couchmonkey said:
You seem, to be right about marketing. As I recall, stated strategy at launch was: third parties first (30+ third party games to 2 Nintendo games); hardcore gamers first, casuals later; this and no more blue ocean or disruption (in an investor call). This resulted in a pathetic lineup until second Christmas. I personally felt the strategy started to shift around E3 2013(?) when they unveiled Wii Sports Club and fit U. ultimately this may be a case of marketing trying to polish a turd. The game pad was antithesis to the Wiimotes and there was no Wii Sports-quality idea to sell the game pad. |
Nintendo Switch only had 2 Nintendo games at launch; BOTW (a Wii U port) and 1, 2 Switch (a paper thin mini-game collection that makes Nintendoland look ambitious).
Wii U actually had the more casual orientated launch. With 2 titles that on paper have bigger sales potential and target market than any Zelda. The Switch's initial success (beyond being a hybrid) seems directly attached to Nintendo getting their core audience on board right away which is why it reflected in the initial older male skewed demographic. NSMB may have the potential to sell more than a typical zelda (30m+ each on Wii and DS), but its not the reason a Nintendo fan buys a new $299 system. Nintendo's core audience was served first on Switch, the casuals followed later once the library continued to build and positive word of mouth spread. The most hardcore fans being early adopters is always the case but Wii U not even reaching 15m units sold in 4 years is a reflection of the majority of Nintendo's core audience not even bothering with the system. Point is; I can't see how Wii U was a hardcore orientated system on any level: not software, not marketing and not hardware. In terms of 3rd party, it simply benefitted from more 360/PS3 ports initially because it was slightly more powerful than those 7 year old systems.
Comparably the Switch's great 1st party line up for year 1 is largely a result of being a literal continuation of Wii U development cycle. Nintendo did not have to go through the usual hurdles of creating new games from scratch, for a specific platform. Everything that had been in development from 2014 was just shifted to Switch (something similar we saw with gamecube to wii transition)
And definitely agree with your last comment, the Wii U had untapped potentially but as a whole it was such a woefully executed and unappealing device.
