True. But the interest of the market might be gained at a slower pace. Look at the DS; it did start better, but touch screen innovation started to be a selling point later on, with software such as Brain Age and Nintendogs, both in Japan and in the West. Wii was lucky to attract many people to begin with; Wii U is not as lucky as the Wii was, but nothing prevents the GamePad to be a selling point after people recognized it as a useful, and innovative, tools for gaming. Also, weren't you saying that Vita had actually some chances to be interesting for the market, so let's wait, it's not all lost? I mean, I do think Wii U has way more chances to be successful in the market than Vita.
The difference between Sony's console and Nintend's console to me is that the first rely on "classic prposal" and "third party support", while the second rely on "innovative concept" and "first party products". Plus, the business model is really different in terms of price positioning, with Sony's HW starting high and being able to cut the price several times along their lifecycles. While Nintendo console tend to sell better in their first half of life cycle. That's the reason why I think that Vita could be saved (note: I'm not saying that Vita will spin it' destiny entirely becoming able to sell 70K a week), while I'm not so sure that Wii U will be able to change its path.
Remember that we're just talking about its first 3 months in the market.
Nintendo did a mistake leaving empty the first 2013 quarter, but in Spring releases should be more constant, and we know the IP Nintendo will release. Look at PS3 first months, for example. Even 3DS first months, better than Wii U but not so much better, in terms of releases.
And, more importantly, top Wii U games are still selling.
Top Wii U games are selling poorly. 6k a week is almost nothing imho. System seller keep selling way more. Of course, with a low install base, they performed well, but the problem is that they were supposed to push exactly the HW base. They are not able to do it, after the christmas season. Of course I admitted that whene releases will hit the market, the situation will be better than now.
NSMB was the most important on Wii, and it was on DS, but that does not mean it will be on Wii U.
For comparison, Brain Training and Nintendogs were the most important titles on DS in the first period, but failed to repeat the craziness on 3DS. Still, Animal Crossing: New Leaf is selling way better than Wild World, and 3DS got an IP (Monster Hunter) that did not even exist on DS. Hence, it's not safe to assume that NSMB U will be the strongest Wii U seller. I mean, it might happen that the next Zelda will be so big to attract more gamers; or the 3D Mario will be actually more valued by them.
NSMB U suffers the competition of 2 on 3DS, and a franchise fatique that other IPs do not have; for example, the next Super Smash Bros. will be big as usual, and it will be a system seller for sure.
I already said that if there will be some surprise hit as for Sport on the Wii and Brain training on the DS, the situation can change. But those are un-predictable phenomena. With their classic IP considering how Super Mario is performing, I don't think that Wii U will be so different compared to the GC. Not saying that it will do exactly GC numbers but probably just slighlty better. Thinking that classic IP could attract more gamers than before it's hard, up to now. Wii u is neither as broad as the Wii on the casual market, nor popular as the GC on the hardcore fans.
And the competition with the 3DS is something that they'll suffer all the lifecicle, imho. You cite Smash bros? It will suffer a lot on the Wii U, considering that it will be a dual-release with 3DS (first time portable version; mutliplayer based game on portable in Japan; 10x time install base and so on...)
I think you stated some wrong things here. PS3 did not gain any momentum over the masses; it's relying on a faithful, though small userbases; it's selling every year the same IPs and the same typologies of games. Minna no Golf is failing to reach the heights it had on PS2, and in general there are no games towards the masses, such as Taiko, Dragon Quest, and so forth. It's succeeding, but not in the way PS2 did. it succeeded in catching a portion of the userbase PS2 did; other portions are now spread across 3DS, PSP, Wii. Third parties offers on PS3 is quite limited if we talk about targets. And it's not so obvious PS4 will continue what PS3 did. I mean, if PS3 struggled after PS2, PS4 will not likely be an instant success. And it's going to be release one year after the Wii U, when the Wii U will get its AAA titles from Nintendo, and probably something from third parties. also, third parties are struggling developing on HD platforms even now (just look Konami, Square, Capcom, atlus, Level5), hence it's not so obvious PS4 will get "all the beloved franchises" from the start. I might be wrong, of course, but at least I do not put a simplistic framework.
I really think that PS3, despite not being a success, was able to regain a momentum in terms of re-setting classic gameplays, approaches and IPs as the focus for the home market in Japan. PS4 will benefit a lot of this situation.
I know that Japanese softco are struggling on HD development, but we are not seeing ANY effort in terms of HD production values from Japanese softco on the Wii U NOW that it would be easy to port the assets on that console, I don't think they'll spend too much time in adapting the new assets once PS4 will be released. Of course we will not see all the beloved franchises at launch on PS4, but it's way easier to imagine that scenario compared to a scenario where they support the Wii U with all their HD productions while "mastering" PS4 assets.
I think Nintendo must absolutely exploit this year of advantage as much as it can. If it can arrive to 2013 holidays with a good price, good bundles and a good internal offer, then it might repeat even a fraction of what 3DS did in 2011, leaving out the competitors out of the picture.
yes, they have to. The problem is that exactly for this year they seem to have nothing firm to change the path of the console.
Land and Mario faded after the Holiday season; price is probably perceived too high (in japan especially I think that the Premium pack is very expansive, considering that there is no bundle); no third party sighificant support for the actual year (except DQX, that probably cannot sell more than 200K, I think), no game at all for the entire Q1 (Wario and Tank?ok...); few releases announced or pre-announced, none of which able to spin the perception of a "average nowadays nintendo console" (so, not so hot for core gamers as the GC was, not so appealing for the masses as the Wii was) as Fit is a shot in the dark, Pikmin is a good but minor IP, Kart could easily come back to GC level of appreciation (Kart7 is not performing as KartWii or DS too) and we don't know when it will be released; Mario3D could even perform better than expected (as Land on 3DS compared to New Mario 2) but no way it will perform bettern than New Mario U in terms of general LTD numbers; Project X is the spiriutual successor of a beloved game that sold 140K and even imagining it able to double those sales...
Or they'll create a new un-predictable phenomena (aka Sport/Brain) presenting new bundles with a price cut (based on the assumption that the console is perceived as overpriced), otherwise I see them continuing selling like this.
Wii U is no 3DS.
