Topic: Why has Wii U's advertizing been so lackluster?

Need a guy sitting in a cube again with a basketball bouncing all around him lol

Nintendo is in dire need of a better marketing team.. The commercials are really bad. They had such an awesome campaign for the Wii, I don't get why they couldn't come up with something better than people playing in color coordinated boxes.

Nintendo's advertising history has traditionally been hit or miss (usually the latter).

They did a phenomenal job with Wii and DS, and awareness for the 3DS has been pretty good. The Wii U has unfortunately been very lackluster; due mostly to the name (IMO). I can understand Nintendo's reasoning for continuing with the Wii moniker, but it seems to have backfired on them; with confusion among the 'casual' (ugh) masses.

I can already see certain steps taken by NIntendo to reverse this situation. I perused some Wii U mini booklets at my EB Games recently, and the contents were very intent on highlighting the differences between Wii and Wii U. Honestly, I think Nintendo's best course of action is an oldie (but a goodie) - release a killer app or two, and cut the price. I have no doubt the former (not sure about the latter) will happen VERY soon. Nintendo are simply waiting until the PS4 and Durango to wow gamers, before swooping in (undoubtedly at E3) to steal Sony and Microsoft's thunder by unleashing a tidal wave of awesomness.

TV advertising in the U.S. is still important. It's why hundreds of millions of dollars are spent advertising with TV ads in politics. The Super Bowl? Millions spent for a 30 second to 1 minute commercial (Sony did advertise God of War during this last Super Bowl, which I thought was interesting).

Nintendo is sitting on billions, and making decent commercials isn't something that should even really be questioned if they're trying to sell the Wii U to the mass market like the Wii. There were Wii ads on TV when we visited family out of town, A LOT, a few years back. I was actually surprised at the time, because we didn't have cable TV (still don't) and didn't see how (or how much) Nintendo was advertising the Wii on TV.

We know their demo stations in stores here in the U.S. are pretty horrid, their commercials were horrid here, and there hasn't been anything else I think since November or early December. Not ever Nintendo YouTube videos/ads, to get the "fans" excited. I think that's what some are wanting, to see the marketing campaign get going that excites them; and also not have to explain that the Wii U is a new console, not just a new Wii accessory...

Nintendo did a great job with the 3DS marketing right after the Olympics, by getting the U.S. gymnasts signed up to help advertise it. That was reaching a broader audience, I'm not sure what they are doing with the Wii U in that fashion, because I'm not seeing it.

Well those Wii U commercials were wack for one thing. Their celebrity videos are forced as well, but probably help with casual females. Hopefully they are going to be more creative with their commercials for their AAA games, which the Wii U's fate lies solely on IMO.

After seeing the PS4 announcement I couldnt help myself but think how much more awesome it was than last years Nintendo presentations. Lately Nintendo blows my mind with their directs, but the general awareness of Wii U really is BAD. I know many video game geeks, aged 20+ and not even those know too much about the Wii U, or even care. And I think it all starts with the naming. Wii U... just look at Playstation 4. Brandname, highly recognizable + a digit, 4 instead of 3, so everyone knows its the new thing. Easy.

Wii 2 would have been better, but maybe it sounded a bit like "we're ripping off" or "we're also important" lol
Only Wii II would have been worse. Or Wii 2.0.
Whatever.

On the other hand, look at the Vita, it has superior tech compared to 3DS (funnily enough it gladly ditch 3D and dualscreen for the touchscreen OLED and dual analog sticks) and way better advertising in shops and everywhere here and still... we know how that ended.
Im curious if they can raise some more Vita sales with "remote play" function of PS4. Where they got THAT idea hm?

PS: I think Nintendo should have gone with their codename, Nintendo Revolution
and the next system could have been Nintendo Revelation and then the next one Nintendo Apocalypse.... hohoho

Im curious if they can raise some more Vita sales with "remote play" function of PS4. Where they got THAT idea hm?

From the PSP, which could do remote play with the PS3 before the Wii U had even been announced.

I've never heard of anyone streaming their PS3 games onto their PSP. Im not a Sony fan though so I might have missed it.

Yep. PSP Remote Play. Wasn't a great feature in the end, but it existed, and this remote play is an extension and improvement of that, not a 'copy' of anything Nintendo did.

@Bankai
There, I learned something. Weird.
Why you think it never became bigger? Lack of support, lack of promotion or too weak PSP hardware/screen?

Primitive technology when it was first launched, and such limited interest that as a result Sony never really felt the need to work on it.

That's my suspicion, anyway.

If N had commercials like Iwata and Miyamoto horsing around in luigi hats with a replica vacuum cleaner before and after some cool gameplay screens, I think it would at least grab more viewer attention than the overly polished family and friends spots they do.

Absolutely.
Japanese people can be absurdly funny and childish. They should try to capture that spirit and put it into advertising!

They should do awesome commercials like this more often!

If only we can help Nintendo on advertisement..

I honestly don't know. Part of it could be arrogance because of the wii's early success. I still think the worst thing they could have done was name the console the Wii U. Too much confusion, and too much of a stigma. At this point I'm thinking that there's gonna have to be a 50 dollar price drop by the time holiday rolls around unless we finally get some really killer apps. But it's going to take more than just a 3D Mario. They're gonna need at least one of either Smash Bros. and Zelda out by holiday.

I telling you this right now: Zelda and Smash Bros. are NOT going to be out at all this year. They will be shown at E3 yes, but it will be a while before we see the finished products. If they did come out this holiday season, it would do more harm then good since the games would only be about halfway done.

wii u is trash...

Yo bro, you know you gonna get that Wii U

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