Is the Wii U Already Dead? 403
kube00 writes "The Wii U has been struggling as of late. Even Nintendo has admitted sales haven't been as high as they would like. So what went wrong? Is this just a fluke? Will the Wii U recover and bounce back? Will the PS4 and the next 360 come out the door and leave the Wii U in the dust? GoozerNation takes a look at some of the NPD's and speculates on what it all means."
Nintendo needs to rethink its place in the world (Score:5, Insightful)
They've cruised on their name, they've went with gimmicks, they've stubbornly stuck with being the kids console, they've put only a half-hearted effort into online play, they've all-but-resigned themselves to staying in the last gen, etc. And, most woefully of all, they seem to have put little to no thought into WHERE THEY FIT IN NOW.
Methinks they need something they probably haven't had in a long time--a conclave of their board and big-wigs to ask themselves some fundamental questions about what their mission is, how they are going to accomplish it, and how they're going to compete in the modern gaming market.
Comment removed (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Nintendo needs to rethink its place in the worl (Score:5, Interesting)
It doesn't help that Nintendo apparently can't comprehend software to save their miserable lives. They can make games; but their grasp of the non-game software components is tragicomedic even compared to Sony, and that's saying something.
DRM is always user-hostile; but Nintendo's is just hilarious(even as their consoles are markedly easier to crack than Sony's or Microsoft's). Downloaded material is permanently locked to the hardware it was downloaded on. Even now that the Wii U has 'Nintendo network accounts' those are locked to the device they were created on. There is a transfer process for certain sorts of material; but it's the most ass-backwards and error-prone exercise one can imagine. Even better, the 'virtual' Wii within the Wii U, for backwards compatibility, counts as a separate device and is almost entirely non-integrated. It's just terrible at every step.
Sony's 'well, we could download updates in the background; but instead we'll make you watch' also isn't a masterpiece, and Microsoft is clearly sucking at the ad-money teat a bit too much in laying out their atrocious 'dashboard'; but that's at least evil rather than cluelessness.
Re:Nintendo needs to rethink its place in the worl (Score:5, Interesting)
I just traded my Wii U for a comparable Xbox/kinect system. My kids are already getting more enjoyment and use from the Xbox.
The Wii U is half baked. Maybe the hardware gets figured out by developers, and even Nintendo, but right now the shortcomings are to visible. Right from system menu navigation being so slow and frustrating that it made me not want to boot up the system. So yeah, Nintendo doesn't do well with the system software designed for their own System.
I was one of the unfortunate ones to get a system that kept locking up - luckily after over a week being sent from the East to West then back East, I got a working system - but while the system didn't crash anymore, it was still a pain to navigate, and the games were underwhelming.
It actually wasn't an easy decision to trade the system. Nintendo may work everything out... The gamepad was a unique feature, but not so unique now that Microsoft seems committed to "SmartGlass." But my final decision to give up on the Wii U came down to the kids --- do I get a system they can have fun and variety with now, or do I pay $60 - $70 for half baked ports that may or may not play properly and cross my fingers the kids can have a comparable experience 6 months, a year, 2 years down the road... Nintendo dropped the ball on this system...
On the other side of things -- maybe they do work it out. I had an Xbox 360 up until about 3 years ago - and the experience on the one I just traded for is much better than the one I got rid of. But I have a hard time thinking Nintendo can fully recover from this one with the PS4 and the next gen Xbox right around the corner... Add in the Steambox and the explosion of tablet gaming and it doesn't look good for the Wii U.
Re:Nintendo needs to rethink its place in the worl (Score:5, Interesting)
Exact opposite happening here. Our Xbox 360 is collecting dust (except occasionally when the kids want to play Tekken 6) & the kids are really digging the Wii U. They play NintendoLand, Super Mario Wii U & Sonic Racing all the time. 5 player gaming that doesn't involve the internet is a big hit at our house. Personally, I'm not too big on the Wiimotes, but I love the Wii U's GamePad. I also like the fact that I can, as of this weekend, get my retro F-Zero fix while the kids are watching TV, without having to fire up an emulator. Can't wait to see what else they release on the Virtual Console.
If Tekken or possibly Mortal Kombat ever comes out for the Wii U we may as well pack the 360 up for all the use it will get.
Re: (Score:3)
I thought it was cool that you could use the Gamepad to play (certain) titles just on the gamepad - but the range really isn't that good. We are in a smaller apartment, and I couldn't move past the living room and get a decent connection. annoying.
I had the Sonic Racing game as well, and while we liked it, the same game is available on Steam and Xbox cheaper than it was on the Wii U.. The gamepad didn't add much to it to warrant $20 more.
That's the other big issue moving forward (for all the next gen con
Re: (Score:3)
Are you crazy? The software gets better on a system over time, but if a new system can't beat the previous generation of existing systems its going to have some serious issues. Eg, Dreamcast may have been the first and slowest of the 4th gen systems but it sure kicked the crap out of PS1, Saturn, and N64 - even on launch day.
Re: (Score:3)
You are taking it out of context and missing that the 600k and 200k were for different sales periods, December and January.
In December, Wii U sold 600k. According to here [engadget.com], the 360 sold 1.4m, easily trouncing the Wii U.
In January, the Wii U sold 57k, w
Re: (Score:3)
Re:Nintendo needs to rethink its place in the worl (Score:5, Insightful)
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
Distribute the games on a medium that isn't designed to be easily created with ordinary consumer hardware. Back in the day that meant cartridges. These days it would probably look more like a USB flash drive (or maybe like a memory card), except instead of flash memory inside it would have a ROM chip. The device is designed to read the game software from that medium -- not from a CD, DVD, or hard drive.
This doesn't stop really determined pirates who have a lot of reso
Re:Nintendo needs to rethink its place in the worl (Score:5, Informative)
You don't need to remind DS and Wii owners that Nintendo doesn't comprehend software. Even at a lower level, it's clear they don't understand the fairly common OS concept of hardware abstraction, and that they stubbornly refuse to figure it out.
The DS was released back when WPA/WPA2 was... okay, maybe not "new". When the DS was planned, yes, WPA/WPA2 was probably "new". So, the DS couldn't connect to WPA/WPA2 wifi points, only unencrypted or WEP. Fair enough. So then the DSi comes out. Hooray! It can support WPA/WPA2, finally! Except... all old DS games can't. Apparently, DS games THEMSELVES make explicit calls to the wifi hardware with no layer of abstraction between them. That is, a DS game can't just ask the console "Give me a network connection, I don't care what the underlying encryption standard is", it reads data from the OS and makes its own calls to set it up, and Nintendo couldn't even be arsed to come up with an emulation layer to trick those games into using the DSi's WPA/WPA2 network access. No, their answer is to present an entirely separate configuration screen just for DS games in the DSi interface, going so far as to start the DS emulation just to load this screen. Worse, they figured this was as good an idea as they could get, as the exact same setup STILL EXISTS IN THE 3DS!
The Wii's SDHC support, though, that's another story. At first, the Wii only supported plain SD cards (no SDHC). This worked well enough for a while, right until Guitar Hero World Tour came out. DLC songs sure ate up the size limits of non-HC SD cards quick (and Nintendo wanted to push WiiWare more), so Nintendo released a firmware update that allowed SDHC cards to work. But, of course, you can probably guess where I'm going with this: Any Wii game released before the update that supports SD cards? They couldn't figure out SDHC cards at all. Even if the console understood the card, the older games wouldn't, apparently because nobody at Nintendo bothered to look up filesystem abstraction. Hell, I only had ONE class in very, very basic OS design back in college, and even I know why this is necessary in a modern OS, yet this is a company with supposedly thirty or so years of computer experience under their belts!
I'm completely convinced that if Nintendo gave up on hardware and went third-party, they'd fail. Badly. It'd make Sega look like their old selves by comparison. From what I've seen of their crazy broken hardware ("broken" in terms of "services not directly related to playing the game"), it seems to me that Nintendo's got a very, very stubborn culture and developers who entirely depend on having complete and total communication with the hardware designers, just like the old days. In fact, it just seems like Nintendo wants to pretend like it's the old days, and that things like XBox Live, Steam, smartphones, tablets, and the internet itself don't exist.
Frankly, I say, if you've always liked Nintendo in the past, like I have, then you'd better enjoy them now while they're still around. They won't be around much longer unless they get their heads out of their asses in a timer-just-reached-100 hurry.
Re:Nintendo needs to rethink its place in the worl (Score:5, Insightful)
YOU can do whatever you want, Valve in the meantime is drowning in a firehose of cash.
Re:Nintendo needs to rethink its place in the worl (Score:5, Insightful)
If I want to access my game library anywhere on the planet, I can just employ external storage. The same goes for any other form of "entertainment". This can last for as long as I like.
The only stumbling block is DRM.
Unfortunately, Steam is still DRM.
It's a really pleasant cage but it's still a cage.
Re: (Score:3)
Do you ever lock the doors to your house?
No. Don't believe the hype, security is mostly theatre. How many crooks go to rob a house but then find a locked door and say "oh damn we're screwed, let's move on until we find an unlocked door"?
Re:Nintendo needs to rethink its place in the worl (Score:4, Interesting)
No, because it's still Nintendo's primary problem. The DS didn't kill the PSP. The PSP was the first successful non-Nintendo gaming handheld, and by "successful" I mean "sold substantially in the popular market", "had a lot of games", and "has a successor". That's pretty successful. The PSP may not have beat the DS in sales figures, but that's still a pretty huge win given the wasteland of other failed non-Nintendo handhelds.
Innovation isn't gimmickry, but the Wii was gimmickry. It did most certainly not force Microsoft to do anything. Sure, they came out with the Kinect. The number of good games using it? Zero. Sure, it's found a lot of non-gaming use, but that's irrelevant. It's irrelevant to gaming. Nintendo only finally at the end of the Wii's lifecycle managed to show motion controls could work ... but only as well as a regular controller at best. (Worse, Zelda Skyward Sword triggers my RSI too fast to be playable.)
For the casual market, maybe something like Ouya is sufficient. Even my Roku XS plays Angry Birds. But this is buying the Nintendo Lie: that everyone is a casual gamer. If anything, fewer people are becoming casual gamers, since so many people are growing up with video games. It's no longer just for nerds.
In the end, Microsoft and Sony only need to do one thing: make sure their consoles have games that Nintendo doesn't, or even just that they play games better than Nintendo. Given the last three generations of Nintendo consoles (Wii, Cube, N64), this is hardly a stretch.
Re:Nintendo needs to rethink its place in the worl (Score:5, Interesting)
Sure, they came out with the Kinect. The number of good games using it? Zero.
Correction: The number of good games (series) using the Kinect is one. The Dance Central series is hands down the best use of the Kinect as a peripheral to create a game that literally could not be done any other way. The problem is the same as most games on the Wii. Most developers use motion controls as a substitution for pushing buttons instead of starting with the concept that you can do things based on movement and designing a game solely working off that basis.
Re:Nintendo needs to rethink its place in the worl (Score:4, Informative)
Fruit Ninja Kinect is awesome. Kinect Party is pretty fun with kids. Kinect Adventures is sort of fun. I certainly play any of those three titles more than I ever play with the Wii.
Re: (Score:3)
You probably haven't because it's successor is the Vita.
Re: (Score:3)
Try Again (Score:4, Insightful)
76.3 million worldwide [scei.co.jp] as of last March. Maybe you consider selling 76 million units "a failure" but you're the only one. Do I smell some fanboyism here? Sure, this is about half of Nintendo's 153 million DS units as of Dec 31, 2012, but considering this is Sony's first handheld and Nintendo has had a dominating stranglehold on the market since 1989 with the Game Boy, that's a pretty good first attempt
The fact you don't know what the Vita looks like simply means you don't pay attention to the news, or the news you do pay attention to is simply focused on Nintendo-only products.
Re: (Score:3)
a locked down box you plug into the living room TV, requiring the consent of the entire household to do so, to play games is really going out of the window.
I think that's why they went with the gamepad and the second screen option. Gabe from Penny arcade said he'll buy every game that supports that for Wii U over anything else because he doesn't have to stop playing if the family takes over the main TV... he can stream it to the gamepad and keep going.
Re: (Score:3)
Yup. My kids and I absolutely love that feature;
I would never have guessed how much we would use that feature. It wasn't a selling point of the WiiU at all for us.
But it gets used pretty almost daily.
Re: (Score:3)
Re: (Score:3)
It's not just about pandering to casual gamers. The Wii did that partly through having an innovative and interesting input device. I see the success of the Wii as a lucky accident that way. Who would have expected I'd find old people playing Wii bowling? That it was possible for people who weren't into gaming at all to use a Wiimote. There's nothing uniquely interesting about the Wii U that way though.
The Wii was the right technology at the right price for its marketplace. They've tried to duplicate t
Re:Nintendo needs to rethink its place in the worl (Score:5, Insightful)
I love PCs. I like the fact that it makes it easier to download lots of games and has more function than just a console. I like 25" 1080p widescreens, but I really like hooking my PC up to my 1080p 52" TV in my living room.
I don't want either model to die, and I don't understand why so many people think that there can be only successful model. I think there are a lot of people who, like me, love consoles and don't want to see the box-with-controllers-and-some-way-to-insert-a-game-and-a-TV-out model die. There's a demand for this model, even if you don't fit into it.
Re: (Score:3)
I bought a PC in 2008 and have made one single upgrade of the video card. Its basically a Core2 E8400 (3GHz) with a Nvidia 275GTX. There have been exactly zero PC games in the last 5 years that have not run smoothly on this machine. Worrying about specs for PC games is more or less a thing of the past, these days if you can play one decent game you can play them all.
Re: (Score:3, Interesting)
Re:Nintendo needs to rethink its place in the worl (Score:4, Informative)
Because a lot of family-friendly and all-ages content shows up on the Wii, and as every teenager will tell you, 'all-ages' and 'family-friendly' is just code for 'games for babies'
Re: (Score:2, Informative)
Which is why they also appeal to older, never owned a gaming console, generations looking for "That thing that lets you bowl at home..."
Re: (Score:3)
How old is that? Games consoles were around in the 1970's - that is 40 years ago!
The issue here is "Jaded oldies who find the average game no more exciting than writing PHP" (which is just like the BASIC they grew up with, apart from the client-server concept and the internet). They dont think today's console games are a heap better than Leisure Suit Larry, but find playing "Tiger Woods Golf 2009" to unlock the secret girlfriends is good exercise compared
Re: (Score:2)
Graphics quality come into it too. I've noticed Wii graphics aren't as good as X360/PS3. Look at the recent Ghostbusters video game on the X360 or P3 vs. the Wii...
Re:Nintendo needs to rethink its place in the worl (Score:5, Interesting)
Have you heard of the game "Transformers: War for Cybertron"? The Wii version is called "Transformers: Cybertron Adventures."
If you bought "X-Men Origins: Wolverine" for Wii, you might notice some substantial differences between it and the other platforms (e.g., PC). Blood and gore is practically non-existent, and the bad guys actually say "I'm sorry" after Wolverine's done tearing through them. I wish I were making that up.
There are exceptions -- take "Madworld," for example -- but by and large, "family-friendly" pretty much does mean content-neutered.
Re:Nintendo needs to rethink its place in the worl (Score:4, Insightful)
Because the 16-22 year old male can't see any reason for games that don't pander to him. If it does not have pointless levels of violence and lots of bewbs they are not interested.
Sure violence and sex can be fun in a game, but for them that is all there is. Games that are just fun are not on their radar. Worse yet are games that a child or family could enjoy because they are trying to prove to the world they are Real Men, which is why they behave like children.
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
Because that's the easiest cheapshot for Under30-something PS3 fanboys to articulate.
Because the games were boring (Score:3)
I have actually got a Wii, I got it for last story. That was good... but I had to hook it up to a small display because else the graphics were just not acceptable anymore.
There is no such thing as a gamer, what one loves, the other hates but the Wii mostly seems to appeal to the extreme casual market. And that hurt the console because not many can afford to buy a console for just one game like me.
And the casual market is huge but Nintendo sells casual games for 40 bucks. The iPad sells them for a dollar o
Re:Nintendo needs to rethink its place in the worl (Score:4, Interesting)
It doesn't help that the Wii was the first Nintendo console to have serious hardware issues. A lot of the people who got early versions of the console got hit by some kind of disk reading error that affected some pretty major games. Nintendo was willing to fix the problem for free, but you either had to ship the console off somewhere or find a local authorized repair center, and it was a big hassle to deal with. Then just about the point that Nintendo started changing their mind about the above RPGs my Wii got some kind of corrupted memory issue and forced me to reformat it. So now i've got Xenoblade and Last Story, but i'm afraid to start playing them on my Wii because i don't trust the memory. I could get a Wii U, and maybe i will at some point, but right now i want to avoid the early shipments in the hopes that any bugs will get ironed out.
And honestly, the wiimote is great for some games, but in my experience it's just not that good for other games. Sometimes the developers allow you to use an alternate control mode, but sometimes they insist that you have to use motion controls. (I believe it's Xenoblade that a friend of mine has that will let you use classic controls for the main game but insists you use a wiimote for the starting menus. It doesn't help that their Wii has trouble recognizing the wiimotes a lot of the time, so it's kind of a disincentive whenever they sit down and decide which game to play in the evening.) Sometimes i want to play a simple old school 2D game with simple old school 2D controls. Nintendo _could_ excel at that with their "underpowered" console, but they choose not to. If i want those kinds of games my choice is usually the DS, or more likely, the PC through Steam.
Of course Nintendo isn't the only company whose console isn't living up to the hype in my opinion. The PS3 has been kinda overwhelmed by "mature" FPS and 3rd person shooter games with a relative dearth of good RPGs and strategy games. I have picked up Disgaea 4, which was great, and FF13, which was okay, and plan to get Ni no Kuni, but that's not a great deal to base a console purchase on. If the trend continues i'm going to be waiting for awhile before picking up a PS4 too. Of course now that i know the PS4 won't be backwards compatible i'm kinda disinclined to buy any more physical PS3 disks.
Re: (Score:3)
Second, clearly our standards are very different. The collection of GameCube and PS2 games i have on my shelves d
Biased Just a Little? (Score:4, Insightful)
They've cruised on their name
I'm sorry, which console maker hasn't and how do you determine who is "cruising" and who isn't? Playstation to Playstation 4? That's not cruising on their name? They've been in the game a lot longer than Microsoft or Sony ... so what?
they've went with gimmicks
I know, right. It's like those tired rhythm music games were only available on the Wii. Oh, and Sony and Microsoft keep leveraging innovative titles like Call of Duty 18 and Battlefield 5 and Medal of Honor: Get On 'Er.
they've stubbornly stuck with being the kids console
Right and if they hadn't, everyone would be criticizing them for not sticking to their bread and butter. It's cool you don't like those games but that's a market share and equals $$$.
they've all-but-resigned themselves to staying in the last gen, etc.
By releasing the Wii U a year before the XBox 720 and PS4? I don't get it. I think they're trying to offset themselves by a year and give consumers some breathing room to enjoy all consoles instead of making a choice. Sure, something released a year later better have good specs but can you point out the publishers that claim Nintendo just lacks the hardcore power for their titles? I haven't heard a lot of complaints and frankly, I own a Wii, Xbox 360 and a PS3 ... graphics are rarely a factor for me in which title I play. I value game play and Nintendo pays more attention to this than the rehashed shit I find on the other two.
And, most woefully of all, they seem to have put little to no thought into WHERE THEY FIT IN NOW.
I get it, you like first person shooters. Enjoy. I like how you totally overlooked the obvious to me: Nintendo games are games that I play when my friends come over and want to drink and have fun. The wiimotes are fun in person and the Kinect is actually trying to break into this market. You are explaining this from one of the most narrow and convoluted false narratives I've come across.
You're attacking Nintendo for owning their market share while the other two consoles do exactly the same thing. Hell, it's arguable that Sony and Microsoft are gutting each other by fighting over the same user base while Nintendo chugs along owning one. How are those XBox 360 and PS3 sales? Through the roof right now?
Re: (Score:3)
If Nintendo is making all the right moves (as you seem to contend), why has their stock been dropping steadily for the last 5 years (from a high of over $72 to $12 now)? Obviously SOMEONE thinks they're screwing up, and it ain't just me. Maybe it has something to do with headlines like this [joystiq.com] and this [joystiq.com]?
Face it, they're NOT on the right path right now.
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:3)
I don't think stocks are really a great way to determine how one console company is doing compared to another. Nintendo pretty much only makes
Re: (Score:3)
graphics are rarely a factor for me in which title I play.
Graphics aren't, but I admit that resolution is. We have our 480p Wii feeding into a 720p TV via component cables (which are abundantly sufficient to carry the Wii's low-res graphics in near-perfect detail), and it looks expectedly awful and blurry. I don't care about trillions of polygons or infinite FPS, but it'd be nice to run it at my TV's native resolution. I can imagine how it'd look on a newer 1280 line display, and my mental image isn't pretty.
Re: (Score:3)
Re: (Score:3)
No, but in any case it can't actually make the picture any sharper. It can only blur it in more aesthetically pleasing ways. I'd still much rather have a native-resolution display than look at the output of even the best upsampler.
Re:Nintendo needs to rethink its place in the worl (Score:5, Insightful)
Hi, parent here.
I can buy a Wii for a lower price than the XBox or PS. I'm 8 years from angsty teenagers, so I don't have to deal with the desire for mature rated games for a long time. The Wii games are more fun for the tipsy adults when we have friends over.
The Wii U doesn't appeal to me because it looks more complicated and it costs more than twice as much. Talk to me when it is $150. I'd also prefer it didn't have big easy-to-break-looking, drain-its-batteries-all-the-time controller tv things.
Re:Nintendo needs to rethink its place in the worl (Score:5, Informative)
I'd also prefer it didn't have big easy-to-break-looking, drain-its-batteries-all-the-time controller tv things.
As a Wii U owner w/ 4 children, let me just say, you're wrong on both of these points regarding the GamePad.
Kids console? (Score:2)
From the great 20th century author C.S. Lewis:
“When I was ten, I read fairy tales in secret and would have been ashamed if I had been found doing so. Now that I am fifty, I read them openly. When I became a man I put away childish things, including the fear of childishness and the desire to be very grown up.”
Likewise, I'm in my 30s and I have zero interest in the PS4 right now because the vast majority of the games shown were violent M rated games or sports games. That's fine if that's what you
Re: (Score:3)
It is just too expensive (Score:5, Interesting)
I would have bought one already if it was a little cheaper. Nintendo stuff is supposed to be cheap and cheerful. $349 is too much, and the $299 version is too crippled to justify even building much less buying.
Drop $50 and I will take one today.
Re: (Score:2)
Good point. I thought the Wii launched in about the same price range, but looks like it was actually $249, which is an inflation-adjusted $282. So the Wii U is priced about 20% higher in real terms.
Re: (Score:2)
If the $349 version was $249 I would already have one, even $282 would have been fine.
I almost bought the $299 version until I realized that would be a mistake.
Why they can't just let me upgrade using standard internal hard drives like the PS3, I don't understand.
Re: (Score:2)
That will look just great in the living room!
Plus it will likely be over USB or something else slow as molasses.
Re: (Score:2)
Not Even Close (Score:4, Interesting)
But in order for that strategy to work, there has to be a comparison. The Wii U came out at a time when it seemed like the console wars were over -- or at least dormant. I think the market and the makers benefit from a three way tie because everyone wants a new console. But when it was just the Wii U the titles weren't that compelling and the hardware was, well, it was Nintendo hardware.
I predict the Wii U will have flagging sales just like their handheld consoles that come out with no competitor. And then next Christmas when the XBox 720 and PS4 launch, parents will walk into a big box store and little Tommy will want that new $500 PS4 bundle but their eye will catch the Wii U for $175 or $200 and they'll think
Or they could just release an exclusive Zelda title on it
Anyone have any guesses as to what new feature the Sony or Microsoft offerings could come up with to lockout the Wii U? I mean, there's no new disc standard or input device idea that I'm missing, is there? That'd be the only case where the Wii U would be in trouble -- if there was some new feature X like VR goggles that a consumer just had to have at all costs.
Re: (Score:2)
The next Zelda title is coming out in December and it's a re-release of Wind Waker, a *Gamecube* game. They really dropped the ball on getting 1st party titles out there.
I have a few ideas, but my favorite one is: Put a Tetris game on there that I can play from another room on the controller. I'd buy that. That's what sold a lot of Game Boys, remember?
Re:Not Even Close (Score:5, Informative)
It seems like the next generation MS and Sony consoles essentially run high-end commodity PC x86(-64) hardware with Blu-Ray drives and huge gobs of system and video memory (8GB combined GDDR5 in the case of PS4). No more Cell, powerpc, whatever have you and horrible graphics memory limitations (like 256MB, wtf).
So yeah, porting for those and PC will be relatively painless while the Wii U is stuck with Xbox 360 launch specs.
Nintendo has missed the boat.
Re: (Score:2)
Furthermore, the launch slate of games for Nintendo is terrible again, as usual, and this year there will be like 3 Wii U titles or something? And the next Zelda release is yet another port/remake?
Re: (Score:3)
Nintendo hasn't made a good case that the Wii U was necessary. For the casual gamers that made the Wii a hit, the Wii is still good enough for anything they want to do. Super Mario Galaxy III would work just as well on the Wii as SMG-I did. For those of us who want games with depth, we're still better off with a 360, PS3, or PC than a Wii-U. Does the Wii-U have anything in the works that could compete with the recent X-com? The upcoming Wasteland 2?
Re: (Score:2)
One of the problems that the Wii U faces right now is that it's not the cheapest option. I'm sure Nintendo would like it to be, but it's not. For less money, you can get an XBox 360 or PS3, and while they sure are old at this point, they still have tons of life left in them. We'll be seeing new releases on those consoles for many more years to come. In addition to that, you get blu-ray (ps3) or dvd (xbox) player, netflix, amazon, vudu, last.fm (xbox), hbo (xbox), Syfy (xbox), VEVO (xbox), Youtube, ESPN (xb
Re: (Score:3)
Anyone have any guesses as to what new feature the Sony or Microsoft offerings could come up with to lockout the Wii U? I mean, there's no new disc standard or input device idea that I'm missing, is there? That'd be the only case where the Wii U would be in trouble -- if there was some new feature X like VR goggles that a consumer just had to have at all costs.
I honestly can't imagine, right now, how the next Xbox is going to be that substantially different from the PS4. And frankly, the Xbox 360 and PS3 aren't all that different, either. They've become different over time, but from the get-go they were both similarly-powered, championed online-play, and were basically both competing for exclusive contracts with the Big Studios for the Big Games. Nintendo decided to stay out of this rivalry of the giants and go in a different direction. It worked for them.
This co
Microsoft? (Score:5, Interesting)
Why is this story given the Microsoft icon?
Re:Microsoft? (Score:5, Funny)
Achievement Unlocked!
Lack of games... (Score:4, Insightful)
Re: (Score:3)
Re: (Score:2)
I agree. The Super Mario Brothers game on the Wii U is great, and.... theres not much else out there. Nintendoland got boring after a few weeks.
The Wii U however is a great Netflix device (no extra charges like the xbox), and would be an awesome youtube viewing device if the interface weren't staggeringly bad.
The browser's ok too.
But here's the real rub. We're still using our old Wii because we'll be damned to move our stuff over "once and only once" to the Wii U. What a load of horsecrap. We use the W
Re: (Score:2)
This is why we haven't migrated and sold the Wii. Now, because of this hostility, my daughter and I have a half-finished game of Lego LOTR that we probably will never finish, because it's just not convenient to go to the other TV (my wife's TV in the bedroom) nor is it convenient to put 2 Wiis on the same TV, nor is it convenient to migrate (not to mention how long starting Wii mode takes), nor start the game over, since we were halfway through already. It just makes me depressed about the whole thing, to
Re: (Score:2)
This. As an owner, I can tell you there are 2 problems:
1. No launch titles except Mario. I hear ZombiiU is good, but since I think the whole zombie thing is ridiculous, I'll never know. Seriously, my brother got us a bunch of games after finding out we were getting one, and they all suck. This could be fixed by putting out a few more great games. It also could have been fixed by making Wii games run hi-res on the WiiU, because then I might actually buy more Wii titles in the meantime, but they didn't
Too expensive (Score:3)
I can almost guarantee that if Microsoft releases an XBox 720 (only one SKU) for $200 that they will be the undisputed champions of this generation. Sony is clearly going for the high end again and will struggle to meet even a $300 price point. Fanboys will deride the console as not nearly as powerful as the PS4, but it won't matter because your games will still work and you'll have a lot more of them to choose from because publishers tend to flock to the most successful console.
Re: (Score:2)
It's hard to predict what would happen if MS went with the cheap low tech Nintendo style option, but I don't think that's going to happen.
My prediction is that Sony wins this next generation handily. With the current generation, the PS3 came out a year later, at a significantly higher cost, but was still comparable in hardware specs. It was also much harder to develop for. Despite this, on average it's been outselling the 360 slightly and has nearly caught up to the 360.
In the upcoming generation, they won'
Re: (Score:2)
I'd be surprised if the XBox 720 launches for $200. The XBox 360 launched at $300 in 2005, which is $350 if you adjust for inflation. Can they really afford to launch the 720 at barely more than half that?
Confusion (Score:5, Insightful)
I feel like Nintendo just wasn't on the ball with this generation of consoles.
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:3)
Nintendo has done some marketing? Pictures or it didn't happen!
In-Store-Demo (Score:4, Interesting)
The system on demo at Best Buy just didn't do it for me. Why they decided to make a simple (if beautiful) side-scroller the only playable demo (the rest are just videos) is beyond me, when the title that supposedly comes with the system is meant to showcase the possibilities.
I was perplexed as to why they didn't put a game on there that really showed what the machine brings to gaming. When the first Wii came out, people were eagerly waiting in line for a turn to roll a bowling ball or play some tennis. There was often a small group cheering on whoever was currently playing.
It's almost as if they are intentionally not enticing me to buy the Wii U.
Meh. (Score:2)
My family and I considered getting one for Xmas, but as others and TFA points out, there weren't any games we were interested in. I appreciate that Nintendo always seems to make Zelda and Metroid games "right", but any guesses as to when there will be a Wii U Zelda? Also, didn't they say they were rebooting Zelda, so that makes more more willing to hold off.
Heck, I (might) get it for Mario Kart, but no, gotta wait for that too. Maybe when Zelda and Mario Kart is available I'd get a used Wii U, as I'm not su
The controller is weird (Score:2)
Maybe it's just me (and I know it supports the old wii-motes), but I think the big controller is too weird and too big.
I'm looking forward to ouya console or the steam console.
Haven't even seen one (Score:4, Insightful)
The first Wii with all its movement and potential for interaction had me (and my kids) drooling for one when they came out. But I don't think it has been on in 2013 and only a few times in 2012. No game has made me want to use it and none of my friends have said, "Hey have you seen this Wii game X?" Nor have my kids have not asked for any Wii games. I have no idea about what the Wii U and know noone who does know what it can do but I doubt it can be that interesting as I haven't read anything about any hackers (people doing cool things not the thieves) doing anything with it like people were with the WiiMotes when they first came out.
So did Nintendo make a crappy console or did they fail to market a good console? The answer is one or both of those options.
Personally I think that where Nintendo failed was that their first Wii fit into a market for fun simple games. So people didn't complain about the low specs. But now smart phones and tablets have eaten the market for fun simple games. Thus if you are going to make a console the lesson seems to be that you'd better make it nearly a super computer.
Horrible marketing (Score:2)
Who is the market? (Score:5, Insightful)
Nintendo needs to go somewhere that their competiors are not. In my opinion, they should be working with the Occulus Rift people to develop a box which can be worn as a backpack, which ties into the goggles. The VR Boy 2... They could concede lower quality graphics, but very, very low latency input and output to make the most of the VR hardware and minimize motion sickness effects. They already know a lot about building appropriate controllers. If this was well done, they could make the XBox and Playstation seem totally out of date. The way games used to be played, where you looked at the virtual world through a glowing rectangle with a plastic strip around it.
The cheese has moved (Score:5, Insightful)
and Nintendo is seemingly unaware.
Every kid I know want's either a smartphone or tablet. From my observation the only people playing consoles anymore are teenagers and adults that grew up with consoles many of which are increasingly shifting their attention to mobile. The younger kids have ditched their DSi for iTouches over the last two years and are playing casual and social games. When I visit family I am bombarded by nephews and nieces that want to play my iPad.
Nintendo is trying with a tablet but doing it horribly wrong. Instead of focusing on their hardware they need to focus on their software on established mobile hardware and ecosystems.
Every year more mobile devices activate than all consoles sold combined. Mobile devices also iterate with a much higher frequency. Most modern mobile devices are fully capable of rendering any Nintendo title if adapted for it.
My prediction is none of the new consoles will sell as well as the prior version and all will likely flop. They will fail for the reason that they focus on a living room that has become mostly vacant.
The Target Wii U market is happy (Score:3)
I hope it does well (Score:4, Insightful)
People will rip on the Wii U for being insufficient in resolution or frame rate, but those are mostly people who want to buy Halo 27 and CoD 12 - Nintendo hasn't worried about those people for a long, long time.
Re: (Score:3)
No, Nintendo doesn't care about people who want to buy Halo 27 or CoD 12, they're more interested in the people that want Mario 33, or Mario Kart 18, or Paperboy ... But, pray tell, of the 10 Wii U exclusive titles out right now, which ones should the hypothetical Wii U purchaser be looking at?
Re: (Score:2)
You say this, but I never really saw anything like Journey, Flower or Unfinished Swan on the Wii. They've always seemed happier creating lots of versions of their classic line-up, and for a lot of people that seems enough.
"Remain calm, all is well!" (Score:2)
You young'ns fail to remember what happened with the Gamecube: decent launch followed by a drought of games in Jan/Feb, in fact I seem to recall the Gamecube drought lasting through April. The Wii U has had no new games, of signifigance, released since its launch. Next month brings Lego City Undercover on 3/18 and Monster Hunter the day after. It's nothing more than the usual post-launch drought for any console.
Personally, i'm enjoying the Wii U, the off-TV gameplay using the gamepad is the unexpected kille
the real reason (Score:2)
Nothing new in this generation (Score:2)
It's likely the PS4 and Xbox 720 won't sell that well either.
The manufacturers are aware of this, which is why their new consoles aren't as costly as the previous ones.
Make revolutionary games, and people will come. But what's left to revolutionize anymore?
Re: (Score:2)
If the PS4 ends up being cheaper than the original PS3 (and I wouldn't count on it just yet), it would only be because the Blu-Ray technology has come way down in price, they're certainly sparing little expense based on the other specs they've released.
lack of games, economy and smart phones (Score:2)
Late to the game (Score:2)
Nintendo should have released the Wii U 1-2 years ago when the Wii was just starting to decline. At that time, it would have been a perfect mid-generation console upgrade adding HD support, competing with the Kinect/PS-Move, and riding the general buzz of the time while giving it the power-boost needed to compete with traditional games on the other consoles.
Now it's simply too little too late, particularly at their given prices. Once the PS4 and Xbox720 are released Nintendo will be back to being the unde
ALL consoles suck... (Score:4, Insightful)
ALL consoles suck their first year or year and a half. If you're lucky, a console will launch with a fantastic game or two, and then games for the system will stagnate for a year or year and a half. ALL consoles follow this trend. The Nintendo DS did this. The Nintendo Wii did this. The Xbox 360 did this. The Playstation 3's games problem lasted for years. Going back as far as I remember, to the NES, we had this problem. The latest system to do this was the Nintendo 3DS. Now the 3DS is taking off like a rocket, and we all see that reports of the system's death were greatly exaggerated.
The Nintendo Wii U did not have a stellar launch lineup. This is not exceptional. Most systems have crappy launch lineups, and all systems suffer from a year or a year and a half of game drought. I do no claim to predict the future success of the Wii U, but I can tell you that tales of a console's death prior to its 2nd year birthday are almost always uncalled for.
What went wrong (Score:4, Insightful)
There was basically zero advertising. People still thought it was just an accessory for the Wii even a couple months after it was released. There were almost no games worth buying in the launch window. You had games hardcore players had already bought for their 360/PS3 months ago, another 2D Mario platformer that was barely different from the last 4 "New" Super Mario Bros. games released in the past couple years, a tech demo minigame collection, and ZombiU (which, even if it is a decent game, has a retarded name and, again, basically zero advertising).
Most critically, they've abandoned what made the Wii such a big fad: an interface so intuitive that your grandma can play the game with you at Thanksgiving/Christmas. WiiU minigames are much more complex and much more "gamey," often requiring players to simultaneously be aware of the action on two screens at once, and with an interface that somehow manages to be even more complex than a standard 360/PS3 controller-based game. Wii's success was completely predicated on the fact that actions performed with the controller mimicked real world physical actions, such as swinging a golf club, tennis racket, or rolling a bowling ball. This type of gameplay has been completely abandoned on the WiiU.
Combine all this with the global economic recession and the obviously impending announcements of the PS4 and Durango, and you have a recipe for disaster for Nintendo. A recipe which says very little about the future of video games in general or the potential future success of said PS4/Durango. We're looking at another GameCube at best. A Dreamcast at worst.
Re: (Score:3, Funny)
Re: (Score:2, Informative)
So install an emulator and go for it. You might have to jailbreak, I am not sure but that sounds likely with a walled garden device.
Re: (Score:2)
Have you tried it yet?
I wanted to hate it, but tried it in a store and now I will be buying one. It really is a cool idea and from the games I played well executed.
Re: (Score:2)
I disagree - the Wii was perfectly position as a cheap, fun game machine when MS and Sony were chasing high-end gamers with expensive consoles, and Nintendo sold a ton of them, because the population of people who want to buy something cheap to entertain their kids is very large.
The problem Nintendo has now is that the Xbox has dropped in price, so there's less room for the Wii to be significantly cheaper. So now they're letting the Wii drop in price, and going up-market with the Wii U. They've got a year u
Re: (Score:3)
3) I think you mean they lost the manchild market with games for everyone including adults.
Re: (Score:2)
What's so hard about "transitioning to HD"? PC games never had a problem transititioning from 640x480 to 1024x768.
Re: (Score:3)