The Wii U was in no way a hit during any season.
I fully expect the PS4 to sell close to 3 million during the holiday season. Even with Xbox competition.
There was very little buzz in comparison for the Wii U.
To me it is simply a case of Sony having the interest of the gaming community. Nintendo has not been taken seriously by gamers for a long time. I don't care about 100 million units of the Wii. Yes. Great accomplishment. But that will not be repeated again. Think howmany of then were dust collectors after the fad of waggle controls wore out. Lack of 3rd party support stems from this.
It sold 3.5 million units during the holiday season. Sure it had little buzz, but how is that not a hit?
Now, let's talk about the so called "dust collector".
In its six year life cycle the Wii sold around 100 million units and around 900 million software units, which equates into approximately 9 games per system adoption rate, or 1.5 games per year.
In its seven year life cycle the PS3 sold around 80 million units and around 754 million software units, which equates into approximately 9.4 games per system adoption rate or 1.3 games per year.
In its eight year life cycle the Xbox 360 sold around 80 million units and around 829 million software units, which equates into approximately 10.4 games per system adoption rate or 1.3 games per year.
You could argue that the Wii didn't bring much interest to you in terms of its software library, but if you call that a dust collector, you're just being dumb.
And no third-party support? I suggest you take a good look at this: http://www.gengame.n...mproved-on-wii/
It's funny how the media can simply destroy the image of a console by making bold assumptions out of thin air, with no factual evidence supporting such claims. The Wii died prematurely compered to the HD twins because the media destroyed its image. Soon enough, publisher trust went down and so did support, sales and popularity. Nintendo just gave it the final blow in 2011 by just having Skyward Sword in the pipeline. They abandoned the system, which they had no other option but to do so in order to support the 3DS and prepare for the Wii U. Understaffed Nintendo is understaffed x)
I think about it this way: take ten minutes to look at sales history in the past 15-20 years and see the trend going on. Or, barring that, do this simple equation: as good as you WANT the launch year to be, subtract a lot of positive expectations and prepare for the worst. Why? Because that's what happens EVERY. SINGLE. LAUNCH YEAR.
Exactly. Launch sales are all fun and games until you realize there's little to no quality games in the short-term pipeline. It's always been like this, except this generation it feels that the gap between launch and the arrival of great quality games is even bigger. Maybe it's because there are less and less publishers in the industry, or maybe its because games take too much time to make right now, I don't know. Nevertheless, truth be said that the real test for a system is whether it can regain momentum or not, once the must-haves start flooding in (in which the Vita failed miserably and the Wii U is currently in purgatory).
Edited by Arkhandar, 08 November 2013 - 12:54 PM.