Reason the Wii U has been such a flop #2135

We're approaching two years on the market and Nintendo have only bothered to create two new IP's for the system. There's Nintendoland, a mishmash of existing franchises that has done relatively well and the Wonderful 101, loved by a small community (including myself) but rejected by the wider market. There are several reasons the lack of new IP's is killing Nintendo as a brand.

1) The success of the Wii was built on its unique new software. 13/20 of the top selling games on Wii were new IP's. 15 if you include the Mario Galaxy games. One of the reasons the Wii sales declined so dramatically later in its life was the lack of investment in new games by Nintendo.

2) Nintendo's traditional IP's are in decline. The popularity of Mario, Pokemon, DK et al. is falling and Nintendo aren't doing anything to change the formula of these games to increase interest again. Mario Kart Wii was a huge success because it offered an entirely new way to play a racing game. New Super Mario Bros. Wii reinvented the Mario formula to a modern take on 2D gaming. The Galaxy games added a whole new dimension and scale to 3D platformer mechanics. Mario Kart 8, NSMBU, Tropical Freeze, 3D World, Wii Fit U etc. are just iterative upgrades to existing games on previous systems. They're not bringing in new players and existing fans are seeing little reason to upgrade.

3) Nintendo is turning itself into a niche developer. The lack of new IP's is giving the general public the impression Nintendo is just a Mario production line and if you aren't interested in those games there's no reason to own a Nintendo system. Whether such an impression is fair or otherwise, the lack of investment in new IP's is having that effect.

4) Focusing exclusively on the narrow range of game genres covered by existing IP's will alienate a huge portion of the market and make the conditions for third parties unsustainable. We've already seen this happen, where unless it's a 2D platformer or kart racer, third party games will flop on the Wii U. Nintendo need new IP's to attract different audiences to their systems and allow third parties to find success on the platform with their games.

Ultimately, I can't understand why after the huge success of creating new IP on the DS and Wii, Nintendo would just completely abandon that policy and replace it with just pushing out the same old games with small improvements. Bring on Splatoon.

You mean like new BIG IPs right? Cause they are making new IPs such as splatoon and they made a few in the wii days too!

Actually, I have this funny pic I will post later (Here it is, I know a few of those arent made by nintendo but you get the idea)

As I said in the OP, the success of the Wii was almost entirely based on new IP so this is more about the last four years. The Wii U has two that I can count, three if you stretch the definition a little and include NES Remix.

Point 1 or 2 are ok.

3 and 4 not so much

This seems to be Nintendo's attitude as well. Those ~20 million people who prefer playing each new game we create don't really count and those aren't GamerTM approved video games. Lets devote most of our resources to Pikmin 3 to cater towards those few hundred thousand people instead.

"We're approaching two years on the market and Nintendo have only bothered to create two new IP's for the system. There's Nintendoland, a mishmash of existing franchises that has done relatively well and the Wonderful 101, loved by a small community (including myself) but rejected by the wider market. There are several reasons the lack of new IP's is killing Nintendo as a brand."

Ummmm.....

Splatoon (fun shooter)
Dillon Western Roll (cool action strategy)
Pushmo (never played but heard good things about)
Captain Toad (yes its a new ip now :P)

Well the Wii did have motion controls as well..... But seriously Nintendo seems to be getting their act together. With new ips such as Captain Toad, Devils third and Splatoon, while also bring back dormant ips such as Star Fox.

Edit: Waiting patiently for eternal darkness to resurface

That made me chuckle ... LOL 

Well... Thats arguable really cause granted wii sports was great but I doubt it is the reason why people bought a wii... The wii was marketed very nicely and the motion controls appealed to the casuals as well as its casual games... And not to mention the price point was very cheap compared to its competitors and it launched with Zelda! Vs the wiiU was marketed very poorly and not to mention the huge amount of confusion with the names, it launched with fuck all really compared to Zelda and the Casual market basically went to mobile and a whole other list of reasons why the wiiU is doing soo poorly but the 3ds is doing great by comparasion even though it doesnt have that many new IPs

If Wii Sports was the only new IP that sold well on the Wii I'd say you have a point. But just to make this clear, the vast majority of best selling games on the Wii were completely new IP. Motion controls by itself wasn't the reason people bought the Wii. It was the new games that came with it that made motion controls appealing.

The 3DS will probably end up losing 50% of the market of the original DS.  It is a flop of incredible proportions for Nintendo. A lack of new software, equivalent to what Brain Age, Nintendogs, Layton, Cooking Mama etc. did for the DS is definitely one of the causes of that collapse.

The name debate is such a non-factor in the Wii U's sales. It's a shocking name, sure, but if it was a desirable product people would want to learn about what it was regardless of what it was called. You can easily pick up a Wii U for $200 now so price is irrelevant.