Wman1996 on 02 December 2020
I'm gonna say N64 by a very narrow margin. Wii, NES, Game Boy, and DS are all up there too. Switch might be pretty up there as well, but it's too early to say.
The Nintendo 64 was the first Nintendo platform to have a majority of polygon graphic games. They were nonexistent on NES, and very rare on SNES (Super FX chip games, basically). It was also the first platform I can think of that had four player capabilities right out of the box with no multitaps needed. Pair that with a controller with an analog stick (just about the first in history, if not the first), and a port for memory expansion/haptic features/Game Boy compatibility.
There's also the 64DD. Unfortunately, it never released outside of Japan. It was the first piece of Nintendo hardware to use discs, even though they were magnetic disks. RandNet was a superior and more involved piece of online commerce for video games than previous Nintendo hardware. The GameCube unfortunately never even tried anything as involved as this, and only a tiny few GameCube games supported online.
And of course the software. Super Mario 64 and The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time transformed gaming and their respective franchises. Super Smash Bros. and Animal Crossing have become very iconic Nintendo IPs as well. I know the GameCube versions of the OG Animal Crossing were more successful, but it all started here.
Lifetime Sales Predictions
Switch: 151 million (was 73, then 96, then 113 million, then 125 million, then 144 million)
PS5: 115 million (was 105 million) Xbox Series S/X: 57 million (was 60 million, then 67 million)
PS4: 120 mil (was 100 then 130 million, then 122 million) Xbox One: 51 mil (was 50 then 55 mil)
3DS: 75.5 mil (was 73, then 77 million)
"Let go your earthly tether, enter the void, empty and become wind." - Guru Laghima