Wii U

[Kchrpm]

Kotaku has a great breakdown of where Nintendo is now, where they have been before, and where they could go in the future.

http://kotaku.com/nintendos-toughest...now-1503448737

[novicius]

Nintendo Prepares for Big Loss, Wii U Is to Blame

Video game hardware maker and game publisher Nintendo announces that it is forecasting a loss of 25 billion yet, about 240 million dollars (165 million Euro) for the fiscal year, most of it linked to the underperforming Wii U.

Initially, the company expected to make a profit for the 12-month period that ends in March, but it also expected to sell 9 million home consoles. The current estimate sits at just 2.8 million Wii U units delivered to gamers and even that might be optimistic.

Satoru Iwata, the president of Nintendo, says that the company can recover in the near future.

[Jason]

I think the name "Wii U" was a huge mistake. Every time I hear it come up in casual conversation, most people think its just a "Wii" thing, or the controller or whatever. And when they hear its a different system the reaction is kind of "eh" or negative period. I have to wonder what would have happened if Nintendo used a different name, and went with more aggressive marketing before Xbone and PS4 dropped.

[Kchrpm]

I think marketing was a much bigger mistake than the name, XBox One is just as confusing but if you stick enough ads in everyone's face they understand.

http://mynintendonews.com/2014/01/18...ely-promising/

I literally just had a blast racing around one of our tracks in the rain (the most graphically-intensive weather setting) and it held up pretty damn well. Of course there are optimisations still to be done but side-by-side, the Wii U version we have running in the studio is extremely promising.

Please be great, please be great, please be great...

[harper]

http://arstechnica.com/gaming/2013/1...for-the-wii-u/

The Wii U looks set to be one of the rare counterexamples to this trend. The system sold roughly 200,000 fewer units this November than it did after its launch last November, even though it was only available on US store shelves for 13 days of November 2012. Nintendo will need to see yet another heavy month-to-month sales increase to even match the 890,000 total systems it sold in November and December of last year. If it can't, it will be in the company of negative holiday momentum counterexamples like the Nintendo Gamecube and the Sega Dreamcast, which both went on to become mere footnotes in the business history of their console generations (the original Xbox, which was barely able to eke out a sales increasing in its second holiday season, could be included in this analysis).

emphasis mine.

Wii U is heading to the same fate as the GameCube and Dreamcast. It won't kill Nintendo, but I've heard they're ramping up R&D now...I wouldn't be surprised if we heard about a new console of some kind from Nintendo in 2015.

[Kchrpm]

If this is a 10-year or longer console cycle like some have said that Sony/MS want to make it, and they can do it right, a second bite at the apple *might* not be a certain failure. *Might*

[Kchrpm]

Not a good sign
http://kotaku.com/gamestop-is-cancel...his-1508273787

What we do know is that GameStop will still let consumers pre-order Watch Dogs for the Xbox One, PlayStation 4, PC, PlayStation 3 and Xbox 360. The game is still even available for Wii U on GameStop's website, but our source explained that stores in the U.S. have been instructed to tell customers who pre-ordered the game on Wii U to shift their pre-order to something else or to have it cancelled.

[21Kid]

More bad news...

Tokyo (AFP) - The head of Nintendo said Wednesday he would slash his salary in half after announcing a 30 percent dive in nine-month profit on weak demand for its new Wii U console as gamers are enticed by cheap, downloadable games for mobiles.
President Satoru Iwata told reporters he would draw a reduced salary for five months to atone for the downturn, while other members of the board will take a pay cut of between 20 and 30 percent.
When asked if his pay cut could extend beyond June, Iwata said: "I will make a decision after looking at the management situation at that time."
Nintendo is due to hold an analyst conference Thursday to outline plans for a new business strategy.
The news comes just over a week after the Kyoto-based company shocked investors by warning it expects to slip back into the red in the year to March and slashed its Wii U sales forecast owing to weaker-than-expected holiday season demand.
Analysts have criticised the system's limited game selection, as rivals Sony and Microsoft enjoy robust demand for their new PlayStation 4 and Xbox One consoles.
"Nintendo's worse-than-expected performance is mainly due to a slump in the Wii U," said Hideki Yasuda, a games analyst at Ace Securities in Tokyo.
"They haven't released attractive games titles which slammed the brakes on console sales. Also, its rivals have seen strong demand for their consoles which is taking market share away from Nintendo."

http://games.yahoo.com/news/nintendo...104753497.html

[Kchrpm]

Apparently the same thing happened after the poor launch of the 3DS, hopefully the Wii U has a similar turnaround story.

[thesameguy]

There was a LOT of hype around xbone and PS4 - it's gotta be hard to gain momentum with those two standing in your way.

Also, I think the initial popularity followed by serious doldrums with the Wii really hurt the market for the U. I know lots of people who bought Wiis early on only to end up having them sit around collecting dust. None of us even considered buying a U. I think Nintendo mistook the early-on brand goodwill for general goodwill. A different name probably would have helped distance the Gen2 console from the original, and possibly resulted in a higher interest level. "A new product from Nintendo" earns a lot more interest than "another console that will bankrupt you with accessories you'll only use with games you only play once." Also, I gotta believe the magic of the Wii - casual games - was ripped to shreds with Kinect and mobile games. You can only win with secret sauce once. After it's not secret anymore, you need new sauce. Now that everyone has motion-controlled games, what - exactly - is the U's promise? (I think the answer might be some interesting titles, but from what I can see not system-selling titles.)