The State of Wii U, Nintendo's Next-Gen

The Wii U isn't in great shape. Nintendo's in a better position then it was last year, but It's still clear the Wii U's isn't exactly on track to repeat the unprecedented financial success of it's predecessor. So what's Nintendo going to do about it?

During a recent briefing with investors, Nintendo's Satoru Iwata claimed the entire industry has been in a lull due to the lack of fresh games worth full price. He said the entire industry, including Nintendo, needs new experiences and fresh ideas.  

Many felt this was hypocritical of Nintendo, due to the never ending appearance of ancient franchises, but a lot of that comes from the mistaken assumption that only new IPs can deliver fresh ideas. Sure, Nintendo milks their iconic IPs, stuffing them into every cameo and spin off imaginable, but they also innovate on entire genres with nearly every iteration of the core games that originated those IPs.

But In reality, this has little to do with the problems facing the Wii U. It's suffering from 2 very different problems. The first is simple, Nintendo has yet to release the majority of their first party titles on the Wii U. The second, is much more complex. For better or worse, Nintendo didn't understand the success of the Wii.

At first, the Wii sailed through massive financial success through the mass appeal of the novel and far less intimidating input devices - the Wiimote and Wiipad - but a huge portion of that install base simply wasn't interested in spending money beyond WiiFit and WiiSports. Many devs hopped on board to reap the benefits of the huge install base, but the games just didn't sell. They didn't understand the majority of Wii's install base. 

The Wii U has to face those problems as well as new ones. Lack of sales have lead to trouble with 3rd party support (as usual), the gamepad is arguably more complex then a traditional controller, and the mainstream appeal of motion controls has faded. The landscape has changed. Call of Duty and mobile games carry the torch for the mainstream. Nintendo was unable to capitalize on the financial success of the Wii. They've instead chosen to chalk it all up to the consumer hunger for new hardware. 

So a huge portion of the Wii's massive install base will never move on to the Wii U and Nintendo's core fanbase will become the majority of the entire install base once again. Unlike the Wii, the Wii U will have to rely almost exclusively on incredible 1st party games, just to survive. While that may seem to paint a bleak financial future going into the next generation, the truth is, It's familiar territory for Nintendo, and they won't skip a beat. They will continue to innovate and inspire, because that's just what they do.