To be fair this thread has nothing to do with Nintendo and it was actually a known Nintendo hater that brought up Wii U in the first place

Because the original Xbox was a new brand, at that time people just knew Nintendo, Sega and Sony for the video games, trust is earned over time, and yes it's possible that XB1 sales are less that 360 but the gap will not be as big as in the sixth generation, sales in america will be good, it's important for microsoft.

The main way to determine which console to purchase is by software. To differentiate between PS, XB, and Ninty is by exclusives. Ninty consoles has the most and best exclusives.

I really don't think that it's just hardcore fans buying ps4. There was and to an extent still is an insane hype for ps4's. That hype makes people who are by no means proper gamers (see wii crowd), wanna buy one, because it's something cool to have. It happens with every product. Best example would be iphones and ipods/ipads. There's little reason to own one or especially to upgrade to the newer version, but as soon as their contract is up, people tend to buy the latest model. Whether it's to show off or anything else, many of those people are not hardcore apple fans, they just follow what everyone else is doing. Same with the ps4. According to VGChartzers working at retail, there were people joining the queues, when they saw how massive they were.

The fact that there are constant shortages of ps4's and people see signs of "ps4 out of stock", they might be tempted to buy one when they see it in stock, in fear of not being able to buy one, if they want to at some point (even though it currently has no games they need). I considered buying one and then I had to remind myself that shortages or not, I simply don't have the time to buy one, since I have a huge ps3/psvita backlog. Marketing and media affects us and non hardcore gamers more than we care to admit or even realize. 

As I stated elsewhere I constantly see an impresssive number of posts on 9gag of people buying a ps4, receiving at a gift or wanting to get one. The ps4 suddendly becomes the cool product to have and it's a constant advertisement and the best one Sony could ask for. SImilarly, I, after seeing an annoying amount of posts about the The Hunger Games and Jennifer Lawrence on 9gag, I decided to watch the first movie and after becoming a fan of hers, I even watched American Hustle just cuz she was starring in it. 

I expect the ps4 hype to very low at the beginning of February and to increase siginificantly again around March. I don't see it properly dying any time soon. 

Yahh deny 3rd party importance casue U has none.  The same games each gen does not equal best exclusives, wake me up when Ninty makes a platformer or racers that does not feature Mario.

If you go by purchase is by software then PS4 is the only choice, all the 3rd partygames best most diverse exclusives and most indies.

Sales of the Wii U tell us nothing about the hardcore crowd.  Just because Nintendo targeted a more hardcore audience, doesn't mean they responded to it.

The hardcore, for the most part, waited to see what was coming from Sony and MS.  I don't know if there will be as many consoles sold this gen (the Wii really skewed the numbers last gen), but the hardcore audience is certainly larger now as more kids have grown up with video games.

You can just do that between XB and PS, they are too many 3rd party who come on PS4 and XB1 but not on wii u. it's a huge factor.

The hype will die down now that PS4/Xbone will be releasing almost nothing for months on end. That was the Wii U's biggest problem. It actually had a really good launch, but gamers now have become accustomed to a new AAA game being released atleast once a month, and some months there can be up to 5 top notch games. Wii U had one top notch game, Lego City Undercover, over the course of 8 months, and even that is more like a solid mid-level title. Just go look at the lineups for the PS4/Xbone and it pretty much kills the hype just by reading it.

January - Tomb Raider Definitive
February - Rayman Legends,Lego Movie Game, Thief
March - Driveclub,Infamous 3, Titanfall
April - Dying Light, MLB The Show.

6 games that will be released on PS3/360. A zombie game that looks like Dead Island. Another racing game. Infamous 3 looks solid, but the 1st 2 only sold 4 million combined so I really doubt it will move the needle in terms of sales. I don't know about you guys but I am way more excited for Donkey Kong and Mario Kart for that time frame.

Def not as big a gap in the 6th gen but Japan is irrelevent for Xbox and Europe doesnt look like its going to be so hot plus America isnt very loyal when it comes to consoles.

2nd gen Atari dominated

3rd gen Nintendo dominated

4th gen Nintendo & Sega had a close battle

5th gen Sony clearly won with Nintendo having a respectable 2nd

6th gen Sony dominated

7th gen Nintendo dominated first half, Microsoft dominated 2nd half and Sony was in a distant but respectable 3rd

America just chooses what is the must have console at the time and the high price of Xbox plus mistakes that Nintendo has made lead me to believe Sony will have a strong hold of the American market. The $200 price difference could make the battle between Xbox and Wii U much closer than many believe in the early going. I have no doubt that Xbox will outsell Wii U in the long run but 2014 could be a relatively close battle with both having big guns release, Wii U-Donkey Kong/Mario Kart/Smash Bros, Xbox-TitanFall/Halo. Multiplats wont help as much on One as they did on 360 with PS4 having a huge advantage in Europe (70-30 split) and probably an advantage in America (60-40 split).

By the end of 2014 I could see both Wii U and Xbox around 10m with either one having a chance at being slightly higher than the other. 2015 could see Xbox start to pull ahead by a few million and the gap increase each year.

Why not post release dates for Ninty software if you are making a comparision.