Furukawa: Announcing Switch/NX So Early Was A "Special Case"

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Soundwave said:

zorg1000 said:

Nintendo doing something over 20 years ago isn’t really a good reason for thinking they will do it now. Every generation of the last 20 years has either released during the holidays (DS, Wii, Wii U) or was planned for the holidays but delayed to Q1 of the following year (3DS, Switch).

I agree that a holiday launch isn’t important for consoles but that doesn’t mean console manufacturers feel the same way. There is literally zero reason to think they will launch a new console in the summer, wanting something to happen and thinking it will happen are two different things.

Depends where their software pipeline is too ... previously they still had to support multiple consoles (when they launched the DS, for example they still had to make GameCube and even GBA games, when they launched Wii U, they were still neck deep in trying to establish the 3DS and it required a lot of dev resources too). 

As such I think they basically were forced to launch hardware as late as possible in the year without just missing the entire year entirely (so November/December launches and as you mentioned, sometimes they missed even this and were forced to launch in Q1 to at least be able to make the fiscal year end). 

But because this isn't the same case any longer, perhaps they can launch in a manner that suits more of how they would like to launch, rather than being forced to launch at the last possible moment. 

Ultimately though I don't think say an August launch versus a November launch makes all the much difference in the grand scheme of things. 

The launch for christmas is to create momentum and have quick return for the investment they made by manufacturing the first consoles and tooling the assembly line.

Then again, today the game development takes years, and slower start of sales does not lead into games drought, making the launch window less important than what it was 20 years ago.