I write this on the day of the Nintendo Switch launch. Over the past year I have seen many casual comparisons of the Wii U with Sega's ill-fated Dreamcast along with the argument that the Switch could be Nintendo's last attempt to stay in the Hardware market. But this misses the point - the Wii U cannot be Nintendo's Dreamcast as it has a successor in the Switch.
The more accurate question may be to ask whether the Wii U was Nintendo's Saturn and therefore whether the Switch will end with the same fate as the Dreamcast. The Sega Saturn launched in Japan in 1994 and across America and Europe in 1995 and was discontinued only 3 years later in 1998 in the west and in 2000 in Japan. Globally the system sold 9.26 million units. The Wii U launched globally in the final months of 2012 and was officially discontinued in January 2017, 4 years and 3 months later. Globally the Wii U sold 13.56 units (these are shipped units as of Jan 17', the unit is no longer in production so these are likely the final sales figures).
Both consoles suffered comparatively short lifespans and low sales figures compared to the other consoles in their generation. Both followed in the shadow of highly successful consoles from their previous generation - the MegaDrive in the case of Sega and the Wii in the case of Nintendo and had excessively high expectations as a result. Both were plagued throughout their lives by limited third party developer support, both systems also suffered from a confused and chaotic launch strategy. The Saturn was unexpectedly launched early in the USA burning retailers who had insufficient stock, developers who had been working to the agreed launch window and consumers who bought the system but found a shortage of games available for it.
The Wii U struggled to communicate who it was for and that it was a new console rather than an updated version of the existing Wii.
After declining sales and changes in the management of Sega Bernie Stolar, then head of Sega of America, famously remarked 'Saturn is not our future' during E3 1997. The Nintendo Switch was first revealed to be in development during March of 2015, 2 years before it's release and less than 2 and a half years after the launch of the Wii U. Although the phrasing is different both of these approaches showed companies who were preparing to cut their losses to focus on their next big thing. The logic of this move is up for debate, particularly with reference to the Saturn: sales in the US had been stabilising during 1997 and sales in Japan continued to be strong, Sega of Japan were far from prepared to abandon the Saturn at this stage.
These and other factors would plague both the Saturn and the Wii U throughout their short lifespans, third party support in particular became increasingly stuck in a cycle of poor sales meaning less support meaning worse sales.
Production of the Saturn stopped in 1998 in Europe and America, leaving a void for a year before the Dreamcast became available at the end of 1999. Production of the Wii U officially ended in January of 2017 with the Switch shipping at the start of March the same year, leaving a smaller gap of 1 month.
Promotion for the Dreamcast began in a similar manner to that of the Switch - with a strong focus on winning back third party developers to support the console with high quality, original games. Time will tell whether this strategy will pay off for the Switch, in my opinion the Dreamcast had some truly brilliant games during its short 2 year lifespan, far better than that available on the Saturn. Unfortunately it wasn't enough to make up for Sega's past mistakes and after launching in 1999 the Dreamcast was discontinued during 2001.
What do you think? Sega had a whole decade of issues, including more than just the Saturn, which built up to the release of the Dreamacst and I haven't factored the success of the 3DS into this discussion. I don't see Nintendo going the way of Sega, Nintendo are a well resourced company but 3 years from now will they still be making hardware or will we be playing Mario and Zelda on other systems? History has a way of repeating itself, particularly where lessons are forgotten. Just to put some outline figures behind this: cross referencing the sales figures for each system with the population figures for their main sales regions in the consoles last year gives the following results. 1 in 78 people owned a Saturn, 1 in 58 people owned a Wii U. This is obviously not totally accurate but based on the best available population figures for Japan, the USA, Canada, the UK, France, Germany, Italy and Spain added and divided by the total global sales. Although countries are missing from the list the same have been used for both systems so the data should be comparable.
The more accurate question may be to ask whether the Wii U was Nintendo's Saturn and therefore whether the Switch will end with the same fate as the Dreamcast. The Sega Saturn launched in Japan in 1994 and across America and Europe in 1995 and was discontinued only 3 years later in 1998 in the west and in 2000 in Japan. Globally the system sold 9.26 million units. The Wii U launched globally in the final months of 2012 and was officially discontinued in January 2017, 4 years and 3 months later. Globally the Wii U sold 13.56 units (these are shipped units as of Jan 17', the unit is no longer in production so these are likely the final sales figures).
Both consoles suffered comparatively short lifespans and low sales figures compared to the other consoles in their generation. Both followed in the shadow of highly successful consoles from their previous generation - the MegaDrive in the case of Sega and the Wii in the case of Nintendo and had excessively high expectations as a result. Both were plagued throughout their lives by limited third party developer support, both systems also suffered from a confused and chaotic launch strategy. The Saturn was unexpectedly launched early in the USA burning retailers who had insufficient stock, developers who had been working to the agreed launch window and consumers who bought the system but found a shortage of games available for it.
The Wii U struggled to communicate who it was for and that it was a new console rather than an updated version of the existing Wii.
After declining sales and changes in the management of Sega Bernie Stolar, then head of Sega of America, famously remarked 'Saturn is not our future' during E3 1997. The Nintendo Switch was first revealed to be in development during March of 2015, 2 years before it's release and less than 2 and a half years after the launch of the Wii U. Although the phrasing is different both of these approaches showed companies who were preparing to cut their losses to focus on their next big thing. The logic of this move is up for debate, particularly with reference to the Saturn: sales in the US had been stabilising during 1997 and sales in Japan continued to be strong, Sega of Japan were far from prepared to abandon the Saturn at this stage.
These and other factors would plague both the Saturn and the Wii U throughout their short lifespans, third party support in particular became increasingly stuck in a cycle of poor sales meaning less support meaning worse sales.
Production of the Saturn stopped in 1998 in Europe and America, leaving a void for a year before the Dreamcast became available at the end of 1999. Production of the Wii U officially ended in January of 2017 with the Switch shipping at the start of March the same year, leaving a smaller gap of 1 month.
Promotion for the Dreamcast began in a similar manner to that of the Switch - with a strong focus on winning back third party developers to support the console with high quality, original games. Time will tell whether this strategy will pay off for the Switch, in my opinion the Dreamcast had some truly brilliant games during its short 2 year lifespan, far better than that available on the Saturn. Unfortunately it wasn't enough to make up for Sega's past mistakes and after launching in 1999 the Dreamcast was discontinued during 2001.
What do you think? Sega had a whole decade of issues, including more than just the Saturn, which built up to the release of the Dreamacst and I haven't factored the success of the 3DS into this discussion. I don't see Nintendo going the way of Sega, Nintendo are a well resourced company but 3 years from now will they still be making hardware or will we be playing Mario and Zelda on other systems? History has a way of repeating itself, particularly where lessons are forgotten. Just to put some outline figures behind this: cross referencing the sales figures for each system with the population figures for their main sales regions in the consoles last year gives the following results. 1 in 78 people owned a Saturn, 1 in 58 people owned a Wii U. This is obviously not totally accurate but based on the best available population figures for Japan, the USA, Canada, the UK, France, Germany, Italy and Spain added and divided by the total global sales. Although countries are missing from the list the same have been used for both systems so the data should be comparable.