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Sales need to explode *now* if its going to even sniff that type of number. Wasting a full first year and finishing at 50 mill ain't happening. 

If Wii Sports/Fit/Party U don't bring tons of casuals back, there's no hope of 50 million.

I guess many people don't realize that nintendo has flopped 3 out of 4 consoles: N64, gamecube, wii and wiiU.
Of these only wii has been a success. If it wasn't for the portable market nintendo would be broke years ago.

I agree.
I don't really know if PS4 is going to shift more units than Xbox One, beacuse Kinect and voice commands could be a nice appealing factor for the market audience.

That could be an interesting idea and would like to see Nintendo be able to focus all energy on one product.

Earlier this year Nintendo kept saying to be patient and wait for the 2nd half of this year- and yes they did release some good games and yes sales did rise but not enough good games and not enough sales-

Now the focus is on Mario 3D Land/ Holiday sales and 2014- some say 1st Q 2014 some just say 2014 (because we really don t know when the most anticipated games announced to date will be released)

The problem I see is 2014 sounds good but 3rd party support (reasonable quality 3rd party) could or probably will be non existent other than Watchdogs and possibly 2 or 3 lego games- So right now we are looking at DKTF, MK8 and SSBros that we feel sure will be released in 2014 (hopefully all in the 1st 3 or 4 months)- We don t know when or if we will get X in 2014 - we don t know if we will get Zelda in 2014 - I think there have been 2 or 3 other good games mentioned that could be 2014 -

My point is there are many unknown timing variables for next year - we could get 3 or 4 huge games in 2014 but little else in between- which would lead to temporary spikes on the sales charts little activity otherwise
Unless Nintenod has quite a few unannounced games (1st and/or 2nd party) they can and will release in 2014 that will ensure we don t have any more significant software droughts in the coming year, then we will be looking at a rough year ahead with a few big games splashed in- IMO DKTF was pushed back to 2-14 to buy time and help avoid a big gap after the holiday- which says they either do t have enough games coming or the games they are planning for 2014 are not going to be ready when they had hoped-

Many people have mentioned a possible Post Holiday Nintendo direct in which they will announce more of their lineup for the coming year but I don t have a good feeling about that- If you look at their most recent earning report and look at the games noted in it as future releases I did not see anything that has not already been announced nor did I see any "unnamed" games mentioned- not sure how much the earning report is an indicator but typically investors want to know how a company is going to make money in the coming year

PS: did anyone see the Walmart "Black Friday one week early" add/announcement today- It listed many of the games and consoles that would be on sale, how much they would be and what consoles they would be available-Although I did see 3DS and 2DS consoles/games listed, I did not see any Wii U console or games listed- Don t know if it was a mistake or not but it did make me nervous if Walmart is not carrying Wii U games for the Holiday or beyond

At the equivalent point in the Xbox 360's life, it had sold 5.5 million. Wii U is at 4 million.

Xbox 360 sold about 79 million to date.

Why is the Wii U more like the 360 than the N64? Because the 360 launched a year before its rivals, but really didn't take off until a real killer app showed up about a year after launch. The N64 had its biggest killer app on day 1 (Mario 64), and released last within the generation.

The Wii U is almost keeping up with the launch-aligned 360, despite the economic circumstances, lack of major third-party support, and poor advertising by Nintendo, compared with the 360 launching during great economic circumstances, depending primarily on its strong third party support, and being by Microsoft (who are, when it comes down to it, primarily an advertising company - it's where their real skill lies).

Oh, and Wii U weekly sales now are about where 360 weekly sales were in late 2006. And Mario 3D World is about to launch.

yeah but the original xbox wasn't popular and the 360 had hardware issues. the ps2 was still dominating and xbox doesn't sell anything in japan so you can't compare them

The original Wii has been abandoned for 2 years, Wii U had the biggest drought ever and PS3/360 are still dominating. That sounds pretty comparable to me

It's the little things in this post that give it away. If you look below at all the fine print you will see that the N64 which you so proudly used to prove your point actually destroys it. The N64 had all its major titles within release in its first couple of years with little much of 3rd party support between releases and huge delays throughout. The Gamecube also suffered from this exact fate. Although it recieved far more 3rd party support this time around. The Wii had a steady influx of software with a few 3rd party gems sprinkled amongst its library. The Wii U is only failing to meet Nintendo's own expectations. It is actually doing well considering that at the same time in its life cycle, the 360 @5.9m LTD http://vgsales.wikia.com/wiki/Xbox_360 had far more 3rd party support. The Wii U's early launch was necessary risk and come November 2nd, 2013, it will be worth it. Everything else will fall into place after that. Nintendo still has plenty of cards to play left to play.