UK: New Super Mario Bros U Deluxe Enters At Number 1 And Sales Up 24.8% Over Wii U

((*comes back to the top of the comment* Ugh! I typed A LOT more than I intended. Oh well. You don’t have to read past the first paragraph (which sticks to the topic of our little conversation) as the rest of the comment after it is just ramblings.))

I think it has to do with the fact that when they were doing the same thing as Sony did with the PlayStation (making just a stronger system than the previous systems) & got their asses handed to them with the N64 & GCN both losing out to the PS1 & PS2 respectively, I think it scared Nintendo out of doing the same as others. Before PlayStation came along, Nintendo was sitting comfortably at the top & it made them egotistical (maybe a bit narcissistic.) Sure Sega gave Nintendo a run for their money with the Genesis but Nintendo still was at the top & Sega, in their desperation & greed, thought they could rush out their next systems & crush Nintendo for good only to fall short, boosting Nintendo’s own ego in the process. So when PlayStation knocked them off of their high horse two times in a row with the PS1 & PS2, they gave up trying to be the same & figured being different would put them back on top.

With Wii, it worked… For about 2 or 3 years. lol But in spite of the Wii falling in popularity, the money & the sales of the Wii itself blinded them to that fact and thus they did the Wii U which doubled down on being different. Unfortunately, the Wii name was already a damaged brand by the time of the Wii U so most gamers wanted NOTHING to do with the U & even most 3rd parties abandoned it. Even the ones that continued to support it after that first year didn’t put as much effort into it as they did that first year & the beginning of the second year. Still, they weren’t done giving up on being different. After all, their handheld division remained untouched by others that not even Sony Interactive’s superior (least in power & video quality) handhelds could compete with. That & along with the fact that portability in the form of laptops, tablets, smartphones, etc (ESPECIALLY tablets & smartphones), they came up with the Switch, a hybrid of home console & handheld/portable gaming. So far, it’s working wonders like the Wii before it. But unlike the Wii, 3rd party support is far better & most of the games from them aren’t (for the most part) watered down versions like many of their games for Wii were. I’m keeping a close eye on this 3rd year of the Switch, though. If the Switch’s momentum can continue to be this strong well into this 3rd year & well into the 4th year, then I think Nintendo may have finally found that different thing that is an all around success… Unlike the Wii which floundered after some time.

If the Switch had been another failure, I think Nintendo would have either given up on home consoles and actually gone 3rd party, given up on home consoles & went all in with handhelds, or they would have gone back to just doing the same as others & accept the possibility that they may never be on top again & just be happy with their current position beneath Sony Interactive as they just make a 3rd twin in the industry that just so happened to be the only place to play their games. Those were the best case scenarios, though, as they could have followed Konami & made pachinko machines or followed countless others & just make low quality mobile games or both.

In any case, I hope they stick with the Switch concept & just improve upon it for the next few gens and revisit innovation every now & then by way of new types of controllers as a side project for their Switch systems instead of making a system revolve around the innovation. ESPECIALLY if the Switch is a vast improvement over the Wii.