Release time

While I think it was clever, albeit confusing to the gaming press and gamers at large, for Nintendo to release the 3DS at the end of the first quarter, the same tactic would be unwise for Ninty to do next year. Nintendo gave us a glimpse of what they expect to see out of the Wii U at this years E3, but it didn't actually show the public at large what to expect. In fact, there was so much confusion with Nintendo's E3 announcement, that many thought their new tablet-like periphrial was the console itself, and as the actual console only makes a quick and barely visable appearence, it's no wonder we were all left scratching our heads.

Nintendo needs to fix this huge oversight. They need to show off the console itself, show some games running off their hardware (and not videos taken from games running on the competitors consoles). The best place to do this, is at next year's E3, and they shouldn't release the Wii U a moment before. Thankfully, the big N has said they will be doing this.

Pricing

The Wii debuted at $249.99, and no one expects the newest iteration to live up to that price point, but many have pointed out anything pricier will only drive away the mass market that made the Wii such a huge success. What we know so far of the Wii U is that the hardware appears to be on the same level, if not minimally better than the PS3's insides. And no one should be surprised, that's all now nearly 6 year old technology, which wasn't even top of the line when the PS3 finally hit the market. Gut's on that level mean that Nintendo can offer graphics that live up to their competitors, bringing casual Wii owners into a world of high-fidelity while also keeping Nintendo's cost low.

The tablet that the Wii U sports doesn't seem to be much more than a screen - with inexpensive resistive touch capabilities added on. Unlike the Wii's controllers - which handled all the processing of various input data and sent that stream back to the Wii - it appears the important stuff will be handled by the console itself, and opting to reverse the Wiimote's process and stream the data to the tablet periphrial. This not only keeps the cost of the giant VMU down, but ensures that it doesn't step on what the 3DS has to offer.

All in all, $299.99 is probably the lowest price point we'll see the Wii U at, but I'm not going to count on it. On the other hand, anything above $349.99 might be asking to much, and alienating the casual market - which Nintendo obviously wants more money from. Nintendo usually makes money off it's hardware right off the bat, but with today's economy the above price points might not much of a profit, if any, from the starting line. We won't really know till the console hits and someone can dissect it, however.

Content is King

In their latest earnings call, Nintendo has admitted that the 3D's lack-luster sales can be partially (though I would argue mostly) attributed to lack of games. While the latest portable system has had some great titles, the best of them are rehashes of old games - and while I have been a "sucker" to buy two of them, I actually never owned the original Ocarina of Time or StarFox 64. While Nintendo has promised the games will come, the fact of the matter is Mario, Zelda, Kirby and the likes sell their systems, and holding off to let third parties get a jump has turned into a catch 22. All of this is probably better served for another time, but the point is that Nintendo can't afford to make the same mistake twice. And Nintendo knows. Let's hope their reasoning behind the Wii's sharp decline in game development is because the focus has shifted to the Wii U.

All in all, I think Nintendo has a great chance of making something that can be a huge success, but they need to tread lightly. It's become clear that they've gotten a bit too comfy and are now looking at a loss for the first time ever. I have no doubt they will turn that around, and that there is actually a bit of strategy to what they were thinking. Nintendo isn't dumb, maybe bad at some things, but far from dumb. Let's hope the Wii is a worthwhile system.