I hope you are aware that the best thing for the industry is for itself to be making more profits. Primarily they are all still businesses.
Of course. But when profits come at the expense of the consumer, those profits will not sustain themselves.
Only a few radicals/revolutionaries like Iwata unstood that profits and what the gamers/customers really want to buy is totally intertwined. The heart of a gamer does influence their purchases. Iwata understood this more than anyone else ever in the gameing industry. That creates a conundrum though. Do you always appease the gamers or do you milk existing cash cows just for more profits? Nintendo seems to have a decent approach here. Milk the cash cows till you are in a financial position to make a more innovative game to satify the customers need of more innovative game play. This also requires the hardware innovation to make this possible. Nintendo is doing it every console now and Sony is doing this with VR.
I disagree that Nintendo is doing it with every console. The Wii had the opportunity to be the greatest console of all time. It's still a console with some spectacular games, and a unique way to play some of those games, but ultimately, it fell short by not meeting industry standards in terms of hardware.
The Wii U did not innovate in any way. Again, still a great console, with some of the best games out currently, but again, fell short in terms of hardware
and the controller held it back.
Which is why I make my point later on about the controller needing to be gimmick-free. Like it or not, the gaming world as a whole is tired of "innovative" control methods.
Nintendo did not do this just to be different to everyone else. Nintendo did it because it wanted to release consoles when it felt like the best time was.
Nintendo did it to make a quick buck.
Nintendo did not want to be stuck to a forced release cycle. It gives Nintendo more flexibility to release things when they are actually ready. I reckon MS and Sony should do the same. Not release mid cycle. I mean abandon the whole set time scale cycle idea all together. Reelease consoles and other things when they are ready, not when an arbitary cycle demands they do so.
It isn't arbitrary. Cycles are in place for a reason. They give the consumer more "bang for the buck". Making a $300+ purchase on a piece of hardware is an investment. As a consumer, you expect this investment to last you more than 2-3 years. Because you're not just making the hardware purchase: you're making software and peripheral purchases as well, and—in the case of MS and Sony—you're paying for monthly subscriptions to online accounts.
By your theory, all three companies could release "updated" versions of new hardware every 2-3 years. I mean, PCs are upgradable literally multiple times a year, so if you like, Nintendo could release the NX, NX 2.0 and NX 3.0 all within a two year period, and that would be okay? Absolutely
not.
- I disagree with the first point. A unique wat to interact with the NX needs to be one of the major selling points of the NX. Nintendo also however need 1st party games that take advantage of it well. So that new innovation is the must have thing of the moment.
Like I said, I feel like the majority of the industry is tired of "unique" control methods. I think the Wii Controller was
the way to go, but Nintendo didn't stick with it, and now it's too late. The Game Pad was a failure. I promise you no one wants a gimmicky controller anymore. Thus, Nintendo can't afford to make the Wii and Wii U mistake a third time.
If there is going to be innovation, it has to come from elsewhere. I'm not against Nintendo trying something new, unique, or even rebellious, but it simply
can't come from the controller. The time for that may come in the future, but the NX can't afford to take a gamble, and a gimmicky controller is a gamble, and one that will fail based on precedent.