The evolution of the console market over time

[JWeinCom]

Norion said:

JWeinCom said:

It's weird. Besides Wii Sports, Switch has literally everything that was successful on the Wii in terms of hardware and software. So, I think the question is why wouldn't the Switch appeal to that audience? Unless you think Wii Sports was literally the only reason thing people liked about the Wii, then there's really no good answer.

It wouldn't appeal much to the crowd that only bought it for Wii Sports but that crowd isn't that big considering how well games like Mario Kart and New Super Mario Bros did. It certainly isn't a coincidence that Mario Kart 8 DX is the best selling Mario Kart game since the Wii one. A lot of people who bought the former will have played the latter as either a kid or young adult.

I think the "mainly/only bought it for Wii Sports/Fit" crowd is substantial, but the question of why the person bought the Wii is largely irrelevant to whether or not they would buy a Switch. The more apt question is what did they enjoy on the Wii.

Just because someone got caught in the Wii Sports craze and bought a Wii doesn't meant that's all they played on the Wii. Wii Sports was basically a trojan horse. Nintendo obviously didn't plan to sell a Wii to someone for a minor profit and never make another dime off of them. The hope obviously was that they would buy Wii Sports and then would go on to buy other games. And since sales of basically every Nintendo franchise went up, it seems like that's exactly what happened. And quite possibly they liked these games enough that in the future their sequels might help influence them to buy a new system.

Again, it really comes down to the fact that from the beginning some people hated the Wii and were arguing that the people buying it were filthy casual gamers who would lead to Nintendo's downfall in the long run. And they're sticking to the narrative regardless of whether there's any evidence.

Last edited by JWeinCom - on 04 April 2021