It’s no secret: Nintendo’s probably the best video game company ever (says I, with my totally unbiased opinion). But it’s also no secret that as of late, they had fallen on some difficult times.
Nintendo had some massive success with the Wii, making a console with motion control that appealed to gamers and casual players alike, spanning all ages. Andit no doubt came as a surprise that their next endeavor, the Wii U, barely sold a tenth of what the Wii did over its regrettably short lifespan.
Now you can talk all day about why the Wii U failed, and continued to fail, since it launched in 2012. Personally, I love my Wii U. I still do. I’m still in the act of playing and buying games for it. But with a weak launch lineup of games and poor marketing (among other things), the system failed to convey what it was trying to accomplish, and it missed its mark completely. The audience that loved the Wii just wasn’t interested in getting a Wii U.
But now we fast forward to March of 2017, and the launch of Nintendo’s next baby, the Nintendo Switch. And they must be doing something right with this one, because it has already overtaken the Wii’s launch sales. And no doubt, it’s mostly do to the outstanding quality of their newest adventure, The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild.
Though if I’m being perfectly honest, that’s really the only reason I can see as to why.
Don’t get me wrong: the Switch is pretty great. It’s got a lot of promise, blending the market of handheld and console gaming, and sporting a lot of impressive technology. But the launch titles, aside from Zelda, are really no more impressive than the launch titles for Wii U. You know, the ones that failed to convince anyone to actually buy the darn thing when it came out.
And that’s not saying anything bad about the other games’s in the Switch’s launch line up. It would be wrong of me to say that they’re bad games, since I haven’t played them at all yet. I couldn’t have played most of them if I wanted too, anyway: whenever I check the electronics department at my place of work, they basically only have Zelda on the shelf for sale. It’s been that way since launch day. So it’s seems that, while they’re not necessarily bad games, not many people are interested in them compared to Zelda.
But back to my main point. Let’s compare the launch lineups of the Wii U and the Switch, shall we?
The Wii U launched in November of 2012 with these following games (in the United States):
- New Super Mario Bros U
- Nintendo Land
- Zombi U
- Assassins Creed III
- Batman: Arkham City Armored Edition
- Darksiders II
- Just Dance 4
- Skylanders Giants
- Sonic and Sega All-Stars Racing Transformed
- Tekken Tag Tournament 2
- And several others, ending up with a total of 32 Launch Titles for the system, available for purchase on disc right away.
Now, the Nintendo Switch lineup (again, for the US region):
- The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild
- 1-2-Switch
- Just Dance 2017
- Super Bomberman R
- Skylanders: Imaginators
- And a handful of games available for digital download, leaving us with a total of only ten launch games.
That leaves me a little confused. Comparably, the Wii U had a much stronger line up of games available day one. True, most of them were ports of already existing games from the Playstation 3 and XBox 360, but the fact of the matter is that they… existed. And it wasn’t like they were unknown titles, either: there were a lot of big name games from big name developers. Logic dictates that the Wii U should have been the better selling system at launch. And yet, here we are in some sort of bizzaro world where less games equal more sales.
Do the Switch’s capabilities and a Zelda launch title mean that much to gamers? Apparently so. And Breath of the Wild isn’t even an exclusive Switch title: the game was in development for the Wii U for the longest time, and was going to be the system’s exclusive Zelda title. Or at least, that’s what we all thought. Now the Wii U has no Zelda game to truly call its own! Though ironically, you can play almost every other console-based Zelda game on the thing, and even a few handheld ones.
It doesn’t really seem like there’s a strong case for the Switch being a success, oddly enough. I’d go as far to say that, with all these crazy sales, people are buying into the Switch a little too soon. And this is coming from a guy who jumped on a chance to reserve the thing, so I could get it day one and star playing immediately, like I was a five year old jumping into a ball pit.
My personal advice to people looking to buy a Switch (if you can even find one right now, they seem to be sold out all over) is to wait a little a while. More specifically, wait until closer to summer, after the Electronic Entertainment Expo, also known as E3 (and Gamer Christmas), this June. At that point, the Switch will have more games released for it, like Mario Kart 8 Deluxe. Hopefully the new Nintendo title Arms will also be out, and we’ll be closer to the release of Splatoon 2.
Plus, waiting till Nintendo’s E3 presentation this year will be beneficial in the decision to buy the system as well. No doubt we’ll get even more game announcements, including some release dates for more anticipated titles. It just makes sense to give the Switch a little more time to produce more content, rather than throwing $300 at a system that barely has anything to do on it yet.
Overall, I think the Switch’s early success comes down to the marketing side of things; the Switch has had its debut, its features, and its strengths portrayed much more effectively than the Wii U did. I remember when the Wii U was announced, people couldn’t make heads or tails of it. Was it a new system? Was it an upgrade to the Wii? Was it a new controller? No one really knew. Heck, even I wasn’t totally sure what to make of it.
But overtime I found plenty of reasons love the Wii U, and I’m sure I will with the Switch as well. The new Zelda is so gigantic, it will keep any dedicated fan playing for weeks. But if a new Zelda isn’t quite convincing you to get the system right away, just listen to your instincts. Waiting till the summer seems like the best choice in this situation.
What’s your thoughts on the Switch and Zelda? Did you grab them right away, or are you not sure and you’re gonna wait it out before buying? Be sure to let me know!
Anyway, I guess that’s the end of my little rant. I’m gonna go back to saving Hyrule and waiting for Mario Kart to come out. Sparky is signing off for now!
It is a little weird that the Wii U failed with the line-up it had. Guess it does come down to hardware in the end. Or the marketing, which was great for the Switch in my opinion.
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Yeah, the Wii U did suffer from a lot of disadvantages, looking back on things. It’s a shame too, because I like the system a lot, even more so than the Wii and Gamecube. It has a lot of great content, just not enough of a draw to convince people to buy it.
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