The system has yet to even peak for Nintendo, so the Wii in 2010 comparisons don't work since the Wii as already in clear decline in 2010. This is the company that delayed the GBA because the GBC was still selling better then expected.
That's my point. Nintendo shouldn't wait for there to be a decline. Instead, it should anticipate Switch's inevitable decline and be ready with a new console. Nintendo can delay the successor if it really feels Switch is doing that well. That said, I really can't envision a scenario in which Switch rides a wave of unprecedented success to 2023, let alone 2024 or 2025. Historically, Nintendo has rarely been ready to launch new hardware even with the writing on the wall. Rather, it's weathered the storm with its more successful hardware (and flat-out failed with Wii U). Maybe Nintendo should stop doing that.
Also, using an outlier year like 2020 as an indicator for sustained Switch sales performance seems like fool's gold to me.
Of course the biggest problem for the Wii in 2011/2012 is Nintendo moved most development to the 3DS and Wii U, causing Wii software to dry up.
Yes, and Nintendo was still bafflingly ill-prepared to launch both 3DS and Wii U anyway. The lack of first party software is always going to hurt Nintendo hardware since that's what the company hangs its hat on. However, third party support was also drying up and wasn't consistently shored up for the successors either. How many times does this have to happen before Nintendo, you know, maybe tries something else?
For third parties, the Switch never got ports of many of the top sellers on the PS4/Xbox and yet that never hurt the system.
I fundamentally disagree with this argument. While not getting other consoles' top selling third party titles may not have
hurt Switch per se, it didn't
help either. Ideally, Nintendo would be actively courting third parties for support.
Releasing a Switch successor too soon makes much of that audience buy the new system instead. Nintendo wants everyone buying the Switch and then buying the successor.
Nintendo's bread and butter is software, not hardware. If it released cross-generation games for a couple years, Nintendo gets what it wants anyway and better positions itself moving forward. It should be planning for sustained success rather than reacting to falling into a deficit.