Where would Nintendo be, without the Wii?

Here's an interesting question. Where do you think Nintendo would be had they not decided to take the breakaway revolution route? What if they had decided to follow the crowd (which keep in mind would have meant the PS3 wouldn't have any motion sensor stuff either) and basically just upgraded their engine for the next generation.

I certainly wouldn't have been happy if they had decided to go there. As great as the more low key innovational games were, like Donkey Konga Jungle Beat and which ever Mario Party had the microphone, I think if more of those titles were continued, the new system would get very gimmicky and boring, fast. Each additional controller would probably have to have a handful of unnecessary sequels developed for them just to warrant the control being made in the first place (IE all of those annoying Konga sequels).

So in that respect, I think the next generation was always going to be a hit or miss for Nintendo - either find themselves a unique system that could house all types of different innovational games, or reluctantly follow the competitors being forced to basically recycle last generations games/ideas/concepts.

Who knows, maybe if the Wii never happened, Nintendo might have retired from the hardware industry. Focusing on the Nintendo DS or even developing the occasional game for Sony or Microsoft, it all depends on how much dignity they wanted to maintain, I suppose.

Anyway, those are my thoughts. How does everyone else feel? Could Nintendo have survived another Gamecube?

( Edited on 23.07.2006 16:52 by Soundworks )

If Nintendo didn't go with Wii, I'd still expect a sleek console with top end technology in.

They would have to change things such as the amount of money used to bribe third parties etc.

They would have to promote promote promote.

^ Absolutely, nintendo would have to use some sneaky under-handed tactics to get by. It would be necessary for them to acquire a GTA game for their console. I would imagine that the "what if" Nintendo console would be very unorginal and have endless sequels.

Well I think no matter what happened, it would get lower sales than the Gamecube. Of course, if they got hold of third parties that might change. But I think the 3rd parties, if they left Sony, would just go over to Microsoft.

The Wii is really like a restarting for nintendo. For everyone. It's different, creative developers like that.
The control scheme is different. Non gamers, game skeptics, and those who've gotten tired of games will like that.
More people liking it. More 3rd parties jump on because of a larger number of Wii units out in the world as well as ease to develop for.

It's just this great rebirth of sorts for nintendo. If it wasn't for this, nintendo would probably still be considered kiddy.

That is an interesting concept, They would more than likely, as everyone above has answered, go along with the technologies.Have a much lamer Controller unlike the Wiimote.
Surely they would have to bring something to there side so that they appeal/Stand out more to the general public.Prehaps a Few different outstanding Wii only games.Who knows..The possabilities are endless.

I'd probably buy a tricked out (technologoy wise) Wii anyway. As long as it still looked the same. It would just be up to Nintendo to ram this console down our throats.

I would imagine that Nintendo would release a console that was more powerful than the Xbox 360 yet not as powerful as the PS3. Nintendo would probably try and stick to thier quality of quantity slogan. The console would probably be the cheapest console too.

Nintendo would probably also put more of an emphaisis on its online straergy and on its consoles link up to the DS.

A bigger Gamecube controller with a few changes would probably have replaced the Wii mote. Most people liked the GCN pad since some people thought it was too small.

It is really hard to imagine the Wii not exisiting. It has really caught on and will make an impact into the industry.

nexus i couldnt agree more, its actually really hard to think what we would all be saying had nintendo not gone the way of wii, brings up another question tho: what would nintendo have done to make the next-gen console unique? but it really is impossible to deny that the hype that has been made is incredible and if wii makes the same impact that is hype did its going to do exceedingly well!!

They wouldn't drop out that's for sure but their sales would have gone down soooooooooo much since they wouldn't have gone HD.

If Nintendo didn't go the Wii way, I'd have thought they'd have dropped out of home consoles sooner rather than later - not this coming up gen, perhaps not even the one after, but definitely sooner, as they'd probably have been getting less and less sales to the point where it wouldn't be worth staying in the race anymore. They could build the most powerful console, but how they are perceived by the public in the home console front would have dragged them down, and they would've been kicked in by Sony and Microsoft again on the strength of this/last gen. Wii is the best way for them to go, as they're doing something different - a surefire way to get noticed, where they may not have been if they'd just done a Gamecube 2. The Wii also allows them to pretend that they're not in battle with Sony and Microsoft, which is sort of true, sort of not, and will be beneficial.

Without Wii, though, you still couldn't say they'd be going down. Their home consoles would still be a moderate success, enough to turn a profit, but their emphasis would be far more focused on making DS even more of an insane success than it already is.

i agree with most of the comments. i think they would have gone HD and ramped some serious power into it. zelda would still have been the biggy. they wouldn't have called it gc2 but it would have been the cheapest console. i guess theyd hve kept the VC and that would have bneen the unique selling point for it. whereas with the wii its one of many selling points.
nintendo is never likely to stop making consoles until they dont turn a profit and the gc did that easily as the ds is doing as well. i just dont like the idea of link on MS or SOny it would ruin the series.
wii is the best route for them as the ds has proved for handhelds. wii will do the business but its what follows wii that will be truly interesting.