Shadow1980 said:
If true, this could end up being a repeat of 2008. Mario Kart Wii and SSB Brawl were released mere weeks apart in spring of that year, and as a result of releasing two games from some of their biggest franchises in the same season, Nintendo saw the Wii experience four consecutive sales months far beyond any other non-holiday period in the system's history:
See how in 2008 there's a big hump in the middle of the year when there's normally a trough through the first 10 months of the year? That's just from those two games, which were by far the biggest Wii titles of 2008. Even when hardware sales dipped in summer, they were still higher than any other summer in the Wii's history, plus the following November was the biggest in the system's history. As a result of such high median sales in the non-holiday months, 2008 was the Wii's best year overall. Even with December of '09 being the Wii's best December due to a price cut and NSMBWii, 2009 couldn't beat 2008 as the system's peak year.
Imagine if the Wii U is able to retain decent momentum in January, then gets a boost from DKC in February, MK8 in early spring, then SSB in mid to late spring. Even if nothing big comes out in the fall, those three games combined could cause 2014 hardware sales to get a huge boost, and this could end up being the Wii U's peak year. The estimate in my sig is a conservative estimate. If the Wii U tracks at average around 40% of Wii levels like I think it will, it could get to over 9 million next year. Of course, there's the longer term to take into account. While 2008 was the Wii's peak year, it still had a solid selection of titles coming out in 2009 and 2010, including DKC Returns, Super Mario Galaxy 2, Mario & Sonic at the Winter Olympics, and especially the aformentioned NSMBWii, which collectively helped the Wii have health sales even after it peaked. Major releases became increasingly sparse after 2010, though, and as a result the Wii dropped big time in 2011 and again in 2012. Can the Wii U manage to keep major releases coming in 2015 and beyond? We know that there's a new Zelda game in the works, and apparently Miyamoto insinuated that a new Metroid is possibly being planned, with perhaps Retro being involved. Also, Miyamoto has a new IP he's working on. But they're going to need more than that. They need at least one more Super Mario game, preferably a 3D "collect the stars" game in the vein of SM64 and SMG due to the demand for such a title (don't think I'm knocking 3D World; I'm sure it too will itself likely be very good and sell very well). Nintendo also needs to revisit IPs that they've been sitting on, including Star Fox and F-Zero. Neither series has been seen since the GameCube era. Star Fox is an especially interesting case due the fact that one "sequel" (SF Adventures) was basically a dolled-up installment of another game Rare was making and another (SF Assault) was a Namco-developed title that was not nearly as well-received as the original game and SF64 due to a linear mission structure and mediocre on-foot sections. So, it's been 16 years since the release of a Star Fox game produced by one of Nintendo's first- or second-party studios that was actually designed as a Star Fox game, that being Star Fox 64, the most popular and well-received title in the series. If they revisit Star Fox, it should be developed in-house and follow in the footsteps of SF64, with branching missions and no on-foot sections.
Of course, the question remains "Will they actually release SSB in spring?" After their last financial report, Nintendo still says they hope to ship 9 million units for the fiscal year, which ends March 31. They obviously won't sell through all those by then, and they're obviously savvy enough to know that, so putting out big shipment numbers for the whole fiscal year combined does give them plenty of stock to fill potentially strong demand should they choose to release SSB in the spring or summer. Could their target shipment goals be an indication that they've already been planning a double release for the late winter and spring months in the hopes of keeping sales very strong in pre-holiday months, just like how the Wii had its best non-holiday period when MK8 and SSBB debuted in spring of '08? It's possible.
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