2012. I was hypothetically speaking as if the world doesn't end.

I was surprised when I saw Squlliam too... he doesn't reply to me anymore on Steam :'( he hasn't signed into PSN for over a year!  In all honesty I made this thread to just chat with someone outside of my normal crew on this subject, the discussion so far isn't winning me back XD got some good counter points with my steam friends however, I think that's a big reason I see no benefit to really come back lol I came to VGC for the discussions and points the old crew used to make which were well thought out and we even had nifty charts to back up our claims, and whenever I started or found a topic like this I felt someone would always contribute something new I hadn't thought of be it for it or against.  Shits just not happening anymore *bows out for a while unless this topic picks up a bit more, might wait till I can post a thread on GAF and just copy/pasta to get their ideas and thoughts*

Well, though PS3 had it hard going at the beginning due to it's unique architecture, both Xbox and PS3 have (more or less) same 3rd party support - so it's 1st party games that determine which way you go - and I'd say Sony excels in that, maybe their titles don't sell as much individually, but if you look at diversity I say they are at the top of their game. That said, even if all 3 consoles get same 3rd party support it will come to 3 things:

1) who prefers whose 1st party titiles - all 3 consoles have their very loyal fans, so I don't see much shifting of user base there

2) where you online friends are - I'd say Microsoft has some advantage here, though lot of people prefer PSN

3) how good 3rd support actually is - are your version of multiplat game is close enough in visuals/performance to other 2

To be honest, I don't see Microsoft and Sony failing in any of these (though 3 is still problematic for PS3 compared to 360), but I do see Wii U having problems with 2) and 3)....all said, IMO, best case scenario is Wii U manages to attract enough 3rd party support, makes good online and be on par with other 2, which will give them some 60-70mils. Thing is I don't think major publishers will stay for long, they really want a major push in technology, once 720/PS4 launch we'll see games that simply can't run on Wii U without major cutbacks (I forgot who just recently announced PC game that will require 4GB RAM as minimum (reminder - Win7 uses under 512MB, Win8 even less)), and it will be Wii level of support from majors again. On the other hand, as I said, Unity deal is good thinking, lot of succesful titles have been and are made on it (e.g. Limbo being one of them, and it's "sequel"), so at least I can see lot of love from "indie" comunity. One way or the other, eventually I'll enjoy my Mario Kart U and Zelda U, unfortunatelly, for me that's about it...

I honestly am seeing an end to the console wars in the near future. Mostly because all 3 consoles should do very well sales wise and because the vast majority of games will be multiplatform. As long as ps4 and 720 release at 400 bucks and not more I think they will gain on wiiU pretty fast and from there it will be a pretty neck and neck race that will end with all the consoles making it to 80 million +. And given the potential length of this next gen they could all break 100 million. So I think it will be a battle or profitability, and maybe a slug fest in Japan between Sony and Nintendo.

Hahaha yeah I see now that I explained the part about 20m poorly. What I meant by that is that GameCube sold 20m, so that should be Nintendo's fan base. It makes me wonder why Sony, in less time, have manage to get a bigger fan base - but still not moving as much 1st party games as Nintendo... Or maybe I didn't understand what you were saying? Am I missing the point completely?

The "base" in the context I'm meaning are those people who are generally inclined to buy one console over the others. GCs 20M represent the Nintendo core: being those who will always buy Nintendo in good times and bad. It's possibly to lose a lot of the base if you screw up badly. It's not really possible to lose the core. Nintendo screwed up badly with GC so they pretty much lost all of their base. They got it back with Wii.

Sony established a large base because they sold a butt load of PS1s and PS2's. They sold more PS1's than any non-handheld Nintendo console, and then they went one better with PS2. By comparison Nintendo's best selling non-HH console before Wii was NEs at 61M. PS3 has sold more than NES by 5M units. And it looks like Wii won't beat out PS1. So PS3 has sold better than every non-HH Nintendo other than Wii, and Wii has sold worse than every non-HH PS console other than PS3. What does that tell us? The base for brand Playstation built up pretty rapidly over the course of 2 generations. The base for non-HH Nintendo cannot be said to be higher than Playstation on the basis of Wii's performance. It might be higher than PS if the first time ever console buyers who bought Wii can be consisdered part of Wii's new base. But that's far from certain. Why would a person who bought Wii for Wii Fit feel compelled to buy a Wii U? They have no particular brand loyalty to Nintendo or Wii. The evolution of fitness software on consoles is arguably on Kinect, so the Wii Fit demographic may have already gone to 360/Kinect. Or they may be more inclined to get 720/Kinect 2.0.

Estimating the base for each console brand is pretty much a guess on my part. But estimating the base will be connected in some way with the sales history of the brand. We have a 3 generation history for PS brand and it averages out to about 100 million per generation. But you've also got to look at the brand's low point when considering the base too, and the context of that low point. PS3 had a bad generation, at least until 2009. It was total doom and gloom with predictions of 10-15M lifetime sales. But in spite of that PS3 has managed to have a reasonable generation in terms of units sold. That suggests the brand's base is pretty close to PS3 sales. Not all of PS3's sales will be to its base, but most of them will be. 60M is optimistic for me perhaps, but 50M is very realistic for PS4 even if all Sony does is slightly change the controller to improve some ergonomics and of course produce a PS4 with the rumoured specs or thereabouts.

The Xbox base is the least discernable as it's got only 2 generations of information and they've established no pattern, and their first generation was rather lackluster, unlike PS. It's base might be 25M or it might be 50M. But at this point, because Xbox is so strong in USA (i.e. it has a solid base there now I think) and UK I think 50-60M is well and truly on for 720. So maybe I should express things in a range, like 50-60M for the 3 consoles and hence 150-180M consoles are pretty much pre-sold.

I stopped reading after this.

In my opinion, there are essentially 2 sides to selling videogame consoles:

1) Providing incentive to buy the system

2) Removing barriers to buying the system

On incentives, the Wii U is an interesting mix. While the system's hardware is not bleeding edge it is a dramatic improvement over the Wii and Nintendo should be adequate to attract support from some good developers; I'm not suggesting exclusive support from the elite developers, but studios like Grasshopper Interactive and Platinum Games (smaller developers who have yet to have a massive hit) that are on smaller budgets may be happy with the hardware. The tablet controller is less groundbreaking than the Wiimote but developers already seem to have a better grasp on how to take advantage of it. But I think the most powerful incentive may be the social gaming and Miiverse; in both cases it uses people's family and friends to encourage the purchase of the Wii U.

On disincentives, while the price of the Wii U is more expensive than the Wii was, the Wii U is still being released at an affordable price; and when you consider that it still operates will people's Wiimotes and Nunchucks and people won't need to buy accessories at launch the price increase doesn't look too bad. The price could be improved and (in theory) I may be saying that it needs a price cut 6 to 12 months from now, but at the moment I don't see it as being a high barrier for (most) people.

I like Nintendo and history always repeats itself so yes.