How Nintendo Should Follow Up the Success of the Switch with the Switch 2
Spenser Clark
As we gear up for the end of the original Nintendo Switch’s lifecycle and eagerly await the reveal of Nintendo’s next console project, which the internet has deemed the Switch 2, we are taking a look back today at some of the history behind what made the Nintendo Switch such a great console and top seller as it did, and think about what features or ideas Nintendo could do next.
Looking back, Nintendo has had a history of producing top performing consoles or achieving fantastic sales throughout their lifecycle, but having the following console perform poorly and slump in sales for several reasons. The Nintendo Switch’s predecessor, the Wii U console unfortunately followed that cycle and was a hard act to follow considering the seismic impact that the Wii had on the home console market. The Wii was well-known for being able to convert non-traditional gamers such as families with older members playing and more casual players into customers. By pursuing their wireless motion technology with the Wii remote, they went down a path that no one else was actively chasing after and thus capitalized on a whole new market of people and ideas that revolutionized gaming and introduced audiences to what wireless motion technology could do. The Wii ended up being a smash hit for Nintendo and sold over a 100 million units hardware wise with total sales landing at 101.63 million units. It ended up being one of their best-selling consoles!
To follow this up, the Nintendo Wii U came next. It took some of the ideas that the Wii used, but used similar branding, brought over Mii’s, and allowed backwards compatibility. To the average casual gamer and family base that they converted for their last generation, some problems emerged that didn’t quite translate to terrific sales like the previous generation. One being that the Wii U name confused a lot of customers who felt that it was possible to play Wii U games on their Wii. The other was they used a tablet as the main controller for the console. When this console was starting to be designed around 2010, tablets were starting to catch fire and become tremendously popular and were novel to own at that point, but by the time the console actually launched in 2013, they had become quite commonplace and weren’t as impactful as an earlier launch could’ve been. The console ultimately only sold 13.56 million units. If it wasn’t for their handheld console, the 3DS, which had 75.94 million units sold, it would’ve been a much rougher period for Nintendo. All this said though, these lessons and their time developing these consoles weren’t wasted as all of this would be instrumental for their next console, the Nintendo Switch.
Nintendo launched their next console, the Nintendo Switch, on March 3rd, 2017, with a brand new Legend of Zelda game, Breath of the Wild, and was a great anchor title to hold down their launch. Coincentally, it was also one of the last Wii U titles to be released. The Wii U being a commercial failure wasn’t a complete loss for Nintendo since they used their fantastic library of first- and third-party titles that didn’t reach the widest audience and ported many of the titles over to the Switch where they have reached a much more mainstream audience. Ports from the Wii U library like The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild, or Mario Kart 8 helped bolster their lineup and fill in the empty gaps while building back confidence with third-party developers which had been lost during the tenuous Wii U lifecycle. So many other convenient factors worked well for the Switch’s success such as the versatility of the console itself being both a handheld and a home console, their use of cartridges which unlike discs don’t often encounter problems with scratching or laser issues, or their amazing stable of intellectual property such as Super Mario, Pokémon, Splatoon, or Animal Crossing. The Switch has ended up being a massive success for Nintendo overall with lifetime sales reaching 143.42 units so far and is still going as we await the follow-up console to the Nintendo Switch.
As we await the Switch 2 to be announced, we would like to look forward to what might be some exciting ideas for Nintendo to approach and what ideas have seemed to work well for them with the original Nintendo Switch. First, people love physically collecting for the Nintendo Switch. Many companies and developers have ported their games over to take advantage of the large amount of consoles sold and the collecting fanbase that has bolstered companies such as Limited Run Games this generation. Nintendo, as evidence of their incredible software sales, have sold 1,266,460,000 units thus far both physically and digitally. Customers always love backwards compatibility as a feature, and with so many physical Switch titles out there, it’s an easy slam dunk for Nintendo to make. This also incentivizes your customers by being able to supplement the lack of games at first with a fully developed and robust library of titles to choose from. Speaking of the digital sales though, Nintendo needs to make sure that digital purchases follow customers this time to make it feel like your money will not be wasted on a previous platform. It’s an easier pill to swallow financially when customers don’t have to re-purchase everything again. One of the only drawbacks that Nintendo needs to improve upon for the next generation for their cartridges is making the sizes larger than the standard 8GB cartridges they provided. Developers, due to the cost of upgrading to the 16GB or 32GB often passed on upgrading to the larger sizes altogether, assumably for fear of passing that cost along to the customer and decided to go for some of the data would be on the cartridge while the rest would be a digital download. The drawback to this collecting wise is that when the Nintendo servers aren’t supported anymore, there will be physical games that are incomplete since they need a download for you to have the full game. One of the best examples of a developer going above and beyond for gamers and collectors was CD Projekt decided to incur the cost of the 32GB cartridge and release The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt for an affordable price when it was ported over to the Nintendo Switch.
Next, people absolutely loved having a handheld and home console all at once. Nintendo combined their handheld and home console gaming departments into one several years back when they shut down production for the Wii U and 3DS consoles, and that has allowed them to have an incredibly talented team of developers working together in one department. It is almost unimaginable to see their next console not continuing this idea since they have dominated the handheld market for three decades and this would allow them to continue innovating and controlling that market. Competitors have naturally noticed the success of the Switch’s handheld and home console in one idea and released several other consoles to compete with the Switch such as the Steam Deck, Rog Ally, or even the PlayStation Portal to a degree.
Building on the ideas first utilized by the Nintendo Wii with wireless motion technology captured by a sensor bar at the time, Nintendo introduced Joy-cons that were capable of everything their predecessors, the Wii remote, did while being truly wireless. It would be impactful for them to continue building on this technology and see what could be next. It has been rumored that they may eventually work on virtual reality at some point in the future and with some improvements and tweaks, a new set of Joy-cons for the Switch 2 could turn out to be amazing for their VR efforts.
One of the biggest complaints many people have had including even myself would have to be the Switch’s digital marketplace and their lack of organization and speed. During the first several years, it wasn’t too bad to stumble upon new games or sales, but as time has gone on, there have been a LOT of new games launched almost daily it seems and has thus become extremely popular and crowded. It’s a great problem to have honestly but has caused issues with shopping digitally or finding new titles without being bombarded by shovel-ware titles at times.
Lastly, if Nintendo just picks up what they did for the Switch and continue their work on a more powerful console, they will probably achieve the same great success, but that’s not what makes them Nintendo. Coming out with new, interesting, or innovative ideas when it sometimes has made sense to just push for new and powerful has never been their style. Some of the most interesting, fun, and wackiest games, controllers, and accessories were made by them or for their consoles because they always push the envelope. Usually when Sony or Microsoft launch a new console, you can almost always guarantee a very safe controller that is similar to the previous one with a few tweaks or revisions and a more upgraded console and design. Nothing too crazy or wild that will shock you, but provides a nice, safe, and steady path to success too and there’s nothing wrong with that. While they choose power and graphics, Nintendo pushes forward down their own path. Nobody asked for or envisioned some of the accessories or software that have released during the Switch’s lifecycle such as Ring Fit, Labo, or 1-2 Switch, but every time they do, they push forward with new ideas that help improve on old existing ones and figure out new ways to have fun. So, while it would make sense to create a “Switch 2” that is pretty much a continuation of the last console, it would be just as excited to see what kind of wild console they announce soon. As time marches closer and the holidays pass, somewhere in late January or early February will be when we will hear the latest news and see what Nintendo has cooking presumably. Until then, let’s all enjoy a fantastic library of first- and third-party titles and new releases by them such as Mario & Luigi: Brothership, Dragon Quest III: HD 2D Remaster, Xenoblade Chronicles X Remastered, or other super popular titles like Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild, Metroid Dread, Kirby & the Forgotten Land. This list could go on and on so we will stop there, but we are excited as ever to see what the Big N has cooking for us next.
Source(s): https://www.nintendo.co.jp/ir/en/finance/hard_soft/index.html
