It's replay likely that Nintendo will announce Switch's online service, for that reason, they will also announce the end of the free service.

Based off the first statement I'm gonna go with a no on whether he should be believed or not.

11th

Yeah, there's no chance they're not going to even announce it the day before.

Where’s this direct you promised us?

*Wraps a chain around his fist*

I’m crazy!

No, the fallacy is the strawman argument you provided. Nowhere did I argue that New Super Mario Bros was a killer app, in fact, I stated the exact opposite. You fabricated an argument, said it was mine, and then made your attempts to defeat it. You made a straw man.

A killer app is NOT a game that sells over 10 million; a killer app is a game that drives a substantial demand for hardware sales on its own - like how Wii Sports and Breath of the Wild did. Both consoles sold out until several million units had sold. With Switch, Breath of the Wild exceeded hardware sales numbers for a time.

Neither Animal Crossing nor New Super Mario Bros 2 drove millions of sales; people bought those titles because they already had a 3DS. Otherwise, 3DS sales were at baseline the year both games were released, selling slightly less than 2011's and 2013's holidays. Factoring in the competition, 3DS in 2011 had much stiffer competition than 2012, since other handhelds sold significantly higher in 2011. If both New Super Mario Bros 2 AND New Leaf were killer apps, you would expect to see an unprecedented sales spike with 3DS being sold out for months; this didn't occur. Thus neither game was a killer app.

Also, if it's still not obvious enough, look at the sales numbers of New Leaf - they are FAR below the sales of the 3DS.  There is little correlation between 3DS sales numbers and New Leaf sales numbers; this indicates little/no relationship between new 3DS purchases and New Leaf. It was an evergreen title that sold moderately well at launch and continued to sell among the 3DS userbase. The ownership of 3DS drove the sales of New Leaf, not the other way around. The 10 million sales it eventually received was the result of years of moderately good sales. The game was not a killer app.

Nope, New Leaf was a reason I bought my 3DS, gg no re! Hence the problem with your definition of killer app, we can't know exactly what each individual customer bought their system for. Just looking at short term hardware sales after a release is ignoring the scenarios where people buy systems in anticipation of games (like I did for New Leaf) or well after it's already released because any number of reasons.

To say Wii Sports/BotW sold systems completely on their own is a massive stretch. Well, to say a game that sold over 10 million and is in the top 10 best selling games on the system isn't a significant contributor to hardware sales is already a crazy stretch, but I digress. There are plenty of other games around Wii Sports/BotW and the hardware n advertising were also on point. Without those I highly doubt the Wii and Switch would have sold the same on a single game. This also goes for the 3DS baseline, I'd say it's not selling that much in spite of New Leaf, it's selling that much because of it. The baseline would surely be lower without it.

Using your logic with attach rates (which applies to most systems), I guess 3DS has no system sellers then? I don't think you're willing to go that far, so then what do you think are the 3DS' system sellers? Just Pokemon? Despite each game also having a huge sales difference compared to hardware numbers, unless you believe each version sold to completely different people, that there's no overlap whatsoever, but that would be silly! Once Zelda's attach rate falls to 15-20%, will you also say it's not a system seller anymore? lol no, the only conclusion is that there are multiple system sellers that do not have much overlap.

Imo the only real killer app is no one thing on it's own but a combination of everything: great games on a consistent schedule, great hardware and great marketing.

1. You don't know what a killer app is. It's not a piece of software that sells high over a long period of time on a user base, it's not a combination of software, nor is it the piece of software you personally bought the console for. A Killer app is a piece of software that millions of people find indispensable and drives massive demand for hardware. This results in huge sales spikes - such as that seen with the PSX at the release of Final Fantasy 7, Wii sports which reversed a long-term period of decline for Nintendo home consoles to record-breaking highs, to a lesser extent Breath of the Wild which drove massive sales of the Switch coming off of another longterm period of decline and a failed home console. Another example is the release of Pokemon Blue and Red which caused gameboy sales to hit annual record-breaking sales over a decade after launch. Animal Crossing New Leaf sold a lot, but there weren't millions of people flocking to purchase 3DSs as a result needing to play this game. The data shows that vast majority of 3DS purchasers at the time were clearly not buying it for New Leaf. The game sold moderately well over a long period of time. It is not what you call a killer app, but an evergreen title.

2. I never argued that there weren't any factors that drove 3DS sales, I argued that Animal Crossing New Leaf was not a killer app - big difference. Stop making strawman arguments.

3. If you think that it's a massive stretch to say that Wii Sports and Breath of the Wild were driving hardware sales, then you clearly haven't been paying attention to the market.  I really don't have much more to say to you. You're just being contrary for the purpose of being contrary.

Here's a test:

If you remove Breath of the Wild from the Switch launch, and Wii Sports from the Wii launch, and replace both with Animal Crossing New Leaf, how successful do you think each would be? Do you honestly believe that they would have enjoyed the same level of success, or anywhere near it?

Nintendo's system sellers are: Zelda, Mario, Pokémon and Smash Bros.

Animal Crossing will broaden their demo though.

tag