No, the Wii did not decline from the Gamecube. But it is an outlier from Nintendo's trend of home console sales, and I pointed that out. When a 3rd stringer in the NBA averages 2 ppg, but one game, he scores 40, do you then say "omg, he's the best player on the team"? No, you say that was a one off and probably won't happen again, as he continues to score 2 ppg afterwards.  He only scored 40 because he got more minutes (waggle) for that one game. Now that the team plays how they normally play (a tradition console), he goes back to what he usually does. 

And no, that's not what my theory was, at all. It was the fact of "I get to control the game" that got people to get the Wii. Would you rather play NBA by shooting with the O button, or actually going through the motions? Would you rather play a racing game by using an analog stick or "turning the steering wheel"? You think this didn't come into people's minds? That prospect is why the Wii sold. 

Why do you think the Kinect sold over 20M? Definitely not because it had a ridiculous amount of good games. It was because "you are the controller". Even the EyeToy on PS2 sold 10.5M, and that had piss all for games. But these two were outside peripherals. Giving motion to every console? We saw the results.

Seriously, compare the Wii library to prior Nintendo libraries and even the WiiU library tell me that it was just so immensely better than the others, that it sold 100M on that. I don't think you can do that while being honest with yourself. 

NX will sink or swim on its own merits.

The XBox 360 (MS best selling system) launched 4 years after the first XBox. In hindsight, we all say that was a smart move.

The DS (Nintendo's best selling system) launched 3 1/2 years after the GBA. In hindsight, nobody complains about that.

There are pros and cons to launching in 2016. 

No motion controls in Smash Bros Brawl, still the highest selling entry in the series.

Motion controls barely come into New Super Mario Bros Wii, and it sold 28 million copies.

Did motion help Wii sell? Of course. But it wasn't the only reason it sold. It also benefitted from giving gamers the darker, more mature Zelda they wanted in Twilight Princess, an epic and ambitious 3D Mario in Galaxy, a flagship Monster Hunter to seduce the Japanese market, etc.

SSB being the highest entry comes with the territory being on a 100M selling system. But....the GCN sold 21M and its Smash sold 7M. Seriously, do you think Brawl is just so immensely better than Melee? That it only managed 5M more on 5x the userbase?

NSMBWii is bundled to this day. 

And, like I said, you get to swing the sword in Zelda and Monster Hunter, and use motion to interact with the planets Mario is on. Knowing you can do that in games appealed to people. Just about ever Wii game could be played with a traditional controller. But the appeal of motion was the driving force behind its sales. 

Motion control wasn't the selling point of games like Monster Hunter, (which is primarily played with the classic controller) Mario Galaxy, or NSMBWii. Remove all motion control and they would still have sold well.

I think that under these circusntances the NX will be a flop regardless.

Might have a chance if its a fusion of portable with home console, but even so, without consumer trust Nintendo is done. They would have to bring out that Pokémon MMO.

So if they launched in 2016, all consumer confidence is lost, but if they launch like 8 months later in 2017 ... it's all good? 

Video game fans on message boards are more caught up with this nonsense than the normal consumer is, normal people don't count down the months their game hardware is active. 

At this point, I can't see the NX being all too successful.

Assuming it's a home console, Nintendo's credibility as a serious and competitive home console is pretty much dead.

It'll most likely flop...

Pretty much this. Also if the general consensus is right and Nintendo is putting all of its resources into making NX software, then that means there's a good chance NX will launch strong and attract a good amount of attention from the supposedly 'lost' fans anyway.

The lost the casualswith Wii U, who are fickle and don't want expensive hardware for games. They lost the hardcore gamers with the Wii when they catered to the casuals. Now they are losing their most loyal fans by abandoning the Wii U prematurely. If they weren't so focused on the NX, we'd have better games on the Wii U right now and Zelda wouldn't have been delayed.