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[spekkeh]

Exactly. Outside of those games and maybe a Dragon Quest (if it ever returns to PlayStation), Japan stopped giving a fuck about consoles years ago.

Yes. Which makes Iwata's moves all the more boneheaded. I'm just afraid it's too late to turn it around. Even if the shareholders were to sack him, creating a 'Nintendo West' would take five years at least, and the introduction of a whole new console, for which they have no money and no goodwill.
Lets just hope there's still enough people here that care for Mario and the Big N. I'm close to buying one, so will do my part. But will it be enough?

 

[Anticitizen One]

told you guys. Don't expect better sales in America either.

To be fair the game ended up being way better than it looked but people wanted Super Mario 64 2 not a HD sequel to a handheld game.

 

[Verendus]

 

[Solid Samus]

Well thats kind of shocking, just verifies how bad the Wii U has been handled.

Except it's not really shocking at all and Nintendo's given us plenty of examples of how bad the Wii U has been handled to date. I'd like to see how the game continues to sell over the next couple weeks and months and if it's got the kind of long tail sales that other Mario games have had. It sure as hell won't save the Wii but I expect it'll put a few in homes come Christmas time

 

[Morfeo]

There is unfortunately nothing that can save the Wii U at this point, and this just proves it. The whole console from the first showing and till today have unfortunately been a train wreck, and its extra baffling coming after the highly successfull Wii. I hope the people responsible for this strategy is not the same guys that will be responsible for its successor.

 

[Sergiepoo]

Reasonable performance for its time of release is a requirement for consoles. Again, the Wii was an exception because it had motion controls, which excited people more than anything else has or ever will again. They wooed the casual market and now that market has moved on to smartphones, never to return to consoles.

The market for consoles is dominated by young males in the west and has been for a long time. We have now returned to this state of affairs. They are more tech-savvy and always demand reasonable performance from their machines. They want the shiniest graphics possible for a reasonable price.

You have absolutely no proof of this. None.

You and every other armchair analyst have been saying, practically crying, that the Wii is a fad since day one. It's as if the the entire industry collectively decided that after Wii started breaking records and getting crazy sales that there could be no other explanation other than it must be some freak accident. It's easier to think that Wii is an accident than to ever consider there's anything wrong with the traditional gaming business model. The Wii smashed all expectation that young males are the most important audience and that games need push graphics ahead of everything else, and yet the industry still clung to the idea that the Wii wasn't happening. They held on for four years to the idea that the Wii was a fad, and when sales started slowing down, they ignored the fact that Nintendo's relations with 3rd parties were shit, that Nintendo's own output had dramatically slowed down, and that there were massive holes in the Wii's release schedule. Instead, they went "Aha, this must be the Wii fad finally dying. Now we can get rid of those nasty casuals and motion controls and go straight back to business as usual." And with a snap of their fingers, Sony and MS releases a brain-dead, incremental improvement on their past consoles with absolutely no sign that they learned anything from the Wii, and the traditional gaming industry cheers because now everything will go back to normal, and it will just be like the good ol' days where we're the only industry that matters.

But Wii sales fell off a cliff, you say. Is that not proof that the Wii and the concepts behind it are dead. Correlation!=Causation. A number of different things could have caused Wii sales to die. The fact that Nintendo stopped supporting it for two years might, just might, have something do with it. But you cannot simply go, "Sales are down. Must be because Wii is a fad." I have yet to see any study or real evidence that casual gamers just went up and were like, "Yeah, we don't give a shit about motion controls and consoles anymore. Mobile gaming all the way!" This is just the conventional armchair theory, and what's worse it's not based on any proof. If anything, it's more wishful thinking than anything else. Everyone wants the Wii to go away because we cannot accept any other reality other than the one where traditional gaming rules.

Now there's one big problem with all of this, and it's the one thing you people actually got, and it's the fact that at some point Nintendo decided to massively switch gears and leave the Wii behind. I have no explanation for this and think it's one of the worst decisions in all of gaming. Maybe Nintendo saw something we didn't, or maybe Iwata got greedy and thought he could cater to both casuals and hardcore gamers. I don't know. But if you want to blame Nintendo for the Wii U disaster, do it because of their complete inability now to capitalize on the success of the Wii, and not because of some silly notion that casual gaming on consoles is dead.

 

[Aquamarine]

Is there any information on digital download numbers? That could make a difference, too (compared to the Wii/Gamecube games)

There's a chance we may get three-month download sales in January if Famitsu releases another backlog of digital download sales numbers along with their new distribution strategy.

 

[DaBoss]

told you guys. Don't expect better sales in America either.

To be fair the game ended up being way better than it looked but people wanted Super Mario 64 2 not a HD sequel to a handheld game.

lmao

I don't think you understand the situation the Wii U is in, any 3D Mario game would have bombed like this.

 

[Solid Samus]

told you guys. Don't expect better sales in America either.

To be fair the game ended up being way better than it looked but people wanted Super Mario 64 2 not a HD sequel to a handheld game.

people in general =/= gaf

lol

c'mon

if Nintendo developed strictly what people are known to want and actually go out and purchase (and by people I'm talking about actual honest to god people not loud internet opinions) then we'd be talking about New Super Mario Bros. 3 right now

you've really got to get off this notion that the Wii U Mario Bros. game that you want is the Wii U Mario Bros. game that the Wii U 'needed'

 

[Danny Dudekisser]

There is unfortunately nothing that can save the Wii U at this point, and this just proves it. The whole console from the first showing and till today have unfortunately been a train wreck, and its extra baffling coming after the highly successfull Wii. I hope the people responsible for this strategy is not the same guys that will be responsible for its successor.

Honestly, all the proof I need of the people in charge's incompetence is that in the US, Nintendo released the Wii Mini this month. They still haven't learned that the Wii/WiiU thing is confusing to consumers and are still actively increasing that confusion.

So yeah, I'd like to see them clean house. Unfortunately, being a Japanese company, that could take a looooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooonnnnngg time.

 

[Anticitizen One]

lmao

I don't think you understand the situation the Wii U is in, any 3D Mario game would have bombed like this.

Super Mario 64 was a launch title for an undesirable system that was going up against Sony Playstation.

Think about that for a second

 

[RobFox64tm]

Is it really hypocrisy though? Maybe he just believes the Vita is a well designed product, whereas the Wii U isn't. There's a number of reasons any particular product fails, and they're argued about continuously.

The only thing that can't really be argued about is how poorly both are selling right now.

Sure, but who's to say the Wii U isn't a well designed product as well? That's all a matter of opinion, isn't it? The point is that the situation both systems are in is pretty dire, in spite of what one might think personally of those products. Also, I'm not really sure sales should considered an accurate measure of the quality of any product.

 

[Vandiger]

Except it's not really shocking at all and Nintendo's given us plenty of examples of how bad the Wii U has been handled to date. I'd like to see how the game continues to sell over the next couple weeks and months and if it's got the kind of long tail sales that other Mario games have had. It sure as hell won't save the Wii but I expect it'll put a few in homes come Christmas time

I don't follow Nintendo to closely, but I assumed 3D world was going to be the big blockbuster for Wii U that Iwata stated would change the trend.

"One game has the power to change everything," Mr. Iwata said, smiling often during the meeting with reporters, which lasted almost an hour beyond the initially scheduled 30 minutes. "Are we satisfied with these sales results? No. Is it impossible to recover from this? No."

 

[Solid Samus]

I don't follow Nintendo to closely, but I assumed 3D world was going to be the big blockbuster for Wii U that Iwata stated would change the trend.

"One game has the power to change everything," Mr. Iwata said, smiling often during the meeting with reporters, which lasted almost an hour beyond the initially scheduled 30 minutes. "Are we satisfied with these sales results? No. Is it impossible to recover from this? No."

One game isn't going to change the console's entire outlook in a single week lolol

 

[Danny Dudekisser]

Super Mario 64 was a launch title for an undesirable system that was going up against Sony Playstation.

Think about that for a second

The N64 wasn't undesirable when Mario 64 came out... that stigma didn't attach until well after the launch.

 

[Warm Machine]

No, you clearly don't know how it works.

You can't just say "average worker is paid $75k, 100 people worked on game, dev costs alone were $22.5mil because it's been 3 years since Galaxy 2." That is not how it works. It assumes that those 100 people were only working on 3D World for those entire 3 years, when that is not the case. I'm not even talking about the team starting smaller and ramping up. These people worked on other projects in those 3 years, most likely Super Mario 3D Land among other games.

Are you the guy who said Pikmin 3 cost like $50 million to make because it was announced like 4 years ago? If so, it seems like you haven't figured it out since then.

I've worked in games for 18 years. I know what the average salary is in a mid range studio as of 2012. I know how production ramps up and how it tails off. I currently run an indie game company. Trust me when I say it is damn expensive to make a game at a regular dev studio, let alone a corporation like Nintendo with their overhead. There may have been up to 100 people on the team but what about core technology staff who are there as well feeding the team? Like suggesting Gears of War was made by 50 people forgetting the Unreal Engine staff behind them.

The only numbers I'm not aware of are outside of the core game dev. But check the credits and then take a good look at the corporate and QA credits then factor in printing and marketing across all the territories the game ships in. Even a 2 person XBLA game like Super Meat Boy has a few dozen Microsoft corporate credits that push the game through submissions and onto the platform and then tasked with supporting it.

What do you think the game cost? 10 million?

 

[VXLbeast]

We didn't. The ABSOLUTE LOWEST prediction that GAF made for Super Mario 3D World's first week is 108,000, and it only sold-through 106,967 units.

Haha, was that your guess? Cause that is surprisingly, impressively close.

It seems there are two types of Nintendo fans, the ones that want Nintendo to get their shit together and the ones that technically don't give a shit about Nintendo themselves but just want their Mario, Zelda, Animal Crossing, Pokemon fix and will go into a fanatical rage if you criticize the company's behavior.

And the latter of these are made more terrifying because they travel in packs. And don't say anything about the 3DS screen around them...

I happen to belong to the first group, and I want Nintendo to hurt. Maybe this bothers some people, and I'm sorry. But I'm hoping they will learn a little something (something you would have thought the 3DS launch would have taught them). When games like Wario's Whatever the Fuck eat dirt hard, it shouldn't surprise people I don't shed any tears. It seriously, seriously sucks that this incredible Mario game can't do better, but that it released on a console with such a terrible value proposition makes it not so surprising.

Here's hoping the Wii U situation can be turned around, because Nintendo are some of the most important developers in gaming.

 

[Sandfox]

This is around the number I expected given the install base.

 

[Solid Samus]

Super Mario 64 was a launch title for an undesirable system that was going up against Sony Playstation.

Think about that for a second

It took me one second of thinking about it to realize why that's not an apt comparison at all.

Lets see how long it takes you

 

[StoopKid]

Lol

 

[Captain Chaos]

What?

Nintendo Land
NSMBU/NSLU
ZombiU
Lego City
Pikmin 3
Wonderful 101
Wind Waker HD
Rayman Legends (Definitive version)
Super Mario 3D World
Wii ____ U

2014 and later announced:
DKC Tropical Freeze
Mario Kart 8
Super Smash Bros.
X
Bayonetta 2
Yarn Yoshi
FE x SMT
Zelda U

+ Wii U VC
+ Wii VC and BC
+ CoD, Batman, AssCreed, Watch Dogs, Project Cars, NFS:MWU (definitive console version), Deus Ex, etc.

Even for a Nintendo lifelong fan that list is simply just not long enough.

 

[Jonm1010]

You have absolutely no proof of this. None.

You and every other armchair analyst have been saying, practically crying, that the Wii is a fad since day one. It's as if the the entire industry collectively decided that after Wii started breaking records and getting crazy sales that there could be no other explanation other than it must be some freak accident. It's easier to think that Wii is an accident than to ever consider there's anything wrong with the traditional gaming business model. The Wii smashed all expectation that young males are the most important audience and that games need push graphics ahead of everything else, and yet the industry still clung to the idea that the Wii wasn't happening. They held on for four years to the idea that the Wii was a fad, and when sales started slowing down, they ignored the fact that Nintendo's relations with 3rd parties were shit, that Nintendo's own output had dramatically slowed down, and that there were massive holes in the Wii's release schedule. Instead, they went "Aha, this must be the Wii fad finally dying. Now we can get rid of those nasty casuals and motion controls and go straight back to business as usual." And with a snap of their fingers, Sony and MS releases a brain-dead, incremental improvement on their past consoles with absolutely no sign that they learned anything from the Wii, and the traditional gaming industry cheers because now everything will go back to normal, and it will just be like the good ol' days where we're the only industry that matters.

But Wii sales fell off a cliff, you say. Is that not proof that the Wii and the concepts behind it are dead. Correlation!=Causation. A number of different things could have caused Wii sales to die. The fact that Nintendo stopped supporting it for two years might, just might, have something do with it. But you cannot simply go, "Sales are down. Must be because Wii is a fad." I have yet to see any study or real evidence that casual gamers just went up and were like, "Yeah, we don't give a shit about motion controls and consoles anymore. Mobile gaming all the way!" This is just the conventional armchair theory, and what's worse it's not based on any proof. If anything, it's more wishful thinking than anything else. Everyone wants the Wii to go away because we cannot accept any other reality other than the one where traditional gaming rules.

Now there's one big problem with all of this, and it's the one thing you people actually got, and it's the fact that at some point Nintendo massively decided to switch gears and leave the Wii behind. I have no explanation for this and think it's one of the worst decisions in all of gaming. Maybe Nintendo saw something we didn't, or maybe Iwata got greedy and thought he could cater to both casuals and hardcore gamers. I don't know. But if you want to blame Nintendo for the Wii U disaster, do it because of their complete inability now to capitalize on the success of the Wii, and not because of some silly notion that casual gaming on consoles is dead.

If the wii wasn't a temporary novelty that's worn off where is the overwhelming demand for rhythm and waggle based games? Why has kinect 2 not been a success so far? Why has move become an afterthought? Why is guitar hero and dance games seeing huge drops in sales and social relevance?

Mobile games are booming based largely on casual games with low barriers to entry.

There may not be a smoking gun to prove the correlation is causation that many of the casual gamers who bought a wii are now on mobile but there's a lot of smoke to suggest there is a fire.

 

[DaBoss]

Super Mario 64 was a launch title for an undesirable system that was going up against Sony Playstation.

Think about that for a second

1) It is a launch title
2) It was one of only 3 games available for it
3) Consoles were much more prominent back then in Japan

It is after launch that the N64 was seen to have poor support and became very undesirable.

 

[MisterHero]

You have absolutely no proof of this. None.

You and every other armchair analyst have been saying, practically crying, that the Wii is a fad since day one. It's as if the the entire industry collectively decided that after Wii started breaking records and getting crazy sales that there could be no other explanation other than it must be some freak accident. It's easier to think that Wii is an accident than to ever consider there's anything wrong with the traditional gaming business model. The Wii smashed all expectation that young males are the most important audience and that games need push graphics ahead of everything else, and yet the industry still clung to the idea that the Wii wasn't happening. They held on for four years to the idea that the Wii was a fad, and when sales started slowing down, they ignored the fact that Nintendo's relations with 3rd parties were shit, that Nintendo's own output had dramatically slowed down, and that there were massive holes in the Wii's release schedule. Instead, they went "Aha, this must be the Wii fad finally dying. Now we can get rid of those nasty casuals and motion controls and go straight back to business as usual." And with a snap of their fingers, Sony and MS releases a brain-dead, incremental improvement on their past consoles with absolutely no sign that they learned anything from the Wii, and the traditional gaming industry cheers because now everything will go back to normal, and it will just be like the good ol' days where we're the only industry that matters.

But Wii sales fell off a cliff, you say. Is that not proof that the Wii and the concepts behind it are dead. Correlation!=Causation. A number of different things could have caused Wii sales to die. The fact that Nintendo stopped supporting it for two years might, just might, have something do with it. But you cannot simply go, "Sales are down. Must be because Wii is a fad." I have yet to see any study or real evidence that casual gamers just went up and were like, "Yeah, we don't give a shit about motion controls and consoles anymore. Mobile gaming all the way!" This is just the conventional armchair theory, and what's worse it's not based on any proof. If anything, it's more wishful thinking than anything else. Everyone wants the Wii to go away because we cannot accept any other reality other than the one where traditional gaming rules.

Now there's one big problem with all of this, and it's the one thing you people actually got, and it's the fact that at some point Nintendo massively decided to switch gears and leave the Wii behind. I have no explanation for this and think it's one of the worst decisions in all of gaming. Maybe Nintendo saw something we didn't, or maybe Iwata got greedy and thought he could cater to both casuals and hardcore gamers. I don't know. But if you want to blame Nintendo for the Wii U disaster, do it because of their complete inability now to capitalize on the success of the Wii, and not because of some silly notion that casual gaming on consoles is dead.

3DS was in trouble and they decided to give it software priority. Soon it will be Wii U's turn. Nintendo also restructured their console and portable divisions to work closer together. Wii's time was up anyways; they're not going to restructure and keep working on old stuff.

Everything else you said is spot on though.

 

[Oppo]

Super Mario 64 was a launch title for an undesirable system that was going up against Sony Playstation.

Think about that for a second

ouch

 

[jmdajr]

well...

that's not good

 

[greg400]

Even for a Nintendo lifelong fan that list is simply just not long enough.

Console is barely a year old and 2014 onward is only announced games.

 

[tsab]

More copies for us europeans!

Spoiler

the install base is not that great

 

[Anticitizen One]

people in general =/= gaf

lol

c'mon

if Nintendo developed strictly what people are known to want and actually go out and purchase (and by people I'm talking about actual honest to god people not loud internet opinions) then we'd be talking about New Super Mario Bros. 3 right now

you've really got to get off this notion that the Wii U Mario Bros. game that you want is the Wii U Mario Bros. game that the Wii U 'needed'

Actually it was folks on Gaf who were vehemently defending this game. This weird reputation I got that I like to troll Nintendo actually stemmed from my repeated complaints about Mario 3D world looking unappealing.

While I would love nothing more than a SM 64 2 what I really am trying to say is the new Mario game needed to be really ambitious, big, open, and doing things that haven't been done before. Mario 64 when it came out was a sight to behold little things like fish moving away from you, being able to creep walk or run depending on how much you shift the analogue stick, etc. really wow'd the shit out of people even people who don't play video games. Mario 3D World just comes across as a by the numbers Mario experience something we have already had 4 or 5 of in the past few years. They need to give Mario a break and come back with a really ambitious title that will capture everyones attention because right now the feeling is "oh hey its another Mario game" and you don't want customers feeling that way. I'm not the best with explaining things but do you kinda get what I'm saying?

 

[Carpe Libertatem]

I've worked in games for 18 years. I know what the average salary is in a mid range studio as of 2012. I know how production ramps up and how it tails off. I currently run an indie game company. Trust me when I say it is damn expensive to make a game at a regular dev studio, let alone a corporation like Nintendo with their overhead. There may have been up to 100 people on the team but what about core technology staff who are there as well feeding the team? Like suggesting Gears of War was made by 50 people forgetting the Unreal Engine staff behind them.

The only numbers I'm not aware of are outside of the core game dev. But check the credits and then take a good look at the corporate and QA credits then factor in printing and marketing across all the territories the game ships in. Even a 2 person XBLA game like Super Meat Boy has a few dozen Microsoft corporate credits that push the game through submissions and onto the platform and then tasked with supporting it.

What do you think the game cost? 10 million?

I don't know what it cost. That's why I'm not throwing around random numbers that have no basis whatsoever. You ought to do the same.

You also still haven't recognized that people don't only work on one project at a time and - from the three year period from Galaxy 2 to 3D World - likely worked on several.

 

[Wickerbasket]

Sure, but who's to say the Wii U isn't a well designed product as well? That's all a matter of opinion, isn't it? The point is that the situation both systems are in is pretty dire, in spite of what one might think personally of those products. Also, I'm not really sure sales should considered an accurate measure of the quality of any product.

Yeah, it's all opinion which is why someone can have differing views on each system while still not being a hypocrite.

I personally think they're both badly designed, each for their own unique reasons.

And while sales don't point to the quality of a system, they do point to whether or not it's badly designed for the market it's released in.

 

[Randolph Freelander]

Lets ignore that Japan's market as a whole cares less about consoles than ever, shall we?

Well, let's also ignore that Wii U in the west hasn't been faring much better than in Japan. I could be wrong, but isn't it even faring worse in Europe?

So let's blame Japan's market condition for Wii U not performing well the world over, agree?

 

[Riposte]

Anticitizen One, I don't think people think your a troll.

 

[Anticitizen One]

1) It is a launch title
2) It was one of only 3 games available for it
3) Consoles were much more prominent back then in Japan

It is after launch that the N64 was seen to have poor support and became very undesirable.

The fact that there were only 3 games available at launch should tell you how undesirable the system was. Also the fact that it was a cartridge based system rather than disc based and that 3rd parties were moving away from it was well known before launch combined with Nintendo's arrogance. It was very much the PS3 of the 90s.

 

[AyaisMUsikWhore]

Hmm.... I have no words. It's just all so gotdamn not surprising but carry on.

 

[Darryl]

I've worked in games for 18 years. I know what the average salary is in a mid range studio as of 2012. I know how production ramps up and how it tails off. I currently run an indie game company. Trust me when I say it is damn expensive to make a game at a regular dev studio, let alone a corporation like Nintendo with their overhead. There may have been up to 100 people on the team but what about core technology staff who are there as well feeding the team? Like suggesting Gears of War was made by 50 people forgetting the Unreal Engine staff behind them.

The only numbers I'm not aware of are outside of the core game dev. But check the credits and then take a good look at the corporate and QA credits then factor in printing and marketing across all the territories the game ships in. Even a 2 person XBLA game like Super Meat Boy has a few dozen Microsoft corporate credits that push the game through submissions and onto the platform and then tasked with supporting it.

What do you think the game cost? 10 million?

I think the DIY attitude common around tech sites due to a vague familiarity with most of the technology involved causes people to think this stuff is much cheaper than it is. These games are global products. They're far from cheap.

If the wii wasn't a temporary novelty that's worn off where is the overwhelming demand for rhythm and waggle based games? Why has kinect 2 not been a success so far? Why has move become an afterthought? Why is guitar hero and dance games seeing huge drops in sales and social relevance?

Mobile games are booming based largely on casual games with low barriers to entry.

There may not be a smoking gun to prove the correlation is causation that many of the casual gamers who bought a wii are now on mobile but there's a lot of smoke to suggest there is a fire.

Kinect 1 did amazing though. Kinect 2 probably hasn't been a success because it's not exactly appealing to that casual audience right now. Too pricey. I thought rhythm games were doing great. I thought Rocksmith and Just Dance 2014 were both doing fantastic. I think you've got to get your head out a bit.

 

[EatinOlives]

*sigh*

We're going back to even more 2D Mario in the short future, aren't we?

 

[mephixto]

I think Mario's generation hit the 40s and reazlied it's time to move on.

 

[Danny Dudekisser]

The fact that there were only 3 games available at launch should tell you how undesirable the system was. Also the fact that it was a cartridge based system rather than disc based and that 3rd parties were moving away from it was well known before launch combined with Nintendo's arrogance. It was very much the PS3 of the 90s.

The fact that there were only 3 games available tells me that there were 3 games available. It says nothing about how desirable the system was. How are you even making that leap in logic and not realizing how preposterous it sounds?

 

[Aaronrules380]

Well, let's also ignore that Wii U in the west hasn't been faring much better than in Japan. I could be wrong, but isn't it even faring worse in Europe?

So let's blame Japan's market condition for Wii U not performing well the world over, agree?

I'll acknowledge the wii u is doing awfully worldwide. Doesn't change the fact the Japan has a horrible market situation for them regardless. I really don't see the ps4 doing too well in Japan either to be honest.

 

[Loco4Coco]

Actually it was folks on Gaf who were vehemently defending this game. This weird reputation I got that I like to troll Nintendo actually stemmed from my repeated complaints about Mario 3D world looking unappealing.

While I would love nothing more than a SM 64 2 what I really am trying to say is the new Mario game needed to be really ambitious, big, open, and doing things that haven't been done before. Mario 64 when it came out was a sight to behold little things like fish moving away from you, being able to creep walk or run depending on how much you shift the analogue stick, etc. really wow'd the shit out of people even people who don't play video games. Mario 3D World just comes across as a by the numbers Mario experience something we have already had 4 or 5 of in the past few years. They need to give Mario a break and come back with a really ambitious title that will capture everyones attention because right now the feeling is "oh hey its another Mario game" and you don't want customers feeling that way. I'm not the best with explaining things but do you kinda get what I'm saying?

So you want a "brand new" 3d Mario with stuff we haven't seen in a Mario game before but want SM64 2?...

 

[Cygnus X-1]

You have absolutely no proof of this. None.

You and every other armchair analyst have been saying, practically crying, that the Wii is a fad since day one. It's as if the the entire industry collectively decided that after Wii started breaking records and getting crazy sales that there could be no other explanation other than it must be some freak accident. It's easier to think that Wii is an accident than to ever consider there's anything wrong with the traditional gaming business model. The Wii smashed all expectation that young males are the most important audience and that games need push graphics ahead of everything else, and yet the industry still clung to the idea that the Wii wasn't happening. They held on for four years to the idea that the Wii was a fad, and when sales started slowing down, they ignored the fact that Nintendo's relations with 3rd parties were shit, that Nintendo's own output had dramatically slowed down, and that there were massive holes in the Wii's release schedule. Instead, they went "Aha, this must be the Wii fad finally dying. Now we can get rid of those nasty casuals and motion controls and go straight back to business as usual." And with a snap of their fingers, Sony and MS releases a brain-dead, incremental improvement on their past consoles with absolutely no sign that they learned anything from the Wii, and the traditional gaming industry cheers because now everything will go back to normal, and it will just be like the good ol' days where we're the only industry that matters.

But Wii sales fell off a cliff, you say. Is that not proof that the Wii and the concepts behind it are dead. Correlation!=Causation. A number of different things could have caused Wii sales to die. The fact that Nintendo stopped supporting it for two years might, just might, have something do with it. But you cannot simply go, "Sales are down. Must be because Wii is a fad." I have yet to see any study or real evidence that casual gamers just went up and were like, "Yeah, we don't give a shit about motion controls and consoles anymore. Mobile gaming all the way!" This is just the conventional armchair theory, and what's worse it's not based on any proof. If anything, it's more wishful thinking than anything else. Everyone wants the Wii to go away because we cannot accept any other reality other than the one where traditional gaming rules.

Now there's one big problem with all of this, and it's the one thing you people actually got, and it's the fact that at some point Nintendo massively decided to switch gears and leave the Wii behind. I have no explanation for this and think it's one of the worst decisions in all of gaming. Maybe Nintendo saw something we didn't, or maybe Iwata got greedy and thought he could cater to both casuals and hardcore gamers. I don't know. But if you want to blame Nintendo for the Wii U disaster, do it because of their complete inability now to capitalize on the success of the Wii, and not because of some silly notion that casual gaming on consoles is dead.

This is a very interesting point and I take the opportunity to make some comment.

I think it's perfectly legit to give credit to Nintendo to have orchestrated Wii's success. They are responsible of it, because they were able to create the necessary conditions. They built first of all anticipation - crazy, irrational anticipation that grew up as more, dropwise information were delivered. When they announced the home system in 2004 at E3, they claimed it would have been different, it would have been a departure from classical gaming and slowly they delivered titles, projects and hints. People were eager to know more and the coverage was extensive as every news was given - although confined to the gaming press.

Then things exploded when at the Tokyo Game Show Nintendo presented the Wiimote and the Nunchuk. I remember: everyone went nuts. Yes, even the hardcore players did, because they dreamed of being able to cut Ganondorf while slashing your hand instead of pushing a button.

All of that wasn't a coincidence. Nintendo built up such a hype that everyone couldn't resist. Things went even more crazier at E3 2006, when they showed up Wii Sports and Mario Galaxy. Although the hardcore complained about the graphics, the mass media covered massively the event. Here's the key: the mass became aware of the system. And that's the reason why there were shortages for so many months: excellent word of mouth and the sensation that something really innovating and fun was delivered on the market.

Well, now think for a moment at the Wii U - the entire system was created and delivered in such a way that buzz was close to zero. The tablet failed to impress people because tables already were a "past" topic, since iPad was the first one introduced (with mass success). The system was targeted more to hardcore, but the hardcore didn't see anything interesting in it, since third parties would not be there and it is - again - underpowered. Just people playing Nintendo's games were interested. And the mass market - simply wasn't aware of it. Wasn't aware of the difference with the Wii. Wasn't excited at all!!

In conclusion: Wii's success wasn't casual. Nintendo created the conditions for it to happen. At the same time, Nintendo created the conditions for Wii U to fail miserably. It is as simple as it sounds.

 

[RobFox64tm]

Dave has said Vita deserved to fail because it is a product without a market, as Sony themselves have admitted. It is, however, a nice piece of kit for the money. Wii U is not.

edit: he can obviously speak for himself.

This is not an objective fact, but seems to be written that way. That's the same problem I have with Dave's pro Vita, anti Wii U stance; everything is stated in a manner that claims to be the cold hard truth, but it's all just his opinion. Admitting the Vita is a failure doesn't change that, because he still sees it as the original quoted comment suggests; Wii U is flawed and deserves to fail, while Vita is some great, undiscovered secret to the world. In that sense, how can you claim the failures of one system over another to be attributed to reasons that amount to personal preference? Vita and Wii U all failed for a multitude of reasons, some of which had nothing to do with the actual products themselves.

 

[The perfect Dark]

*sigh*

We're going back to even more 2D Mario in the short future, aren't we?

Btw, I'd really like to see an new Wario Land (U).

 

[Anticitizen One]

The fact that there were only 3 games available tells me that there were 3 games available. It says nothing about how desirable the system was. How are you even making that leap in logic and not realizing how preposterous it sounds?

Because Playstation had more launch titles? Obviously 3rd parties were more interested on making sure they had games ready for that platform instead?

 

[Captain Chaos]

Console is barely a year old and 2014 onward is only announced games.

Come on it's just not good enough, here is the first year of releases for the GameCube in the US

Luigi's Mansion
Super Monkey Ball
Wave Race: Blue Storm
Super Smash Bros. Melee
Pikmin
FIFA 2002
All-Star Baseball 2002
Batman Vengeance
Crazy Taxi
Dave Mirra Freestyle BMX 2
Disney's Tarzan Untamed
Madden NFL 2002
NHL Hitz 20-02
Star Wars Rogue Leader: Rogue Squadron II
Tony Hawk's Pro Skater 3
Extreme-G 3
SSX Tricky
Universal Studios Theme Parks Adventure
Animal Crossing
NFL Quarterback Club 2002
The Simpsons: Road Rage
Sonic Adventure 2 Battle
Cel Damage
NBA Courtside 2002
ESPN International Winter Sports 2002
Dark Summit
Virtua Striker 2002
NBA Street
18 Wheeler: American Pro Trucker
Smashing Drive
Jeremy McGrath Supercross World
Cubivore
All-Star Baseball 2003
Gauntlet: Dark Legacy
Spy Hunter
James Bond 007: Agent Under Fire
Bloody Roar: Primal Fury
Home Run King
NFL Blitz 20-02
Sega Soccer Slam
Pac-Man World 2
NBA 2K2
Rave Master
Resident Evil
Donald Duck: Goin' Quackers
ESPN MLS ExtraTime 2002
Mystic Heroes
Driven
Spider-Man
Lost Kingdoms
Burnout
2002 FIFA World Cup
ZooCube
Legends of Wrestling
Bomberman Generation
WWE WrestleMania X8
EA Sports F1
Tetris Worlds
Eternal Darkness: Sanity's Requiem
RedCard 20-03
MX Superfly
Capcom vs. SNK 2 EO
Disney Sports Soccer
Beach Spikers
Super Mario Sunshine
NCAA Football 2003
Evolution Worlds
UFC: Throwdown
Aggressive Inline
Disney's Party
Smuggler's Run: Warzones
Disney's Magical Mirror Starring Mickey Mouse
Madden NFL 2003
NFL Blitz 20-03
NFL 2K3
Super Monkey Ball 2
WTA Tour Tennis
Turok: Evolution
MLB Slugfest 20-03
Pac-Man Fever
Freekstyle
NCAA College Football 2K3
Ty the Tasmanian Tiger
The Scorpion King: Rise of the Akkadian
Egg Mania: Eggstreme Madness
Phantasy Star Online Episode I & II
Big Air Freestyle
Worms Blast
Monsters Inc. Scream Arena
Kelly Slater's Pro Surfer
NHL Hitz 20-03
Scooby-Doo! Night of 100 Frights
Crash Bandicoot: The Wrath of Cortex
Disney Sports Skateboarding
NASCAR Thunder 2003
Star Fox Adventures
Rayman Arena
Rocket Power: Beach Bandits
4x4 EVO 2
Need for Speed: Hot Pursuit 2
NHL 2003
Pro Rally 2002
Taz Wanted
NBA 2K3
Godzilla: Destroy All Monsters Melee
Mat Hoffman's Pro BMX 2
NBA Live 2003
Knockout Kings 2003
Namco Museum
Backyard Football
Robotech: Battlecry
BloodRayne
Casper: Spirit Dimensions
X-Men: Next Dimension
TimeSplitters 2
Mario Party 4
Swingerz Golf
Tony Hawk's Pro Skater 4
Top Gun: Combat Zones
Pool Edge
Tiger Woods PGA Tour 2003
Star Wars: The Clone Wars
Outlaw Golf
Shrek: Extra Large
Defender
Zapper
Spyro: Enter the Dragonfly
Medal of Honor: Frontline
Resident Evil Zero
Sonic Mega Collection
Hot Wheels Velocity X
Wreckless: The Yakuza Missions
Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets
Die Hard: Vendetta
Darkened Skye
Evolution Skateboarding
Metroid Prime
Mortal Kombat: Deadly Alliance
Rocky
Baldur's Gate: Dark Alliance
Hunter: The Reckoning
James Bond 007: NightFire

 

[Tom Nook Sawyer]

So you want a "brand new" 3d Mario with stuff we haven't seen in a Mario game before but want SM64 2?...

The two aren't mutually exclusive. Mario 64 was really the only Mario game of its type. There is TONS of room there to expand upon it, whereas Mario 3D World is just a refinement of things we've seen before.

Plus the fact that it's been 20 years since Mario 64, and not 2 might have something to do with it

 

[Anticitizen One]

So you want a "brand new" 3d Mario with stuff we haven't seen in a Mario game before but want SM64 2?...

I said I would personally like SM 64 2 but I think Nintendo NEEDS a "brand new" 3D mario game that is as ambitious and monumental as 64 was

 

[Solid Samus]

Actually it was folks on Gaf who were vehemently defending this game. This weird reputation I got that I like to troll Nintendo actually stemmed from my repeated complaints about Mario 3D world looking unappealing.

While I would love nothing more than a SM 64 2 what I really am trying to say is the new Mario game needed to be really ambitious, big, open, and doing things that haven't been done before. Mario 64 when it came out was a sight to behold little things like fish moving away from you, being able to creep walk or run depending on how much you shift the analogue stick, etc. really wow'd the shit out of people even people who don't play video games. Mario 3D World just comes across as a by the numbers Mario experience something we have already had 4 or 5 of in the past few years. They need to give Mario a break and come back with a really ambitious title that will capture everyones attention because right now the feeling is "oh hey its another Mario game" and you don't want customers feeling that way. I'm not the best with explaining things but do you kinda get what I'm saying?

I do and I wish people in general meshed with that opinion too. I'm just saying man. Not only is it definitely not a by the numbers Mario game as has been reiterated several times (despite the impression that the game does give occasionally), going by sales numbers, people don't even care whether or not a Mario game even is. Fun and accessibility and familiarity seem to be what sells Mario and Nintendo has done a fantastic job of bringing a game that features all of these things but has a freshness all its own.

I gotta tell you man, play 3D World and tell me that it's lacking ambition anywhere besides its presentation (and even then ymmv)

And expecting another Mario game to be as fresh and impactful as Mario 64? That's like expecting another video game period to be as fresh and impactful as Mario 64.

I can't remember the last time that happened since

Mario 64

and honestly? I'd rather they just stayed the course and developed a new ambitious IP instead of trying to reinvent the world's most popular brand just because a relatively small amount of people would appreciate it.

 

[Biker19]

And with a snap of their fingers, Sony and MS releases a brain-dead, incremental improvement on their past consoles with absolutely no sign that they learned anything from the Wii

LOL, now you wait a minute here.

Compare the hardware inside of the PS3, to the hardware inside of the PS4, & you'll see that there isn't a "incremental leap" between each other. Plus Sony have learned their mistakes after what happened to them with the PS3.