This is based on recent rumors that Nintendo will be launching a new brand with its hypothetical hardware, aimed primarily at the western "hard-core" audience:

• Full-Blown Pokemon MMO  - Bam!! Instant WoW Killer!
• Localize Mother Series, preferably with updated graphics, leading up to Mother 4 HD made by EAD Tokyo! Based on recent interviews in which Itoi (creator of the series) has mentioned he would not be creating another game in the series, but would like to see it live on. This could also be a serious contender in the genre of RPGs with a stronger western style, like Mass Effect etc. This is certainly a genre with increasing appeal in the west and could be an important market to try and capture.
• Speaking of RPGs and expensive HD remakes, what company better than Nintendo has the deep pockets necessary to help Square-Enix make FF VII HD a reality? Nintendo exclusive, of course
• All new IP Shooter franchise by none other than Retro Studios! Let them run Wild and flex their creative muscle, giving the likes of Bungie and IW a run for their money!
• Comprehensive Media capabilities, including Blu-Ray play, "tablet" support (aka the controller with an HD touch-screen), streaming demos (via Onlive or gaikai), social connectivity and user-created content at the OS level as well as other possible non-gaming services like a book-store (for the "tablet") and so on. This would definitely give Apple and Sony a run for their money. Recent comments from Reggie strongly point to Nintendo looking to broaden its focus from games only to other forms of entertainment too.
• Modular hardware with a simple upgrade path: Imagine releasing with 2 gigs of system RAM with an option to add 2 more gigs in the future. Other possibilities include SLI support for an additional graphics card add-on when the time comes, or even a water-cooling unit that would plug on top of the main CPU and allow for dramatic over-clocking via firmware update. The platform could be designed from the ground up so that performing these replacementsupgrades is as simple as plugging in Lego bricks. This is the kind of ingenuity Nintendo is good at and has already been rumored as Project Butterfly. It can also be argued that this would have huge appeal for graphics and image-quality enthusiasts the likes of which have dedicated countless hours to creating the Dolphin platform. This way, in addition to extending the lifetime of the hardware it could also be used to make improvements to existing games (for example, a game running on a single GPU could have superior lighting and Image quality when run in SLI mode).

• Same classic Nintendo franchises, but in HD! It's as simple as that! A new mature HD Zelda! >>> Dragon Age or Elder Scrolls. A new Pikmin that borrows from the likes of the Total War franchise, allowing you to control potentially thousands of Pikmin at once (there was a remark made by Miyamoto not long ago about how these two franchises especially could benefit from HD).

Obviously, all of this at once would provide a prohibitively large investment for any company, not just Nintendo. But some of these moves could have serious ramifications with Nintendo's relevancy in the growing western markets which are becoming dominated by western companies like Valve and ActiBlizzard. It could be argued that there is a long term agenda here for a Japanese platform holder like Nintendo, especially with the home-market becoming less and less significant. This is something that even Nintendo mentions repeatedly as a problem and goes together with the rumors that they will be launching a new brand with this hardware, aimed primarily at the western "hard-core" audience.

Of course, the recent wave of rumors could all turn out to be false. But assuming they are not, the question to be asked is: Does Iwata see this as an opportunity to grow the company into something bigger than it is today in order to remain competitive on a dedicated closed platform? If the answer is yes, then at least some of these moves seem essential to me.

Personally, I would be just as happy, if not more, seeing Nintendo go in the opposite direction and explore simple ideas rather than ones that are so grandiose, so I am basing all this strictly on what has already been rumored.

Any other ideas? Or suggestion? Or just telling me how much I suck for starting such a thread?

New system should be cutscene unfriendly and make it hard to just throw money at the graphics and scale. Then Nintendo should flip western developers the bird over still not giving them support, even with the 3DS having high specs.

despite the subtle sarcasm I do think you bring up an important point, which is "should Nintendo support these trends in western gaming or try to combat them?"

I'm sure they could be successful and profitable either way, but I am not convinced that it is within their power to "dominate" the west if they go against the trends set by Valve, Epic, Blizzard etc. This is why I am trying to think of ways Nintendo could offer their own spin on these trends, in such a way as to differentiate them as well as leverage their existing strengths, but without alienating western publishers and developers by going in a completely radical, incompatible direction.

First of all, these companies are not really setting the same trends. And the trend Nintendo should really fight against is the notion that graphics should advance for the sake of it.

And I didn't mean Blizzard of Valve, but Epic and EA, who have been known to spout BS about Nintendo, so why should Nintendo try to court them?

Let the gaming console play games. There's no need to add all the bell and whistles and increase cost when everyone already have the needed media tools or sort.

Personally I agree. But the premise of this thread is that Nintendo is going after a different audience with this aleged new brand. This plus many recent comments from Reggie regarding media, deals with AT&T and movie studios for 3DS, and even stuff mentioned by Iwata such as 3D video recording on the handheld lead me to believe Nintendo has an eye in this direction. Granted I believe it will be a distinct offering in this space, with more of a "gamey" flavor to it as far as interface and presentation...

Also, what do you think of my other points? These are all obviously wild speculation and not dependent on one another.

Mother HD, Media Capabilities, and an upgradeable console to dominate the west... Nintendo fans are the greatest trolls in the world confirmed?

I agree that we are not speaking about one single trend, I should have phrased myself more accurately. Basically I am thinking about major trends in western gaming which are proving to be successful as well as being different from Nintendo's way of doing things up until now.

Hence I mention things like MMOs, western RPGs, Shooters and so on. All this is only relevant under the assumption of the thread, obviously, which is that Nintendo are indeed launching a "western core-oriented" system. This is also the reason I found the subject interesting to begin with because it is clearly an area where Nintendo are out of their element, and thus provoked me into thinking how many of these issues they could tackle with a single hardware release (and its software, of course).

The main Blizzard "trend" in this case, so to speak, would be the hugely successful MMOs (Hence I mention pokemon). Epic's would be wide-spread universal middleware, as well as pushing hardware to its limits in general tho this is also shared by other companies. Hence the upgradeable hardware which is also more akin to a PC enthusiast experience.

Valve is about the distribution channel, which I have not tackled directly besides mentioning real-time demos, better connectivity between users and more online services in general.

EA, to be honest, I don't know what trend they are trying to push, if any. They seem to me to be more followers than pioneers in this area, by which I mean "wait until somebody else makes money of of it before launching a competing product or knockoff"

LOL

regarding the media capabilities and upgrade-ability, I am just going off the recent rumors, trying to put everything under one umbrella, so to speak.

Software is of course the big deal here. I should have been more clear about that, perhaps I'll edit it.

What do you think about Pokemon MMO or FF VII HD though?

(edit: the primary incentive to mention the Mother series here is because of the recent rumors from interviews with Itoi and Iwata together. Basically I'm just trying to come up with an all-encompassing theory of all recent rumors because it's fun )

Pokemon MMO would be huge... so would be FF VII HD. Heck, I'd buy it @ launch if it had FF VII HD, and I never got a Nintendo console at launch!