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[AzaK]

Amir0x's posts have been rather convincing on the notion that Nintendo created a culture on the Wii which pandered towards 'lite/casual/mini-game compilation' software instead of fostering a system in which more 'mature' software could find success.

It actually happened way before the Wii. It started with the NES. Every generation except the Wii has seen worse sales for Nintendo's home console. Sure they had core games on all their platforms, but Nintendo doesn't focus on games like that nor is it their MO. When competitors entered the fray early on, they targeted everyone. Sony was like "Put anything you want on our machines, and here's 650MB of storage to do it on". PC's started going nuts with the FPS craze and that's where the industry started to accelerate. Whereas Nintendo kept things cheaper and oriented to their more casual/family market.

As gaming exploded people wanted more and Nintendo couldn't really offer them that.

 

[PotionBleue]

I understand that Just dance has been more of a disaster, sales wise on the WiiU, than ZombieU. So does this mean we won't get any Ubi games on WiiU at all?

It's not a sales disaster lol. It's the 3rd platform where it sells the most, after Wii & 360. PS3, PS4 and XB1 sell less Just Dance than Wii U.

 

[69wpm]

Right now Zombi U is at 700,000 sold. Now ubi soft said it was a low budget test game for them. They also said the game was not profitable... which i have to question. 700,000 (even though some of these were bundled) is still a win in my book. No way they spent 10-15 million developing and marketing Zombi U.

Well, if they did, we know why: The game was meant to be for the 360, got ported to the Wii U and completely changed from Killer Freaks to Zombi U. That is Ubis fuck up and not really something to blame the consumer for.

 

[Shiggy]

so many quality indie games coming that i cant be mad at the 3rd parties. I mean we are even getting the Original Trine remastered game. plus fast racing neo should hopefully launch Q4. there is also affordable space adventure... too many to name but the indie devs are stepping up BIG time for Wii U.

Yes, indies are on Wii U. Though saying "big time" might be a bit exaggerated. Every once in a while there is some real high quality stuff coming. I'm still hoping for something from Skip Ltd. or Q-Games - though the latter seems to have kissed Nintendo goodbye.

Right now Zombi U is at 700,000 sold. Now ubi soft said it was a low budget test game for them. They also said the game was not profitable... which i have to question. 700,000 (even though some of these were bundled) is still a win in my book. No way they spent 10-15 million developing and marketing Zombi U.

700k is a number from VG Chart*? The last number we know from the US market was 200k, and it's highly doubtful that sales in Europe are that much higher or that sales dramatically increased.

 

[nephilimdj]

Well, if they did, we know why: The game was meant to be for the 360, got ported to the Wii U and completely changed from Killer Freaks to Zombi U. That is Ubis fuck up and not really something to blame the consumer for.

Killer freaks looked like it was still in alpha stage from the videos, they have no clip on and he dies every 30secs

 

[Foshy]

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hUdkqY5Lr7A

The "sales figures" he mentions are suspiciously close to chartzzz numbers. Yeah, need better sources.

 

[Shiggy]

Killer freaks looked like it was still in alpha stage from the videos, they have no clip on and he dies every 30secs

Killer Freaks (or Killer Rabbids, that's what it was called originally) was limping around as a prototype with a very small team. A few months before E3 2011, the title was greenlit for full production and a small E3 demo was made. Few weeks later the game was scrapped and ZombiU got started. The budget during the prototype phase couldn't have been too big as the team was pretty small.

Vg is usually a little off but not that much. Either way lets say 500,000 sold at 60 a pop.

Referencing VG Char*z numbers is a bannable offense on here as they are completely made up. 500k at 60$/€ also isn't a realistic scenario as the prices dropped quickly down to 20€. Even though the game never got a reprint, it's still readily available. Just shows how much overshipped it was.

 

[Shiggy]

really had no idea VG chartz was bannable. i still to my knowledge remeber Nintendo releasing numbers and it was about 500k worldwide pushing into 600k

No worries, that's why I'm telling you about it.

Nintendo has actually never released any numbers about ZombiU. From what I remember, Ubisoft said they shipped half a million copies to retailers.

 

[Mithos]

No worries, that's why I'm telling you about it.

Nintendo has actually never released any numbers about ZombiU. From what I remember, Ubisoft said they shipped half a million copies to retailers.

So Ubisoft have been paid for 500k copies then, or they send copies out for free to stores, just asking/wondering?

 

[Shiggy]

So Ubisoft have been paid for 500k copies then, or they send copies out for free to stores, just asking/wondering?

They had to grant big discounts to retailers and "took back" some copies and sold them to bargain distributors (ak tronik) which re-sell such titles for €20. The latter is pretty common for titles that are overstocked, even Nintendo did it for titles such as SSBB, Spirit Tracks, or Mario Power Tennis. So obviously they got paid for those copies, just not as much as you may imagine.

 

[Burai]

yep especially if what he said about the sales numbers are correct. 250,000 for just dance Wii U and 200,000 for Assassing creed IV Wii U. that is not much of a difference.

Oh please. Do you think that Assasin's Creed costs the same to develop/port/optimise as Just Dance? It's not just a matter of unit sales, it's the return on the investment.

 

[MisterGrey3000]

...Alright.

I certainly didn't buy the WiiU for M-rated games like Assassin's Creed or ZombieU, and I'm assuming that most other WiiU owners (outside of enthusiast forums like GAF) didn't either going by how that software performs on the console.

I understand the important implications of Ubi saying this (The big N basically has no AAA Western 3rd party support at this point) and it makes sense why this is a 20 page thread, but as a consumer of casual/family-aimed software I just don't care...
Ubi never really made an honest effort to appeal to me as a WiiU owner outside of Rayman.

Edit:

It's not a sales disaster lol. It's the 3rd platform where it sells the most, after Wii & 360. PS3, PS4 and XB1 sell less Just Dance than Wii U.

Is this true?
Huh...even when their console is a complete failure and they have the most toxic ecosystem on the market, family/casual stuff still seems to perform "better" on their systems.
:/

 

[ArcaneFreeze]

Killer Freaks (or Killer Rabbids, that's what it was called originally) was limping around as a prototype with a very small team. A few months before E3 2011, the title was greenlit for full production and a small E3 demo was made. Few weeks later the game was scrapped and ZombiU got started. The budget during the prototype phase couldn't have been too big as the team was pretty small.



.

iirc thats not how it happened, the game was originally a Rabbids spin off game for 360/PS3, development then shifted towards WiiU as an exclusive Rabbids game. Since it was now exclusive they decided to change the game and turn into a shooting game utilizing the Gamepad that still involved the rabbids, but then things changed again because Ubisoft thought it felt weird shooting at cute little creatures so development then changed again to fit a darker tone which changed the game to Killer Freaks from Outer Space. Now when they tried to fit it around WiiU they felt the fast paced style didn't fit it well so they decided to change it again and go with a slower model, the slow model didn't fit Killer Freaks either though so they changed it to Zombies, which left us with our final product in ZombiU. It may have been a small team but the development production went through so many phases they had to have lost money somewhere along the line.

 

[Rocky]

Is this true?
Huh...even when their console is a complete failure and they have the most toxic ecosystem on the market, family/casual stuff still seems to perform "better" on their systems.
:/

Kind of. Even though the WiiU version of 2014 was third, I think it only sold a couple hundred thousand on that platform compared to millions on Wii and 360.

Though I'd still call it a disaster, since the next gen versions aren't compelling enough for fans to get new consoles to play it. They're content to play them on last gen systems because they aren't all that different from year to year.

 

[Shiggy]

iirc thats not how it happened, the game was originally a Rabbids spin off game for 360/PS3, development then shifted towards WiiU as an exclusive Rabbids game. Since it was now exclusive they decided to change the game and turn into a shooting game utilizing the Gamepad that still involved the rabbids, but then things changed again because Ubisoft thought it felt weird shooting at cute little creatures so development then changed again to fit a darker tone which changed the game to Killer Freaks from Outer Space. Now when they tried to fit it around WiiU they felt the fast paced style didn't fit it well so they decided to change it again and go with a slower model, the slow model didn't fit Killer Freaks either though so they changed it to Zombies, which left us with our final product in ZombiU. It may have been a small team but the development production went through so many phases they had to have lost money somewhere along the line.

Yes, the original prototype ran on 360/PS3. The directional change from Killer Rabbids from Outer Space to Killer Freaks from Outer Space wasn't that big - Ubisoft management was afraid of damaging the kids-friendly Rabbids brand. Thus the creatures called "killer rabbids" became "killer freaks". When Unit Image created the initial E3 trailer, the project was still called Killer Rabbids.

Development costs until early 2011 cannot have been to huge as the prototype was nothing spectacular and the project was only ramped up by then for the E3 Wii U reveal. Pre-production with a pretty small team usually isn't that expensive.

 

[Mithos]

They had to grant big discounts to retailers and "took back" some copies and sold them to bargain distributors (ak tronik) which re-sell such titles for €20. The latter is pretty common for titles that are overstocked, even Nintendo did it for titles such as SSBB, Spirit Tracks, or Mario Power Tennis. So obviously they got paid for those copies, just not as much as you may imagine.

Aiit, thanks =)

 

[MisterGrey3000]

Kind of. Even though the WiiU version of 2014 was third, I think it only sold a couple hundred thousand on that platform compared to millions on Wii and 360.

Though I'd still call it a disaster, since the next gen versions aren't compelling enough for fans to get new consoles to play it. They're content to play them on last gen systems because they aren't all that different from year to year.

Hmmmm...
I don't believe that any amount of compelling "next-gen" features will make casual/family gamers purchase a PS4 or Xbone for Just Dance.
The PlayStation and Xbox are mainly geared towards young males from almost every perspective (Aesthetics, branding, marketing, software ecosystem, etc.)
It'll probably take a drastic Kinect-like change in focus to make casual/family gamers look away from their phones/tablets (or even Wiis or 360s in this case), and pay attention to either of those consoles.

 

[Rocky]

Hmmmm...
I don't believe that any amount of compelling "next-gen" features will make casual/family gamers purchase a PS4 or Xbone for Just Dance.
The PlayStation and Xbox are mainly geared towards young males from almost every perspective (Aesthetics, branding, marketing, software ecosystem, etc.)
It'll probably take a drastic Kinect-like change in focus to make casual/family gamers look away from their phones/tablets (or even Wiis or 360s in this case), and pay attention to either of those consoles.

Well, there's not much difference between the Wii and WiiU versions. My niece gets the game every year for Christmas. First on the Wii, and now on the WiiU. There's not much differences year to year, aside from new songs and slight graphics changes. Its kinda like Just Dance is Ubi's equivalent of Madden really.

 

[digoutyoursoul]

I don't see Nintendo really surviving as a hardware manufacturer for too much longer unless they make some sweeping changes. Though, considering what they've said about creating an OS and supporting that as a platform they have a chance. They have the right idea.

Nintendo's problem has always been that they treat games as toys. Family friendly, fun for all ages. That was great for handhelds as it suited that market perfectly, but they lost ground on the console front for decades as their initial audience grew older (I started with an NES). Their last opportunity to be a contender for the young male demographic that would eventually be the last loyal bastion of console gaming was back during the N64 days and they fucked that up just epically. Wii was a very focused toy. Nintendo basically created that pretty much at the perfect time, as smartphones were on their way and they have supplanted Nintendo's audience nearly completely. Wii would have been a huge hit during the N64 or Gamecube eras as well. But making consoles toys just isn't going to work anymore due to the ease of use, cheapness and ubiquity of smartphones and their games.

Anyone expecting them to release a traditional console and gain traditional third party support with mature titles that we come to expect from the likes of the playstation or xbox families is going to be sorely disappointed. That race ended long ago. Nintendo never played by their game (bending over backwards to gain support and nab major titles), shit Nintendo never even bothered to bestir themselves to create mature titles themselves after the N64 age. One of the biggest game companies and these guys don't even chase that market themselves.

Good post. I hope you are wrong though, I would be gutted if they stopped making systems. I have not bought the Wii U and don't intend to buy it any time soon but I do crave for them to compete on a online network/hardware level with the other two.

 

[Nealand Liquor]

Wiiu owners only have themselves to blame, all 10 of them.

 

[10k]

Wiiu owners only have themselves to blame, all 10 of them.

I may have put on a few pounds, but I'm not big enough to be 10 people. Geez man.

 

[Shion]

Nintendo may refer to themselves as an "entertainment" company, but they still think and act as a toy company.

As much as I respect Miyamoto, I think it's time for him to step down from his current role and return to what he's actually good at. A good game designer doesn't necessarily make a good general manager / decision maker. And Miyamoto has proved to be a terrible GM for Nintendo. He shouldn't be able to dictate the company's strategic vision and he most certainly shouldn't have the power to guide development solely towards the type of games that he, personally, prefers. This kind of over-managed and overly centralized structure is making it difficult for new blood and ideas to emerge and for outside information to filter in.

In an ideal world Nintendo would position their consoles as entertainment products with games for all audiences, not as toys for little kids and families. The aesthetics of their OS wouldn't resemble something designed in an elementary school, they'd have a modern, sleek and neutral design like Android. And Nintendo's designers wouldn't only create content for the kids/families demo.

Truth is, Nintendo targets "everyone" only in the theoretical sense. In actual, real-world, conditions, Nintendo's appeal is very narrow. I'm sure that Nintendo considers Kirby as "a game for everyone". That's fine, but how many people, above the age of 10, are actually interested in playing a Kirby game? And what happens with those people? Do you ignore them as an audience? Even a franchise like Zelda, that could help Nintendo expand their appeal beyond the younger audience, is made with the younger demographic in mind.

In an ideal world Nintendo would widen their appeal by building an entire division focused on providing high-quality games for older demographics. Not games with macho-gorillas and giant guns that kill everything that moves. But games that, thematically and aesthetically, would offer an actual mature experience in the same way that good movies and novels do.

As a side note, I think they are literally killing themselves by trying to chase profit margins that are impossible to achieve in a mature industry.

 

[Jethro]

Wonder how many digital copy of Zombi U has been sold. It's often on Sale here and in the Top 20 of the most bought Games on the eShop (Europe)

 

[M°°nblade]

thats not the issue the issu and issue alone was he said the sales. I understand they cost different amounts to develop. The point is as far as the sales go they are not that different so its not like just dance is out pacing by a large margin.

His sales numbers are from VG and therefor not reliable. He doesn't know the difference in sales. He also doesn't know the difference in development costs which makes his entire argument to call out Ubisoft from business point of view baseless.

The only undoubtable conclusion you can come to after watching his video, is that he loves nintendo.

 

[69wpm]

Wonder how many digital copy of Zombi U has been sold. It's often on Sale here and in the Top 20 of the most bought Games on the eShop (Europe)

With the price it's had for a while, I'd say quite a few. Sadly, we will never know.

 

[muyricosuave]

I'm just thankful they tried they were the only third party publisher I supported really normally on My ps3 I wait for games on ps+ and don't really spend games but I always got ubi games on Wii U. I'm sad nobody bought them on Wii U. Ubi makes great games

 

[M°°nblade]

Question for you guys... if VG is so bad and use made up numbers why ...

It's not 'if'. They are made up. That's why it's a banned site.

 

[Aquamarine]

Question for you guys... if VG is so bad and use made up numbers why is the site still up and I guess you can say relevant. Why havent anyone called them out on their BS. maybe someone has but why do people still use them as a source?

Because there are lots of gullible people out there who believe anything they read on the Internet.

 

[daxgame]

well

he's right, I mostly don't care about those titles

I'm getting AC4 when it gets around 15€ because that's his value for me, and I'm getting Watch Dogs for U.
ZombiU was nice though.

 

[shadowsdarknes]

WiiU is probably the best system for Watch_Dogs, since there isn't as much insanely superior direct competition for it as every other platform its out on.

I don't know why anyone would want to play Watch_Dogs when Sleeping Dogs, GTA, Infamous, Saint's Row, etc all exist, but seems like it would fill a nice hole in the WiiU's genre library. Too bad it couldn't be a better game.

That's a nice theory and all, but it would have still sold the least of all platforms.
The game is above 8 million copies sold. Despite competing with other big games, the game did remarkably well.

 

[shadowsdarknes]

Question for you guys... if VG is so bad and use made up numbers why is the site still up and I guess you can say relevant. Why havent anyone called them out on their BS. maybe someone has but why do people still use them as a source?

People use info_wars as a source too. Everyone who doesn't wear a tinfoil hat has called that place out on their BS yet the site is still up and people lap that shit up like it's the Bible.

 

[Jethro]

I'm getting AC4 when it gets around 15€

You can grab it for 15 because it's on sale...

 

[Zombie James]

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hUdkqY5Lr7A

Yikes.

 

[The_Intruder]

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hUdkqY5Lr7A

So true.

 

[Glass Rebel]

I do buy AC - on PC where I can get them for less than 10€, because that's how much I'm willing to pay for a yearly franchise like this.

It's not me, Ubi, it's you

 

[……forgetit]

I only buy exclusives on my wii u, I'm part of the problem.

 

[metalslimer]

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hUdkqY5Lr7A

Pathetic not even including the fact that this guy tried to pass off Chartzzz numbers. I hope too many people don't take this guy seriously.

 

[bomb]

Maybe because WiiU owners dont want to pay money for mediocore Assassins Creed games. Basically the same game year after year.

 

[Shmuely Bully]

Yikes.

I love how he gives Ubisoft grief for having Assassin's Creed III release 'late' for the Wii U when it was a launch title. The Rayman Legends delay may be something worth complaining about, the Assassin's Creed III 'delay' isn't.

 

[sörine]

Question for you guys... if VG is so bad and use made up numbers why is the site still up and I guess you can say relevant. Why havent anyone called them out on their BS. maybe someone has but why do people still use them as a source?

I'd say it's because of NPD's near complete information blackout. NPD's practices are the only thing giving Chartz any real opportunity and by extension legitimacy. And as a result various respected media outlets and even game publishers themselves have sourced Chartz.

Thanks NPD.

 

[metalslimer]

I love how he gives Ubisoft grief for having Assassin's Creed III release 'late' for the Wii U when it was a launch title. The Rayman Legends delay may be something worth complaining about, the Assassin's Creed III 'delay' isn't.

It's really confusing to see people complain about the bad ports at launch as well when Nintendo was the one with the dev kit issues for so long.

I'd say it's because of NPD's near complete information blackout. NPD's practices are the only thing giving Chartz any real opportunity and by extension legitimacy. And as a result various respected media outlets and even game publishers themselves have sourced Chartz.

Thanks NPD.

It's also really funny to think of Square Enix being too broke to afford NPD data.

 

[Shmuely Bully]

It's really confusing to see people complain about the bad ports at launch as well when Nintendo was the one with the dev kit issues for so long.

Yeah, really.

Even discounting that: Launch titles on hardware that isn't much stronger than its last-gen competition don't run as well as on hardware devs have had 7 years to optimize for. News at 11.

 

[Bizazedo]

Question for you guys... if VG is so bad and use made up numbers why is the site still up and I guess you can say relevant. Why havent anyone called them out on their BS. maybe someone has but why do people still use them as a source?

Personally, I'm glad it's still up. Helps point out people who know what they're talking about and who doesn't when their numbers are used.

 

[Aquamarine]

I'd say it's because of NPD's near complete information blackout. NPD's practices are the only thing giving Chartz any real opportunity and by extension legitimacy. And as a result various respected media outlets and even game publishers themselves have sourced Chartz.

Thanks NPD.

The only thing that gives Chartz legitimacy is mass ignorance about how video game sales tracking actually works. It's understandable...sales tracking is quite niche.

Many people just see a number in front of them and assume the methodology behind it is sound...when in many cases Chartz just randomly picks numbers out of a hat.

 

[Pociask]

Dang, I missed the discussion on Nintendo competing on hardware. It looks like some people were saying if Nintendo wanted to make competitive hardware, they'd have to up the price more. The thinking behind this is that Nintendo saves money by using old tech. Not true! Nintendo spent a ton of money on r&d crafting brand new hardware for the Wii U. It is state of the art, and in fact, best in the industry at what they set out to do. But what they set out to do was to make 360 level graphics in a box the size of the Wii, with a tiny power draw. They did it! A state of the art efficient console appears! But it doesn't do anything [in the market].

Anyway, all of this is to say is that Nintendo could have put that R&D into the best graphics $250 or $299 could buy. That would have been a real step up from the PS3 and 360, and would have given them momentum with the "core" gaming audience. But they didn't. And the guy in charge of designing the hardware, and his boss, both still have their jobs.

 

[heidern]

The rest of the third party library along with Just Dance games account for something like 500M+ units of software from memory. Somehow this un-compelling third party library managed to sell.

It managed to sell, but it didn't manage to keep selling. Contrast that with Dragon Quest which was seeing increased sales with each iteration. Wii was like the Atari crash all over again.

Again, you define "effort" with regard to dimensions you value. Why would a 35 year old mother of two care what headlines at a trade show?

She wouldn't care about what headlines at a trade show, although if mass media picks up the headline then she might care. But that misses the other key point, what headlines at a trade show illustrates a companies priorities. Very clearly third parties did not prioritise the Wii, they prioritised the PS3/360. So clearly they didn't put their best effort towards the Wii audience and in doing so got limited results.

Third parties made efforts to create software based on observation of consumer needs and desires.

Limited efforts designed to cash in on customers with no long term vision and feeble or not attempts to lead consumer desires and give consumers what they didn't know they wanted.

The platforms and software that are now attracting the demographics of the expanded audience market are not competing on those "effort" dimensions you list, and they are not out-competing Nintendo's platforms based on those dimensions. The production values of Candy Crush do not match Mario Kart. The artistic vision of PazuDora isn't superior to The Legend of Zelda.

Those platforms are not comparable to videogame hardware because they are not being bought for the purposes of gaming. People primarily buy phones because of the need to communicate. The key point being that mobile games do not need to convince consumers to buy the hardware and they don't need to be compelling enough to get people to keep the hardware. This means they can be made with a low budget and low effort in comparison to software on dedicated device.

It's like comparing a Ferrari to a Ford. You shouldn't compare them. You could say a Ferrari is better quality and that a Ford is more practical. They serve different needs and so you evaluate them on their own terms. You don't complain about a Ford not being as sleek or as fast as a Ferrari, but that doesn't mean you can't criticise/praise a Ford with regards to how it serves its own market or whether it fulfils its potential.

That you're referencing a market some 30 years ago as if it's a relevant contemporary example aside, publishers created software on the NES to capitalize on the same market base that the platform holders cultivated. They did so on the PlayStation and Xbox platforms. They did so on the Wii. Ubisoft did not make a dance game because Nintendo made one and cultivated the genre, as Nintendo didn't. They made a dance game that they believed would appeal to the same market Nintendo cultivated.

The NES is a relevent example because it was an example of hardware that attracted a brand new audience. The PSX could also be used as an example where the likes of Resident Evil, Metal Gear Solid, Gran Turismo, Tomb Raider, Tekken etc targeted a new audience. In fact you had a great variety and many experimental or ambitious games small and big including Parappa the Rapper, Parasite Eve, DDR, Tony Hawk, Vib Ribbon etc where new audiences were targeted and existing audiences were targeted beyond what they had already shown they wanted. The quality of the products led to word of mouth and was newsworthy and led to wider coverage in the media and created a market that was sustainable.

Third parties on the Wii did not create a thriving market full of creativity and risk taking. They played it sage and in doing so they did not create major hits, did not create dedicated fans and did not generate hype or garner mainstream media coverage. It's telling that you continuously refer to Just Dance as that was the only third party Wii game that made a notable impact.

 

[Shiggy]

Dang, I missed the discussion on Nintendo competing on hardware. It looks like some people were saying if Nintendo wanted to make competitive hardware, they'd have to up the price more. The thinking behind this is that Nintendo saves money by using old tech. Not true! Nintendo spent a ton of money on r&d crafting brand new hardware for the Wii U. It is state of the art, and in fact, best in the industry at what they set out to do. But what they set out to do was to make 360 level graphics in a box the size of the Wii, with a tiny power draw. They did it! A state of the art efficient console appears! But it doesn't do anything [in the market].

Yeah, basically who cares about the size or power draw as long as it's reasonably small and uses a reasonable amount of power?

 

[Mithos]

Yeah, basically who cares about the size or power draw as long as it's reasonably small and uses a reasonable amount of power?

Playstation 4 is "small" enough, but I love the smaller size of the Wii U even so.

 

[Nintendojitsu]

Delaying already completed launch titles, gimping ports and unreleasing DLC is a surefire way to instill faith in customers. /s

The excuse of Assassin Creed IV sales being a catalyst as to why Watch_Dogs will be the last rated M game released from Ubisoft is utter bullshit especially when you factor in that a rated M game has already gone on to sell extraordinarily well given its rushed nature; Zombi U.

 

[shinra-bansho]

It's not the only third party title to make a major impact. It's one of the most notable. Skylanders is another. Infinity. The LEGO titles sold well. There are other million+ seller titles that you or I would probably label artistically meritless shovelware. Just Dance does not account for 500M units of software. And it was a thriving software market for a period. And they did not play it safe on the Wii any more or less than on the PS3 or 360, in all three cases they made software for markets/audiences built by first party product positioning. Not genres. Audiences. The same audiences.

They put in adequate effort towards addressing consumer needs at the time. They didn't prioritise the Wii in terms of budgets because again that isn't necessarily the metric of relevance. It may be something of relevance to you. But not to those audiences who are now lapping up software made for a relative pittance. Where the market is sustained by clones, and the mechanics can be as simple as match 3. Something you seem to refuse to accept. Design efforts were towards simplicity not complexity.

You say they failed to address consumers' incipient needs. And I'll agree on that. Because that need was for even greater convenience, even more simplified control schemes, even lower cost. They were and are ill equipped to meet those needs. And these needs have consequently been met elsewhere. Their fault was not however their dearth in risk taking in creativity and genres, nor limiting production values because there isn't much to suggest that that's what those audiences wanted and what would have prevented them from migrating to other forms of entertainment that better met what they actually wanted.