Super Mario Maker Back on Top in Japan as 3DS and Wii U Sales Increase

I suppose it's really good that the Wii U sales weren't just a one week thing. Wonder how long it will last.

Isn't the ps4 get a price cut in Japan soon?

Just what the WiiU needs the world over lol.

Edit: although those WiiU numbers are pretty great this week!

Revelation: Everything the West loves about the PS4, Japan hates. I very much doubt Sony's luck will change until they can come up with some more popular Japanese titles. But it also shows the power of Mario is still a thing for Nintendo in Japan at least.

@readyletsgo

Yes, tomorrow is the price cut for the PS4 and I expect well see a big jump next week in the PS4 sales, it will probably be the #1 hardware seller for a while.

Why do Microsoft bother?

@ThomasBW84

"New releases in Japan have been on Vita, PS3 and PS3"

I guess you mean PS4

Wonder what Sony will sell next week? Can they get over 30K with PS4?

Nice to see Wii U keeping up momentum from Splatoon and now Mario Maker. Too bad there wasn't another title like Zelda or Starfox making an appearance in November/December. Still if 2016 is packed with releases maybe the Wii U can chug away and see 15-20 mill in sales before it retires into the sunset.

I think the hardware trends in Japan will ultimately dictate what Nintendo does next in the hardware market. Portable consoles are by far and away the biggest sellers over there 48k for handhelds vs 25k for home consoles.

I don't expect Nintendo to release a traditional home console again, the trend shows consumers moving away from that in their home region and I don't expect that to change any time soon.

The issue for nintendo is that the west does still to a large extent prefer a home console, so what do the do. Do they go with a handheld/console regardless or go with some sort of hybrid as has been rumoured. Or do they go with both a handheld and home console but build them with exactly the same specifications and release the exact same games on both? I think the answer is likely to be the latter. The question is can they pack the power of a home console into a handheld, or do they make the games scalable so they can work on both.

4 months old Splatoon beating out brand new Phantom Pain. Go Splatoon!

Wow, what's happening with PS4?
And where did Yokai Watch suddenly come from?

@manu0

There's a price cut coming soon on the PS4. I think it happens tomorrow or something like that. If that's the case, expect next weeks PS4 sales to be through the roof.

Yeah Wii U is selling better than PS4.

But less than Vita.

I know it's Japan, handheld capital of the world, but considering all the effort Sony seems to put into killing that thing - the recent "our last handheld" announcement, no major new games being made for it awhile back, cheaper PS Vita Tv version last year, can't be good to be selling less than that.

But I am glad to see Wii U leading the way for home consoles, got to keep the faith alive.

@MoonKnight7 Ah okay, lol.

Now, just imagine how different things might have been if Nintendo had actually had a few games like Super Mario Maker available during the launch of the Wii U—games that actually show off exactly what's so cool and unique about having a GamePad with a touchscreen and stylus...

Nintendo, the company that constantly goes on about how games sell hardware, couldn't even figure out that if it really wanted to sell Wii U units it probably should have had a genuine system selling game (or two, three, four...) at launch that actually showed off why people should want to play this thing.

Here's hoping its actually learned it's lesson for its next console, because the dropped the ball in this particular respect with quite a few of its recent platforms for a couple of generations now—with the Wii being the one exception.

@ThomasBW84: You forgot to mention: Splatoon finally surpassed the Mario Kart 8 retail sales week-by-week in Japan. After 18 weeks since launch, Mario Kart 8 sold 678,250 units, while Splatoon now have sold 681,495 units.

@Kirk You keep mentioning Mario Maker as if Nintendo said, "Oh, I have this idea for a Wii U Mario game, but let's release the game well after the Wii U's launch window." Heck, before E3 2014 YOU wouldn't even know that a Mario Maker game exists in the first place.
Maybe Nintendo hasn't done so much with the Wii U GamePad (outside of Nintendo Land and Game & Wario), but at least the games for the system are outstanding.

Good for Nintendo. But bad news for Intelligent Systems.

......Where is FE FATES sales? Like did it pass a million? I can't understand how that isn't concerning. How does Rhythm Tengoku still out there when it released way before FE Fates did?

SMM and Splatoon still strong. Splatoon dip a bit last week, but it's now back to 20k+. The Wii U situation might be different if SMM and Splatoon were launch titles. Wii U increase is nice to see, unexpected even. I hope it could stay 15k+.

PS4 will surely take number 1 spot next week, and hopefully will strenghten home console market in Japan in a long run. Vita seems to do well too.

Awesome!! Ps4 is doomed 😂

@rjejr
In defense of Vita, Persona 4 Dancing All Night is the best rhythm game I've ever played in my life.

Ever.

I'm in Japan right now! I've been in a gaming bar! Everyone was playing Mario Kart 8,

The Japanese in the bar were excited to watch (over our shoulders) A Resident Evil Mercenaries session I was having with my friend....

@sandman89
It's not doomed. PS4 is dead.

@Artwark well, I don't think FE Fates will sell 1 million in Japan alone, but worldwide, it's almost certain. I was hoping it could do better, but last time it charts at around 2k weekly and keep declining. I think it already has a decent run in Japan, being RPG that is usually front-loaded instead of having legs. I'll start to worry though if the game failed in the west, which would be unlikely given the popularity of FE Awakening.

FE Fates is also sort of special too, with second storyline as DLC, the DLC numbers might be higher than any FE games. Unfortunately, we have no way to find out, unless Nintendo included it in their report.

What I can say is, calm down. FE Fates didn't become a phenomenon like YW or Pokemon, but it still selling as well as other FE titles.

Wii U = PS4X4 lol.

@JaxonH You lost me at "rhythm game".

Have you played Legend of Kay? There are some mandatory boar riding segments I think you might like. At least that's what I tell myself while I'm cursing at the TV - Jax would like this.

Also in fairness to Vita, it has 5 games in the top 20, Wii U and PSThree both have 2 each, so Vita deserves to be selling well. Software sales promote hardware sales. At least I think that's how it's supposed to work.

@Artwark These are very different games (not to say that fe if sold more than tengoku). Rpgs are much more frontloaded. Fire emblem if already sold more than half a million, passes awakening and is the second best game in the history of the franchise in Japan. It's a huge success. You dont need to get worrier about how the game fared. It's already one of the top RPGs in the country, losing only to real big stuff. Also, tengoku is, historically, a bigger franchise.

@sandman8 @Splatburst

PS4 is getting a price cut tomorrow in Japan, it'll be the other way around next week, and probably the rest of the year.

Still waiting on more PS 4 1 TB details which should be coming soon. No way I am getting the 500 gb model

We're still waiting for that DQ8 announcement. Cmon Squenix!

@JaxonH

You say that because you still have to play Rhythm Heaven

@sinalefa
Maybe, but unless RH has a storyline about those little stick men watching a video at midnight and getting trapped in another world, I have my reservations.

Not that it isn't a great game of course

@JaxonH

Nope, but RH actually teaches you to play the music without relying on visual cues, something that no other rhythm game manages to do. The purest rhythm game is the one you can play only by ear.

The backstory of the minigames is a joy reserved for the few brave souls who manage to finish the minigames with a perfect rating. Something equally satisfactory, stressful, infuriating and challenging.

@VeeFlamesNL I'm saying this with the understanding that games like this (Super Mario Maker, Art Academy: Atelier) were basically extremely obvious examples of how to show off the GamePad, as far as I'm concerned. Games, or games/experiences very much like them, that I personally would have had prepared for the launch of Wii U—if I was running Nintendo.

And I want to make this very clear: I mean that I actually did indeed think about this kind of stuff long before the Wii U even existed. Such that I think Nintendo should have too, and REALLY should have had the foresight to realise that this was exactly the type of software the Wii U needed, day one. Creation based software that takes full advantage of everything that is great about the GamePad.

AND . . . I also say this knowing that the reason I thought of this stuff LONG BEFORE the Wii U even existed . . . was because Nintendo itself showed me the blueprints for such "Play, Create, and Share" type game experiences in the first place, which were/are pretty much perfectly suited to the GamePad: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mario_Artist

I'm saying that Nintendo itself came up with the idea of entire creation suites back in the days of the N64 DD, including one called Mario Artist: Game Maker (which most likely used loads of Mario assets too), and the fact it didn't have the nat-level intelligence to realise this is EXACTLY the kind of stuff it should have had on Wii U at launch, probably even built into the system directly (which it would have had if I was in charge), is just totally mind bogglingly sp*zmodic to me.

The Wii U didn't need to be a flop, not the way I see it, but right now it is a total and utter flop by most people's accounts—and, imo, it's all Nintendo's own fault. Nintendo has done some pretty f'n moronic things with the Wii U, and not even managing to release a few titles at launch that genuinely showed off the Wii U GamePad in all its true glory—and, no, Nintendo Land wasn't one of those games/experiences I'm talking about—was one of the most moronic things of the bunch.

Do you get me?

The Wii U launch needed titles like this.

@BinaryFragger
I want that new Hatsune Miku coming on on Vita (when it's releasing I have no idea). I just hope the songs are in English. But I definitely want it either way.

But ya Persona 4: DAN really impressed me. The story mode is like playing a real Persona game, only it's dancing. See I just recently got into rhythm games. I pride myself on playing everything on all consoles (as long as it's top shelf of it's genre), and it recently dawned on me that I never really played rhythm games before. I'm surprised how good they can be, particularly this one.

I bought Rhythm Heaven Fever on Wii at the recommendation of @Sinalefa as well as Final Fantasy Curtain Call, but have yet to really dig into those.;

That's two weeks where low PS4 sales have been explained by readers in the comments section, so it's a bit daft to leave out the pending price drop explanation in articles rejoicing about the Wii U beating it.

Still great to see the console staying consistent and competitive in any market. With a modest but notable stable of hits that are or have shown great staying power, perhaps what would consolidate it in the absence of any blockbuster releases (XCX for the West I know), would be to have, oh I dunno, a price cut.

@Kirk Of course I do get you. I'm also well aware the GamePad was not utilized properly. All I'm saying is that I believe games that use the GamePad more than just a tablet to draw and place blocks would have done the Wii U more justice.
Let's put it this way. Mario Maker sells a million because it based in the Mario world (and hence has the name Mario attached to it). That's great. Now how would a Star Fox Maker, or even a Zelda Maker, sell? Many, perhaps, but likely not as much as Mario Maker. Art Academy: Home Studio may be popular on Miiverse, but I'm guessing its sales figures is less than the 3DS/DS iterations.
What the Wii U needed was games that used the GamePad in a way no other console could, not just games that make it easier to draw, make Mario courses, or create things. Key words, :not just

While the Rhythm Heaven series might be brilliant in its simple gameplay, I wouldn't say it's the best rhythm game series of all time. I've only played the original DS version, but I'll still say that just taps and flicks won't do it for me. I want to be able to follow some sort of shape, draw shapes themselves, and do all sorts of things in a rhythm game.
Don't get me wrong, Rhythm Heaven is a really awesome piece of software, but give me more, and I'll consider deeming it "the best rhythm game EVAH."

@VeeFlamesNL "What the Wii U needed was games that used the GamePad in a way no other console could, not just games that make it easier to draw, make Mario courses, or create things. Key words, :not just"

Well that is exactly what those games [experiences] do—you can't even come close to drawing/painting properly on the other consoles and you can't intuitively drag and place stuff on the other consoles with simple touch or stylus based input either—and I think what Wii U needed is a whole bunch of games [experiences] like Super Mario Maker and Art Academy: Atelier at launch.

If Wii U had something like the Mario Artist series built into it and available for all Wii U owners to use for free out-the-box—much like how Microsoft is now basically giving all Xbox One owners Project Spark for free (and that doesn't even come close to what I'm talking, especially when you consider the Xbox One doesn't really have an ideal input for such a creation tool, and Wii U absolutely does)—I think it would be winning the console war right about now.

If Nintendo had a console where all users could freely and easily create images (drawings and painting), animations, 3D models (which could be used as assets for games), music, simple videos (using the GamePads camera, and maybe some video editing tools that work with the touchscreen and stylus), and even the likes of full video games, all using the extremely intuitive input of the GamePad (and its touchscreen and stylus), and then upload and share them with all other Wii U owners—maybe even being able to charge a small fee for their creations too, if they chose to (so an entire ecosystem could exist around these user creations)—as well as just share them online via sites like YouTube (in the case of videos); I think it might have had one of the most successful consoles of all time.

Note: Nintendo could have given all of this a very "gamey" spin too, so it feels like you're actually playing and having fun with all of this stuff—in the same way Super Mario Maker is both a pretty awesome Super Mario level creation tool but also a fully fledged game in its own right.

If you combine that major USP with all Nintendo's great first party games, and whatever else is appealing about Nintendo's systems (like amiibo and all that jazz)—and a few other little tweaks to the system here and there—it could [would] have been pretty much unstoppable imo.

All this chatter about rhythm games makes me wonder if we will ever see Elite Beat Agents 2.

@GLA I don't think people are happy Wii U outsold PS4 for a week, I think they're just happy it's doing well even after the week of the Mario Maker launch. Which it is, regardless of how much PS4 has sold

@JaxonH no arguments there

@Kirk I think they just released it too early. Waiting a year and increasing specs to compete while giving their teams time to make games would have helped them a lot.

@Morph With those figures, that's still a sizeable home console market. It's just that if they plan it right, they can still profit on a 30m to 60m console seller, no idea if they can profit on anything less.

The NX really needs to launch with a proof of concept game like Mario Maker, or at least something exciting.

@VeeFlamesNL #41 In my opinion, what the Wii U needed was a total redo. In general, the system is just very flawed and could have really used some much needed improvements. More gamepad focused games would have helped, but in the end, I don't think it really would have changed much.

Awesome figures. Keep it up Nintendo!

@sketchturner really? As far as I can tell Metal Gear sold around 5000 copies more, they are just split between PS3 & PS4

@Kirk The funny this is that I thought they had learned their lesson after the Gamecube launch.. Everyone talked about how the Gamecube not coming out with big software in the beginning harmed it greatly and then they did right with the Wii... Then for some reason they forgot.

I like how in these sales posts we need 20 people reminding everyone that the PS4 is getting a price cut in some odd effort to downplay the fact that the Wii U outsold the PS4.

Everytime a Nintendo platfom gets outsold: doom and gloom
Everytime a Sony platform gets outsold: [Insert excuse here]

I'm glad the vita outsold the wii-poo again

@roboshort Yeah, with the Wii, Nintendo nailed it better than basically any console in existence, in terms of having a launch game that actually shows off perfectly what the console is all about (which is doubly essential when your console is based almost entirely around one core gimmick), and that is actually a genuine system seller. I personally liked Super Mario World and Super Mario 64 more as launch games but Wii Sports is no doubt one of the most important launch titles in existence. Also, I think packing in a system selling and defining game at launch really is the way to go.

Nintendo totally dropped the ball with the launch of Wii U. It did the same with 3DS too.

I really hope it's learned its lesson but precisely because it did exactly what you said, and f'd up even after it seemed like it had learned its lesson with the GC, I'm not entirely confident it has.

@Fillupmycup Yeah, that might have helped. I think the real problem with the Wii U as it exists, however, was not having a system selling and system defining game at launch. That would have given it the head start it needed to at least not fail basically right out the gate. It might still have lost ultimately, like the N64 did next to the PS (and the N64 launched with the sublime Super Mario 64), but at least it would have had a chance.

The Wii U has so many issues that just have a couple of great, system selling and system defining games at launch probably still wouldn't have saved it, and I think the lesson to learn here is that Nintendo needs to get a lot more things right next time around, and one of them is at least launching with a few games that show you exactly why you have to buy this new console basically day one.

I don't know why people think things would be any different if Mario Maker was at launch. The Wii U launched with a 2D Mario (possibly the best one in the 'New' series), which are always the best selling titles on recent Nintendo machines. On the DS, Wii, 3DS and Wii U, 2D Mario has been close to Mario Kart in sales figures and leaves other big names like Smash in the dust. There's no indication so far Mario Maker is going to be more popular than NSMBU so I don't think it would have improved things at all.

@JaxonH But the people pretend that the PS4 is selling low because of the Wii U's success, which isn't the case at all. 18,000 is a pretty average number, nothing special, it looks good in comparison to the PS4, but that's due to the upcoming the price cut.

@Octane
Who is pretending that? Maybe one person in the comments- there's always one person who'll say and think anything.

But make no mistake- 18,000 is a good number. Even the top selling system in the region barely sold more than that. Maybe 5 years ago it was average but not today.

And the PS4 was only averaging 12k a week before. So the Wii U is definitely doing better recently regardless of the PS4 price cut

@Octane reeeeally doubt it. Historically, the holidays in Japan favours much more the nintendo systems than sony. The ps4 will sell better for a while, but it probably wouldn't beat wiiu in december.

@BinaryFragger it doesn't matter. PS4 has been selling poorly from day 1, worse than what Wii U was selling at the time. It's way behind. A price drop does make sense since it's such a total flop in Japan.

@kirk
I actually think Nintendo thought it had what it needed in Nintendo Land but the presentation was far from universally exciting and the format was a reminder of the worst of the Wii genres: mini-game collections.

My family had no problem embracing the aesthetic and premise of the game once we realized how deep it went in challenging people who worked at it, but it obviously didn't resonate with many.

The game had so much right and unique going on. It's just that few cared and critics are often only concerned with the single player experience.

My family still plays Nintendo Land quite a bit. Some things we haven't done that we want to. I can't blame people for shrugging it off, but, again, I think the failure that Nintendo had there was theme and aesthetics pushing away even their fans and not understanding the knee-jerk triggers they were going to set off with that game.

The creative angle would have been great to have at launch as well, of course. There was too much figuring it out as they went along — looks like miiverse drawings are taking off, let's get a limited version of Art Acedemy out quick!-- and nothing for the core gamer to grab onto at the start. That leads the discussion to whatever happened with EA, etc.

It's funny, though. To your point, the arguments about GamePad utility have diminished quite a bit now that Mario Maker is successful. Hard to argue, but to someone like me and mine? We were convinced on launch day through playing Nintendo Land.

@aaronsullivan The problem with Nintendo Land, as I see it, was that it showed off all the actual gimmicky stuff that you could do on the GamePad, rather than any genuinely compelling and paradigm shifting stuff you could do on the GamePad.

I know I don't care about tilting the thing to clumsily aim a bow in some Zelda mini-game. I don't care about playing a really bad tilt controlled F-Zero mini-game that's not even close to the kind of F-Zero game I really want. I don't care about swiping on the screen to clumsily aim a shuriken at targets, like I'm playing some casual 99p mobile game. I'm also not going to get particularly excited about a tiny little hub area, "land" my *ss, with only a couple of points of interest after the first few mins wandering around. To me, it was more the kind of simple mini-game collection that should have been sold as a cheap, casual, party title, with a free Wiimote or whatever, much like Wii Play was on the Wii. That's the only way that any more than a handful of people were going to give a sh*t about this game, from what I could see.

Nintendo Land just fell short of the mark. For any gamers who actually care about genuinely responsive and accurate controls in their games, and depth too for that matter, which is probably quite a high percentage of gamers in general and definitely most of the hardcore Nintendo gamers, I think it was a major fail. It wasn't a terrible collection of games, if you're cool with casual, party, throwaway stuff, but Nintendo Land just went about everything all wrong, imo. It wasn't anywhere near compelling enough to get more than a handful of real gamers excited, and it wasn't simple, elegant, and instantly obvious enough to get all the Wiimote loving casuals from the Wii generation excited either, like Wii Sports was. It simply wasn't the game to sell Wii U systems in particularly strong numbers to any particular group of consumers. Launching with Super Mario Maker would have been about ten times as effective, it's just a far more compelling concept for most people likely to pick up a new Nintendo console in this day and age, and imo that's just one of a bunch of experiences like this that I think Wii U should have launched with.

Wii U could have been a paradigm shift in the industry, based on the way I think of the system and its unique GamePad (and what I would have done with it), but Nintendo just dropped the ball, big time.

Great to see. Really hope it is the #1 seller in America for September, but feel like that is a pipe dream.

@Aromaiden A 'redo' is taking it too far. Are you actually saying there's nothing right with your Wii U?
IMO, there are only a few things I'd change with the Wii U — major things, yes, but few nonetheless. There are great games for the systems and I love the GamePad, even in its underutilization. If I were the head of Nintendo, I'd only consider putting more power under the hood, including a built in Wii LAN adapter, increase games production and some other minor stuff. That's it.
The Wii U isn't perfect, but it's very far from a dud, IMO.
_{Sorry I didn't reply earlier; the website glitched on me while I was replying to you, and I'm a busy college student.}

@VeeFlamesNL "Are you actually saying there's nothing right with your Wii U?"
No, while the Wii U is flawed, it's not a truly terrible console.

Anyways in my opinion, the Wii U just had so much wrong with it from the very start, especially when comparing to other consoles. From the very beginning, the console was very poorly advertised, expensive, confusingly named, under powered, and in my opinion it was built around a pretty lackluster gimmick. The list of negative things pertaining to the Wii U just goes on, so while it's an enjoyable console, I just find it in general to be a poor idea.

@Kirk Yeah, the ninja game is more of an argument against GamePad control and that F-Zero game was just horrible, but all of the asynchronous multiplayer games Mario, Animal Crossing, Luigi's Mansion were instantly fun for groups while impossible to emulate on other consoles.

Your mockery of the Zelda game is in stark contrast to my experience as it was considerably more accurate and fun to use than any other aiming method I've experienced on a console. Plus, with one person as archer and the others sword fighting -with an unexpected amount of depth and timing considering each player is holding only a Wii remote and using two buttons- the cooperation needed and variety of play is something truly demonstrative of the power of using the unique controls of the Wii U.

I'm suspecting you didn't give it much of a chance or didn't play past a level or two with other people given your opinion of it and I suspect that was the experience of many. One additional downfall of the format in Nintendo Land is that the initial levels of most games seemed overly simple and easy to dismiss.

Our family has played Metroid Blast a ton and it remains a fun experience. Again the presentation is off-kilter and it's the most complicated to control of the bunch (making you hold A to aim "the right way" was a mistake), but like Zelda it gets harder and more interesting as it goes. Wicked fun with a few dedicated players, but that can be a tall order for most.

I also hold out the DK game as a special kind of treat for the masochistic gamer and give bonus points for having an alternative button control to the "blowing on the mic". My wife was addicted to that one for awhile.

The Yoshi game was also uniquely viable on the GamePad and later levels were pretty great, but the rigid puzzle structure of the game gets tiresome quickly.

The other stuff you mentioned was about presentation and I agree with you on that. It clearly wasn't the right mix for the reasons I mentioned earlier as well.

It did showcase the GamePad's capabilities to those who gave it a chance and could overcome the awkward theme and mini-game gag reflex. It even showed through gameplay and not theming and visuals that Nintendo was trying to edge more towards the core gamer by making these mini-games not mini at all but ramp up in challenge and content over an extended period.

There's a lot in there that Nintendo did right. Obviously, it failed overall.

@Aromaiden Well, I'd call the Wii U a great idea that wasn't executed properly.
I don't really get the problem with the name; I think the name is a unique one. I mean, you have other names such as Vita (in fact, I had to correct my friends who were calling it the PSP Vita. Surely, a normal person would think that's an add-on, right?) and Xbox One, so I usually refute the name argument. What I will agree on is the lack of marketing and advertising... I don't get why Nintendo skimped on the adverts. Tell the average Joe that he can play awesome games, and bingo.
Just to note, gaming systems are expensive things. If not, a lot of people would have more consoles in their houses... maybe instead of iPhones and Androids.

@VeeFlamesNL "Well, I'd call the Wii U a great idea that wasn't executed properly."
To be honest, I found the idea of the Game Pad, to be well, lackluster. In my opinion, I don't really see any real uniqueness or innovation from the Game Pad, instead it just feels gimmicky to me. Not to mention that the Game Pad itself isn't really that good or comfortable as a controller.

"I don't really get the problem with the name"
To be honest, I wouldn't really have found it to be significant if the Wii U had actually been properly advertised, and if the Wii's audience wasn't mostly a more casual audience. For example, you know it's bad when you see people still constantly coming to game stores asking what the Wii U is and asking if it is just an add on.

"Just to note, gaming systems are expensive things"
While true, the Wii U was actually overpriced when originally released (and still is) and this is only worsened when you consider how the Wii U was under powered and its predecessor, the Wii was very cheap.

It also didn't help that the Game Pad was a big contributor to the overall high price; making it all the more gimmicky in the eyes of others.

@Aromaiden I don't understand this statement:
"unlike the Xbox One which comes from the series of home consoles that is know to have direct successors."
Let's go back to the Average Joe who doesn't play games. Mention "Xbox One" to him. How likely is he to say, "It's the successor to the Xbox 360."? Granted, he'll probably say something like "It's the new Xbox" since he's heard of the system in one way or another (through adverts), but my point is that the name "Xbox One" isn't as straightforward (Heck, it might even sound like some sort of subscription service) as, say PS4, and it's still well received in terms of sales.
The Wii U can have all the strangest names in the world (I'm not complaining), but it won't matter unless Nintendo markets the system, which it failed to do. The 3DS doesn't sound like a direct successor; yet, it's a global cash magnet.

Yeah, the GamePad is quite expensive, and I totally get that the Wii U would be much cheaper without a GamePad. Still, I love the GamePad so much, and I believe Nintendo/third parties can do so much with it. While it's unlikely that Nintendo's next system (not trying to reference NX) will have the GP, I hope it's optional. I'd support it in a heartbeat.

@VeeFlamesNL
I suppose and in a sense that makes since, so we can sort off one of the negative things pertaining to the Wii U off my list. Although in reality, it's just one of many things (no offense) .

@aaronsullivan Well, I think it says a lot that one game done right, Super Mario Maker, has already received far more critical praise and success (if we ignore the fact Nintendo Land is a pack-in game, so it's obviously had more "sales" to date) than an entire compilation of mini-games starring most of Nintendo's big mascots. As well as showing off how genuinely cool the GamePad can be, more so than any other game on Wii U to date.

All the asynchronous stuff is cool but it all still feels very gimmicky and forced for the most part, imo. So, I don't see it ever really being a system selling feature (same applies to games that try to get you to use the GamePad screen and TV screen at the same time, like that Metroid mini-game, and Star Fox Zero, imo). Now, I think if the Wii U could support 4 GamePads, with each player having their own custom screen, then that could have genuinely been a system selling feature, and possibly even paradigm shifting. It also still allows both asynchronous gameplay and gaming where each player can play using both the TV and the GamePad, but it really takes the concept to it's full potential.

Nintendo Land just wasn't the game Nintendo should have been using as its "flagship" launch title for Wii U, obviously.

To me, all the stuff Nintendo did right with the Wii U is undermined by all the stuff it did wrong, as I see it, like the frustratingly limited range that means the potentially awesome ability to play it anywhere in the house isn't quite a reality for many people; the annoyingly short battery life; the limitation of only being able to use one GamePad on the system; the lack of power in the console relative to the competition and just general gamer expectations for the times; the lack of a genuine system selling flagship game at launch; the lack of analog on the triggers (which just stops it being perfectly in line with the controllers on other systems); the lack of basic media capabilities that most gamers expect; like CD/DVD/Blu-Ray playback; the slightly higher price than many people expected and wanted; the lack of third party support, which is partly directly attributable to all those other oversights...

@Kirk No doubt that Super Mario Maker on Day one would have brought much more positive attention to the Wii U.

The initial rumors led me to hope for a screen on each standard controller. Dreaming of ideas for this led to some disappointment with the one GamePad issue (and though I wanted to have at least two it became clear pretty quickly that it wasn't practical for many reasons).

We are mostly in agreement I'm just pointing out why I think the concepts in Nintendo Land weren't far off from some great launch titles. Close doesn't count in this industry, though.

(Just for clarification the Metroid Blast game in Nintendo Land doesn't expect any player to look at both screens except maybe to check on the location of another player from their viewpoint.)

@B64111980
My son loves it and I kind of enjoy it as a mindless Gauntlet-type game, but it doesn't get interesting until the Master Courses and it doesn't make very good use of the GamePad or mixing the GamePad player with the non-GamePad players, in my estimation at least.

Still, that kind of game can be fun and the bosses were pretty cool. Once the colors matter, it gets better. But what is really different in that game compared to other top-down battlers without a GamePad?

@aaronsullivan Yeah, to be totally fair, there are actually some very cool ideas in Nintendo Land. I just wish Nintendo had either went down the whole Wario Ware route, and really just made a whole bunch of really simple, quirky and fun mini-games, which didn't even try to pretend they were anything more (so people wouldn't really go in with unrealistic expectations), or they really went all out and made all the Nintendo Land games something that really would have blown people away. I mean, taking the F-Zero game for example, they really could have made that a whole lot less "casual" and gimmicky. It was basically a 5 minute throwaway time waster—and it's made even worse by the fact that fans are desperate for a proper new F-Zero game.

Personally, I think an all out Wario Ware Game (with just loads of really fun and quirky mini-games, which showed off all the cool GamePad stuff in a really carefree, nonsensical, playful and non-judgemental way) AND a couple of fully developed versions of some of those Nintendo Land games (like close to AAA quality), at launch, would have really be a great way to go, along with Super Mario Maker and Art Academy: Atelier.

It didn't necessarily have to have all those games day one but I think it needed that kind of stuff in the launch window at the very least, along with a couple of genuine system sellers out the gate.

@Kirk I'm in total agreement with you there.