The Dreamcast got many new IPs by Sega, some of which are still regarded among the best of their genres. Some of them like Shenmue, created a new genre altogether. I don't see the Wii U having any of that, allow me to seriously doubt it.

The dreamcast came after the failed Saturn. So it had something against it out the gate. Wiiu is coming after wii, nintendos best selling console. So there is that big difference. And thanks to wii and ds certain franchises reached crazy high sales. So when kart is released the system will start to look healthy sales wise again. And there is the one big gun they still have. Wii sports. They showed it off when they showed off the wii u but have been quiet about it since. And with the way things are going they may announce it next month and probably release it this year to really get sales back in line. That is just what I think but the wii u is far from being the failure some downers make it out to be.

not gonna happen the Dreamcast died because it was so easy to pirate, there wasn't any anti pirating device in the console you could burn a game and play it in your console no modification needed most consoles now you actually need to do some modification to the hardware or some complex manipulation of the software to play pirated games

>Analyst logic

PS3 almost killed Sonys gaming division, they have junk status, had to sell their main offices for billions, and executives are taking away their bonuses why isn't the PS4 a Dreamcast?

Yet another thread linking a garbage opinion comparing Wii U to dreamcast and/or GameCube. Nintendo and Wii U are nothing like Sega and Dreamcast. Wii U's struggles are its own, and have nothing in common with the struggles of the DC. It would be nice if someone could get some unique thought and discuss the Wii U for what it is instead of comparing to old systems under very different circumstances.

The key is that Nintendo *doesn't* overmilk their main games. Think about the SNES vs Genesis: Super Mario World fought Sonic, Sonic 2, Sonic CD, Sonic 3, and Sonic & Knuckles. The Game Boy had Super Mario Land and Land 2, the Game Gear had ports of Sonic and Sonic 2, Sonic Triple Trouble, and Sonic Blast. Not to mention Sonic Spinball and a slew of other spinoffs (like Drift and Labyrinth), many of which were poor, compared to the Mario spinoffs of the same era, like Super Mario Kart and Super Mario RPG, the former of whom started one of the strongest franchises in gaming, the latter of which is eternally well-regarded by gamers

Funnily, the only thing they've really milked lately is 2D Mario (4 games in the span of 6 years), but that was after 14 years with no proper 2D Mario.

Hell, one could argue that Sonic is *still* more overexposed than Mario, at least as far as main-type games are concerned.

Some people are just addicted to Nintendoom, they can't seem to sleep at night unless they read/write a new "Nintendo is dying" piece every day. The doomsayers are going to look just as stupid in 2 years as the people who claimed the PS3 was doomed in 2007 and the 3DS was doomed in 2011 do now.

company<--------->product

Those are two very different things. A company that's doing very bad can still launch a very succefull product, a very succefull company can launch a product that turns out to be a failure.

The Playstation 3 is still in good demand and has great software support, PS4 is getting a lot attention.  Wii had crappy software support at the end, Wii-U has crappy software support right now, it's already released and not in high demand, it's being overshadowed by upcoming competitors and it is underpowered compared to that upcoming competition.

We are comparing a product here not a company.

I am tagging this comment for 2 years from now, i think you will be wrong. And i'm not saying Wii-U is completely doomed, i'm still expecting it to sell 30m-40m. Though the possiblity that it will do much worse is there, and there are similarities with the Dreamcast.

Well actually it was more a bug than anything. The Dreamcast could play copies because 2 sessions were burnt to a CD-R. the first was a standard audio-cd format which actually contained data that would then direct the Dreamcast to skip to the 2nd session. Back then it was prohibitively CPU limited to do any kinda of hypervisor type setup as well has having executable data actually encrypted.

I think you're making the same mistake they are by equating the Wii U to the PS3 and 3DS. Just because those two systems found traction after a tough first year doesn't gauruntee the Wii U will.

The PS3 in the long term was always going to be OK, it always had all the third party support in the world and decent marketing/mindshare behind it. They just had to get the price down.

The 3DS comes from the lineage of the Game Boy/DS brands, Nintendo has always had success in the handheld arena for the last 15 years pretty much uninterrupted. Even without blue ocean games like Brain Training/Nintendogs, the DS eventually probably would've captured most of the Game Boy audience and sold 100 million anyway.

The Wii was lightning in a bottle, driven by Wii Sports/Fit. The Wii never really had a better library than the 360 and generally not the PS3 either (once the PS3 got going), but it brought in so many casuals and it was the "gotta have it!" device pre-iPhone/iPad era.

It looks to me like Nintendo is having a very hard time getting these casuals/soccer moms/fitness-centric women, etc. to come back and sequelizing Wii Sports/Fit isn't what gets that audience excited. They want a new "craze" to latch onto, and so far Nintendo has been usurped by things like Angry Birds, Minecraft, etc.

Historically no home hardware platform has ever been a huge success relying on a handful of franchises. Home consoles are not like handhelds, people buy more console games and expect a wide variety of content (1st, 2nd, and 3rd party). That's why I don't believe relying on Mario/Smash/Mario Kart to fix everything will work.