Originally posted by: Too Beaucoup
Hey, I wouldn't totally doubt it could outsell the Twitch. Look at how abysmal Nintendo supported the Wii-U. I don't think consumer confidence is exactly at a peak with Nintendo, right now. Not to mention, them still rolling with the gimmicks in their consoles. They can't just ever make a console, it's always gotta be something goofy. I think people are starting to get sick of their sh!t.
I'm actually looking forward to the Switch. It's everything the Wii-U should have been. Also +1 for not being confined to the bedroom when gaming on the pad.
I'm buying it on day one and I plan on playing through Zelda BOTW and whatever ever 3D Mario is in the pipes and updated MK8. The diehards will buy up al of the games. Wii-U sold primarily to the diehards who buy everything, and there's surprisingly large number of million sellers.
For instance MK8 sold 7.5 million copies, slightly surpassing Double Dash and Melee on the Game Cube, a system which sold three times as many consoles than the Wii-U worldwide. So while Wii sold 100 million consoles to casuals and nursing homes, it had an abysmally low software attach rate. Wii-U seold 1/8 as many hardware units but with a very high software attach rate.
I expect the Switch to at least be on par with Wii-U, if not exceed it, and if the software attach rate is high, Nintendo stands to make money even if global sales are slow. But i'm tired of people looking at console sales alone as if it's the only metric of how successful a console is. For instance, Gamecube churned profit from day one, whereas microsoft and Sony lost millions of dollars launching PS2/3 Xbox/360 and only recouped their investments midway through each generation. PS4/XB1 would have been a similar stuation but instead of selling a vastly overpowered console and selling at a loss at launch, MS/Sony have chosen to follow the mobile industry model of incremental upgraes.
Nintendo Switch is doing the same going forward, albeit on ARM architecture instead of x86-64. ARM CPUs are almost on parity with x86 now, and vastly exceeds them in performance per watt. Also the whole "tablet with buttons" concept is freakking brilliant, coupled with active cooling and increased performance when docked.
Sorry for the OT, but devices like the NES and future "Mini" consoles will only raise awareness of NES, and when people get dissatisfied with original hardware or janky clones, "boutique" options like the AVS and NT Mini will only grow in popularity. AVS is in the sweet spot in terms of function and price, so I imagine Brian will sell out many "runs" of this console before the FPGA console trend has run it's course.
And AVS/NT Mini is just the start. I see Atari VCS, classic computers, 16-bit powerhouses like Genesis/SNES, muticonsole FPGAs and all sorts of other options as FPGAs get cheaper, bigger, and more ubiquitous.
