Monday, May 11, 2009

Nintendo to reveal Wii 2 soon, analyst believes



In an online article, English newspaper The Times speculates that Nintendo may soon have to detail plans for a successor to their current home console, for Wii 2, if you will.

The reason cited by the author is economic pressure, a highly controversial stance. Although market leader and clearly the most profitable of the three hardware manufacturers, Nintendo stock has also been affected by the economic crisis, the author notes.


Speculation over Nintendo’s development of a Wii 2 console has intensified as the company’s stock has crumpled and the industry approaches the closely watched E3 trade show in Los Angeles next month.

In a shock to the markets yesterday, Nintendo reported that its profits in 2008 were the strongest on record but said that it would struggle to repeat the performance as sales of its two main consoles — the Wii and the DS — level off and foreign exchange turmoil destroys margins.


The author is clearly very critical of the Wii console. The headline "Nintendo admits Wii is close to its ultimate level" appears to be a gross exaggeration of the assertion below that "the company believes that sales of the Wii console will grow by less than 1 per cent this year from the 26 million units last year and gave warning of a 3 per cent decline in sales of the DS from last year’s 31 million." Likewise, the article's assessment of Nintendo's line-up is a sober one.


The once seemingly boundless possibilities offered by the Wii’s innovative control system appear to be reaching their limits and the console is beginning to look underpowered compared with the Microsoft Xbox 360 and Sony’s PlayStation3.

Hiroshi Kamide, of KBC Securities in Tokyo, said the weak-looking pipeline of Wii titles meant there would be a lot of attention on the next instalment of the Zelda games and when it was likely to be released. The series has produced a string of blockbusters for Nintendo and the announcement that the latest instalment may be in the shops by Christmas could be the “killer application” that Wii needs.





Nintendo's economic standing is unclear, at best. While news agency AFP reports that "Nintendo defies recession with record profits", Reuters reports that "Nintendo sees slowdown ahead". The company's shares really have slipped significantly. But it is important to understand that the share price had pretty much quadrupled in the period before. So, I guess, it all depends on whether Nintendo can continue to offer compelling software which will drive hardware sales further.

Also, the author is clearly highly critical of Nintendo. As mentioned above, the headline "Nintendo admits Wii is close to its ultimate level" is a bold interpretation of figures only. The company's most recent financial statement contains no assertion to the effect suggested by the headline. While the numbers are correct, the article also notes that Nintendo "is known for issuing hyper-conservative forecasts, only to exceed them triumphantly later in the year." This is a contradiction in terms.

But what about the article's reference to a Wii successor? In my mind, this argument is completely ridiculous. The hardware manufacturer under the most pressure is Sony, without a doubt. They went from "first to worst", as some analysts had predicted. The entire corporation is in a desperate financial situation and reliable rumours about a revised PlayStation Portable which will do away with Sony's proprietary UMD medium are a clear sign of that. If anyone is under pressure to announce a successor console, it's Sony. And they quite obviously will not, although a successor must already be under way.

With the PlayStation3, Sony may be committed to a ten year life cycle. But Microsoft will clearly pull a successor to its Xbox360 out of the hat before 2012 by the latest. The same goes for Nintendo. And if the PS3 isn't selling now, why should it be selling in three years time, when there will be two next-gen consoles out, which are both sure to surpass the PS3 in either hardware power or controller scheme or both.

On top of that, the argument is flawed in itself, I believe. How would annoucing a successor help any company sell their current product? If anything, consumers might hold off on buying the current model.

So, to sum things up, my predictions for E3 announcements are clear: no new consoles will be announced. Instead, there will be plenty of new peripherals shown for all three competitors. While Microsoft is highly likely to reduce their console's price tag further, Nintendo will not because they are still selling extremely well and Sony will not because the company's boss Stringer finally wants to see a meagre profit from his multi-billion investment.

If you are wondering, though, what a Wii 2 might look like, check out this neat mock-up.

Source: The Times
Thanks to: MaxConsole

24 comments:

True Believer said...

Many of the so called analysts just don't make any sense. They often predict scenario's that are so unbelievable that even the most simpleminded person understands that the prediction is utter crap. Or the analyst states something that has been so obvious for the most people for such a long time that you wonder what took the analyst so long to come to the same conclusion(an analyst like Pachter for example is guilty of both faults).
It just would not make any sense to reveal a wii successor. But I do think that a pheriphal like wimotionplus will be strongly promoted this year. It is also very likely that Nintendo will have a much stronger lineup than last year. I think Nintendo will show some games that will be more catered to their loyal fanbase. It is to early for a new Mario, but a new Zelda could be a real possibility. IGN claims that Nintendo is working on a new Pikmin title. That would be great. I think that if the Wii succeeds in capturing the "core" gamers, the sales of the system would not have to decline. The lineup for releases this year is far mor impressive than 2008. Companies like Sega, Capcom, Ubisoft and EA have much better lineup than last year. The sales of the qualitygames will decide the fate of the Wii this year.

Unknown said...

instead of a headset, I would rather have Nintendo do something about the Wii-stand (the grey one).

yes an add-on. one that every current wii owner can buy. a device/accessory that will boost the performance of the wii. :)

/silwer

Anonymous said...

"Would you like me to finally publish who pays your bills?"

Lol,wtf are you on about?what are you playing at? Actually, yes, I stongly suggest you publish that info! Because if you really went to such great lengths to find out private information about me through the only source that comes into question( the source I disclosed myself btw) in order to threaten me on your blog would not only reinforce what a sad journalist you are, suffering from an inferiority complex, and thus needs to resort to childish identity disclosure methods to silence people like Pero and me who are not shying away from pointing out the problems that Nintendo and Wii face, it also shows you up as someone who is quite obviously not man enough to counter what real gamers have to say with proper arguements anymore. You obviously ran out of arguements and this crap acts as your last resort, your last futile effort to shut me up. You have clearly reached an all time low, surrendered and lost if this is your awnser.

Get off it, mate. Calm down. Disclosing personal info about me won't change anything about the fact that subpar looking games like The Conduit don't deserve the hype and shouldn't be heralded as Wiis last hardcore saviour(there sure are other games that deserve the spotlight like Silent Hill and Red Steel 2 for example) or that Nintendo is kiddy/teeny on purpose without admitting it, etc.


IALS

Anonymous said...

Hey Falafel,

just to clear things up :

no new home consoles, but PSP Go! announced at E3 ?

On subject, to be more complete when comparing the pressure between the 3 manufacturers, perhaps should we take into account the game per system tie in ratio. I'm aware that nintendo makes money from the system itself, but we all know that the real cash-cow are the games. And from this point of view, I wonder who is in best place.

If I had to take a guess at who is a "winner" this generation, past situation taken into account, I would say that microsoft clearly gained market share and, most importantly, credibility (apart from the defect hardware problems) and are now seen as a real challenger. Plus the xbox division now seems to be in boni.

Nintendo clearly regained their place of market leader, but IMO, they have yet to catch the coregamer market if they want to expand the game per console tie in ratio (RE and madworld among others are good examples of what can be done, but IMO it isn't enough...even with "the conduit" (just joking, mate ;) ))

To be completely honest, I am not even sure nintendo wants to capture the coregaming crowd, when you look at the last two systems they released (ds and wii, clearly casual-market oriented), that certainly does not look like the path they are taking.

As of now, it seems to be a winning bet, but I wonder if in the long run they won't suffer from the lack of game per console sold.

What do you think, falafel?
Can nintendo earn enough money with the casual-gaming crowd, a ratio of 3+ game per console and a new peripheral every year or so (which will certainly help sell one or two more games :) )?

Anyway, nice reading, as usual

Regards,

Rincewind.

perod_detlic said...

"Would you like me to finally publish who pays your bills?"

i didn't even noticed that. jesus... wtf falafel?

new wii already? not a chance. all we need are better games and some effort

M. Ferreira said...

I doubt we'll see a new console for a while. MS is sitting pretty in second place. Sony has to dig itself out of the hole it's dug with an overly expensive, difficult-to-program-for piece of hardware. And Nintendo is sitting comfortably on top, with few signs of going anywhere fast.

Right now, a new piece of hardware would likely anger the marketplace as a whole, leading to adverse effects on potential sales. Though, if I were going to expect new hardware, it'd be a PSP iteration. It's the only thing that could benefit from a revision at this point.

Solace said...

It seems that people are so disappointed with the Wii, they just can't wait for Nintendo to announce the pipe-dream that is the Wii 2, which is speculated to be in high-definition, supports Blu-Ray, and has bionic hands that can rub your feet.

The Wii sales are slowing down for this year, but Nintendo has enjoyed successful run with this console. However, in all fairness to the analysts, it is realistic to expect a successor to the Wii pretty soon before 2011, as Nintendo tends to release consoles every 5 years.

Anonymous said...

Nintendo could release a Wii 1.5 akin to the DS->DSi relationship.

Adding a couple of registers to the gpu and more internal frame buffer and texture RAM is all it would take to allow the Wii to go HD. Turning up the clock speed another 33-50% on both the cpu and gpu and upping the main RAM to 256MB and now you'd have a WiiHD that is backwards compatible with the Wii and can handle more complex games.

There are other things that can be naturally upgraded as well in a "revised" Wii. The wireless card could be upgraded to support 802.11n and the internal flash ram could be upgraded to up to 32GB.

I say, drop the price of the current hardware to $150 and release a WiiHD @ $250 and you see another huge spike in sales.

M. Ferreira said...

"I say, drop the price of the current hardware to $150 and release a WiiHD @ $250 and you see another huge spike in sales."

At the potential cost of alienating the 50-million-owner market who just bought the Wii in the past couple of years. :)

Good business sense says that pulling a move like that shortly after release isn't a good idea. Especially since the average consumer is fairly stupid, which will lead to a ton of confusion and anger when they try to buy a "WiiHD" game that doesn't work for their unit.

More than anything, though... it would be derided by the press, fanboys, and trolls as "Gamecube 1.75", since it's built on the same architecture and OBVIOUSLY has to be no different than the hardware that preceded it because of that... nevermind the fact that Intel and the x86 architecture's been around for over 31 years in the PC world, and that NOBODY would dream of calling subsequent chips in the line as "n 8086 chips duct-taped together" (with n being the number of revisions since the 8086 came out in 1978) ;)

That, or it'd be seen as a "cash grab" out of "desperation," and would therefore give the trolls another reason to mock Nintendo in general.

At this point, an upgrade would be lose/lose no matter how you slice it.

Anonymous said...

allright guys these may 14th Conduit shots have ultimately proven to me that there's no hope for this ugly looking game, and that the hype it totally unwaranted:

http://uk.wii.ign.com/dor/objects

/14248157/the-conduit/images

/the-conduit-20090514020041225.html


I

M. Ferreira said...

Anonymous: And how does the Conduit relate to the discussion at hand? :)

Oh, wait... trolls. Nevermind. ;) I'll go back to ignoring you.

Anonymous said...

Wii games should look like this:



http://www.neogaf.com/forum

/showpost.php?p=15865596&

postcount=943

Drake said...

I'm sorry, but Monster Hunter 3 looks like shit.

I don't know what the fuss is about. The game looks like a PS2 game. At least The Conduit has normal mapping and some lighting, while Monster Hunter 3 looks blurry and bland. If Monster Hunter 3 is the standard for Wii graphics, then there is no hope for the Wii to have any decent graphics.

Anonymous said...

@drake

lol conduit looks like shit compared to Monster Hunter 3.

normal mapping and crap they brag about dont mean shit....

conduit is crap

Drake said...

PS2 graphics must really impress you, right?

Falafelkid said...

Good one, Drake! And ´Killzone 2´ is a joke. It looks like a ´Game & Watch´ title and a low budget one at that.

Here's another one: reality!. The graphics are complete shite. So unrealistic. No major update for more than a hundred million years or so. Also, I am experiencing major lag issues. Or is it just me... i.e. you?

Nintendo Videos said...

I think it's going to be awhile before the Wii 2 is released. Nintendo is already back on top of the video game industry with the Wii. No other system even comes close to the realistic gameplay of the Wii. End of Story.

Nintendo Stuff said...

I like how the so called "analysts" of the gaming industry are usually wrong about this. I'll wait until we hear official word from Nintendo that the Wii 2 is going to arrive.

Free Wii Games said...

"Would you like me to finally publish who pays your bills?"

i didn't even noticed that. jesus... wtf falafel?

new wii already? not a chance. all we need are better games and some effort

May 12, 2009 3:04 PM

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