Yes but Nintendo EAD and Nintendo First Party are different things

not at all and youve been talking about WIi U with others for a few posts now so lets not pull the "off topic" card just yet. 3ds is massively down from DS true, but so is the Wii U from Wii that isnt bashing that is a FACT. So if you say that handhelds have no future cause of 3ds at least on Ninty side then the same has to hold true for consoles since its the same situation. 

Both consoles have improved from earlier this year.

The 3DS had lost all its 2013 momentum in the first few months and has finally started to regain it, and this time its actually got a beefy year incoming with popular titles for both east and west. The n3DS is going to give it a much needed new baseline in Japan until it releases in the west for another boost. Funnily enough, its mostly third parties that are going to keep the system going while Nintendo works on the WiiU and some bigger hits for the n3DS. They could have focused squarely on the 3DS and completely abandoned the WiiU but then all of its investments would have been completely lost money. They have wagered their strong 3rd party support and key titles against salvaging the WiiU. I don't think that was the wrong idea for the long term.

The WiiU finally gained some momentum, and managed to push into HyWa, Bayo2, Smash, Toad, and then a seemingly good 2015 (speaking realtive here, good as in it has a lot of titles lined up). This momentum also won't be getting wasted next year if Nintendo can keep pushing out all these titles that are utterly blowing away the competition in terms of quality. The eShop has grown well as well for it, and Nintendo has really started pushing that "Nindie" idea.

Nothing will save the WiiU but its at least going to start turning a profit with hardware and software (as it finally has some), and it may finally drain its initial stock on gamepad contracts, which will let Nintendo make the thing for less in the future and possibly release a cheaper SKU. The 3DS has actual momentum going into 2015 with titles in 2015 unlike the squandered potential of 2013 to 2014. If Amiibos do them some good... we might actually start seeing Nintendo turn a decent profit. (Heck, the MK8 DLC if it sells to a good majority of the MK8 buyers will be a massive boost of money with no costs for distributions or discs or retailers.)

Wow, I missed a lot of what I started. Luckily though there were people to defend the right side.

Actually, the 3DS is doing quite well in Japan. If you compare the 3DS to the GBA then it's just about to pass up the LT sales of it there. (VGC numbers.) I would hardly call that "moving away."

Also, and this isn't necessarily towards you, comparing the 3DS to the DS is plain and simple a ridiculous claim. People who compare the 3DS to the DS often complain when the Wii U is compared to the Wii.

The console market is not massively down overall like the handheld market is. Wii U is, but the market isn't, just like how PS3 was down massively from PS2 but the overall console market last gen grew regardless.

Now that the Wii U has more games, 3DS is less of a potential replacement.

Would you have made Wii U non-HD?

Wii U has inadvertently eaten into the 3DS, though. The moment Nintendo decided to try and (fail to) significantly boost the Wii U sales, they had to stop the kinda constant stream of 3DS games due to their small developing teams. 

The Wii U is a money pit for Nintendo and the 3DS is/was the one with a moderate future.

They could just, you know, hire more bloody people, but apparently that hasn't occurred them.

See previous comments on market futures.

??? They did.