NP, honestly, I was assuming you meant different timeline to start with, but I personally find what happens further in N64-CD timeline much more interesting for speculations (and to be fair, timeline I would much more prefer), since it means fairly different Nintendo and, if not fully absent, than limited MS influence.

Well, that thread remains open and you are more than welcome to use it to speculate about the long term ramifications beyond Gen 5. ;)

I think it's fair to say that by the time we got to Gen 7 in that timeline the industry would likely look totally unlike what we actually got.