Slownenberg said:
In terms of the argument on Nintendo phasing out past systems quickly or slowly:
3DS was phased out slowly because they could. 3DS had no successor. Switch consolidated their handheld and console business, but Switch was obviously a successor to the WiiU, not the 3DS. The handheld line simply ended when Switch came out. 3DS could keep being supported because it wasn't replaced, so you had a $300 Switch and a 2DS/3DS in the
Switch won't have that luxury. It's going to be replaced by something that will probably come out at exactly or just above the Switch OLED price. The two systems (other than the Lite) are gonna be occupying the same market and price range. Nintendo has two options for hardware once the Switch 2 is launches: (1) cut the Switch off immediately other than the Lite which should still bring in a bit of sales, or (2) give the Switch original and OLED models significant price cuts (definitely more than $50) to separate it from Switch 2. They'd no doubt rather have people paying $350 or a bit more for a Switch 2 which is gonna allow a customer to keep buying new games into next decade, than have a customer buy a $2XX original or OLED Switch in which they don't have access to the next generation of games. So Nintendo will probably cut off Switch very fast other than the Lite, in terms of producing hardware. I could see a $50 discount on Switch just before successor launches just to clear out the final few million they produce but I'd expect them to lower original/OLED production to pretty much nothing once Switch 2 is out. |
Switch succeeded both the Wii U and the 3DS. The 3DS could keep being supported because there was still demand for it, unlike the Wii U. That's all there is to it.
The only unnatural transitions that Nintendo has ever had occured both in the same generation. On the home console side they shorthanded the Wii because they absolutely wanted to leave it behind in favor of the Wii U; software releases for the Wii slowed down in 2011 already and became a trickle in 2012, long before the Wii U launched. On the handheld side they wanted to get rid of the DS because they saw it as their only option to make the 3DS successful after betting the farm on 3D had backfired big time.
All other Nintendo consoles lived on or died quickly after a successor's launch based on the actual market demand for them.
