Why is the Wii U not succeeding?

[Raziel]

It followed the wii. The wii became this phenomenon by drawing in non-gamers and casual gamers. But its sales were deceptive. Sure the console sold tons, but a great many of those new non gamers who bought it never bought more games. THey played wii sports or maybe one or 2 others and thats it.

And nintendo tried to chase the same crowd by making a tablet based console. But they missed the boat. That new crowd that came to the wii had already bought tablets and smart phones and had access to all the minigames they could ever want. So they aren't coming back to the wii u.

And the wii u has a hard time targeting core gamers. Its seen as an under powered gimmick console and there are few games on it. So the wii is basically something for kids and nintendo first party fans. Its got too small a base to get 3rd party ports and without them there is nothing for people who aren't nintendo fans.

 

[PedroSteckecilo]

Did you get kiddified versions of Xenoblade Chronicles,The Last Story and Pandora's Tower?

They don't count, they were localized in Europe and brought over to North America by companies other than Nintendo (Xseed for Last Story, and Pandoras Tower and Gamestop of all people for Xenoblade). My case would be Fire Emblem: Awakening got a little bit of censoring in its North American release to cut down on some more "risque" bits and maintain Nintendo of America's family friendly image.

 

[Yopaz]

No games. That's hyperbolic of course. I actually have a Wii U, and I like the games I have for it. But speaking from a former outsider, that's what prevented me from buying in earlier.

Specifically core, new, first and third party titles. Wii U has no killer app. NSMBU is nice, but I think a new 3D Mario would have done way more for the system, especially considering NSMBU is essentially retreading the same old ground from the rest of the "new 2d mario" series. A new Zelda, Metroid, Donkey Kong, etc. Those are the kind of titles that sell Nintendo systems, not minigame collections ala Nintendo Land.

Another massive problem was with the marketing. Immediately after the first trailer at E3 a problem became evident in that people didn't understand that it was even a new console. They pushed the controller so hard they forgot to sell the system itself. Now they realize that, but they should have much sooner.

And the fact that third party developers and publishers are creating a vicious cycle by being reluctant to publish titles on the system because of poor sales - when part of the reason it has bad sales is lack of third party titles.

Those are the key factors I think contribute to its slow start.

All that being said though, Wii U isn't really doing bad. It's not selling great, but you've also got to consider that they're making more money on those few sales than they would on the Wii, and are therefore in healthy financial standing: http://www.escapistmagazine.com/news/view/126475-Nintendos-First-Quarter-Shows-Rising-Profits

And considering there's a number of solid core titles on the way from Nintendo and third party devs in the future, I'd be willing to wager that the Wii U will slowly gain sales by building its library over time. The 3DS similarly had a somewhat sparse opening library, but sees greater profit now that it's had a bunch of great releases in a short time span.

I agree with most (or possibly all) of this.

I bought the console on launch and I got a bundle with Nintendo Land and Zombie U. I love both of those games and I have had great fun with them. My nest purchase was Monster Hunter 3 Ultimate which was released about 4 months later. I don't regret buying one, but I can easily see why people wouldn't tear it off the shelves.

I think we'll have to wait for Nintendo to release more games before we can determine if the Wii U will be the next DreamCast or not. It's entirely possible for the console to flop, but it's too soon to tell right now.

It will be interesting to see if they manage to get some third party support, I think that securing GTA V would at least nudge a few who were on the fence, but I suspect that the majority will buy a Wii U for the titles that are either exclusive or made by Nintendo. This is just my hypothesis though.

I also suspect that they could have done a better job marketing it. Someone mentioned that people weren't sure if it was a new controller or a new system, personally never had that problem, but I won't rule that out as a factor (changing the name could have prevented that confusion I guess). I can't say that it has seen a whole lot of marketing though.

 

[Ace Morologist]

I can't speak to or for the market, but I know why -I- haven't bought one. It's too different from what I like now and what I had growing up. My video game consoles have always been about plugging in a cartridge (later a disc), picking up a controller and engaging with the gameplay (later the story and the gameplay).

The Wii and the WiiU (both of which have awful names, I might add) strike me more as showing off the technology rather than making fun games. The effect is that the technology distracts me from what I'm supposed to be doing with it. This is the same reason I never bought a Kinect or a Move and don't intend to buy anything from the next console generation that has this technology.

So, until Nintendo (and everybody else) gets back to a console with a controller I can hold in my hands and control the goings-on on the television by pressing buttons on said controller, I won't buy a console from them.

Probably that's a bit old-fashioned and I'm just getting set in my ways. But if my feelings are widespread, that might help explain things.

--Morology!

 

[Vivi22]

There's several reasons really. Lack of games is a big one as others have stated. It may be cheap to develop for (relative to the PS4 and XBone), but you aren't going to see a lot of third party titles when they can't port games made for the other next-gen consoles, and support for the PS3 and 360 are going to start drying up soon.

There's also the fact that they built the whole experience on a gimmicky tablet controller with a number of other superfluous features. I say superfluous because no one seems to have a good idea how to use them. Even Nintendo doesn't have a real clue as to what to do with the thing. Compare that to the Wii though: as much as I think motion controls are complete shit and in that form represent a dead end as far as game control goes, it was still pretty evident how they could be used and Nintendo made damn sure to have some of the better uses on display from the get go.

But the biggest reason? The Wii built it's sales on the casual gaming crowd. In 2006 there weren't a lot of options for casual gamers. Facebook games didn't really take off for a couple of more years, it would be a full 6-7 months before the first iPhone hit the market and proved that smartphones were a viable market, and tablets were nowhere to be found. So the Wii was able to find a place with the casual gaming crowd before any of these other platforms really started to matter, and built up steam quickly in the process. Now you've got a successor console which many casual gamers don't even realize is a new console, competing with all of the platforms I mentioned above which most of them have already bought into anyway, and find a lot more convenient since they're often even simpler, and can be played while watching TV or a movie or whatever. Nintendo went from having no competition to trying to compete in one hell of a saturated market after most Wii users already moved onto newer and shinier things and it seems like they never even noticed it was happening.

 

[Callate]

Nearly everyone mentions games, and I don't doubt that's a part of it. But I think the biggest thing is that they simply haven't hit on a marketing strategy that would make the significant number of Wii owners think that they should move on to the Wii-U. It's easy to understand the appeal of swinging a controller like a baseball bat or a tennis racket or a bowling ball; it's easy to see the appeal of something like Just Dance, DDR or Rock Band, all of which seem to have done just fine on the Wii. It's harder to see the appeal of the Gamepad for that same demographic. It doesn't look like something you'd feel entirely safe handing to your six-year-old. The casual/kids/party game crowd doesn't see a lot in the Wii-U that they aren't already getting out of the Wii (that may change somewhat as new Wii releases start to dry up); the more hardcore gamers, while they might like a shot at Bayonetta 2 and probably enjoy Mario games more than they'd freely like to admit, also know that the Wii-U is going to be the least powerful hardware of this console generation.

I think the Wii-U could make advances during the holiday season if Nintendo can get a strong marketing push behind it and maybe make some back room deals with the publishers to shore up their support. But they need to do something to control the over-all miasma of dissatisfaction that surrounds it. Even their own first-party developers seem more interested in creating works for the 3DS than the Wii-U, and that's not helping at all.

 

[Ryan Hughes]

That is a difficult question. Many have brought up the lack of third-party titles for the system, but the reasons for that lack are manifold:

1) The WiiU is difficult to program for. Many of the early ports of third party titles to the system were reasonably poor, like Call of Duty and Batman. This is more to do with the fact that the WiiU is much like the PS3 in that it is a machine with design difficulties. Take the reliance on eDRAM4. This makes the machine faster, but also makes it different than PC and Xbox 360, and developers looking for a quick cash-in on their ports will take numerous short-cuts and end up with an inferior title.

2) The WiiU is a powerful machine compared to the Xbox360 and PS3, but the developer tools for third parties are lacking. Nintendo has not made many advanced development tools available to third parties until recently. This was perhaps because the firmware updates and other things took priority for Nintendo in the early moths, but it left developers with a somewhat limited toolbox.

3) Why on earth was it called the WiiU? I disliked the name of the Wii rather strongly, and I think this makes the console sound, to the layman, like an expansion of the Wii rather than its own console.

4) Third parties have used it as a whipping-boy for the state of the industry. Rayman Legends, whatever Ubisoft said, was not delayed because of poor WiiU sales, it was delayed for the exact same reasons Splinter Cell Blacklist was delayed: to bump up Ubisoft's FY2014 Q2 earnings so they did not lose money over the marketing push for Watchdogs and AC4. Basically, from calendar years April 2010-September 2013, Ubi was 90 million euros in the red. Investors were getting anxious, but they made it back with AC3 and surprisingly strong sales of Far Cry 3. However, to lose money even in a single quarter would send the wrong message to investors, they pushed back first Splinter Cell, then Rayman to cover their marketing campaigns for Watchdogs and AC4. So, the WiiU ended up being the whipping boy for Ubisoft's poor management in that case.

There are many other reasons as well, but both a difficult machine and poor circumstance are to blame. Though, remember that the 3DS started off even slower than the WiiU, and that is now one of the best game systems out there, making Nintendo money hand over fist, and having some truly great game as well. So, I am not sold that this console will be Nintendo's death knell.

 

[Quaidis]

Nintendo promised to be hardcore with the WiiU, release games for the oldschool established gamer, make things challenging, not water things down. They started out with some bad ass ports (asscreed, batman, etc), then kinda fizzled out when all third party developers went back under their rocks. Now WiiU is sitting idly in the water looking for wind. It'll be a real pity if the only wind they get is from their own air.

If game releases pick up and a few third party developers come back, if a bigger deal is made about game releases so people will drown a little in the hype (like I did with Xenoblade way back), I feel the Wii U would improve. Especially so if the games are, as they promised, bigger and better than before.

 

[The_Echo]

Why didn't the Dreamcast succeed? The PSP, the Vita? The 3DS for a short while?

Not enough games. There's nothing on the WiiU that's convincing people to buy it.

But once Mario, Zelda and especially Smash Bros. show up, expect the WiiU to sell much better.

 

[Casual Shinji]

I also suspect that they could have done a better job marketing it. Someone mentioned that people weren't sure if it was a new controller or a new system, personally never had that problem, but I won't rule that out as a factor (changing the name could have prevented that confusion I guess). I can't say that it has seen a whole lot of marketing though.

I'm sure the board members over at Nintendo would've called you crazy if you suggested to leave 'Wii' out of the name. But it seems to be biting them in the ass now. Trying to capitalize on the Wii brand has likely instead caused confusion among potential customers whether it's just the same console with a peripheral, like the Wii balance board.

They really should've gone for a totally fresh sounding name, like the Nintendo Gulf, or the Nintendo Salto or something. Just put 'Nintendo' infront of bouncy, happy word and people are bound to get a bit excited.

They also should've probably spent more time focusing on how to make HD games when they decided to make an HD console.

 

[kasperbbs]

No games. Not everyone likes Nintendo exclusive games and thats pretty much the only reason why anyone would get it right now. And it doesn't even have a passable selection of those. I'm pretty sure that the launch of next gen consoles and the uselessness of it's new gimmicky controller had a part in it too.

 

[BarkBarker]

The fact they didn't make enough of a statement to show that it was a new console not just a gamepad, which I thought was rather obvious but many were confused so there you go, a lack of content to justify the price, I'll buy a console with games that look promising, I bought a 3DS for that very reason, but when I look at the Wii U pricetag, then the games coming out, I don't want to have a paperweight for a year, and of course how they went into it without a damn game plan, they literally had NOTHING in stock for us when they showed us it, tech demos and a few okay launch titles, do I look like I'll buy into your "core gamer" console when you do nothing but ports and meh games? Yeaaaaaah no Nintendo, take this shovel, dig your head out your ass and face facts: You gave us air with the promise of....what exactly? What do I get from this console.....so yeah the console is very much a face with no one behind it, is isn't succeeding because there isn't much beyond the front of it.

 

[Dragonbums]

The WiiU is failing because Nintendo are competing with themselves.
They are losing and winning at their own game.

On the one hand, the 3DS is really picking up.
On the other hand, they made the 3DS so good that Nintendo fans have no reason to get a WiiU.

 

[anthony87]

I'd say it's because of a lack of must have games combined with poor marketing.

Now....where's Jeffers?

 

[masticina]

Because Nintendo

The Wii printed money for them so much that even the huge amount of utter shovelware was not seeing as damaging the brand. When the list of good Wii games began to dry up the last 2 wii years well they began to question about shovelware.

The WiiU came out with very little reason to own one. Zombies? Right.. oh and there is that Call of Duty game that actually is good. Except better on the other consoles. I mean Call of Duty on the WiiU aint bad. But really the problem is indeed games.

It seems as if Nintendo lost the magic touch. Games for children are fun and a great time yeah but gamers want more. And the mother/father/grandpa's kinda stopped after their Wii's became dust collectors. Yeah I mean it I bought my Wii second hand of a family that OBVIOUSLY simply stopped playing. Of course they only owned Wii Sports so there you go.

So even though the Wii was a money maker the seed already was there. How many times haven't we here had developers saying "No we are not making a Nintendo version" pointing at sales numbers. And they are right.

So this drought is their own fault. yes this year and next we get a few games direct from Nintendo. Will it save the WiiU? In part I hope so, the PS4 and the Xbox One are so equal that the idea of the WiiU does matters.

 

[PedroSteckecilo]

I still don't trust Nintendo because of Nintendo of America's unwillingness to release Xenoblade, Last Story and Pandora's Tower.

Given how poorly a lot of hardcore games(god I hate using that term)sold on Wii can you blame them for being hesitant to release 3 hardcore japanese games so late in the Wii's life?For all the talk of the Operation Rainfall crowd those 3 titles only shifted about 600,000 copies combined in North America so maybe it wasn't such a silly idea in the first place

On top of that I worry that we'll get dull 4kidsized versions of titles like Shin Megami Tensei X Fire Emblem because Nintendo of America is so focused on being 100% Family Friendly...

Did you get kiddified versions of Xenoblade Chronicles,The Last Story and Pandora's Tower?

What about Shin Megami Tensei IV? I don't see much in that game for kiddies...

As far as I can tell the North American Version of Shin Megami Tensei 4 was published by Atlus USA who has always been faithful with the products they've brought over. Besides, Shin Megami Tensei 4 hardly fits Nintendo Of America's "MUST BE A MILLION SELLER TO LOCALIZE!!" mandate... hell I'm surprised we got Fire Emblem Awakening out of them...

EDIT: For those of you in Europe, Nintendo of Europe seems to have a smaller market than Nintendo of America anyway, so they don't seem as aggressive when it comes to the "MUST BE SUPER PROFITABLE" mindset. Also they don't seem as ultra-terrified of losing their 100% family friendly image.

 

[Evonisia]

It's name might be an issue, doesn't really sound that different from the Wii but it is (as opposed to say the Xbox 360 is what people refer to when they say 'Xbox'), so people might be mistaken.

The controller is horrible, really it's literally the only reason I don't want to get a Wii U, especially because I wasn't a fan of the Wii's handheld motion controls either.

There aren't many games out for it that people want to buy. Despite the fact that it can play Wii games there's not a lot of reason to buy it when the Wii is more popular and has the larger library. Maybe when Zelda, Metroid or another popular franchise (like Bayonetta 2 which is generating some buzz) releases an installment on it it'll get sales.

 

[Ratties]

My wii is essentially a $200 netflix machine. The game I played the most on my Wii was Wii sports. Why would I invest in a new system when the old was essentially a party gimmick? So in my case, I'm not buying one because I dont see what it does better than the Wii, which I didnt like that much in the first place.

Here is all the games that I own on the supposed Netflix machine you are talking about.

Super Mario Galaxy 1 and 2.
Super Smash Bros Brawl.
Xenoblade Chronicles
Rayman Origins
Donkey Kong Country Returns
The Legend of Zelda: Skyward Sword
Metroid Prime 3: Corruption
Punch-Out!!
Tatsunoko vs. Capcom: Ultimate All-Stars
No More Heroes 2: Desperate Struggle
New Super Mario Bros. Wii
Kirby's Epic Yarn
Boom Blox
Zack & Wiki: Quest for Barbaros' Treasure
Little King's Story
Super Paper Mario
Madworld
Sin & Punishment: Star Successor
Phantom Brave
Goldeneye James Bond 007
No More Heroes
Trauma Team
Muramasa: The Demon Blade
Monster Hunter
A Boy and His Blob
Sakura Wars: So Long, My Love
Rune Factory: Tides of Destiny
Rune Factory Frontier
The Last Story
Klonoa
De Blob 1 and 2.
Metroid: Other M
Mario Kart Wii
Harvest Moon: Animal Parade
Geometry Wars: Galaxies

 

[eBusiness]

All that being said though, Wii U isn't really doing bad. It's not selling great, but you've also got to consider that they're making more money on those few sales than they would on the Wii, and are therefore in healthy financial standing: http://www.escapistmagazine.com/news/view/126475-Nintendos-First-Quarter-Shows-Rising-Profits

I think you got that backwards. With tablet controller and blu-ray drive there is no way Wii U consoles can do better than breaking even. The 3DS consoles on the other hand probably make a decent margin, but it is still the games that make the biggest load. On top of that, while they are not selling a lot of Wii consoles there is still a strong market for Wii games.

As for the future, if Nintendo get their games together of course the Wii U will sell, but I don't see the production price dropping fast, the screen and battery of the tablet are components that don't drop production cost nearly as fast as computer chips, and the chips of the console are already so small that there is hardly anything gain left to be made. Compare that to the PlayStation 4 which has a lot more of its cost bound in chips, in 5 years time after a couple of die shrinks those chips are going to be pretty inexpensive to make, leaving Sony very little in the way of shipping some very cheap consoles, the Wii U on the other hand will still need its tablet.

the Tablet Controller is more weird than inspiring

The diagnosis probably doesn't get more concise than that, developers and consumers alike think: "What are we supposed to do with that?"

 

[Iron Gix]

i think it's games mostly,that seems to be the biggest issue i hear from other people, but a big line up of games are coming soon so i believe after xmas time and earlier 2014 the WiiU will pick up hugh amount of sales