Topic: How do you rate the Wii U's 2nd year in comparison to it's 1st?

That's because their original goal was probably the maximum, and the second goal was probably the minimum. Taking both goals into consideration, that would mean Nintendo thought Wii U would reach 12 million by April next year. It sold about as much as it did last year, this year, and the year isn't even over.

No doubt. The PS4 sales will bury the Wii U over the holidays. I just didn't bother including that increase in sales numbers as I was just trying to make the point that the Wii U selling 4 million consoles over Xmas was such an unrealistic expectation. The Wii U isn't going from treading water to lapping the competition just because Smash Bros is releasing and people are buying presents.

Assuming Sony can actually supply enough PS4 consoles, for the holiday. I do believe that 9 million is the minimum, and 12 million is the max, though.

On another note, I wonder how Wii U's software tie ratio will look by the end of the generation. As of the end of Q2 2014, we've got 7.3 million hardware shipped and 41.7 million software. That's a current tie ratio of 5.7 games per console, only counting physical. Quite good for a console less than 2 years old. It may top the N64's lifetime tie ratio (6.84) by the end of this fiscal year.

This year July-Sep sold 600k consoles and 5 million games, so that ratio is definitely on the rise, and fast.

I never said it will, I said it could. Also the hyperbole doesn't do anything for your argument. I'm not saying that it'll take over all of the sales, I'm not saying it'll take more than a third of the market, I'm not even saying it'll do anything more than around double what it did last year. All I'm saying is that 10mill would be a reasonable estimate for end of year sales. However with Smash? If sales do match up to the hype? It could potentially push that up by a million or so. That can happen, whether it does or not is another story.

And no, I'm not saying the Wii U is the only console on the market or will be the only console to sell. You also have to remember that this year 360/PS3 are less of an option than they were last year. If sales for consoles overall match last year for the same period? That's around 12mill. All I'm saying is that if Smash is a big hit out of the home console market the Wii U could take 25-30% of the total sales over Christmas. And that the prediction from others that it'll be lucky to take only take 1/10th of the Christmas market are way off.

And your beloved Xbox with the Halo Collection, $50 price drop, Sunset Overdrive, etc. Both it and the PS4 look very appealing this Christmas, maybe even more so than when they were released last year "without any games". This Christmas will pretty much be D-Day for the Wii U. It has a strong library of exclusive games for the first time and it's gotta make a big move or else it's toast...and third party support can be kissed goodbye for good.

I agree that Xbox One is appealing with the new games and price drop, but the price drop still doesn't matter to people who want Kinect. It's my opinion that Xbox One isn't complete, without it. I feel the same way about PS Eye and PS Move. Having all of the options is always best.

I don't think Xbox One and PS4 were lacking games, incredibly. The argument about that was that they had about as many games as Wii U did at launch, and people said that had "no games" at the time, so that statement just carried over to other platforms.

Wii U will be fine. It still has a high software attach ratio, and that's where most of the money is made.

So like 4 people.

It depends. The people who want all the options aren't going to settle without Kinect, The price drop takes it down to $350 for the console, but Kinect is $150 separate, so you're paying that much either way. People can buy the console for that price, now, then buy Kinect later. I could see that happening for people who don't have all the money for the bundle, and do actually want it,

Also, everybody said they "hated" PS Eye, too, but then most of the people at launch bought one. There are people out there who want "the full package"; even if it's not everyone, they are still out there...

We can complain about Kinect forever, but from what I understand the first Kinect was INCREDIBLY successful, so that is something to consider.

I think part of that is the same situation as the Wii, where the hype was made for a product that...wasn't quite ready to be hyped, and by the time it was ready, the word had spread that the old version wasn't very good and your average consumer doesn't understand that technology evolves and that the thing they bought 3 years ago is not the same as the new thing they're releasing this year...

I mean, I'm not a fan of Kinect on a base level, but much like the underused Wiimotion plus, I'm sad what did get popular were the versions that desperately needed improvement - that the things they rushed out to market got all the hype while the upgrades gather dust on the shelves.

(I was going to make a music connection, but then I remembered that 3 of my favorite bands + Linkin Park all got at least temporary boosts in popularity after they released albums that proved they grew and matured. The Killer's "Human" is arguably just as overplayed as their "Somebody Told Me" of yesteryear, perhaps moreso, and I'm happy about that)

I'm only a pretty recent consumer to the Wii U market, so I only have MK8, Bayo 1 & 2, WW HD and Mario and Luigi U that came with my bundle. Do they consider bundles like that one game? Bay 1&2 came together, so is that one game or two? Same with NSMBU and NSLU?

I've not yet touched any of the first year games, but I'm really interested in a few of them, like Zombi U, Deus Ex and Monster Hunter.

It seems like a shame that there are so many good games coming out soon, which means I'll likely not get around to those three for quite a while.

I recently bought a Wii U it was my first time buying a console. In effect I also now have a Wii as well. So far I have bought 10 games for the Wii U (another 6 games pre-ordered) and 6 games for the Wii as well as a couple of games for the VC. I am also planning of buying "Child of Light" and "Armillo" at some point this weekend.

With the exception of Rayman Legends and the two indie titles (I believe "Armillo" is a Nintendo "timed exclusive") none of the other games I've bought are available on other consoles. I can't speak for anyone else but the main reason I chose the Wii U was for Nintendo or "Nintendo-esque" games. I can't see why anyone would choose a Wii U if they were interested more in third party games.

I am one of those people mentioned previously who is not interested in big blockbuster violent games so I wouldn't purchase them but I would like them to come to the Wii U for Nintendo's sake. Purely to help sales and ensure Nintendo continue to make games and consoles in future. Maybe Nintendo can get by without them though at least for the life time of the Wii U who knows?

They should all count but I'm not sure if Bayonetta is being counted given that you can't buy it at retail by itself. Either way I think it's clear that the tie-ratio is going along pretty nicely.

It's also not counting digital sales, which, as far as I know, are proportionately higher for the Wii U than it is for other systems. Kind of counter-intuitive with Nintendo's outdated account system and lack of internal hard drive, but that's what Nintendo reported in their financials.

I don't own any physical games for my Wii U, but I'm definitely above that average tie-ratio.

I'm pretty sure the bundles the stores make count every game included as a sale. If it was something like Nintendo Land or NSMB.U, I could see them not counting that, because the Wii U would have cost that without the game, in the first place.

@SpookyMeths
Well, Nintendo Network isn't completely useless. If push comes to shove, you can get Nintendo to transfer your games. If your console breaks or whatever, they can get your games back. It's just that call to Nintendo that annoys people, but there's no denying that it works.
Also, alot of people with Wii U consoles already knew they would need a bigger HDD. Look at Xbox One and PS4, for example. 500GB doesn't go a very long way, especially if disc games are required to install games. That defeats the purpose of buying disc games in one way, because I could totally understand someone trying to buy disc games to save HDD space, but apparently that isn't a thing, anymore. Everyone is going to have to buy a separate HDD if they are going to want alot of games, even if they are discs on Xbox One and PS4.

The Lego games on Xbox One and PS4 require install, but Wii U doesn't, and the reason why I bring up Lego, specifically, is because that game is the same everywhere, and they still require the install. That means that those consoles can't read data off of disc as fast as as Wii U can; my guess is because of ×86. PC requires install for most discs, AFAIK.

EDIT: You're basically putting in a disc that tells the console what to read off the HDD, with Xbox One and PS4.

@SCAR392 k.

It's just kind of annoying that people give Nintendo crap for not having a bigger HDD, because you can still play disc games without installing them, which isn't a thing on Xbox One or PS4. There is some added benefit, because people can still buy alot of digital indie games and stuff, but the disc games will wipe out HDD space in due time, which will force people to get a bigger HDD, anyway.

First party quality in the second year: 10/10 ->1st year (7/10)... no more Mario Platformers! Hooray!
3rd party: 4/10 -> 1st year (9/10) .... apart bayonetta this is as dry as Sahara Desert

Overall: I had to buy a Ps4 to get the full spectrum of gaming.... so for me overall is a 6.5 - 7... WiiU keeps not giving me what I expected when I bought it...

very very true.... still don't understand what the heck Sony is waiting for...