I guess that's why Nintendo 64 and Gamecube sold so well. Oh wait...

PS1 had issues

PS2 was so bad they had a class action lawsuit

PS3 had YLOD

PS4 had bricked consoles on launch day

Yes clearly Sony is known for great hardware. If you have a selective memory

Oh and comparing a controller to a portable system? Come on dude.

To be fair, although those consoles were powerful and provided beautiful visuals for their respective generations, they were also saddled with other problems that ultimately kept them back. The cartridge technology in the 64 vs. the use of CDs in the PS1, and the mini disc as opposed to the DVD in the GC (along with the cute lunch box design) didn't do it much favors. People in my country switched from the SNEN to PS1 because third parties sided with the PS1 (in a sense) and created more games for it (I understand this is the same with the GC with respect to its medium). But I agree. Hardware is not all. I think it is only part of the equation, and as previous consoles have shown, it is not required to be the best.

Speakin of selective...

I don't know about going strictly software, and the reason they won't enter the mobile market is because it would cannibalize their handheld market. Why would Nintendo release games on smartphones and tablets for a few bucks a pop when they can release them at $30-$40 a pop on exclusive hardware that requires you to spend another $150-$200?

Consoles are a different argument altogether though, and personally I wouldn't mind seeing Nintendo exit the console hardware market. They've had blatantly inferior hardware compared to their competition two generations in a row now, and even when the did have consoles that could compete in terms of horsepower like N64 and GC, they would still make critical design flaws that severely impacted the long-term outlook of their consoles (expensive carts instead of CDs for N64, no DVD or online capabilities except PSO, and the GC just looking like a toy in general).

Why should I drop $300+ on a new console that is vastly inferior in terms of power and online infrastructure, and has a limited library of games?

I don't see the point of Nintendo porting any games to mobile platforms when there so much game piracy on Mobile platforms. You just creating a better version for people to pirate instead of them using existing roms & emulators.

I would much rather Nintendo make an inexpensive smart device with dual screens and buttons in the $200-$250 (unlocked) and a non-phone counter part in the 150-200 region. Since the introduction of the 3DS, the price of capacitative touch screens (which I would like them to put on the top screen), licenses for more powerful ARM chipsets (like Cortex A5, A7, A9, and A12), and larger sized mobile memory have all fallen. Of course they have to work to extend multitasking features (the 3DS has already set the stage with a single notification system running in the background that can update application content without having the app running, as well as some suspended state multitasking) and improve their digital shop strategy.

This is absolutely true, even if I have seen it.There was this one time where some guy released a fake "Pokemon Yellow" game for $0.99 on iOS and it instantly became no.3 in the marketplace.  Just goes to show the demand.

If they released some of their older GBA games like the pokemon games on iOS and android, they would RAKE in the money. Seriously, the amount of people playing on emulators is just insane. If they sold those GBA games for upto £5, my god they would be filthy rich.

Rather speak to a wall than argue with him, really.

Sony's hardware failure rate has always been second only to Nintendo. And it has always been in the industry's accepted standard range of 10%. 

Nintendo sold more thant 1,2 million consoles on the Black Friday week worldwide, so there´s no point in going software-only right now. This will happen when the console market dies, and it will any day.

on the other side, I do think that they could develop something exclusive for phones and tablets, something different from their consoles games, of course. Breaking new frontiers may be good for them