When will Switch pass Wii?

[curl-6]

miqdadi said:

curl-6 said:

Of the 12 systems Nintendo have released to date, I can think of only two, Wii and GBA, that were successful but cut short early.

As Eagle points out, they're still selling the 3DS which is not only approaching its 9th birthday but was much less successful than the Switch.

What determines that is 3rd party support, most likely first party will move to the next project

Again though, the pattern you're describing really only applies to 2/12 Nintendo systems released thus far, it's not their standard MO like you suggest.