Version 3.0
Member
True. It sure is weird that anyone would specifically set out to make a modern console that's efficient but not powerful, though, which seems to be what Nintendo did. They're so crazy.
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NPD January 2013 Sales Results [Up7: Wii U 57K (CNET), Vita ~35K, PS3 201K]
- Thread starter Nirolak
- Start date
True. It sure is weird that anyone would specifically set out to make a modern console that's efficient but not powerful, though, which seems to be what Nintendo did. They're so crazy.
Thunder Monkey
Banned
At this point I'd say batshit.
Pinning their home console future on a trite and tried idea, with no sense of wonder seems like a costly mistake. I mean they literally left behind everything that made Wii an explosive success. To attract... no one.
pieatorium
Member
I think a home console thats basically a big DS (as far as input/gameplay) might have been been a good idea back at the start of this gen when the DS itself was fairly new (i don't think it would have been anywhere near as good an idea as the Wii's motion controlls).
But now we are passed the DS successor and the smartphone/tablet boom it doesn't seem to have that draw too make people give it a look.
Pachterballs
Banned
WiiU is old tech. Stop trying to convince yourself it's anything but.
And yes, ps3 n x360 also old.
And yes, ps3 n x360 also old.
Ninja Scooter
Member
It's amazing that you still have people in denial about the impact mobile and tablet gaming are having on traditional gaming, especially in the handheld sector.
Dave Meltzer
Banned
So enlighten me. Why do Wii U games look at as good as games from consoles 7 years ago? Do you think there's going to magically be some turn around in the next year where Wii U doesn't look current gen?
Gahiggidy
My aunt & uncle run a Mom & Pop store, "The Gamecube Hut", and sold 80k WiiU within minutes of opening.
.
Ko Shiota
Nintendo IRD
From the point of view of design, we didn't just simply apply the latest technology to improve performance. We decreased power consumption and made the casing smaller, so I think this console achieves a good balance between performance, power and chip size.
The casual audience moved on to android and idevices while the hardcore gamers stayed with MS and Sony. Nintendo didn't do much to cultivate a hardcore base beyond pure Nintendo fans. Now Nintendo has no one left except the hardcore Nintendo fan.
Version 3.0
Member
Good quote, Gahiggidy. Clearly the general population doesn't care about their technical achievement there. No one is buying it because it has a low power draw or a small form factor. I think they'd have been better served - in both publisher support and early adopter interest (which feed off each other, of course) - with a more powerful piece, even a total power hog at twice the size.
It is useful though... for people that held out for a tablet (like me, lol). I can put games on my tablet and tablet stuff on my TV (in theory, so far it's only Streetview, oh and of course internet browsing) They're pretty late with this concept, though. Too late, I might say.
Gahiggidy
My aunt & uncle run a Mom & Pop store, "The Gamecube Hut", and sold 80k WiiU within minutes of opening.
Is that possible without raising the cost of production?
Version 3.0
Member
It's simple: the tech is not 7 years old. The power level is. Modern tech, low power. It's nothing for anyone to split hairs over, though. The result is the same: games that look like 360/PS3 games and lack of excitement in the development community.
Gahiggidy
My aunt & uncle run a Mom & Pop store, "The Gamecube Hut", and sold 80k WiiU within minutes of opening.
What's to stop Nintendo from dramatically raising the clock rates on new Wii U models, with bulkier case to boot, and sending kits out to repair shops to modify units owned by early adopters?
A Human Becoming
More than a Member
I'm not sure what you mean. Are you saying that the single touch is more sensitive than multitouch? If you can please use smartphones and the Vita touchscreen for comparison.
Thunder Monkey
Banned
This next generation of videogaming is going to be interesting. Gaming is almost always evolving as it is... but now you've also got another completely viable market to sell to. And this market exclusively uses "nontraditional" inputs.
I love it. The entire thing is hilarious. Touch and motion are integral input devices for the single largest growing sector of videogaming. While console gaming development is becoming this monstrous investment, a new area of cheap development is taking hold.
It makes me laugh, but look at the iOS market. Give it ten years to flourish and you've got the new face of gaming. I mean so far it has seen consistent growth, with no sign of tapering. Sooner or later someone is going to get an involved control scheme right, and from there it's validity in the eyes of the "core" will be assured. Finally eating into that last bastion of "traditional" gaming.
But in ten years hopefully we'll have very consistent streaming speeds on our phones completely equalizing console and handheld in all visual and technical ways.
Version 3.0
Member
Obviously we can't answer that question. At a blind guess, I'd say it might be, or close, if they were willing to give up backward compatibility, which seems to have been a high priority.
But a better question is, which scenario results in profitability sooner? A less expensive box that doesn't sell, or a more expensive box that does? Obviously Nintendo didn't plan for the Wii U to sell poorly, but they certainly should have been able to gauge developer interest, at the very least. It was an area they and everyone else knew they needed to improve upon, and it's gone in the opposite direction.
Is this a serious question?
Sorry, English is not my native language, I should have said accuracy. Resistive touchscreens have pixel accuracy, capacitive multi-touch screens like in smartphones are less accurate and you can't use your fingernails, making handwriting more difficult. You'd have at least use a special stylus that is compatible with multi-touch screens, but you still wouldn't reach pixel-accuracy. Some artists on Miiverse are doing insane things with that, I can hardly think how in the world they're able to do stuff like this.
It is all the more baffling because so many here seem to think 3DS is doing good. They look at those japanese sale threads and assume it is the case elsewhere. It is doing downright bad in the west.
You haven't seen the kinds of things people are able to do on capacitive tablets have you?
and you can't even count on all the hardcore nintendo fans since nintendo burned a lot of them last gen.
No.
Care to share some examples? Either way, drawing pixel art without zooming seems pretty impossible to me, on any input device, but somehow they manage to do it (or are masochistic enough).No.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XukX46i0zG0
On my phone, but there are hundreds of examples out there.
This one is decent. But I've seen better.
I thought it would be something like that, using drawing tools and sophisticated brushes. Kind of a different world, of course you won't need pixel accuracy on these.
A Human Becoming
More than a Member
This confirms my beliefs Cosmozone was underestimating the capabilities of multi-touch. I really think Nintendo was just cutting corners to save money; that have a longggggggggg history of it, all the way back to the NES.
Just like you don't need pixel accuracy for something like Miiverse to function.
Of course, just not as comfortable and in the current form, as I've said.
Heh, I'm fully aware of that. The resolution of the gamepad is also relatively low. You'd want to have at least a decisively higher resolution/size and a made-fore stylus to warrant the relative small multi-touch advantage.
No. Guessing you're just getting stuff mixed up or something. DS launched at $150. 3DS is still $170 for the original model.
DS dropped to $130 in August 2005 just prior to Nintendogs. DS did not take off at that point, but it brought it back to respectability and matching PSP each month. DSLite stayed at $130. It was hailed as a great move at the time to sell the system, and that sentiment was correct. In Japan, the price kept going up, though.
Edit:
Mostly already covered, but the first DS price drop was in August 2005 prior to Nintendogs and not in the Fall.
That thing is so customised to get it as powerful as it is with low power consumption that I imagine it's not that cheap to be honest. Even Chipworks thinks the MCM would be pretty damned expensive.
I mean they have a console that's a little better than current gen, and are losing money at either $300 or $350 (They didn't clarify). So it's not exactly "cheap" when you add it up.
PhoenixDark
Banned
The odd thing is that Nintendo's catalog certainly lends itself to the creation of cheap downloadable impulse purchases, but they are focused on big handheld titles (that don't drive hardware sales). They can't beat Apple, but I'd imagine a cheaper 3DS that you could buy nearly every NES/SNES game on would do very well; plus they could let Miyamoto and others create new titles for it.
Ultimately I think Nintendo is fucked in the console and handheld market. The WiiU seems like it'll be a laughing stock for years to come (barring some miracle turnaround), and the 3DS will continue to decline in the US until Pokemon hits.
Duckhuntdog
Member
What were the 3DS's sales in January of last year. I searched the thread for them and couldn't find a number.
metalslimer
Member
The problem is that Nintendo doesn't want to seem to build an ecosystem. This definitely comes from the toy part of their company DNA, but in the current era platforms should be connected to each other in a meaningful way. If 3DS owners in the US knew they could transfer and play their VC games onto the Wii U and onto the gamepad people would begin to feel a need to buy into Nintendo's digital marketplace and soon enough people woudn't want to leave behind the 100s dollars they spent across that ecosystem. Of course as I say this Sony and MS seem to be preparing to release consoles that destroy that ecosystem they were bulding with the lack of BC.
~175k
http://www.neogaf.com/forum/showthread.php?t=462606
December Mario kart release & 4 weeks figure vs November Paper Mario release & 5 weeks figure.
Psycho_Mantis
Banned
Not bad. PS3 holding up. May even get better due to the exclusives that are coming.
Does that article cover anything else worthy of translating? Its like 5 pages.
If anyone is around and wants to help, I'm looking for solid, recent answers to these questions:
- Most recent LTD sales for GTA: San Andreas in the U.S. I've got a reference putting it at over 9 million, including PC sales.
- Most recent LTD sales for Halo 2 in the U.S. I've got a reference putting it around 6.6 million, including PC sales.
- Most recent LTD sales for Wii Play, Mario Kart Wii, Wii Fit, and NSMB Wii in the U.S.
- Most recent GTA4 sales in the U.S. I have the figure for Xbox 360 and PS3 in its first year.
Aquamarine
Member
Well, it's going to be discontinued in a couple of fiscal years if it continues at 50K a month.
velvet_nitemare
Member
What does this even mean? Who gives a crap about the case design?
It doesn't have games that non-nintendo gamers want and lacks thde hook of better graphics to bring them in early.
If you're talking about all enthusiast gamers as a whole, it's the specs. If you're talking about core Nintendo gamers, it's the games.
The console design has almost zero bearing in reality.
BEST-SELLING US GAME SOFTWARE: JAN. 2000-AUG. 2009
RANK / TITLE (YEAR) / PLATFORM(S) / UNIT SALES
1 / Wii Play with Remote (2006) / Wii / 11.1 million
2 / Guitar Hero III: Legends of Rock (2007) / PS2, PS3, Wii, Xbox 360 / 10.3 million
3 / Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas (2004) / PS2, Xbox/ 9.8 million
4 / Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare (2007) / DS, PS3, Xbox 360 / 8.5 million
5 / Wii Fit with Balance Board (2008) / Wii / 7.9 million
6 / Madden NFL 07 (2006) / GC, GBA, PSP, PS2, PS3, Wii, Xbox, Xbox 360
7/ Grand Theft Auto: Vice City (2002) / PS2, Xbox
8 / Madden NFL 08 (2007) / GC, PSP, PS2, PS3, Wii, Xbox, Xbox 360,
9 / Call of Duty: World at War (2008) / DS, PS3, Xbox 360, Wii
10 / Halo 2 (2004) / Xbox
http://www.gamespot.com/news/wii-play-guitar-hero-iii-top-games-of-2000sso-far-6233163
---
Does it help?
Dragon1893
Member
PS3 is doing well and considering that sony released a cheaper to produce model without a price drop must give them a decent profit margin.
As for the console market, the PS2 sold around 150 million units which is roughly what the PS3 and 360 sold combined, meaning that's the size of the market for home consoles give or take. The wii was an anomaly caused by casuals entering the market but they moved on to mobile and aren't coming back. Those 150 million who have been buying a home console for the past generations aren't going anywhere though and that's the pie console manufacturers will have to fight over. A console doesn't need to sell PS2 or wii numbers to be viable and fierce competition like we've seen this gen is good for the consumer.
The wii U is in a tough position, sales sure as hell wont get any better after the PS4 and durango are released.
As for the console market, the PS2 sold around 150 million units which is roughly what the PS3 and 360 sold combined, meaning that's the size of the market for home consoles give or take. The wii was an anomaly caused by casuals entering the market but they moved on to mobile and aren't coming back. Those 150 million who have been buying a home console for the past generations aren't going anywhere though and that's the pie console manufacturers will have to fight over. A console doesn't need to sell PS2 or wii numbers to be viable and fierce competition like we've seen this gen is good for the consumer.
The wii U is in a tough position, sales sure as hell wont get any better after the PS4 and durango are released.
Not discounting it at all, but that does include PC sales AND I imagine quite a few people bought it for their Xbox 360. Still an amazing feat.
pieatorium
Member
It will be way lower than 57k just from being a 4 week reporting period vs 5 week.
Not sure Digital is included in that figure, it's NPD, they don't include that kinda thing.
But yeah PC as well.
Feb is traditionally higher than Jan, due to the Tax thing the US has. Being down a week though it might end up being even with Jan.
bigtroyjon
Member
Holy shit, Guitar Hero III did that much? Mind is blown beyond belief right now. No wonder the genre got milked the way it did.
Graphics Horse
Member
The thing's not been out long, so the slump in interest may still be ongoing... I wouldn't want to guess but I bet the weekly sales were higher at the start of Jan than the end of Jan.