Topic: Does it matter if the Wii U fails?

EXACTLY!!! Lol I like the Vita and Wii U!

And you don't care about the games neither system will get if they fail?

I wish we could stop every other thread being these.

Anyway it matters because it is tough for companies to restore consumer confidence if their last major console fails even more so if Nintendo pulls the plug early on it. That's the real situation that could hurt Nintendo a lot in my opinion but we can speculate all we want on it and none of us will know for sure as I'm certain none of us can foresee the future.

If Nintendo rides it out no matter how bad it gets then I don't see it being that big of a deal except to investors.

Probably not. The Gamecube did, Nintendo recovered. The Virtual Boy did, they recovered.

Besides, why exactly are gamers so interested in sales all of a sudden? When did the 'business' of gaming become more important than actually playing video games and enjoying them?

To me, it doesn't matter. I enjoy my Wii U and I think it's an easily overlooked console. The negative media surrounding it is mostly hyperbole and feeds the illusion of the 'console war'.

To Nintendo, it most definitely matters. So too would its success. In a way, failures give way to new ideas that either improve or reinvent industries and that is a good thing. In another way, success can stifle creativity and companies get too comfortable with it.

And this is why I'm ambitious and supportive of Nintendo! I think two things are going to happen to the Wii U:

1) The fewer games that come out will be better and higher quality. Not just because it's Nintendo but because they know they need to get their titles right if they aren't going to have a massive library. This means very likely many classic games still ahead.

2) The Wii U is going to be the underdog and will not rebound like the 3DS. I think sales will spike here and there but the slow growth will keep Nintendo on its toes. This paves the path for new ideas or improved ones. It may have a shorter life cycle before Nintendo rolls out the next console but I get the feeling the next one they'll plan more carefully and really try to knock it out of the park.

It's too early to dismiss Nintendo entirely. The power of a quality game is everything. They know that. They repeat that mantra constantly. What's defining for them is creating an experience people HAVE to have. The Wii did that. The Wii U is not as sexy. That doesn't mean it can't be a great, memorable console. It just means it won't sell as many units. Nintendo fans should be thrilled about each new release though. I know I am! =)

when data became an easily accessible resource, then all gamers found refugee on the internet and started caring about every single little bit of info the media gets to highlight about games it just happens the only info media covers that old videogame magazines didn't are the sales and the business so many gamers end clinging to it to justify to themselves why they stopped reading the magazines that didn't have clashing points of view to go to the internet where their point of view is put into check every single second.

Im starting to think that people that make Doom and Gloom threads such as a this just make a thread with a random thought they had in mind. However, don't we all do that?

In the greater scheme: No. Nintendo itself will be fine and I imagine they'll still try to support the system for the rest of this gen while keeping most of the effort on the 3DS so Wii U owners won't completely regret their investment.

If you care about 3rd party (that aren't indie) support on Nintendo consoles, the public's perception of Nintendo, and/or internet flame wars then yes, it matters.

My answer is simple. IGN has been doing a "best games of all time" list extravaganza over the last few weeks. This is IGN, the site that some Nintendo fanatics seem to think is the Nintendo hating capital of the interblags.Going through those lists I see various versions of Zelda, Mario and Metroid not just on a few lists but repeated over and over again. Then I stumble across this today when browsing youtube:

So then I come back to this forum and see this post. My answer is no, no way does it matter. Why not? Because whatever happens with the Wii U I still have the thing and a 3DS. Whatever happens to it I still got A Link Between Worlds, Pokemon Y, Super Mario 3D World, Pikmin 3. Whatever happens I'm still looking at the trailer for Mario Kart 8, Smash and DK and thinking that they are the best versions of those games that have ever been out.

Does it matter to Nintendo? Sure. Does it matter to their shareholders? Maybe. Does it matter to me? Hell no. I'm getting these awesome games.

The main thing involved that matters, and one of the other main reasons I'm rooting for the console, is because the game console that is trying to be a game console with actual new things instead of PC-lite multi-media tryhard consoles (with less interesting notable than going from one Dynasty Warriors to the next) is the one that deserves success.

@skywake
That's pretty interesting that that was from a PS blog. I agree with you and the video.

When I played Mario 64 as a kid, I never really thought much about the painting overworld or how the physics were in Galaxy. I had a pretty good idea of how to play Mario Galaxy when I played it for the first time. The physics didn't really phase me, because it still made sense.

EDIT: Also, NSMB.U was the best in the entire series, IMO. I didn't play much of the DS, 3DS, or Wii one, but the Wii U entry is definitely the best. I think another Mario needs to be weird enough to maybe put some people off.

Personally, it would matter. I put down $350 for the deluxe bundle on release day, so if the Wii U doesn't meet my expectations for its life cycle, then my confidence for their next console will be very low. With the Wii U now, I am questioning whether or not I even want to go through Nintendo's next console. More often than not, their better outputs are on their handhelds in my opinion. I almost was exclusive to their handheld this generation, but seeing Metroid Blast made me want the Wii U. From now I should probably just wait until a new Metroid gets confirmed before I make a purchase.

It depends how you perceive it. As a gamer, no. The failure of the Wii U won't affect us. Nintendo won't just can X, Smash 4, Mario Kart 8 and Bayonetta 2, just out of low sales numbers, it's not in the company's nature. We'll get a small, but epic, epic, library just like the Nintendo 64 or GameCube before it. To Nintendo and their investors, yes. It may mean an entire restructure of the direction and strategy. For their next system, I hope Ninty go for hardware parity with Sony and MS, but not cripple it with storage problems, like the GC and N64.

It just furthers the irrelevance of Nintendo in the home console market which sucks. I've found through working in retail that it seems that people don't really CarE about buying kid friendly systems unless its a handheld.

Had a family come into my store and buy a PS4 for the house and the dads rational was he really only wanted one console and that Skylanders, Lego, Knack, and other PSN titles were enough for his kids.

They just need it to be profitable. Make $500 off the wobble thing and they try again. They have made profit on n64 and gc. If wii u loses 5 million that's a big problem.

^^^ This Comment.....

Not really, since it's at least getting a steady stream of games (I think it's actually received more exclusives this year than any other console right now). Even with dismal sales numbers, ports are so easy to put onto it from PS3 and PS4 that that'll never change (that, and Sony goes out and tries to find 3rd parties and indies to support it). That, combined with a large number of Japanese-centric games (especially JRPGs) and a big portion of that audience to match on the system, in conjunction with an active user-base, means that even with dismal sales numbers, it'll still receive games that its audience cares about.

Nintendo's business strategies are a bit different; they don't seem to be to keen on approaching developers. When developers come to them, they seem very much willing to help and to even promote if they are smaller, but that's about the extent of it. The Wii U's failures do mean that it receives little support from big 3rd parties, which doesn't look likely to change. That, combined with how I haven't seen any really important indie-devs on Wii U yet (there aren't any games in the same league as Castle Crashers, Mark of the Ninja, FEZ, or Guacamelee on eShop yet) spells trouble.

However, if the Wii U fails, that means Nintendo has to learn from their mistakes with it and make a better system later. This would be a fantastic thing, as I feel the Wii U is really lacking, so having a system that learns from its mistakes would be good. Granted, this could also mean that Nintendo just sticks with handhelds if it feels it can't compete, which would be bad. Or they could take a hybrid approach. Regardless of how things go, it definitely matters if the Wii U succeeds or fails.

As a gamer I look at it this way. We're still going to get the first party games, we're almost certaintly going to get more indie stuffs than we did on the Wii and third party support is going to scale back a bit. Especially exclusive third party stuffs. So I think of the Wii (which in AUD cost about the same at launch BTW) and plug all of those things into the Wii's library.

If the Wii had "failed" in the same way that the Wii U is "failing" then I would have still gotten Super Mario Galaxy, Brawl, Kart, Metroid Prime 3, DKCR, New SMB and probably also Galaxy 2 and Skyward Sword. I wouldn't have had games like Okami, Red Steel 2 or Tatsnunoku vs Capcom but things like Rayman Origins probably wouldn't have left because platformers do well on Nintendo's systems. I would have still gotten World of Goo and the Bit Trip series PLUS odds are Super Meat Boy and others wouldn't have jumped ship.

So little change, a negative and a positive is the place the Wii U is in compared to the Wii. I loved the Wii, I don't see how a "Wii U failure" can really matter if we still get indies and first party stuffs.

Judging from Sony's current financial state I sincerely doubt that they'll release a new handheld. I'm even skeptical of a PS5.

As far as the Wii U goes my hopes for it being better than the Nintendo 64 in terms of sales isn't very high. It'll be lucky to pull off Gamecube numbers. Normally I'd be fine with that, I know that Nintendo's first party games would be enough but the move to HD is really bringing down the release times for their games. Nintendo is hurting right now, they need to start paying for 3rd party support, or buy some more developing studios like Platinum games to help fill the long gaps. the fact that I'm not going to get a new Wii U game until May after Donkey Kong is kind of alarming. Reggie himself said there would be no dry periods and it's frankly just a real disappointment because I love the Wii U and I know it can be as great as the Gamecube was!

If Nintendo decided to abandon the Wii U, throw support behind the 3DS for the next couple of years as they worked on a new home console then yes that would matter. Consumers that threw down $350+ on the console + games would be pissed. Die-hard fans may not even purchase the next console. In the minds of other consumers Nintendo would be irrelevant in the console gaming space. I think it would open up an opportunity for Amazon, Apple or whoever to try to jump in.

If they continue to support the console, have great 1st party content, and are able to hit GC level sales and make a profit then it wouldn't be a failure. At the very least they can maintain status as a good secondary console.