I've never cared that much about the specs but if having high specs will help them sales wise then maybe they should consider them.

That wasn't necessary with the Wii. Nintendo accomplished that with the Wii. Nintendo tried to appeal to the tablet market with the WiiU but didn't work out.

Wait, what? Online play in a single-player franchise? I could see being torn up about the lack of a multiplayer co-op option (which, technically, there is) but to be upset that a Star Fox of all things has no online is weird to me. We may as well cry that The Order lacked online at that point. I agree with the Mario Party bit, that's fucked up for sure, but I'd rather that franchise die in a fire. Splatoon is fine, even without voice chat, the game has been otherwise done exceptionally (see, that creativity thing again). And HD Metroid might be lacking more because the series itself doesn't actually have that many fans. When you look back and see that Prime 3 and its rather large budget for the time is going to be outsold by Hyrule Warriors... well... it should put things into perspective. And a Metroid on WiiU, now, would be sent out to die.

And, I genuinely disagree with your assertion that they don't listen to consumer demand or their fans. Look at Fire Emblem, they could have just farted out more Awakening but instead they actually went into it and started fixing it, fixing the systems, expanding the scope and offerings, and giving players of all sides of the coin what they may have been looking for. Now, we're yet to see what the actual breadthe of content within the offerings of the two FE games is and if its really comparable to Awakening per game, but in terms of listening to fans? That's been demonstrated there 101. (Heck, Toad exists because fans wanted a spin-off.) There's a reason that FE:If is seeing such a high first week, so much higher than FE:A, that's because Nintendo built consumer confidence with what they showed and what they were changing.

Also... you know... some people actually like Mario Tennis. In fact a lot of people have been clamoring for Strikers... a Mario Sports Game.

Obviously they can't serve every fan base, though, because that's simply impossible for a company with that many IPs and there respective fan-bases. They've done Smash fans a pretty good one, FE fans could be sitting high, Mario fans are riding high, Kirby has gotten some excellent games, Yoshi is actually getting a good game, Kart fans have one of the best games on their hands, Bayo2 is a love-song for pure-game fans, etc. Heck there the only reason we even get games like Bravely Default/Second, because the parent company doesn't give a rats ass about the western fans.

Metroid, though, that's fucked because its budgets have never really been met with wide support. And the title is used generally as a show-piece... nothing to show on the WiiU. And Tanabe doesn't do 2D Metroid as I doubt Sakamoto would let anyone even so much as touch it.

He may not be the sole mastermind behind everything Nintendo does, but it cannot be ignored that under his tenure, Nintendo posted its first ever annual losses, has its worst selling console and second worst selling handheld to date, and has consumer faith at a staggering low.

But that was before smartphones and tablets took over. The opportunity for a casual dedicated gaming machine is now gone.  I hope i'm wrong because i'm a big nintendo fan but I just believe that it is gone. Nintendo's best bet is in creating something is a must own extra system for core gamers.

They are just so darn afraid to commit.  It's like if you watched Michael Jordan play back in the day and he suddenly became paranoid about driving the lane.  Nintendo has had like four or five moments this gen - including the first two Wii U E3's in 2011 and 2012 - where they came to the threshold of going all in only to chicken out.  It's infuriating to watch.  Last year they came out of E3 looking strong only to suddenly turn yellow in the holidays, reducing their marketing, no Smash Bundle or price cut, no major Wii U ad campaign.  This year Nintendo came off the Zelda delay swinging with good Directs.  It looked like Nintendo was preparing to really push their lineup and go all in at E3.  Then E3 happened and Nintendo once again chickened out.  Seriously the key to success is confidence.  The N64's strong launch was fueled by a large, confident, well executed ad campaign.  And the Wii?  That strong start that kick started its success was the epitome of Nintendo going all in on what they had.  Big ad campaign, strong exclusives out the gate, the works.  The Wii U?  Heck no.  From the get go they never had a ton of confidence openly.  They came close at key moments but always backed off.  With that kind of tone and approach, the Wii U was doomed out the gate.

Honestly I don't have the energy or time right now to dissect a post this long, but suffice it to say, the sales speak for themselves, they are not meeting gamer's expectations, nor indeed their fans given the overwhelmingly negative response to this E3, including a 20,000 strong and growing petition to cancel one of their announced games.

NOOOOOOOOOOOooooooooooooooooooooooo!!!

Oh he did a fantastic job 2006-2010, I agree. But that was a long time ago, how much longer do we give him the benefit of the doubt?

http://gamrconnect.vgchartz.com/thread.php?id=205048&page=1#
Sorta fits in with what I said.