Edit: First off, this applies to Nintendo beginning with the Wii only. I agree they had competitive hardware pre-wii.

That's all. In consoles, the Wii was basically smilar to the PS2/Xbox (probably about like Xbox in power). Being a 50% overclocked Gamecube with added RAM. Now the Wii U is basically on par with PS3/360.

Same in handhelds. DS was a gen behind PSP, and I dont follow handhelds but I'd guess 3DS is in PSP's class, where Vita is a gen beyond that.

So yep, not big revelation or statement here. One thing that interests me is if diminishing returns start kicking in, maybe one day Nintendo's strategy might work as the difference would shrink each gen. For now though, it's obviously not working out for Wii u at all.

well the wii u isnt a modern x86 pc like the ps4 and xbone and last gens consoles weren`t moderns PCs 2.

I don't think anybody is doing anything wrong really. We need companies which push the limits of what's possible with hardware. Otherwise there would be no progress. At the same time, we also need companies looking for new ways to play like Nintendo does. Everyone will copy each other anyway so the way it is, it's good for the players imo.

Do some research. Read articles from Slightly Mad Studios and Shi'nen Multimedia, watch Hector Martin's 30c3, figure out the missing 30% of the decapped chip and tell us all what it's function is, buy a Wii U and THEN comment and some here MIGHT take your opinion with a grain of salt...

Actually, that's not necessarily true in the case of Nintendo handhelds. They've followed a linear progression from day one.

GB/C = NES

GBA = SNES

NDS = N64

3DS = GC/Wii

4DS = Wii U?

Actually, you are wrong here. PS4 and One dev costs are the same as Wii U. When they transitioned to HD, things got more expensive. But the assets that studios create are already in massive high resolutions and the models are in the count of millions of polygons. No console or PC can use these assets at real time (an example, Uncharted 3 original assets would have hundreds of GB). So you just create high quality assets and downgrade them to real time. What they do with Wii U is just downgrade it more.

About dev, Wii U would actually be more expensive, since PS4, One and PC share a similar architecture. You do a game for them and them have to rethink a lot of things for Wii U. An example is if you use GPGPU (a given with the newer consoles weaker CPU, the focus is on the GPU). Wii U uses a older shader model, so you have to rewrite your code basically from scratch. And you have the devs complaining about Wii U's SDK quality and the CPU. Sony and MS simply went with better development toolkits and machines with a better architecture and that drives costs down.

Try to drive costs down by holding inovation isn't the solutions. Better SDKs and more direct architectures are the answer. I've read at some week about the game The Crew. The PS4 version was ported from the PC (since the game was in development long before the dev kits arrived). They ported it in 2 months with 5 guys. That's how you improve costs, with more tech, not with less.