Topic: Making the Wii U ... FREE?

they should ship Wii U With New Super Mario U - it's nice title, I believe they haven't invested much in it since they have probably reused many stuff from New Super Mario Wii

@Scollurio
The thing with smartphones is that they do have a reliable source of revenue. If you get a "free" phone you actually pay for it through your contracted service regardless of how much you actually use it. There's no phone company that gives you an iPhone for nothing and then lets you do whatever you want with it based on an assumption that you'll buy their service. You get the "free" phone when you sign on the dotted line. That's what I was saying with the VC - Console idea. You buy $80 credit and you get a "free" VC box, they're guaranteed to make money on that even if you decide to use it as a doorstop. I can't see the same thing working with the Wii U.

As for what they should to instead I think your assumption is wrong. I don't think people are rejecting the Wii U because they think the GamePad is a gimmick, I do think they're not buying it because it lacks software. Software that communicates why it's not a useless gimmick maybe but software either way. People will get one for Smash Bros, Kart, Mario, Zelda, Animal Crossing, Pikmin and so on. A console isn't a decorative box for your TV, it's an expensive inconvenience that allows you to play games. No games, no sale. That's exactly how they turn it around.

Bad idea. The last thing Nintendo needs is to lose money on a console "sold" or in the case given away to someone who is not invested in it in some way financially. Sure, many people would take a free Wii U just cause its free but with most free things it will not be appreciated.

They aren't making any money off of Wii U sales, so I think what your trying to explain has already happened.
If Wii U would have costed $400, people would have been asking for it to be $350.
Since it actually launched at a retail price of $350, people ask for it to $300.
People will always ask for the price to be lower, regardless.
Anyway, they make money off of 1 game sale. They can't charge any less than the cost of one game($40-60), because if no one buys a game, they can at least break even(they don't lose or gain anything). There is no guarantee that everyone that buys a Wii U will buy AT LEAST 2 games.
It literally an either or situation. 1 or more games sold is profit. No games sold, they still have the console, and will most likely buy games later. That is why people buy video game consoles, right? To play games? You can't get the s*** for free.

EDIT: Also keep in mind, that if the Wii U would gave costed $400, there would have been $50 more worth of components in the box. $50 makes up a percent of the overall console price. $50 is a bigger % of $350, than of $400.

yes in worth not in more components, if you raise the price of any thing the same applies not sure of its relevance here though.

The Wii U costs $350 to make. DONE. So you would have rather had it cost $400 to make it seem more valuable?

I don't know how to reply to that as it would appear though you are quoting me the question you are asking has no relevance to what I actually typed :/

Oh, well I didn't really understand what you typed, anyway. Try retyping it.
'yes in worth not in more components'...?

EDIT: Nevermind, you just didn't use comas.

Because commas are the crux of understanding.

This would throw the Wii U really far away from its market equilibrium point. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Market_equilibrium

Notice on the first graph how region A represents a shortage of goods? This would happen. If Nintendo dropped the price super low, the quantity demanded (QD) would skyrocket, however the quantity supplied (QS) would greatly decrease and there would be a shortage of the Wii U. Market equilibrium is when the QS = QD. Having the product in equilibrium is good not only for the manufacturer but for the consomer as well. Ideally Nintendo would try to increase its QD, so that the equilibrium price would increase as well (thus increasing profitability). Having too much of a surplus is bad for the manufacturer, and having too much of a shortage is bad for the consumer. Thus, companies strive to stay as close to market equilibrium as possible.

I hope I did a satisfactory job of getting my point across.

Sources: What I remember from Introductory Macroeconomics, Wikipedia

Try making a product and sell it for less than it costs to make.
If Nintendo did this, they would constantly lose money until they went bankrupt, or they would have to make games extremely expensive.

this is why there are people on welfare. just no common sence

Actually, to my knowledge, most game consoles are, at least at the beginning of their lifespan, sold at a slight loss. Selling the hardware at a slight loss attracts more early adopters and the loss is recuperated in games, accessories, controllers, etc.

Edit: Reworded post, looked confusing when I read it over again. Oh, well.

And sell it for much less and you're seeing a devastating loss in revenue and your investors will not support you anymore.

It isn't and I'll explain why. If they're losing $50US on a $350US product, lets assume your numbers are correct for the sake of argument, then they don't intend on losing money on it forever. They intend to hold it at that price while the cost to manufacture drops. Not only that but they only have to rely on early adopters to buy a few games. There's also the fact that people who have paid hundreds for a console are going to need to justify their purchase by buying games.

If you made it free you'd be losing money on it for the life of the product. If they had done it with the Wii we'd be talking billions of dollars lost.... and not in the piracy "potential sales" sort of lost but physically lost dollars. There's no way to recover from that sort of thing. You can't do what the PS3/360 have done and make a net-profit on the hardware by the end of the life of the product. What's more the people who own the console might not see any reason to buy any games at all. It's just a ridiculous idea.

If you want to push sales do what they have always done. Come out with great content, bundle it with software, bundle it with credit or drop the price.

Also add that 8GB flash memory is like $8 at the cheapest, which basically doesn't add anything to the price of the Wii U. Having a mandatory 500GB internal memory would have costed at least an extra $50.
They started the game bundles right off the bat. There's the Nintendo Land bundle with Deluxe Digital Promo, and the ZombiU bundle which saves $10 if you plan on getting a Pro controller, or $60-70 if you actually care about ZombiU, and you still get Nintendo Land with the Deluxe Digital Promo. There ARE deals already.
People are crying about no HDD, and the price of the machine in the same arguments. Not very relevant, really.
Nintendo is charging face value. All you gotta do is buy one game on disc or digitally, and the Wii U is up to date with Nintendo support.
I paid $380US including tax for the console, one $50 Pro controller, $135 worth of eShop funds(spent on New Super Mario Bros. U and ZombiU) on launch day. There was no other way to get this stuff cheaper on day one.
I've bought tons of stuff for Wii U later, too, including 4 all new Wii remote+($160. There wasn't any used at the time in my area, and I got rid of 2 Wii remotes I got on Wii launch day, with their respective motion+ which I also got on Wii Sports Resort release), one nunchuck($20. I already had 3), an ext. HDD(Toshiba 2TB $140), another Pro controller($40 at Best Buy) and even things that benefited my gaming without having a Nintendo brand on it, including a $400 Sony receiver, and some speakers that costed around $270
Then I bought another $300 or so worth of games. That isn't even counting the stuff I buy for my 3DS XL...
I don't really get the complaints. I don't even have a job anymore, but I saved like $10,000 while I did, which has gotten me tons of gadgets. I still pay for insurance, gas, alot of food, and I do odd jobs which get me some cash here and there.
I don't even have a job, and I can afford this stuff, so I don't really see why the price point is a problem. I worked my tushie off, and had to quit, but I still have money to buy stuff while being out of work for over a half a year now.
Maybe I'm just good with money, and I understand not everyone is(I know people that spend money on BS at gas stations everyday, or that coffee), but it's possible to get this stuff pretty easily.
If PS4 and Xbox cost $500 or less, with the HDD included, Wii U is golden.

Ya know there are such things as stupid questions, and discrediting any naysayers only makes your position seem more tenuous.

Im glad that there did actually evolve an interesting reasonable discussion (certainly not your fault) and it's a far stretch comparing the statement about the "vibe" of a community to a personal insult don't ya think? Right!

Basicly you've just proven my point, by being like "people on IGN" I meant "quick on insults while not contributing anything reasonable."

Kudos on that money skillz really. Im working 10-12 hours a day and on paper I earn lots of money, yet I really have to plan and think about my "leisure" purchases.

To the others, thanks for your thoughts, my initial idea - reasonable or not - sparked some really good input and discussion, as a fan of the "gaming industry" as a whole I enjoy discussions/insights about the economical aspect of gaming.

Anyone care to take a guess why Nintendo fumbled the launch, their first party lineup and 3rd party support so much (this far)? Sure third party support not being there is logical due to low sales and maybe because the Wii U hasn't proven it's "up to snuff" hardware. And yeah not being x86 platform might really hurt Wii U drawing multiplatform titles. But what I really don't get is, why - given all the time they had - there was no "big" title for the release or not even in the release window?

IF it's true what sony and ms are touting, there will be PLENTY of first party titles and exclusives for their launch window.

@Scollurio
My guess is that the Wii U launch would have been better if the 3DS had done better. The 3DS costed about $100 to make at launch, so it's possible they thought people would upgrade pretty quickly knowing that their DS brand was popular and there were already tons of games on that.
They expected people to buy the 3DS for the upgraded visuals and features not possible on the DS, while still expecting people to demand just as many games they had on DS. The price point on the 3DS being at $250 probably would have gotten through the slow launch faster, but no one saw the need to upgrade so quickly, so it's been pretty recent that the 3DS has been successful.
Nintendo just got ahead of themselves, and were probably planning on using 3DS $250 sales to push the Wii U harder. That's not right for 3DS owners in a sense, because they're buying a handheld at top dollar to push a console they won't have.
Either way, Nintendo fixed the issues, and I think the Wii U will pick up similarly to the 3DS. Also, add that the 3DS and Wii U are actually capable of cross play and such, making it very likely we will have an account system soon. That will attract more companies to put a game on Nintendo consoles, because linking game handhelds and consoles adds more to the appeal than just game sharing and account transfers.
They could even let us download play an entire game from different consoles(the Wii U acting as a local hub) as a form of game sharing, which wouldn't be internet related at all.