Topic: Satoru Iwata: Hubris versus Western Culture

[Adrock]

Well, IMO the sheer bulk of the GamePad along with the non-standard placement of the twin sticks makes the GamePad not a standard, traditional controller, "just with a screen on it."  It's just not a controller I want to use, especially since you can't turn that screen off while the controller's in use.  The Pro Controller is better through the removal of the screen and the subsequent smaller size/mass of the controller, but the placement of the sticks has always bothered me.

Bulk of the GamePad? Consider hitting the gym?

I meant, standard, traditional controller in that it has all the buttons and analog sticks, things the Wii Remote even with the Nunchuk didn't have. If you're problem is the analog stick placement itself, either Microsoft or Sony is doing it wrong because their analog stick placement are different... unless you're only referring to the right analog stick which would be ridiculous.

[TJ Spyke]

brood, you think the GamePad is heavy? I finally got to hold it at a Best Buy, and I was shocked at how light it is, and it fit my hands fine.

[Ceric]

brood, you think the GamePad is heavy? I finally got to hold it at a Best Buy, and I was shocked at how light it is, and it fit my hands fine.

He is.  We've had this discussion on NFR before.  What it really amounts to is somehow Broodwars and I hold are controllers different then each other.  This seems to directly affect whether you think the Gamepad is heavy or not among other things.

I've logged well over 80 hours with the the Gamepad this month time period alone, the PS3 controller the months before, and the PS3 controller with the analog sticks like the 360 controller.  I still notice the PS3 placement as feeling a little different then the whole Gamepad.  Which to be honest I thought the right stick placement feel different in a heavy camera tweak game but it doesn't for me.  Though I do worry about accidentally twisting the GamePad in Half like last night when I was frustrated about being referred to yet another doctor and I got my first Monster Hunter hard lock in the middle of a Goldenbeard Ceadus.

brood, you think the GamePad is heavy? I finally got to hold it at a Best Buy, and I was shocked at how light it is, and it fit my hands fine.

Its amazing light.  Though I wonder if it will be heavy with an expanded battery.

[shingi_70]

Isn't the problem that Nintendo made the wii to compete against the HD twins and not their eventual successors?

[broodwars]

brood, you think the GamePad is heavy?

Not heavy: "bulky." It has a large center of mass and a frame that's WAY too big, which makes it difficult to hold and access all buttons and triggers.  I have to completely reorient my hands to use the L and R or LZ and RZ trigger sets.  That is not a problem on the Pro Controller.

[Ceric]

So the Gamepads is officially:
"It is powered by a rechargeable lithium-ion battery and weighs approximately 1.1 pounds (500 g)."(http://www.nintendo.com/wiiu/features/tech-specs/)

Dual Shock 3 from what I'm looking through is 210 Grams.
360 Controller is 300 grams
iPhone 5 112 grams
iPad Mini 308 grams
iPad 652 grams

So in the end the controller is heavier then the competition but lighter then an iPad.

[Ian Sane]

I see the controller as gimmicky in the sense that Nintendo is trying to sell a console with glorified last gen specs on the controller, which is the same approach as the Wii.  This puts tremendous pressure on the Gamepad to deliver and I don't think it's up to it.  Shingi hit the nail on the head in that the Wii U appears to be designed to compete against the current consoles that are due to start getting replaced this year.  Nintendo is asking me to take the Gamepad INSTEAD of next gen hardware.

And this idea of Nintendo using old ass hardware being a core ethos of them is complete revisionist history.  The Wii was the FIRST console they ever released that did have cutting edge hardware upon release.  When the NES came out console hardware up to that point was like the Atari 2600 and the Colecovision.  The NES runs circles around those things.  The SNES, N64 were arguably the most powerful console ever made upon release and the Cube was only beaten slightly by the Xbox's week earlier release (and clearly Nintendo didn't aim for that; they intended on being better than the PS2).  The Wii is the oddball weirdo that started a new trend.

I also don't believe for a second that the Gamecube losing to the PS2 "proved" that Nintendo could not beat Sony with comparable hardware.  No one even considered such an idea until Nintendo filled their heads with that crap.  The Gamecube lost because it made no effort whatsoever to demonstrate that Nintendo learned from the mistakes of the N64.  Nintendo played right into the negative image that their detractors had of them.  To me the whole thing was Nintendo showing up for the race with their shoelaces tied together and then acting like the race was hopeless from the beginning.  Nintendo's effort with the Cube was incredibly half-assed and lazy and I would not consider the end result as a true benchmark of how things would go if Nintendo truly put in a full competent effort.  They say "well we tried and it was hopeless" because that denies responsiblility and means they don't have to improve or fix things.  And they'll have some spin if the Wii U underperforms as well.  Hell the Wii U isn't selling being "people don't get the Gamepad" (ie: customer's fault) not because of anything that's Nintendo's responsibility.

[Adrock]

1. If you insist on paying $500 to "replace" a console you already own that's still getting most, if not all, of the major games, that's your own damn problem.

2. Nintendo never used cutting edge technology and that's not revisionist history. For example, Nintendo released a non-color Gameboy in a time when color LCD screens were available. In consoles, there was always better hardware available (e.g. arcades). The Wii is the odd duck because it was the first time Nintendo did not do a significant spec bump, but that entire generation was weird. While Nintendo basically repurposed the Gamecube's hardware, Sony and Microsoft leapfrogged where consoles probably should have been spec-wise and that's why PS3/360 were so expensive while Sony and Microsoft ate hundreds in losses per unit. Wii certainly could have stood to be more powerful, but there was no way Nintendo could have planned to compete there at an HD level without expecting to take massive losses. Yes, in hindsight, Nintendo may have gotten away with matching PS3/360 in specs due to Wii becoming a pop culture phenomenon, but no one saw that coming. Transitioning from the last place GameCube, it's really not that difficult to see why Nintendo wouldn't be eager to take major losses per unit.

3. You used the word "proved" not me. I said Nintendo tried competing on specs and it didn't work. If something didn't work, why the hell would they try that again? And Nintendo isn't up against Atari or Sega like generations past. They're up against companies much larger than them with revenue streams other than videogames. Sony has taken such a beating in losses, I'm surprised they're still in it. You demand better hardware, but look at the cost of the technology you want. To put it in perspective, Wii U is selling at a loss with the hardware it has and it's not the GamePad driving the cost up. What Wii U is selling at is just what it costs to have hardware that powerful in today's market. Sony and Microsoft are going to take losses again on hardware that will be outmatched by PCs in a matter of months. If Nintendo followed suit, how do you expect them to shoulder that financial burden?

[pokepal148]

I see the controller as gimmicky in the sense that Nintendo is trying to sell a console with glorified last gen specs on the controller,

you mean like sony is trying to sell the ps4 on glorified cellphone hardware with a share button and the cloud

Nintendo is asking me to take the Gamepad INSTEAD of next gen hardware.

tell me something... WHAT IS NEXT GEN HARDWARE... because...

[Soren]

I think it's disingenuous to say the Wii U's hardware isn't next Gen just because it might not reach a graphical plateau that may or may not occur with PS4/Durango. While the folks at Gaf haven't fully figured out what the Wii U's gpu is made of, we know there are certain things it can do that current Gen systems can't. Even the experts at chipworks acknowledge that it's an impressive piece of hardware.

But yeah, because it's all about 'Teh Graficsz' we have to jump to conclusions on a machine that is barely half a year old and has yet to see games that use it for its full potential. And we have talks about replacing Iwata without having a clear picture of what to do next.

Isn't the problem that Nintendo made the wii to compete against the HD twins and not their eventual successors?

I assume you meant Wii U. When did Nintendo say that?

[Ian Sane]

You used the word "proved" not me. I said Nintendo tried competing on specs and it didn't work. If something didn't work, why the hell would they try that again?

If you fucked a bunch of stuff up in your attempt and it didn't work, why not try again?  Your screw up invalidated the attempt.  You have no idea if another attempt would fail.  Do you use this logic in decisions in your own life?  If you try something and it fails and you know that you flubbed this or that do you write off the whole thing and declare it hopeless or do you accept responsibility for the failure and try to do better next time?  Nintendo's reaction to the Gamecube seemed to be "Boo hoo, we lost.  I guess the whole thing is futile!" which is a good way to deny fault.  "I didn't fail, the whole situation was rigged against me."  The definition of insanity is doing the exact same thing and expecting different results, but Nintendo wasn't going to do the exact same thing unless they were complete idiots.  They were to learn what they screwed up on the Cube and avoid making the same mistakes again and use that knowledge and experience to be better at avoiding new mistakes.  Nintendo had never launched a console from a weak position prior to the Gamecube and should have learned that they could not take the same approach to it that one would from a position of strength.  They could have done it but either didn't want to admit fault or are too blind to see their mistakes so they essentially gave up and tried to target a new market.

And while Nintendo wasn't shoving Amiga hardware into the NES or anything like that, they were releasing cutting edge technology BY CONSOLES STANDARDS prior to the Wii.  They never held back on a console in any way that the rest of the industry wasn't also doing until the Wii.  The Wii is the break from tradition.  Nintendo never had any tradition of releasing consoles that were effectively a whole generation behind the other consoles it was competing against.  That's a relatively new thing.  And that's not fighting with specs that's just following the conventions of the industry.  Like the NES successor had to compete with the Genesis and PC-Engine so it also was 16 bit and had comparable graphics and sound.  A Wii equivalent of the time would have been a slighty spiffed up NES with a gimmick controller.

[pokepal148]

The definition of insanity is doing the exact same thing and expecting different results,

So why shouldn't they keep doing what their doing now with the Wii U
it made them money on the Wii why not continue

[Luigi Dude]

And while Nintendo wasn't shoving Amiga hardware into the NES or anything like that, they were releasing cutting edge technology BY CONSOLES STANDARDS prior to the Wii.  They never held back on a console in any way that the rest of the industry wasn't also doing until the Wii.  The Wii is the break from tradition.  Nintendo never had any tradition of releasing consoles that were effectively a whole generation behind the other consoles it was competing against.  That's a relatively new thing.  And that's not fighting with specs that's just following the conventions of the industry.  Like the NES successor had to compete with the Genesis and PC-Engine so it also was 16 bit and had comparable graphics and sound.  A Wii equivalent of the time would have been a slighty spiffed up NES with a gimmick controller.

As Adrock already said, in previous gens the competition never jumped as high as Microsoft and Sony did last gen.  The gap in power between the PS2 and PS3 would have been like Sega going from the Master System straight to the Saturn.  That is what Microsoft and Sony both did last gen.  This whole industry standard bullshit you keep spouting has to stop because this is a whole different industry then what it was years ago.

Once again, the power of the 360 and PS3 ended up losing both companies billions of dollars their first few years because of how expensive the systems were to produce.  The Gamecube which was Nintendo's worst selling system at 22 million, still made Nintendo money.  In comparison, when the PS3 and 360 had userbases of 20 million both systems were still billions in the hole.

Seriously, it's been over 6 years now and you still don't seem to understand.  If Nintendo had released a system as powerful as the 360/PS3 and it only sold as well as the Gamecube or even worse, Nintendo would have lost billions of dollars because of how expensive such a machine would have been to make.  Yes the Wii ended up being popular enough that Nintendo could have taken such a risk, but nobody back in 2005 had any idea such a thing was going to happen.  To still complain about how the Wii should have been as powerful as the 360/PS3 is to basically complain that Nintendo should have also made a Time Machine as well because that's the only way they could have known how popular the system would have become.

[Stogi]

The reason the wii was so popular was its controller first and its price second. If it had been an HD system and cost 350-400 bucks I truly doubt it would have been as successful (although the shortages clearly identified how much a few people where willing to pay).

[Adrock]

If you try something and it fails and you know that you flubbed this or that do you write off the whole thing and declare it hopeless or do you accept responsibility for the failure and try to do better next time?

Are you really incapable of seeing this any other way?

Nintendo has beaten and has been beaten by competitors with better specs in the handheld and home console space. However, nothing hurt Nintendo more than their own bad reputation. All of the things Nintendo "flubbed up" were in addition to being dicks to everyone for over a decade. The specs of Nintendo's machines never saved nor condemned them (though I'm sure you'll claim that specs condemned Wii). You seem to be coming from the school of thought that if the specs don't matter either way, they might as well have amazing specs, but THAT is flawed thinking. You demand high-end hardware, but without the responsibility of having to pay for it. You want Nintendo to shoulder that burden which is a wholly unrealistic expectation to have from any company let alone one whose entire philosophy on hardware is "Lateral thinking with withered technology."

Nintendo was able to compete on specs when their competitors weren't willing or able to absorb massive losses. You can keep ignoring how important that is to this discussion, but it's not going away just because you won't acknowledge it. The only way Nintendo could have competed hardware-wise was to follow suit and lose billions. Not really worth it, not even to consumers in the long run because that could have crippled Nintendo which is only a video game company.

[Ian Sane]

If Sony and MS went so high up with their specs then what would a more conventional upgrade have been?  I ask this legitimately.  The Wii seemed no different from the PS2/Cube/Xbox gen except for its controller.  PS360 games look noticeably different from the games of the generation before them.  You can say "this couldn't have been done on the previous gen".  What is the hardware upgrade that should have been done by the entire industry?

Nintendo basically sold me Gamecube games with waggle control and called it a new console.  The rumour is that the original plan was for motion control to be a peripheral for the Gamecube but Nintendo instead decided to make it a whole new system to start fresh as the Cube was seen as a lost cause.  You can't say we plateaued and can't go any further because we did and the results were noticeable.  If Sony or MS did a mere Wii-level upgrade no one would have felt their new systems had any value at all as they would have been too similar to the previous gen.

If you took away the controller, who would have cared about the Wii?  On a purely hardware stance the system does not present itself as a noticeable improvement over the Gamecube.  That's just weird.  You figure Nintendo could have at least made something that was a clear step up from the Gamecube, even if it didn't match the Xbox 360 or PS3.  The Wii U doesn't look like it will stack up to the new consoles but it presents a clear step up from the Wii hardware wise.  It isn't like they just relied entirely on the Gamepad to establish it as different from its predecessor.  There is a clear hardware boost.

That's why I consider it an exception, because they didn't present any real hardware improvement over the console's predecessor or at least not enough one to make it a selling point - and that was a selling point for every other Nintendo console prior to that.

Even if you feel Nintendo couldn't afford to match the other guys, that has nothing to do with the Gamecube.  The Gamecube didn't fail because Nintendo couldn't compete with conventional specs, particularly since they still made a profit on it so it wasn't some spending race like you suggest this last generation would have been.

All I expect is that Nintendo offer something comparible to the standard console conventions of the time.  If they're using CDs, you use CDs.  If everyone is going online, you go online.  If they set a certain benchmark for hardware specs, you meet it.  Buying any videogame console should not feel to the consumer like he is making some major trade-of or is missing out on what everyone else is getting.  Besides, with an even playing field first party titles make the big difference and Nintendo is the best at that.  Ironically this plays into their strengths but they instead do some trade-of that costs them third party support and then it becomes first party vs. third party.

[pokepal148]

If Sony and MS went so high up with their specs then what would a more conventional upgrade have been?  I ask this legitimately.  The Wii seemed no different from the PS2/Cube/Xbox gen except for its controller.  PS360 games look noticeably different from the games of the generation before them.  You can say "this couldn't have been done on the previous gen".  What is the hardware upgrade that should have been done by the entire industry?

Nintendo basically sold me Gamecube games with waggle control and called it a new console.  The rumour is that the original plan was for motion control to be a peripheral for the Gamecube but Nintendo instead decided to make it a whole new system to start fresh as the Cube was seen as a lost cause.  You can't say we plateaued and can't go any further because we did and the results were noticeable.  If Sony or MS did a mere Wii-level upgrade no one would have felt their new systems had any value at all as they would have been too similar to the previous gen.

If you took away the controller, who would have cared about the Wii?  On a purely hardware stance the system does not present itself as a noticeable improvement over the Gamecube.  That's just weird.  You figure Nintendo could have at least made something that was a clear step up from the Gamecube, even if it didn't match the Xbox 360 or PS3.  The Wii U doesn't look like it will stack up to the new consoles but it presents a clear step up from the Wii hardware wise.  It isn't like they just relied entirely on the Gamepad to establish it as different from its predecessor.  There is a clear hardware boost.

That's why I consider it an exception, because they didn't present any real hardware improvement over the console's predecessor or at least not enough one to make it a selling point - and that was a selling point for every other Nintendo console prior to that.

Even if you feel Nintendo couldn't afford to match the other guys, that has nothing to do with the Gamecube.  The Gamecube didn't fail because Nintendo couldn't compete with conventional specs, particularly since they still made a profit on it so it wasn't some spending race like you suggest this last generation would have been.

this last generation WAS a spending race... sony was taking a loss on the PS3 from the start and wound up burning through every cent of profit on their previoussystems while Microsoft(while making systems at much less of a loss) wound up paying millions on the RROD... so many developers(and now publishers) have gone bankrupt this gen. we are seeing more and more annuallization of sequels, ever wonder why? because it costs millions to make the kind of blockbuster game people expect.

in the past year alone, THQ is DEAD, Atari is DEAD (again), Square Enix has fallen to desperation,(tomb raider will sell 6 million units HA!!) Sega more then WILL be DEAD at this rate. recently a former sony employee revealed that Sony and Microsoft made a combined loss of 8billion total on the 360/PS3... i do not think nintendo could afford a 4 billion dollar loss then, and even with all the money from the wii i don't think nintendo could take something like that now... RFN is right, the industry is in a huge mess right now

All I expect is that Nintendo offer something comparible to the standard console conventions of the time.  If they're using CDs, you use CDs.  If everyone is going online, you go online.  If they set a certain benchmark for hardware specs, you meet it.  Buying any videogame console should not feel to the consumer like he is making some major trade-of or is missing out on what everyone else is getting.

so your saying if your friend jumps off a bridge you should too... thank you

[Louieturkey]

The problem, Ian, is that philosophy is different between Nintendo and the other two console makers.  MS and Sony  both have the philosophy to make as big and powerful system as you can and make up the losses on it in game sales.  Nintendo, being only a game company, looks at it where you make a system as good as it can be up to a certain price point you think you can sell it at and then stop spending.  They take little to no loss on their hardware because they have no other revenue streams that can make up for big losses on the hardware.  MS & Sony can make a $700 system and sell it at $500 and still do okay because they can take the $200 hit per system initially.  Do you really think Nintendo can do the same?  I don't think so.  Do you want Nintendo to sell at $500 system?  If they did that, they'd be selling a $500 system against two $700 systems, so they'd still be behind.  People would see all three systems selling at $500 and Nintendo's would look inferior.  To compete directly, they'd have to sell their system at $700 and then again they'd be at a disadvantage because people would see the three systems and see they can buy the other two for $200 less and that $200 is not worth Nintendo first party games.

They can't compete directly, so they can't do anything "conventional" because they can't afford what the other two players are spending.  So they think outside the box and go with the "lateral thinking with withered technology" idea, which they've been using for many years against many competitors.

[Ian Sane]

so your saying if your friend jumps off a bridge you should too... thank you

No I'm saying as a consumer I expect your product to match the general conventions of competing products.  The Wii wasn't even a conventional successor console by Nintendo standards.  So you sell me a new console that is practically the same as your previous console only it has a new controller and the only reason I have to pay the full price of a new console instead of just the price of a new controller is because you arbitrarily made it so.  To me it was like if Nintendo decided at some point that they were not going to make NES games anymore and I had to switch to a new system, but the system was just another NES but with a new cartridge shape so that the new games wouldn't fit in the old machine.  The Wii was like Nintendo asking me to pay for a new console to merely extend the Gamecube experience for another six years.  And a lot of games merely mapped button presses to Wiimote shakes so a lot of them didn't even need the new controller that was the whole reason that this was a new console in the first place.  I felt the justification for making me have to upgrade was largely phony, making the product a borderline scam.  Hell one of the launch titles for the Wii was LITERALLY a Gamecube game where they conveniently delayed the Cube release to be after the Wii launch so as to scam the ignorant and grab the fanatics without the self control to wait a few more weeks.

I expect a new console to be an actual new console and not effectively a re-release of an old one.  You shouldn't be able to pass of a port of game from the previous gen and have it not look old or out-of-date next to the new games.  At least the Wii U isn't just a Wii with a tablet.  It actually has some justification to be a new console.

[pokepal148]

so your saying if your friend jumps off a bridge you should too... thank you

No I'm saying as a consumer I expect your product to match the general conventions of competing products.  The Wii wasn't even a conventional successor console by Nintendo standards.  So you sell me a new console that is practically the same as your previous console only it has a new controller and the only reason I have to pay the full price of a new console instead of just the price of a new controller is because you arbitrarily made it so. To me it was like if Nintendo decided at some point that they were not going to make NES games anymore and I had to switch to a new system, but the system was just another NES but with a new cartridge shape so that the new games wouldn't fit in the old machine.  The Wii was like Nintendo asking me to pay for a new console to merely extend the Gamecube experience for another six years.  And a lot of games merely mapped button presses to Wiimote shakes so a lot of them didn't even need the new controller that was the whole reason that this was a new console in the first place.  I felt the justification for making me have to upgrade was largely phony, making the product a borderline scam.  Hell one of the launch titles for the Wii was LITERALLY a Gamecube game where they conveniently delayed the Cube release to be after the Wii launch so as to scam the ignorant and grab the fanatics without the self control to wait a few more weeks.

I expect a new console to be an actual new console and not effectively a re-release of an old one.  You shouldn't be able to pass of a port of game from the previous gen and have it not look old or out-of-date next to the new games.  At least the Wii U isn't just a Wii with a tablet.  It actually has some justification to be a new console.

and i'm saying nintendo couldn't have, did you even read the first part...
and there was a difference in technology between the two systems...
Honestly, people like you are part of the reason the industry is in a rut... the average cost to make a gamecube era console game was $3-$5 million. even now on the 360 and PS3 we are looking at $15 million dollars on average... you may think that having that brand new Super Quad Core HyperX Omega over 9000ghz Processor is a good idea but i dont think we should go any farther then steady native 1080p... Nintendo offered an alternative and this time I think more third parties might be willing to take it... the industry has changed in more ways then either of us realize... I dont think it's in sony's or microsoft's best interests(or the interests of the industry) to try and make much more of a jump then what the Wii U made over the PS3/360... and i think the PS4 and 720 will be alot more like the wii then you think... the Wii U isn't the console the market wants, it's the console the market needs...

[Stogi]

Ians argument: But is it the console the market will buy?

Valid point.

Playing console games will never be as niche as it once was, but if the cost of entry keeps increasing, it will be a luxury only enthusiasts enjoy.

[Pixelated Pixies]

I finally got around to reading the article today. Honestly? I can't really disagree with any of her conclusions.
 
I don't feel like she took any of Iwata's quotes out of context. The article merely charts Iwata's course as CEO and questions whether or not he has learnt from his lessons. I think a pretty convincing case can be made that he hasn't. I thought her assessment of Iwata's approach to western markets was particularly damning. I feel as if the success of the Wii and DS have ultimately had a detrimental impact on Nintendo, as those years of success set an expectation within Nintendo that they could sell hardware in western territories without really fulfilling the wants of western gamers or the needs of western developers. It's absolutely true, for instance, that while NCL have seemingly beat down doors to get at games like Dragon Quest and Monster Hunter, the western divisions of the company have been given very little free reign to do the same.
 
Ultimately, for anyone who has been following the history of Nintendo none of this is particularly revelatory, but I think the article makes a good case for much of the blame for Nintendo's recent woes to be laid at Iwata's feet.

[Ian Sane]

Nintendo can say "this is the console that has to be for the industry to sustain itself" but the others consoles exist and there are games on them that I want to play.  In the case of the Wii, the industry survived and Nintendo's console got almost nothing but shovelware junk from third parties.  I'm to put up with lousy third party support and games that come across as a generation behind because that's what we "need".  The other guys don't restrict me like that.

That's why you have to match because the market just sees the product.  How can Nintendo possibly tell us "no, you don't get that" and have us accept it?  If the PS4 and Xbox 720 totally crash and burn, okay, the Wii U will do alright, but how do you sell someone on console, and thus videogame experience, that comes across as out-of-date?  As a consumer my instinctive feeling is "find a way".  Plus if it was unsustainable how did all the companies that survived make it?  The PS360 didn't crash and burn and the Wii died with a whimper.  Hindsight is 20/20 but I didn't buy their doom and gloom then and today THEY are the ones struggling to sell their "last gen hardware/controller gimmick" model.  You can sell "you get this inferior thing because its good for you" to casual rubes that don't know better but core gamers aren't going to put up with it if they don't want to.

[pokepal148]

Nintendo can say "this is the console that has to be for the industry to sustain itself" but the others consoles exist and there are games on them that I want to play.  In the case of the Wii, the industry survived and Nintendo's console got almost nothing but shovelware junk from third parties.  I'm to put up with lousy third party support and games that come across as a generation behind because that's what we "need".  The other guys don't restrict me like that.

That's why you have to match because the market just sees the product.  How can Nintendo possibly tell us "no, you don't get that" and have us accept it?  If the PS4 and Xbox 720 totally crash and burn, okay, the Wii U will do alright, but how do you sell someone on console, and thus videogame experience, that comes across as out-of-date?  As a consumer my instinctive feeling is "find a way".  Plus if it was unsustainable how did all the companies that survived make it?  The PS360 didn't crash and burn and the Wii died with a whimper.  Hindsight is 20/20 but I didn't buy their doom and gloom then and today THEY are the ones struggling to sell their "last gen hardware/controller gimmick" model.  You can sell "you get this inferior thing because its good for you" to casual rubes that don't know better but core gamers aren't going to put up with it if they don't want to.

do you honestly think nintendo in 2006 could afford to pay a 4billion dollar loss on the wii and then pay 15million dollars to make each game... if you HONESTLY think that, then you are an idiot...

the fact remains that the industry is facing a huge problem right now... the console market isn't growing at the rate that development costs are.

this is when you have to realize this isn't about Nintendo anymore... EVERYBODY IS INVOLVED WITH THIS MESS. Sony and Microsoft honestly have no reason not to make a marginal upgrade over their current consoles and try to hide behind the 'smoke and mirrors' of things like 8gb of ram(which will likely only have 4gb available to actual games), and an eight core processor originally designed for mobile devices. The PS4 and 720 in terms of in game preformance will likely not be a huge upgrade from the Wii U, because the industry cannot take it...

and this time there is nothing to match atm so :p

[Adrock]

What is the hardware upgrade that should have been done by the entire industry?

I'm not an expert on hardware, but we can start with no HD. Think of this way, if Sony replaced the Blu Ray drive with a regular DVD drive, they still would have taken a loss on a $600 console. Hardware at $300 breaking even or taking a small loss is probably where we should have been in 2006.

Even if you feel Nintendo couldn't afford to match the other guys, that has nothing to do with the Gamecube.  The Gamecube didn't fail because Nintendo couldn't compete with conventional specs, particularly since they still made a profit on it so it wasn't some spending race like you suggest this last generation would have been.

How are you still not getting this? First, Gamecube's failings are primarily the result of 15+ years (at the time) of straight-up douchebaggery. If Nintendo wasn't so hard-assed back in the day, they would have flat-out fucking destroyed Sony. There would have been no reason for third-parties to migrate. Yes, some of it was needed when the industry was recovering from the crash, but Nintendo just kept pushing and pushing. Have you read about some of the **** they did? Once third parties had a viable and powerful enough alternative, they bolted. Rightfully so. No one wants to be friends with a bully.

Second, Wii was necessary BECAUSE of those past failings. They couldn't just offer a spec bump and another "Sorry, we were assholes for so long" card. It was too late for that. If Sony released Gamecube with all of its oddball choices, third parties would have dealt with it. The problem wasn't really Gamecube. The problem was that third parties just didn't want to deal with Nintendo. Why would they? Sony was market leader and Microsoft threw money at them. Where does Nintendo fit in there? One is a much better friend and another is trying to buy your friendship. Nintendo had to try something else. They had to find another way to reach consumers in a crowded market where their competitors were largely offering the same thing along with convincing third parties to make games for it. And it almost worked and I think it would have if third parties didn't have to devote so many resources to HD development. It's easy to say it didn't work in 2013, but it wasn't a bad strategy in 2006.

Third, no one is saying that Nintendo didn't gimp out on Wii hardware. You keep bringing that up like it's this really important thing and it would have been had Sony and Microsoft NOT forced the HD era. Even if Nintendo made the expected hardware jump, they would have been outclassed. If Nintendo jumped into the HD era along with Sony and Microsoft, they would be in a lot of trouble financially today. Maybe less so than Sony and Microsoft if Wii still became an international megahit. Now, if all three hardware manufacturers made that expected non-HD jump, Nintendo probably would have come out looking golden. They would have their Blue Ocean AND core gamers because third parties would just port games over, not wanting to miss out on the Wii boat.

Plus if it was unsustainable how did all the companies that survived make it?

Is this a serious question? Holy shitsnacks, man: SONY AND MICROSOFT ARE SEVERAL TIMES LARGER THAN NINTENDO AND THEY HAVE OTHER REVENUE STREAMS. PS3/360 look really super successful until you realize how much money Sony and Microsoft lost. Seriously, look at their videogame divisions and compare them to Nintendo. Yes, Nintendo crawled through 2012. No one is denying that. However, Wii was very successful for them and if Nintendo launched Wii U level hardware in 2006, there is no Nintendo today. That's the difference here. You may not like what Nintendo is making these days, but you don't matter. No offense. I'd rather there be a Nintendo today than a Nintendo that tried to sell a $600 console, failed, and was forced to sell off all their assets and close down.