Nintendo's Wii U Will Be Sold At a Loss 188
another random user tips news that Nintendo will be selling its upcoming Wii U console at a loss in the hopes that spurring earlier adoption will work out for the company in the long run. This differs from the Wii, which made money from the start, but it's a similar strategy to those used with the Xbox 360 and PS3, which both lost money for their companies at release.
"The Japanese firm's president revealed the news after the firm cut its profit forecast. It marks a change in the company's business strategy. The decision to abandon the prospect of immediate profits in order to maximize later earnings is part of a growing trend in the tech world. Nintendo might have altered course to take advantage of the fact that neither Microsoft nor Sony have announced their next-generation consoles yet. Its pursuit of the more casual gamer means it has also had to take account of the keenly priced tablet market which attracts a similar consumer."
Re:Volume! (Score:3, Informative)
They make it up by their higher profit first-party games and licensing fees from third-party developers.
Re:Why aren't people more hyped about the Wii U? (Score:5, Informative)
People aren't more hyped because the console is as powerful as current gen consoles but costs more.
Then why are 3rd party games running at 1080p60 instead of 720p30 like they are on the PS3 / 360 ?
The special controller is crazy expensive and you are only going to get one per system.
And it's being designed so you only have to use 1 to play the games.
Online play is poorly supported, you can't go out and purchase all of the old school Nintendo games through an online market for the system (like literally everyone who games wants to),
?? The Wii-shop from the Wii carries over to the Wii U and you can port over all your downloaded games from the Wii to the Wii U. Seriously there's hundreds of games (including most old school nintendo games) that you can download.
and the system itself doesn't have as rich a supported application set as the PS3 and the Xbox360.
Probably not right away, but they are launching with: Amazon, Hulu, Netflix, Universal remote control, and a browser. What other applications are on PS3 / 360 that you feel you'd miss ?
Re:Real power? (Score:5, Informative)
It has more memory (about twice as much, if you remove the 1 GB reserved for the system) and a more modern and faster GPU than the PS360 but the CPU is lacking even compared to that of the 360. In the end it makes the console a bit faster but not by much and it will have to compete with the next generation of Sony and MS consoles which are expected in about a year or so.
Re:Real power? (Score:5, Informative)
I've read some comments that say the Wii U is "as powerful as an Xbox360/PS3", however I've also read articles that mentioned the Wii U is two generations ahead of the other two consoles [cinemablend.com]... so, which one is it?
Butthurt Xbox360 and PS3 owners spreading FUD about the new Nintendo system now that they have to comment about how gameplay is more important than graphics, or dumbass writers who will say anything to have people read their articles?
Do we even know the specifications of the Wii U's GPU to make such comparisons?
The Wii U being "As powerful as the PS3 / 360" is FUD. It's more powerful and really that isn't hard to do on a budget, considering those consoles are both over 6 years old. One other telling factor is if you notice the 3rd party games that are multiform COD, AC3, etc... are running natively at 1080p60 on Wii U and not on the PS3 / 360. This is also with first generation non-optimized code for the Wii U, pretty safe to say it IS more powerful than it's Current gen rivals.
some specs: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wii_u#Technical_specifications [wikipedia.org]
Re:Why aren't people more hyped about the Wii U? (Score:4, Informative)
Because for all the Wii U's failings it isn't a pointless pile of shit?
Why the flying fuck would I want an iPad when I could buy an android tablet or an Asus transformer or something, and hack a real OS on there?
And yes, I am the Wii U's target audience, even if they are not convincing me to buy one right now.