*sigh* Really, guys? I thought we were done with this.
Yes, Wii U sales have been very, very poor. Yes, this is because Nintendo did a crap job of marketing it. Yes, third party developers aren't exactly trampling each other to get on their consoles. Yes, Sony and Microsoft are now gobbling up massive sales numbers. And yes, Michael 'how did I get this job in the first place' Pachter says that Nintendo is now done for, with Sony now poised to take over the human race.
But Nintendo is not doomed.
Remember during the Gamecube days? Call me crazy, but I think we had this exact same debacle. In fact, we had this same argument a year or two after the Wii launched, when everyone said its sales would drop off and we'd never hear from Nintendo again. What's more, I bet we'll have this same argument again in a few years when they announce their new console. I had assumed that everyone recognized a pattern when they saw it, and that we'd never have this problem again.
Well, apparently, not everyone.
To everyone who is positive that Nintendo's current shortcomings are proof of a complete collapse, let me go through a few reasons why that is not the case.
Firstly is stock price. To investors, stock prices are the most important part of a company. Stock prices go up, people make money, more people invest, etc. And right now, Nintendo's stock is valued higher than Sony's. This is partly due to China's recent announcement about removing the ban on consoles, but partly due to Sony's incredible failures in every branch but their consoles (in fact, Sony recently had their credit rating downgraded to 'junk'). Now, a high stock price does not guarantee high sales, but you can't go bankrupt when your company is worth more than your main competitor.
Next, handhelds. Nintendo always has, and always will, dominate the handheld market. As long as their handheld sales are strong, they can piss away however much money they want and still be financially sound.
Finally, and perhaps most importantly, companies don't just collapse due to a single bad console. Nintendo didn't collapse because of the Gamecube. Sony didn't collapse in the opening years of the PS3. Hell, Microsoft unloaded a whole clip into their balls during the Xbox One announcement, and they still sold well. So far, the only recent company that has withdrawn from the race altogether is Sega, which has spent the last twenty years proving they had no idea how to run a videogame company. And I wish we could learn from these constant misjudgments, but I suppose we'll just keep on supposing for years to come. Next generation, people will be crying the doom of Microsoft because their Xbox Two (watch, they'll totally name it that) hasn't lived up to its sales predictions, and they'll be as wrong then as you are now. So, until then, just remember these famous words from William Shakespeare: "If videogame companies went bankrupt from bad decisions, EA would just be a pair of vowels violating each other's personal space."
P.S. For those of you saying Nintendo 'deserves to die,' I challenge you: Find a friend who has Nintendo Land and play it with them. Then, tell me the company that made that game deserves to go bankrupt.
Yes, Wii U sales have been very, very poor. Yes, this is because Nintendo did a crap job of marketing it. Yes, third party developers aren't exactly trampling each other to get on their consoles. Yes, Sony and Microsoft are now gobbling up massive sales numbers. And yes, Michael 'how did I get this job in the first place' Pachter says that Nintendo is now done for, with Sony now poised to take over the human race.
But Nintendo is not doomed.
Remember during the Gamecube days? Call me crazy, but I think we had this exact same debacle. In fact, we had this same argument a year or two after the Wii launched, when everyone said its sales would drop off and we'd never hear from Nintendo again. What's more, I bet we'll have this same argument again in a few years when they announce their new console. I had assumed that everyone recognized a pattern when they saw it, and that we'd never have this problem again.
Well, apparently, not everyone.
To everyone who is positive that Nintendo's current shortcomings are proof of a complete collapse, let me go through a few reasons why that is not the case.
Firstly is stock price. To investors, stock prices are the most important part of a company. Stock prices go up, people make money, more people invest, etc. And right now, Nintendo's stock is valued higher than Sony's. This is partly due to China's recent announcement about removing the ban on consoles, but partly due to Sony's incredible failures in every branch but their consoles (in fact, Sony recently had their credit rating downgraded to 'junk'). Now, a high stock price does not guarantee high sales, but you can't go bankrupt when your company is worth more than your main competitor.
Next, handhelds. Nintendo always has, and always will, dominate the handheld market. As long as their handheld sales are strong, they can piss away however much money they want and still be financially sound.
Finally, and perhaps most importantly, companies don't just collapse due to a single bad console. Nintendo didn't collapse because of the Gamecube. Sony didn't collapse in the opening years of the PS3. Hell, Microsoft unloaded a whole clip into their balls during the Xbox One announcement, and they still sold well. So far, the only recent company that has withdrawn from the race altogether is Sega, which has spent the last twenty years proving they had no idea how to run a videogame company. And I wish we could learn from these constant misjudgments, but I suppose we'll just keep on supposing for years to come. Next generation, people will be crying the doom of Microsoft because their Xbox Two (watch, they'll totally name it that) hasn't lived up to its sales predictions, and they'll be as wrong then as you are now. So, until then, just remember these famous words from William Shakespeare: "If videogame companies went bankrupt from bad decisions, EA would just be a pair of vowels violating each other's personal space."
P.S. For those of you saying Nintendo 'deserves to die,' I challenge you: Find a friend who has Nintendo Land and play it with them. Then, tell me the company that made that game deserves to go bankrupt.