But there was a plausible audience there of people for Nintendo to go after -- if you were a casual player or someone who could play games with the complexity of Pac-Man or the original Mario Bros. and not much else, there wasn't really much on the PS2/GCN/PC/XBox for you to turn to. Nintendo successfuly exploited that for a few years before others copied it (Kinect) and then Apple completely took that audience away. 

What audience is under served right now for gaming? Casuals are very happy with smart devices there are hundreds of new games every year. So are kids. Core/hardcore gamers are well served with the PS4/XBox 1 and then you have Steam on the PC. I mean I guess no one's making games for dogs/cats?

I don't think Nintendo will be able to find a new fad this time. Every level of gamer from the fringe/casual/non-player all the way up to the most hardcore player has a ton of options. I mean maybe VR? OK. But it looks like Sony, MS, and Facebook/Occulus are already moving on that. 

Just because Sega hit paydirt once with Sonic on the Genesis to save their bacon didn't mean the "hail mary killer app" formula ever worked again for them, not on the Saturn with NiGHTS or the Dreamcast with Shenmue (even though Sega spent a small fortune on the game). I don't think there is a Brain Training or Wii Sports coming again to save Nintendo this time. 

Let's not try to pretend the Wii was the first console that tried to appeal to casuals. It wasn't. Even now, consoles are still trying to appeal to casuals. Just not the tablet-mobile casuals.

I'm not saying Nintendo is gonna hit a homerun next gen like what happened with the Wii and they'll have some killer app that'll make them infinitely more successful than XB and PS, but if I know one thing about Nintendo, it's to never count them out. When they hit low points, they always come back swinging. History repeats itself, and Nintendo knows what mistakes not to make again next gen. I don't think 60-80m is out of reach for them at all, especially considering they may be the only console manufacturer left and if Nintendo Fusion becomes a reality, their console/handheld divisions will merge and give them a ton of profit/sales. 

I think it's just wise to wait and see what happens. Assuming Nintendo is finished is just as foolish as assuming they will easily dominate. We don't know anything of their plans.

Does the author really believe that the likes of Rockstar doesn't want to put GTAV on the WiiU because they are intimidated by Nintendo's first party titles? Or that's the reason Ubisoft didn't release Far Cry 4 on the WiiU?

Also, Nintendo is the savior of gaming? Since when?

"Unlike Nintendo, though, neither Microsoft or Sony use their own IPs very regularly. For the most part, it’s the third-party titles that keep the two console spaces afloat."

Someone who send him links to sales numbers for Sony's and MS's franchises sales.

We need to stop pretending that anyone needs to be "saved"...Nintendo only needs to sustain. A lot of people called the GC a failure because it really didn't sell all to well, but it made money, and that is what matters. The options are not PS2 or Virtual Boy...there is room in the market for more niche devices. 

Will Nintendo ever have another success as big as the Wii? Who knows. But can they get back to profitability? I'd say yes. That is the path that they should focus on. The "All or Nothing" attitude dominating the game industry (why the A/AA market died) is not helping anyone, and the sooner companies realize that its not about competing for #1, the sooner video games become better for everybody...

I agree, Nintendo can be more moderately successful in the future. 

I just think their time as far as being a major player in the home console market in particular is over. They've just mismanaged their console division too badly and the market has changed too much for them to keep up.  

If their next console basically just reuses their handheld mobile chipset (x2 or x3 perhaps) and they can sell even 15-20 million of those, they could make a decent profit even at a low price. That's probably their play. If it sells more than that, great, if not at least they don't lose any money and it solves the problem of their bigger budget games (like Mario Kart 8) being stuck on their smaller userbase (Wii U vs. 3DS). Now even if the console kinda flops, Mario Kart 9 (hypothetically) still has portable users to sell to. 

Pretty ignorant article, if I'm honest. He ends it with "I think what they're doing is best." No. It's clearly not best. In what backwards world is performing the worst the best decision to make?

If he has an argument against Dan's suggestion, he needs to come up with a superior alternative. Staying the same is the inferior alternative, clearly.

I always say this, but if Nintendo wants third parties, they need to spend the money. What they're doing now with 3rd party collaborations is a small step, but it's not enough. Instead of investing more money securing multiples, they need to spend money creating exclusives that create an ecosystem that those games can actually live in.

Nintendo will never keep games like Destiny on their systems if they have no exclusives that can bring those types of gamers in. They need to invest heavily in western studios that can make those types of games. Nintendo needs like 5 studios like Retro/Rare, and they need to be focused exclusively on making new Western IPs. And they have to be good, quality games with mass western appeal.

Once Nintendo has an exclusive ecosystem that houses games similar to those made by western devs, they can finally bring over those gamers with those exclusives, which means that the console will have an audience that would actually buy those games.

In other words. If Nintendo wants GTA, first they have to make GTA.

Do you actually think Nintendo would do any of that? I doubt it. Nintendo's shown they have zero interest in this. Adelman's insightful comments about Nintendo's internal structure in Japan also indicates why this would never happen, too many old farts on their board of directors would staunchly oppose such moves. Nintendo's had amply oppurtunity to expand into the West, they simpy don't want to, in fact if they did it would be a threat to many on Nintendo's Japanese board of directors (what happens if the US division gets too strong? What happens if like Rare they start making games that begin to outshine the Japanese games?). 

Yamauchi could cut through all that political BS, but Iwata can't. He has to play ball with the board. 

I'm not really a big believer in the "history repeats" ... no there are plenty of examples where history doesn't repeat. Even the history that Nintendo is on is that they were on a fairly consistent decline in the home console business since the 1980s onwards, with a 4 year spike due to the Wii, but now they're right back on their previous trajectory. 

I think what the console business is today -- 95% Western consumers and Western publishers, being an enviornment in which Nintendo really can work in. Even Iwata himself says while he is NOA's president he doesn't understand the Western market very well. 

So I'm looking at that. Maybe they can pull off another miracle, but I tend to think if your business is banking on always pulling off a miracle, the day will inevtiably come where you can't pull of a miracle. 

You lied to me, you told me it was a good read. I was laughing half the time at the writer =P

I never said that they would do that. I said that that's what they must do if they want to get third parties without bribing them. They need to cultivate that ecosystem internally before they can ever expect improvement externally. They need to redefine what it means to be a Nintendo fan.