With the Wii U just releasing, many people have compared its launch to the the HD consoles' launches. Oftentimes people use this comparison to conclude that the Wii U's launch is pretty good. But people should understand that this conclusion could be flawed depending on how the Wii U lives its life.

The PS3 and 360 did not have good launches. By most measures they were pretty terrible. In fact, years after they released, most people still believed they would ultimately be low-selling consoles, probably selling under 40m units. These weren't bad estimates at the time either; the consoles were just selling so poorly. Fortunately, the HD consoles compensated for their weak start by having strong later years. Sales picked up so much that they didn't peak until their 5th & 6th years.

The Wii's life by contrast was very frontloaded and seemed much more like a sprint. It had a great launch and peaked in it's 2nd year. After which, sales dropped fairly hard but it's overall sales were still great. However, what if the Wii had a poor launch? Would it have compensated later on? I don't think so. Unlike the HD consoles, the Wii's life seemed more focused on a powerful start. I don't think it would have had the endurance like the PS360 to compensate for a weak launch.

If I had to guess I would say the Wii U is a sprinter like its predecessar. In which case, its start is much more important than the PS3 and 360's start. That's why the PS360 vs Wii U comparisons aren't necessarily accurate indications for the future of the Wii U. The Wii U may not have the endurace of the PS360 to compensate for a weak launch. I'm personally not sure how the Wii U will live its life, I just thought this was an important point that most people seemed to miss.

Could a mod please move this to the Nintendo discussion?

lol

It's impossible to say whether it is a sprint or marathon runner just taking the WiiU into account. We will have to know when/how the other consoles will arrive, prices, etc. before making conclusions.

I do think PS4 and Nextbox will have a longer life

The PS3/360 were future proofed because of their bleeding edge specs for the time.

They were bred to be marathon runners.

Wii U is definitely not that. It needed a good start much moreso.

what defines each of these runners ?

Finally a good question that doesn't involved the Wii U being doom.

Like you said if we go by history the launch of a console does not determine the outcome of the console's life. Even though I consider first impressions to be very important, in the long run they doesn't really matter, especially in terms of video games.

I would consider the consoles launch mildly important since the launch shows what the system can do in terms of the Operating System and how can games use (in case if needed) the new controller (aka Wii Sports and NintendoLand), but in terms of games is impossible to decide the future of the system.

It entirely depends on how Nintendo reacts. I want to say marathon runner but nintendo gave up towards the end of the wii years. This coming E3 will be very telling I think

I thought it was a videogame console...

Imo the games will decided that, not the graphical advantages. 

Even if that were true, which I don't think is entirely accurate (games like CoD, BioShock, Battlefield, etc. would not be the same experience on lesser hardware), Nintendo is out of luck here because third parties don't give two hoots about them. 

And Nintendo is somewhat their own worst enemey here because they refuse to let go of the Mario/Zelda/DK/Pokemon safety blanket. Are they willing to invest real marketing and development dollars on an IP to attract new audiences now that the casual gaming bubble looks to have burst for them?

We'll see.