Nintendo Switch 2: Thread 01

[Nu-Eclipse]

I honestly think that's pretty uncharitable to Nintendo. I think they've done some amazing work with their hardware design over the years which has helped uplift and shape the whole industry.

I'm glad we have them in the mix making interesting toys when the rest of the console race has descended into framerate/resolution/ray tracing hell (*cough* PS5 Pro *cough*), and I love when those toys sell gangbusters!

Unpopular opinion alert: I'd love Switch 2 to have at least one very wacky quirk.

It's not uncharitable at all. Businesses make bank by any means necessary - name of the game, and I'll remind you that we're talking about Nintendo who historically spend way less on R&D than Sony, Sega and MS ever did so it isn't like they push the needle that much with their hardware. A repurposed Nvidia Shield is about to become their best ever selling console!

It's ironic that they've recently come out said that R&D is more expensive, pretty much them foreshadowing a more expensive follow-up to Switch.

[wakka]

According to this page it's about half that:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_best-selling_Wii_U_video_games

I quickly added up the top 20, which are pretty much all first party, and it's about ~65m.

Still pretty bonkers considering they only sold about 13m machines.

[Nu-Eclipse]

...Also, I don't necessarily agree with what Sony is doing with PS5 Pro but I have to say that the whole "power doesn't matter" argument is so utterly disingenuous. Powerful graphics obviously aren't all that matter but then why do people want Switch 2? Why are we not still playing on the Commodore 64 and NES??

[wakka]

I stand by what I said. They are not great with gimmicks at all. You could argue that they fluked incredibly with the Wii and DS era considering the sh1tshow that WiiU was and given how the 3DS significantly struggled early on.

Eh, agree to disagree then. If their successes so far have been down to luck, I must get Miyamoto to pick my Euromillions numbers for me 😁

[Nu-Eclipse]

Eh, agree to disagree then. If their successes so far have been down to luck, I must get Miyamoto to pick my Euromillions numbers for me 😁

Given how Nintendo functions these days, It'll probably be Yoshiaki Koizumi & Kenta Motokura actually picking your numbers and Miyamoto-san & Tezuka-san exec producing the lottery pick!

(LOL. Now I'm being harsh. But I couldn't resist! )

[Nu-Eclipse]

According to this page it's about half that:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_best-selling_Wii_U_video_games

I quickly added up the top 20, which are pretty much all first party, and it's about ~65m.

Still pretty bonkers considering they only sold about 13m machines.

How much money did those software sales make? Genuine question, I CBA to look.

[wakka]

No idea. A pretty substantial amount I would think but it's the re-releases on Switch that will have raked in the big money, since development costs for those will have been basically negligible.

[Nu-Eclipse]

Didn't they sell something like 130M first-party WiiU titles from 2012-2016, not including digital? Those numbers are crap compared to the Switch of course, but I can't think of a single publisher that wouldn't sacrifice their first-born for those kind of sales. The hardware certainly flopped hard, but the games didn't.

How much money did they make on those software sales?

I'm pretty sure that a lot of that was given away. It's hard to money-spin games for a system that nobody really wanted to buy. The numbers sold might look good but I'm not convinced that they made that much money out of them and certainly not enough to offset what they would've surely lost developing WiiU hardware to begin with.

[fishbowlhead]

According to this page it's about half that:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_best-selling_Wii_U_video_games

I quickly added up the top 20, which are pretty much all first party, and it's about ~65m.

Still pretty bonkers considering they only sold about 13m machines.

What’s amazing is MarioKart8 has now sold more copies on Switch than all of Nintendo 1st party sales on WiiU combined. Absolutely crazy numbers for a port.

[fishbowlhead]

How much money did those software sales make? Genuine question, I CBA to look.

I know the WiiU made a profit overall, not like their other consoles but it still broke into profit after being perceived as a dismal failure.

[Nu-Eclipse]

I know the WiiU made a profit overall, not like their other consoles but it still broke into profit after being perceived as a dismal failure.

I don't believe that it did make a profit. Sorry, I don't. Break-even at best and that's disbelief-suspension levels of being kind.

3DS and Amiibo were the money generators for Nintendo that generation.

[Neon Ignition]

The WiiU is an incredibly interesting system. Much like the Switch, I often used the Pro Controller so it was much easier to digest traditionally and also more enjoyable as a result. However, the really interesting element is that it was a brutal lesson for Nintendo that their flagship franchises can't sell a system. Similar to the GameCube, it's super low price point was amazing but a low price point also couldn't keep the wheels on the wagon. Instead Nintendo does well with a fine balance between the two, it's one of the reasons I expect Switch 2 to cost more than the OLED but not necessarily much more.

With Nintendo's gimmick focus, they've certainly paid off at times but the WiiU alone shows the risks involved. The Wii and DS were strong performers in part because of the appeal they offered to those who normally don't show much interest in gaming thanks to the novelty, but trying that trick is so unreliable that it was playing with fire to try it repeatedly. The 3DS managed to break free of its woes but largely due to abandoning that novelty element, Nintendo never even tried with the WiiU and it paid a heavy price as a result.

Purely personal preference - I'm fine with the lack of gimmick. Wii and DS were, not bad but for me the weakest hours of Nintendo.

When it comes to hunger for more powerful systems, I don't think it matters to the majority of gamers at this point. These days we hear a lot online about the fragile state of Switch sales 8 years into its life but really its hyperbolic talk from a core that has been thirsty for a more powerful iteration since the system barely passed two years old. The Switch is on course to sell more this year than there's a good chance PS5 Pro will over its lifetime. It's sales last year are only 3-4m behind that of PS5 as well, a staggering figure for the age of the system. If Nintendo were to hold off until Switch was actually selling in low volumes, Switch 2 would get long grassed by years. Like PlayStation (and a detail MS seemed to miss), it's amazing how much weight the incremental increase of the number at the end of the consoles name has.

Like I imagine most, I'm interested in seeing Switch 2 but mostly because it's shiny new. If they said they were holding off for two more years I wouldn't be bothered at all, the Switch is holding up just fine in the meantime. I'd not be surprised if Switch 2 goes the full decade without a successor at the rate of things, those noisy clamourers of Pro's and the likes I think are going to be sorely disappointed by the Switch 2 post-launch and how long Nintendo rides that train for.

[Neon Ignition]

http://www.nintendo.co.jp/ir/en/library/events/140508qa/index.html

I did a thing!
Found this link, if the translation holds true - Nintendo manufactured WiiU to not make a loss. However, that calculation was based on the system selling a pre-determined figure which it failed to do in most years so software revenue had to make up the gap.

[hudson]

What you reckon? Monster Hunter Wilds to be a launch title on Switch 2?

[wakka]

http://www.nintendo.co.jp/ir/en/libr...8qa/index.html
I did a thing!
Found this link, if the translation holds true - Nintendo manufactured WiiU to not make a loss. However, that calculation was based on the system selling a pre-determined figure which it failed to do in most years so software revenue had to make up the gap.

That makes complete sense. 65 million first party software sales will have been highly profitable and will have balanced out that there's really no way to make money from a games console that only does ~13m units, unless your per-unit profit on each machine is absolutely massive. R&D and marketing will still have killed you on the hardware P&L.

The Wii and DS were strong performers in part because of the appeal they offered to those who normally don't show much interest in gaming thanks to the novelty, but trying that trick is so unreliable that it was playing with fire to try it repeatedly.

The thing is, they did try that trick repeatedly, and every time they tried it it worked - since the Gamecube, three of the five major consoles Nintendo have released have offered a radically new design unlike anything else in the market place. They were all smash hits. Two instead offered updated versions of previous models and did comparatively and very poorly respectively.

I just don't buy this idea that Nintendo need to stick to the straight-laced PSBox design playbook to find success. I don't think there's any evidence for it. Their hardware business would have died out back in the 2000s if they'd done that.