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Wii Outselling Wii U, Only 160,000 Units Shipped Last Quarter
rescendent writes with news that the Wii U still isn't selling very well. From the article: "Nintendo's Wii U console sold only 160,000 units worldwide during the past three months, with the company blaming a lack of first-party releases for the poor performance. Software sales for the system were just 1.3 million units. During the period Nintendo sold 90,000 Wii U consoles in Japan, 60,000 in the US and only 10,000 in Europe and Australia."
El Reg reports that the Wii sold 210,000 units in the same quarter. On the bright side, Nintendo is once again profitable.
Nintendo dragged its feet in the move to HD and is paying the price. They underestimated the time and money expense, and now their first-party releases are behind. On top of that, there's barely been any marketing for the Wii U, which has a name that implies it's an accessory for the Wii rather than a new console. The console's tablet controller doesn't offer anything that people's existing smartphones and iPads can't do better. It was likely released in reaction to the iPad (Nintendo stated in 2010 that Apple is their biggest threat). With the lack of hardware power and user base, there's nothing with which to court third-party developers, who are focused instead on the more powerful consoles coming out later this year.
Nintendo's stronghold remains handheld gaming. However, even that is under threat from smartphones. On top of what Android already supports, iOS 7 will ship with native physical controller APIs, and Apple is working with hardware manufacturers to release official attachments and wireless controllers. While the 3DS certainly won't disappear, it will be interesting to watch how well it fares among adult gamers when physical controllers become commonplace in the iPhone accessory aisle.
All I wanted was more Mario Kart Wii, not a giant controller with a screen on it.
For the first few years, Sony's PS2 also out-sold the PS3, didn't it?
But it's honest, which is more than you'd get elsewhere.
Only having 4 new game releases in Japan and 7 for NA last quarter was going to hurt.
I bought a Wii and a 3DS practically on the potential of their respective Virtual Consoles alone.
I've learned my lesson.
If Slashdot only updated when there was a story more important than the previous one, it wouldn't update very often.
Nintendo has always had a cost niche that set them apart from xbox and ps3. Why would they want to go head to head? My kids are older now and I am not going to shell out that much money because they want to play a few titles that they liked when they were younger.
love is just extroverted narcissism
It is ironic, but its also a correct analysis.
As a Wii U owner games I would like to see on the Wii U are:
New Mario Kart
New Mario Galaxy
New/Relaunched Metroid
New Paper Mario game
New Mario Party game
New Zelda FPS style game
But NONE of these titles exist!! As a long time Nintendo fan, I'd buy all of these, but they didn't even bother to make and have them ready by the Wii U launch!!
Also, the migration from the Wii to the Wii U was so customer hostile that we don't play Wii games on the Wii U, we fire up the Wii and use that. One time, one direction game data transfer!! Fuck that shit!! One of the worst customer decisions ever by Nintendo. On the Wii you could plug in the cartridge from your gamecube to access the saved game data, why the hell won't the Wii U and Wii allow you to move Wii save game data back and forth on a SIM card. Oh, what's that Nintendo? Piracy, you say? Well Fuck you there too! I'm a customer who's fairly committed to your stuff who is getting rapidly disillusioned.
They are so paranoid about compatibility because of their history of designing things around fixed hardware to get the most out of it (including saving time NOT testing software for such changes.)
Nintendo could simply create an OPTION to run Wii games in full emulation mode or enhanced mode - and let the user set the option; default to the safe option. Later, with enough feedback online (a simple forum or poll online) could allow them to update their software with a list of safe games to run in enhanced mode.
OR they could continue to think like the music and movie industry and expect people to buy replacements... then NOT release HD versions of their old games-- Nintendo rarely ever remakes anything, just a few zelda games and the rest is all emulated.
Democracy Now! - uncensored, anti-establishment news
I really like the Wii. The motion controls system is by far gen 1, and I always figured that the successor to the Wii would have a better motion control system (perhaps something akin to the Kinect, but a little shy). Then the Wii U is announced and it turns out that the motion control system is identical. The Wii U is a Wii + a fat controller with a screen stuck between the controls.
So Nintendo back peddled on the motion control thing they had going for them, and as a result the older hardware is still outselling the new hardware because it's cheaper and does as good as the newer hardware in what people buy a Wii for. If the Wii U had a motion control system consumers considered to be an improvement over the Wii, I suspect that Wii U would be at least outselling the Wii.
The first step to solving a problem, is identifying it. I find the fact that Nintendo was willing to blame it self for its failure in the market place encouraging.
Rather than a bunch of executives playing CYA and concocting some narrative full of nonsense about macro economic headwinds or something, they actually named something they will be expected to do something about.
Repeal the 17th Amendment TODAY! Also Please Read http://www.gnu.org/philosophy/right-to-read.html
I'll start caring about computing power on consoles again when we have ray-shaded games, I haven't cared about the shininess of games in years now.
New Zelda FPS style game
Worst....Idea....Ever. Zelda is perfect.
I did want the first Wii, my kids wanted one, my wife wanted one. I dutifully got into line at 6am and got one for Christmas (The year after they came out).
So now we have the new Wii U and my kids haven't peeped about it, none of their friends have one, my wife doesn't know it exists, and Nintendo hasn't shown me anything interesting.
I am not saying that the thing is great or that it sucks. I just don't know and haven't seen anything cool about it.
Nintendo did this to themselves when they abandoned hardcore gamers to cater to casual games with the Wii. That move will always come back to bite you because the casual users are fickle while hardcore gamers will get you through the rough times. And sure enough, casual gamers have moved on to Facebook, tablets, and smartphones, and Nintendo doesn't have anyone left to sell consoles. I used to buy Nintendo consoles because I could play most of the great games available on other systems as well as Nintendo's excellent titles. But ever since the Wii, Nintendo lost most of the decent third-party developers which meant that hardcore gamers would have to buy the Xbox 360 or Playstation 3 to be able to play those games. When that happened, many of the developers and the gamers haven't looked back. Luckily for Nintendo, they're still selling decent numbers of portable units, but the Wii U is in serious trouble. There's no doubt that it will pick up a bit when more first-party titles come out and after an inevitable price drop, but right now most of the hype is around the Xbone and PS4. At this point, I just don't see them making a miraculous comeback and I can't help but wonder if this is their last console. If they did another console, it would have to be absolutely revolutionary - my vote is for a fully immersive virtual reality experience, but I'm not going to hold my breath for that.
So you want Nintendo to have 6 brand-new 1st party developed games at launch? Name one console that has done this in the history of consoles. Go on. Try it.
Also, a Zelda FPS is the dumbest idea ever. Your idea of refreshing a genre is by shoehorning another tired genre into it?