The 3DS has no real direct competition while the WiiU has rather a lot. Not to mention when you consider its lack of 3rd party support, to anyone who doesn't specifically like Nintendo games the WiiU's library is rather small.

You'd have thought after the GC Nintedo would have learned that home consoles aimed at the core market really need strong 3rd party support to thrive :/

Well... GC was profitable for them, they didn't lose much money but they weren't selling buildings either... With the wiiU, they were losing money but now, they are breaking even and it should be all profit from here... If the wiiU is a profitable investment for nintendo at 20 million and they dont suffer much losses at alll like they did with the gamecube, then I consider 20 million being fine. Its not great, its not good but its not bad either... I think Nintendo tries to do new things by taking some risks and when the risks don't pay off, they get something like the wiiU but if they pay off, then its something like the wii

Right, in the end all that matters is how much profit it makes for Nintendo which it will soon I hope.

I think you've missed my point.

Nintendo vs Sony's 1st party is irrelevant, since Sony aren't trying to sell their console purely on their own merits. 3rd parties make up the vast majority of home console software sales, which is proof enough that the majority of the core market care more for 3rd party games than they do the 1st party titles of any of the big three.

For someone to enjoy the WiiU they have to enjoy Nintendo games. For someone to enjoy their competitors there is no such restriction.

With the "casuals" gone, Nintendo either need to start appealing to the core market again by providing a competitive online experience and the same 3rd party support as their competitors, or continue to watch the WiiU burn.

the only way for the Wii U to reach 20M is by at least one of these things happening:

-massive price cut, putting the console at sub 200€/$
-hackers crack it
-huge marketing push with a proper Zelda (like the HD demo they had) + a new approach to mature their new titles (maybe get some voice actors, a real story supporting the games... basically Nintendo's own The Last of Us type of games)

Was GC profitable? Nintendo made profits in the GC generation, but they also had gameboy which sold a lot more hardware and software than GC.

While this whole thread is great, I particularly like this part. I never realized predictions were so easy.

Let's see: 80m PSP's...divide that by two....subtract 10m....carry the 1...

Aha! PS Vita confirmed to sell 30m!

That's the issue though. Can Nintendo have another Wii?

Nintendo's home console sales have been steadily declining since the NES. Only the Wii was able to break that trend and be a huge seller. They need to make their consoles appealing to a broader audience if they want anything close to the Wii. 

I hear this a lot, that the GC was profitable for Ninty, but where does this come from? Nintendo were making so so profits during this period, despite GBA selling massive numbers of HW and software, which to me would imply that the GC was at best cost neutral and more likely not profitable as a whole. Second, the Wii U may be profitable now, but thats assuming Nintendo don't make any further price cuts, and if they don't make any price cuts then how are they going to reach 20 million? At its current avg sales rate it will take another 5 years to reach 22 million, and thats with the highly unlikely assumption that sales don't drop off as time goes on, particularly with 3rd parties abandoning the Wii U as gen 7 winds down. 

I just can't share many people's optimism in this thread, not with the facts at hand. Wii U is very unlikely to be a success, because 1) it isn't likely to be profitable as a whole (given the amount lost so far and future price pressure from PS4/XB1) and 2) Nintendo would have lost an unprecedented amount of marketshare, mindshare and industry clout in the process. It does had the potential to become a second console, but then so did GC (particularly when it hit $99) but look at how much that helped (not very). The marlet for multi-console owners is much smaller than many people here seem to believe, so I don't think that will help drag Wii U away from its current trajectory. 

You could likewise ask what Nintendo games compete with Uncharted or TLOU. Even including 3rd party games there are still Nintendo games that don't have any direct competition from another popular series (such as MK), which is why Nintendo have their own core set of fans. The problem is you can't sustain a console off just those games.

You need a combination of 3rd party games to give your product mass appeal, and then 1st party games to make you competitive to those who have the same support. I'm sure there are huge numbers of people that love Nintendo's games, but simply don't want to spend the money on a console purely for them. Heck, i'm one of those people :P (though if i didn't already own a 3DS i'd be a lot more inclined to go through with it).

Or they could just make GTA6 a WiiU exclusive. That would probably do the job on its own