Anybody excited yet? Full disclosure: I work at Nintendo, but you can certainly post negative opinions too. I'm not researching public opinion or anything, I translate technical documents, but I am interested in the public perception of the Wii U.
My wife is a casual gamer, and we're really looking forward to Nintendo Land, Rayman Legends, Epic Mickey 2 (I think this is for Wii), and probably New Super Mario Bros. U, all of them look to have fun multiplayer experiences, especially Nintendo Land.
I'd like to play more "AAA" games, and Assassin's Creed III at least will be coming out relatively close to the other systems, but I can't imagine Batman and Mass Effect will sell very much, since they have been out so long on other systems. I doubt there are many people in my position of wanting to play those games but only owning a Wii.
Anyway, what do you think of the console, any games you're looking forward to?
New super smash, whenever it comes out. It will probably be one of two reasons I get the Wii U, that and any new Zelda games which haven't been announced yet I think
For launch titles, I'm looking at Zombi U and AC3, but I can get AC3 on PS3 so I don't know if I should even bother. Another thing to consider is that all AC games drop in price, so I can just wait for it to go down instead of paying $60 for it.
The lack of discussion regarding the Wii U is an indicator of how Nintendo has plummeted, unfortunately. This console is launching in several days and it's complete silence. At the same time, digital media is on the verge of overtaking physical media as reported by the latest NPD report.
Despite the lack of perceived enthusiasm from the gaming community. it is already expected that there will be a shortage of Wii Us from Nintendo. It will be interesting to see how this console fares.
I'm already waiting for Pikmin 3 and the new Monster Hunter 3 Ultimate. They haven't released a ton that I'm interested with just yet, but I'm willing to give them the benefit of the doubt. Nintendo hasn't steered me wrong so far, and I say that as a 3ds owner that bought it at $250.
I'm curious as to the shortage. I haven't heard a reason for that yet.
"Restriction breeds creativity." - Sheldon Menery on EDH / Commander in Magic: The Gathering
"Cancel Culture is the real reason why everyone's not allowed to have nice things anymore." - Anonymous
"For what will it profit a man if he gains the whole world, and loses his own soul?" - Mark 8:36
"Most men and women will grow up to love their servitude and will never dream of revolution." - Aldous Huxley, Brave New World
"Every life decision is always a risk / reward proposition." - Sanjay Gupta
And exactly what is the point of saying that the Wii U will fail before it is released?
You know what people didn't take seriously before it was released? The Wii. Guess what?
You don't know. Nobody knows. No one has a clue how the Wii U will perform in the market. So let's stop pretending anybody does and actually wait for the data.
I fully intend to get one within the next few months.
The only reason I'm not getting one right now is that with it being the last month of classes, it would be a bad idea for me to get a gigantic new distraction.
If I wasn't in school, I would've pre-ordered one though. Just the promise of Smash Bros, Zelda, Metroid, Mario Kart, etc. (I'm a sucker for Nintendo franchises) means there's no way I'm not getting one some time in the next year or two, and the games coming out now or in a few months are good enough that I'd rather play them sooner than later. So might as well get it now.
But honestly, since I'll only have a short period at the beginning of spring semester and then the summer available for some serious gaming, I'm more worried about what will be out by then. New Super Mario Bros. Wii U and another game or two (whether physical or eShop) should be enough to keep me busy for January, after which I'll have to get back to work anyway. But I understand if you have plenty of free time and you can devote hours a day to gaming, you would be less satisfied with the lineup than I will be.
All his 'article' basically says is "Hardcores determine the market" which the Wii itself proved completely false - and the Wii U is actually trying to make inroads back to the hardcore market again.
Yes, right now for a hardcore gamer like myself the titles it has look too weak for my tastes yet - but then again, there hasn't been a console that really drew me in as a "must have" for 6-9 months in with the exception of the 3DS (mainly for the RE title that was badass)
Launches are over-hyped with regards to their importance.
People are talking about the 3DS being a bad launch - and yes, it had its problems. The need for a price cut was a big stumble. But people forget that the DS didn't have a stellar launch, yet it went on to be one of the best selling pieces of gaming hardware of all time. In fact, the 3DS's first year sales were twice as many units as the DS's first year.
The Wii didn't have any killer next gen games at launch (Twilight Princess was awesome, of course, but it was really a GameCube title with some improvements and changed controls). Overall, I think the Wii U launch lineup is actually relatively strong - it just lacks the killer app of a Super Mario 64, Smash Bros Melee* or Twilight Princess that they had for the N64, NGC and Wii. Or the quality of marketing that Wii Sports provided (my impression is that Nintendo Land is actually a better game than Wii Sports, but not as easy to market due to the asymmetrical gameplay being harder to depict in a short commercial).
New Super Mario Bros U and Nintendo Land plus a number of quality 3rd party releases (and sure, hardcore gamers will already have several of them, but I wouldn't dismiss them as irrelevant) makes it actually a pretty good launch lineup overall.
I will say that I'm not excited for the 2013 lineup yet - they need to announce something big, and it probably would've been helpful to them to announce something big, even if they couldn't give a specific release date.
*Actually came out a couple weeks later in the US, but same difference if you ask me.
Well what's telling to me is that resonance said the Wii U wasn't going to do well in the same post he said the Wii U had completely sold out.
Again, we won't know for like 3 years exactly how well the Wii U is going to do. Give it time.
I agree with erimir that the Wii U has an unusually good set of games at launch date. Usually you have to wait until Christmas for things to kick in. It helps that the Wii U is not competing against anything right now. Microsoft and Sony will take a while to enter something else into this new console generation. Plenty of time for the Wii U to get people on its bandwagon.
The launch set is better than recent consoles for sure - but looking back to the PS1 era consoles were launching with 30 games with a few being super-hyped - it's got two that are super hyped ATM with like 15?
Better than PS3 and X360 with like 6-10 games at launch by far though. (Assuming my memory is serving right)
Well what's telling to me is that resonance said the Wii U wasn't going to do well in the same post he said the Wii U had completely sold out.
It's from a combination of scalper demand and limited manufacturing capacity. Hahaha... (The Surface sold out and a number of Lumia 920 colors and no one is vouching for their "success".)
Based on anecdotes from Slickdeals, supply is not as short as anticipated by Bloomberg, however. Wii U started off $550 on Ebay and price is declining. (Prices historically fall from launch.) Some scalpers are now intending to return their consoles. Some blame the lack of advertising on the part of Nintendo.
P.S. The base model is a lot less popular than the deluxe.
The launch set is better than recent consoles for sure - but looking back to the PS1 era consoles were launching with 30 games with a few being super-hyped - it's got two that are super hyped ATM with like 15?
Maybe you're talking about PS2?
PS1 and Saturn both released in the US in 1995. PS1 with about 11 games, Saturn with 5. Saturn had Panzer Dragoon and Virtua Fighter, PS1 mainly had Rayman, Ridge Racer and a few sports games. Some of the killer games that we remember for the PS1 (FF7, Gran Turismo) didn't come out until 1997 and 1998. Even Crash Bandicoot didn't come out for several months.
N64 followed in 1996 with a grand total of 2 games (Super Mario 64 and Pilotwings 64). A few other good games followed before Christmas (notably, Mario Kart 64).
PS1 era consoles had worse launch lineups than the Wii U, across the board. The only thing is that Super Mario 64 was such a strong title that a lot of people just had to have it. I have to admit, the first time I played Mario 64 it was magical - in a way that none of the 3D games on the PS1 at the time were (I had played Crash Bandicoot... but its on-rails approach to 3D was blown out of the water by SM64). And the whole game was amazingly good.
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The PS2 generation, on the other hand, had much larger launch libraries.
Dreamcast: 19 games, including Sonic Adventure, Soulcalibur, Mortal Kombat and some others.
PS2: 29 games, including Dead or Alive, SSX (meh, 1080 was better), Street Fighter, Tekken, some racing, sports, other fighting games, etc. It was a pretty broad lineup, but looking over it, none of them are games I wanted when I finally got my PS2 later on. By contrast, I would've said to get Super Mario 64 if you have an N64, no matter when you bought it. I'd say that the PS2 had a broad lineup but no truly amazing games in the batch.
GameCube: 13 games, including Wave Race, Luigi's Mansion, Star Wars Rogue Squadron 2, Crazy Taxi, some sports games (like Tony Hawk 3). GameCube's best seller, Super Smash Bros Melee followed very soon thereafter. Looking at it, I'm surprised at how strong the GameCube launch lineup was.
Xbox: 14 games, including Halo, Oddworld, Dead or Alive, Jet Set Radio, Tony Hawk, a couple racing, sports. Pretty strong launch lineup.
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Wii U launch has 22 games, including Nintendo Land, New Super Mario Bros U, Epic Mickey 2, Ninja Gaiden 3 (might as well be a new game, given how much improvement it has over the 360+PS3 versions), Scribblenauts Unlimited and some ports of big name games that have been out for a little while. It has FPS, sports, fighting, survival-horror, action/adventure represented.
Maybe there's nothing must-have for a hardcore gamer who had to buy those 3rd party games on other consoles earlier, but it's at worst middle of the pack compared to some previous launch lineups.
I think that the WiiU will be a solid console, but will need time to gain traction. It's got a good launch lineup in my opinion, and I think the Big N will have a solid pool of exclusive games for it in the future. The difference with this console is that it's getting much needed 3rd party support. That alone will help push it towards the hard core market.
P.S. The base model is a lot less popular than the deluxe.
Is this supposed to be shocking news?
Forbes projects the Wii U as selling 3.5 million units this year, which is actually ahead of the 3.1 million the Wii sold in its first year. Not bad for a month and a half.
I don't know if anyone has official sales numbers so far.
Yea, think I was thinking PS2 - I started in consoles in the middle of PS1's life-cycle (was PC exclusive before then - besides hanging out at friends).
I was just trying to think of the only reasonable theorizing the guy did - was just comparing against past killer launches, not anything particularly recent.
My wife is a casual gamer, and we're really looking forward to Nintendo Land, Rayman Legends, Epic Mickey 2 (I think this is for Wii), and probably New Super Mario Bros. U, all of them look to have fun multiplayer experiences, especially Nintendo Land.
I'd like to play more "AAA" games, and Assassin's Creed III at least will be coming out relatively close to the other systems, but I can't imagine Batman and Mass Effect will sell very much, since they have been out so long on other systems. I doubt there are many people in my position of wanting to play those games but only owning a Wii.
Anyway, what do you think of the console, any games you're looking forward to?
Despite the lack of perceived enthusiasm from the gaming community. it is already expected that there will be a shortage of Wii Us from Nintendo. It will be interesting to see how this console fares.
Or the fact that we have nothing to discuss. There are no Wii Us in anyone's possession.
Not to mention that no other new consoles have been released, so it's not a console war.
Re: People misusing the term Vanilla to describe a flying, unleash (sometimes trample) critter.
I'm curious as to the shortage. I haven't heard a reason for that yet.
My helpdesk should you need me.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=O_aSqrC0wz4
"Restriction breeds creativity." - Sheldon Menery on EDH / Commander in Magic: The Gathering
"Cancel Culture is the real reason why everyone's not allowed to have nice things anymore." - Anonymous
"For what will it profit a man if he gains the whole world, and loses his own soul?" - Mark 8:36
"Most men and women will grow up to love their servitude and will never dream of revolution." - Aldous Huxley, Brave New World
"Every life decision is always a risk / reward proposition." - Sanjay Gupta
You know what people didn't take seriously before it was released? The Wii. Guess what?
You don't know. Nobody knows. No one has a clue how the Wii U will perform in the market. So let's stop pretending anybody does and actually wait for the data.
The only reason I'm not getting one right now is that with it being the last month of classes, it would be a bad idea for me to get a gigantic new distraction.
If I wasn't in school, I would've pre-ordered one though. Just the promise of Smash Bros, Zelda, Metroid, Mario Kart, etc. (I'm a sucker for Nintendo franchises) means there's no way I'm not getting one some time in the next year or two, and the games coming out now or in a few months are good enough that I'd rather play them sooner than later. So might as well get it now.
But honestly, since I'll only have a short period at the beginning of spring semester and then the summer available for some serious gaming, I'm more worried about what will be out by then. New Super Mario Bros. Wii U and another game or two (whether physical or eShop) should be enough to keep me busy for January, after which I'll have to get back to work anyway. But I understand if you have plenty of free time and you can devote hours a day to gaming, you would be less satisfied with the lineup than I will be.
All his 'article' basically says is "Hardcores determine the market" which the Wii itself proved completely false - and the Wii U is actually trying to make inroads back to the hardcore market again.
Yes, right now for a hardcore gamer like myself the titles it has look too weak for my tastes yet - but then again, there hasn't been a console that really drew me in as a "must have" for 6-9 months in with the exception of the 3DS (mainly for the RE title that was badass)
Re: People misusing the term Vanilla to describe a flying, unleash (sometimes trample) critter.
People are talking about the 3DS being a bad launch - and yes, it had its problems. The need for a price cut was a big stumble. But people forget that the DS didn't have a stellar launch, yet it went on to be one of the best selling pieces of gaming hardware of all time. In fact, the 3DS's first year sales were twice as many units as the DS's first year.
The Wii didn't have any killer next gen games at launch (Twilight Princess was awesome, of course, but it was really a GameCube title with some improvements and changed controls). Overall, I think the Wii U launch lineup is actually relatively strong - it just lacks the killer app of a Super Mario 64, Smash Bros Melee* or Twilight Princess that they had for the N64, NGC and Wii. Or the quality of marketing that Wii Sports provided (my impression is that Nintendo Land is actually a better game than Wii Sports, but not as easy to market due to the asymmetrical gameplay being harder to depict in a short commercial).
New Super Mario Bros U and Nintendo Land plus a number of quality 3rd party releases (and sure, hardcore gamers will already have several of them, but I wouldn't dismiss them as irrelevant) makes it actually a pretty good launch lineup overall.
I will say that I'm not excited for the 2013 lineup yet - they need to announce something big, and it probably would've been helpful to them to announce something big, even if they couldn't give a specific release date.
*Actually came out a couple weeks later in the US, but same difference if you ask me.
Again, we won't know for like 3 years exactly how well the Wii U is going to do. Give it time.
I agree with erimir that the Wii U has an unusually good set of games at launch date. Usually you have to wait until Christmas for things to kick in. It helps that the Wii U is not competing against anything right now. Microsoft and Sony will take a while to enter something else into this new console generation. Plenty of time for the Wii U to get people on its bandwagon.
Better than PS3 and X360 with like 6-10 games at launch by far though. (Assuming my memory is serving right)
Re: People misusing the term Vanilla to describe a flying, unleash (sometimes trample) critter.
Based on anecdotes from Slickdeals, supply is not as short as anticipated by Bloomberg, however. Wii U started off $550 on Ebay and price is declining. (Prices historically fall from launch.) Some scalpers are now intending to return their consoles. Some blame the lack of advertising on the part of Nintendo.
P.S. The base model is a lot less popular than the deluxe.
PS1 and Saturn both released in the US in 1995. PS1 with about 11 games, Saturn with 5. Saturn had Panzer Dragoon and Virtua Fighter, PS1 mainly had Rayman, Ridge Racer and a few sports games. Some of the killer games that we remember for the PS1 (FF7, Gran Turismo) didn't come out until 1997 and 1998. Even Crash Bandicoot didn't come out for several months.
N64 followed in 1996 with a grand total of 2 games (Super Mario 64 and Pilotwings 64). A few other good games followed before Christmas (notably, Mario Kart 64).
PS1 era consoles had worse launch lineups than the Wii U, across the board. The only thing is that Super Mario 64 was such a strong title that a lot of people just had to have it. I have to admit, the first time I played Mario 64 it was magical - in a way that none of the 3D games on the PS1 at the time were (I had played Crash Bandicoot... but its on-rails approach to 3D was blown out of the water by SM64). And the whole game was amazingly good.
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The PS2 generation, on the other hand, had much larger launch libraries.
Dreamcast: 19 games, including Sonic Adventure, Soulcalibur, Mortal Kombat and some others.
PS2: 29 games, including Dead or Alive, SSX (meh, 1080 was better), Street Fighter, Tekken, some racing, sports, other fighting games, etc. It was a pretty broad lineup, but looking over it, none of them are games I wanted when I finally got my PS2 later on. By contrast, I would've said to get Super Mario 64 if you have an N64, no matter when you bought it. I'd say that the PS2 had a broad lineup but no truly amazing games in the batch.
GameCube: 13 games, including Wave Race, Luigi's Mansion, Star Wars Rogue Squadron 2, Crazy Taxi, some sports games (like Tony Hawk 3). GameCube's best seller, Super Smash Bros Melee followed very soon thereafter. Looking at it, I'm surprised at how strong the GameCube launch lineup was.
Xbox: 14 games, including Halo, Oddworld, Dead or Alive, Jet Set Radio, Tony Hawk, a couple racing, sports. Pretty strong launch lineup.
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Wii U launch has 22 games, including Nintendo Land, New Super Mario Bros U, Epic Mickey 2, Ninja Gaiden 3 (might as well be a new game, given how much improvement it has over the 360+PS3 versions), Scribblenauts Unlimited and some ports of big name games that have been out for a little while. It has FPS, sports, fighting, survival-horror, action/adventure represented.
Maybe there's nothing must-have for a hardcore gamer who had to buy those 3rd party games on other consoles earlier, but it's at worst middle of the pack compared to some previous launch lineups.
Is this supposed to be shocking news?
Forbes projects the Wii U as selling 3.5 million units this year, which is actually ahead of the 3.1 million the Wii sold in its first year. Not bad for a month and a half.
I don't know if anyone has official sales numbers so far.
I was just trying to think of the only reasonable theorizing the guy did - was just comparing against past killer launches, not anything particularly recent.
Re: People misusing the term Vanilla to describe a flying, unleash (sometimes trample) critter.