What would it take to save the Wii U?

[FerretGamer]

Can we agree the Wii U is doing better than the Saturn.

I'm not so sure about that. Wikipedia has WiiU at about 5.5 Million and the Saturn at 9.5 Million. Nintendo is coming off of the world wide hit with the Wii and has had one or two very highly rated games so far, but their momentum is completely gone.

So then the Wii U will be more niche and popular than the Saturn then right?

I can see that for sure. There are some real gems in the Wii U library already. I think the same goes for the Wii considering it was mostly dismissed by the core gamers.

[Violent By Design]

While the PSP sold 80 million the DS sold more than 150 million. I'd say that's a pretty big market domination by anyone's standards.

That's just restating what I said, and leaving out the important detail that they didn't actually dominate their competition more than the Gameboy did.

Again, the DS outsold previous consoles yes - games sell more today than in the past in general. But you do realize that the 7th gen is actually the first time ever that multiple companies were able to get a big chunk of the handheld pie.

80 million units, is a lot of units (same amount as the Game Boy Advance). The DS didn't even double the PSP's sales, so while it clearly dominated, it actually has competition. Compare that to previous generations.


The Gameboy sold 118 Mil (combinging GB with GBC)

GBA sold 80 mill


Gamegear sold 8-10 mill.

Neo Geo Pocket sold 2 mill (including the NGPC)

The Lynx sold 500k-1 mill.

N Gage sold 3 mill


So Nintendo actually dominated the handheld market last gen less than they have any other generation. And again, you have to not only take into account the PSP, but the iPhone - which of course, has sold many many units, and sold many many games. 3DS biggest competition are Droids and iPhones now, not the Vita.



The DS was still #1 by far, but I'm not sure if you can confidently say the DS was more successful than the Gameboy just because it sold more units, you have to factor in the times that they were released. More people play video games now than they did when GB came out.

[k.vlaros]

I think it's a really tough question. The WiiU already has enough games out or imminent (though I don't think X coming to America is set in stone) for me to justify buying and keeping it. As retro gamers, we have all asked ourselves something like, "well I kind of want a Turbo Grafix, but are there enough games I want to justify it?" and I think for current and future buyers, as has been said, the WiiU will meet the minimum bar, if only just. But my overall thought is that this system shouldn't have been named or designed so similarly to the Wii. My advice to Nintendo is keep the chin up, follow through with all the games announced (few though they may be) and add another few surprises like Starfox, and then wow us with a handheld / home console fusion system in a couple more years (available in three). Or perfected motion control, or haptic feedback, or holograms, or headset display, etc.

[SoltanGris]

I plan to pick up a Wii U in the next few months. The Mario games, Smash, Kart, Zelda...those are more than enough to justify the system in my mind. Any good 3rd party games are just icing on the cake.

[Valkyrie-Favor]

I haven't even played a Wii U yet.

Damn.

[Exhuminator]

80 million units, is a lot of units. The DS didn't even double the PSP's sales

Actually, it did more than double. The last released number for DS + DS Lite sales was 153.98 million sold, but if you add DSi sales on top of that (28.42 million), you end up with over 182 million DS family units sold. Thus the entire DS family's cumulative sales are in fact twice what the PSP sold, even with all of its own variations combined (1000/2000/3000/Go).

I'm not sure if you can confidently say the DS was more successful than the Gameboy just because it sold more units, you have to factor in the times that they were released.

You have to factor in the sales time frame the Game Boy family had versus the DS family. The Game Boy family began being sold in 1989 and was discontinued in 2003. That's a 14 year stint that resulted in 118.69 million units sold. That's an average of 8.4 million units sold a year. In contrast, the DS/DS Lite sold from 2004 - 2011, which gives those variations a 7 year stint that resulted in 153.98 million units sold. That's an average of 21.99 million units sold a year. (And that's not even including the DSi family sales in the mix.) The math would suggest the DS sold more than two and a half times as much as the Game Boy per year. I would call that more successful personally.

My sources:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Game_Boy
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nintendo_DS_sales
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nintendo_DS
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nintendo_DSi
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/PlayStation_Portable
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/PSP_Go
http://www.gamesradar.com/psp-go-sold-1 ... s-just-14/
http://blog.ziggytek.com/2009/12/21/psp ... atrocious/
http://gonintendo.com/?p=156354
http://www.nintendo.co.jp/ir/en/sales/hard_soft/

[arcadifvid]

im willing to bet in 10-20 years, the wii U will become sort of a must have "retro" console. (hard to imagine any HD-era console a "retro" console though)
as far as saving the wii U today, sorry to say there really is no saving it right now, but I hope Nintendo survives through this.

[Flake]

I plan to pick up a Wii U in the next few months. The Mario games, Smash, Kart, Zelda...those are more than enough to justify the system in my mind. Any good 3rd party games are just icing on the cake.

This. This is why the WiiU doesn't need any saving.

[dsheinem]

I plan to pick up a Wii U in the next few months. The Mario games, Smash, Kart, Zelda...those are more than enough to justify the system in my mind. Any good 3rd party games are just icing on the cake.

This. This is why the WiiU doesn't need any saving.

Depends on how you look at it.

If "saving it" means "it needs to have some good games that a particular (loyal and small) audience will buy the console for" then no, it doesn't need saving. It will have enough good games to make it worth getting at some point for most people who frequent a site like this one.

If "saving it" means establishing long-term relevance and profitability on par with the competition (Sony and MS) then yes, it does need saving. Despite already having games/series on the WiiU that have sold well in the past for Nintendo, the system as a whole is not selling well. Compare the interest/enthusiasm for the Wii U (which some of you feel has at least a couple of killer exclusive games already) with sales of the PS4 and Xbox One (which by most measures don't yet have any killer exclusive apps) and you'll see that the WiiU's sales problem is likely one that no amount of new software alone could fix.

From the second perspective, I think the Wii U is/was DOA. From the first perspective, I am eagerly anticipating the inevitable clearance sales after the system's last gasps...

[BoringSupreez]

80 million units, is a lot of units. The DS didn't even double the PSP's sales

Actually, it did more than double. The last released number for DS + DS Lite sales was 153.98 million sold, but if you add DSi sales on top of that (28.42 million), you end up with over 182 million DS family units sold. Thus the entire DS family's cumulative sales are in fact twice what the PSP sold, even with all of its own variations combined (1000/2000/3000/Go).

My sources:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Game_Boy
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nintendo_DS_sales
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nintendo_DS
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nintendo_DSi
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/PlayStation_Portable
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/PSP_Go
http://www.gamesradar.com/psp-go-sold-1 ... s-just-14/
http://blog.ziggytek.com/2009/12/21/psp ... atrocious/
http://gonintendo.com/?p=156354
http://www.nintendo.co.jp/ir/en/sales/hard_soft/

The Nintendo website and Wikipedia already combined DS/Lite/DSi sales into one number, which is 153 million.