• Hey, guest user. Hope you're enjoying NeoGAF! Have you considered registering for an account? Come join us and add your take to the daily discourse.

Wii U / Wii: retailer confusion almost a year later

T

TheGreyHulk

Member
bumpkin said:
It's funny how people would *get it* if it was a "2", but are completely retarded when it's a "U".
Click to expand...

that's what happens when you have a system that sells 100 million quickly AND they have several items released using "Wii" as a prefix in the titles...

Wii Fit
Wii Fit Plus
Wii Play
Wii Party
Wii Sports
Wii Sports Resort
Wii Music
Wii Play: Motion
Wii U

you can't blame regular old consumers from being confused when the system itself looks so much like the original Wii and it looks like a tablet accessory for the Wii.

nintendo blundered on the name and design of the system as well as marketing
 
S

Saint Gregory

Member
ArkkAngel007 said:
I get that and agree, but you didn't make it clear that the whole issue was surrounding what the box looked like ; )

However, I'll say that it's a question that is common for every system at retail. To them, they all look the same. Obviously, there's an issue where the controller is priority real estate in marketing and the name follows too closely with the peripheral names, but that sort of questioning is far from being exclusive to the Wii U.

Just last week I had someone ask me about the new Xbox, as well as the usual can I use my old stuff with it, can you play its games on the 360, and so on and so forth.
Click to expand...
I should have made that part clear. I don't have my consoles on when company come to visit so the only see the boxes. I have an OG 360, OG PS3 and Wii in my living room and the slim 360, slim PS3 and Wii U in my den which I also think adds to the confusion. You could argue that the slim versions of the last gen systems look more like new consoles than the Wii U :/

I've thought about your second point many times. There's going to be a lot of confusion in the marketplace once all the consoles are released. We've never had a generation begin before where so many consoles and revisions were out in the market at the same time and still relevant like the situation that we're going to have starting this holiday. I'd hate to be a non-gamer trying to make heads or tails of the VG section of most stores this Xmas.
 
S

Solid SOAP

Member
bumpkin said:
It's funny how people would *get it* if it was a "2", but are completely retarded when it's a "U".
Click to expand...

Wii
Wii Sports
Wii Sports Resort
Wii Play
Wii U

How does one instantly come to the conclusion that U = completely new console when it looks exactly like the previous console and has had so many variations?
 
Haunted

Haunted

Member
At some point Nintendo needs to man up and pour some serious money into marketing to turn this around. Being conservative about it and hoping everything will clear up eventually if they just continue with their regular marketing will only make it worse. The longer they wait, the harder it'll be to clear up this misconception.
 
F

FreedomFighter

Member
Even though retailers are idiots for not knowing the difference between products they themselves order from the manufacturer, I blame Nintendo for this primarily.

How did they think using the "Wii" name again was a good idea.
 
I

IsntChrisL

Member
FreedomFighter said:
Even though retailers are idiots for not knowing the difference between products they themselves order from the manufacturer, I blame Nintendo for this primarily.

How did they think using the "Wii" name again was a good idea.
Click to expand...

You can hardly blame them for wanting to keep the name that got them in first place last gen. They just went too far. They made the console look way too similar, focused too much on the controller (even members of GAF got confused about whether or not it was a Wii add-on during E3 2011), and the only differing factor in the name is a single letter.

That said, I very much doubt they keep the Wii name for their next console.
 
E

ElectricKaibutsu

Member
cypher.jpg

Why oh why didn't I name it Wii 2?
 
W

WillyFive

Member
FreedomFighter said:
Even though retailers are idiots for not knowing the difference between products they themselves order from the manufacturer, I blame Nintendo for this primarily.

How did they think using the "Wii" name again was a good idea.
Click to expand...

Using the Wii name was the correct move, what was wrong was using U, because it didn't differentiate it from the Wii.
 
batman2million

batman2million

Member
I sold my copy of Mario Bro's Wii U on Ebay. They guy just messaged me saying it doesn't work on his Wii. Later he figured out that "the U" is an entirely different system. Asked for a refund.
 
bumpkin

bumpkin

Member
TheGreyHulk said:
that's what happens when you have a system that sells 100 million quickly AND they have several items released using "Wii" as a prefix in the titles...

Wii Fit
Wii Fit Plus
Wii Play
Wii Party
Wii Sports
Wii Sports Resort
Wii Music
Wii Play: Motion
Wii U

you can't blame regular old consumers from being confused when the system itself looks so much like the original Wii and it looks like a tablet accessory for the Wii.

nintendo blundered on the name and design of the system as well as marketing
Click to expand...
Hmm... Ultra Games is out of business now, right?

Ultra Wii

DO IT NINTENDO!
 
S

SlipperyMoose

Member
Consumers still don't know the difference and/or are even aware what the Wii U is. Just yesterday a woman at my work thought that the Wii U was a Wii bundle.
 
P

Piers

Member
UNCMark said:
At some point it stops being confusion, and just becomes outright apathy.
Click to expand...

No, it already is - at least a mix.
People in the UK have the gist that the Wii U is a new console - they just don't give a shit and would rather get the new PS4/XB1.
 
stuminus3

stuminus3

Member
At the risk of ending up on the NeoGAF shit posts Twitter feed, I have to play devil's advocate and ask... are the hilarious/sad stories of occasional retailer mix-ups really the source of Nintendo's troubles with the Wii U?

I mean, there are hundreds of thousands of similar ads printed every week all over the world where there's no confusion to be found. I think the general videogame buying public know fine well what the Wii U is. They just don't care.
 
C

Coolwhip

Banned
stuminus3 said:
At the risk of ending up on the NeoGAF shit posts Twitter feed, I have to play devil's advocate and ask... are the hilarious/sad stories of occasional retailer mix-ups really the source of Nintendo's troubles with the Wii U?

I mean, there are hundreds of thousands of similar ads printed every week all over the world where there's no confusion to be found. I think the general videogame buying public know fine well what the Wii U is. They just don't care.
Click to expand...

It's both, but you need to fix the confusion first before you can even think of getting people to want it.

The gaming aisle in Mediamarkt for example is mixed Wii/WiiU. You have to be pretty damn informed to know what's going on there.
 
A

AmyS

Member
As others have already mentioned, at this point Nintendo couldn't do badly by relaunching as Wii 2 / Super Wii / Wii HD / whatever.

Gotta try something Nintendo.
 
J

Jackano

Member
I even seriously don't understand if the Wii system is included.

Looks like a competition for shitty paper ads on internet, but I suspect the confusion is intented here to sell some old stock as Wii Us.
 
N

Ninja Scooter

Member
Coolwhip said:
Nintendo should just take that 100-200 million dollar hit and rebrand Wii U to Wii 2.
Click to expand...


It would be a waste of $200 million because a name change isn't going to force people to care about a system that has very little mainstream appeal. At some point Nintendo probably realizes that sinking money into rebranding or relaunching isn't going to cause enough of a surge in sales to make it worth it. You can't just throw money at every problem and expect it to magically fix itself. The post about it being more apathy than confusion is spot on. People just don't care. You can bombard them with commercials and change the name but it won't make the product any more appealing.
 
M

Mt Heart Attack

Member
Funny thing is that 99% of the people on here including myself saw this coming as soon as the name was revealed, how Nintendo could think it made sense to call their new console Wii U is beyond me. Of course people would get confused.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.

Similar threads

Did anyone else think that the Nintendo Wii was going to be the best selling console ever back then?
39
3K
Eddie-Griffin replied
The "I survived development hell" club (7 years+) of games.
2
62
7K
Ozriel replied
Every Activision Blizzard Game in Development (IGN)
Opinion News
39
4K
Sentenza replied
The Wii U Is Getting Two New Physical Releases This Year
29
2K
zeorhymer replied
The Super Nintendo Entertainment System Is Officially 30 Years Old Today (in the US)
2
69
4K
wondermega replied
Top Bottom