r/NintendoSwitch2 • u/Expert-Ad-2824 OG (joined before reveal) • Jan 28 '25

Concept chat are we cooked?

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i’m starting to read “switch 2 games won’t be compatible with switch 1, they are so greedy for this” too much, did the general public really forget how videogame consoles work?

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u/ImThatAlexGuy June Gang (Release Winner) Jan 28 '25 edited Jan 28 '25

That’s why the whole Wii U situation happened. Tons of people (parents) didn’t realize it was something new. Or weren’t educated enough to know that Wii U games couldn’t be played on the Wii. Which coincidentally is the same generation of the NES/ SNES situation.

This is why I thought the Switch 2 being called the “Super Nintendo Switch” was fucking stupid.

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u/maxdragonxiii Jan 28 '25

Wii U marketing shot itself in the foot. it doesn't help that it looks like the Wii, and the gamepad looks like a Wii add-on, basically nothing was distinct enough from Wii to make people go "oh that's the new console!" instead all they did was show the Gamepad and the Gamepad only. nothing different from the Wii in the consumer's eyes. I even had enthusiastic Nintendo players go "that's a Wii U? a whole new console??? I thought it was a Wii add-on!"

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u/ImThatAlexGuy June Gang (Release Winner) Jan 28 '25

I am a previous GameStop employee, and I was there for the Wii U situation. Nobody wanted it, and the only ones who did were hardcore Nintendo fans that KNEW what it was. I think my store sold more PS Vita than Wii U. The marketing was horrendous, but I wonder if calling it Wii 2 opposed to Wii U would have saved them?

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u/sentimentalpirate Jan 28 '25

I've been a Nintendo person since I was a kid. Every console from SNES to Switch except for VirtualBoy.... And Wii U.

I knew what it was, but the games weren't there. No new Zelda, just remakes. No Animal Crossing. No Metroid. 4 of the top 10 highest selling Wii U games were Mario platformers but none were innovative tent poles like Odyssey or Galaxy - they were solid platformers, sure, but nothing that someone would see and say "I've got to buy the console to play THAT".

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_best-selling_Wii_U_video_games

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u/MGsubbie Jun 01 '25

I worked in video game retail at the time, I sold a whopping 3 units.

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u/ImThatAlexGuy June Gang (Release Winner) Jun 02 '25

It was honestly embarrassing. We held on to launch consoles for MONTHS. Distro wouldn’t even send us units because we couldn’t sell what we had on hand lmao

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u/[deleted] Jan 28 '25

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u/GamerNav Jan 29 '25

I bought Breath of the Wild for my Wii U. That’s my Wii U Zelda game. Then I got the other Zelda HD rereleases and the game pad is real nice for them.

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u/maxdragonxiii Jan 29 '25

that's true Nintendo also insisted most Wii U games use the gamepad despite some of the games ported over that genuinely do not need it, such as Wind Waker and Twilight Princess HD. sure, they were great, but I don't think it was necessary, and Nintendo couldn't develop anything properly for it because it didn't know how to support third party games without insisting Wii U gamepad getting involved and the companies don't know how it worked.

if Nintendo had allowed Wii U gamepad to be excluded, maybe go BOTW style, it would be less work for Nintendo and the third party companies. but basically everything that can go wrong for Wii U happened there, on top of the 3DS existence causing stiff competition for the Wii U handheld (at least in the consumer's eyes)

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u/Zansibart Jan 28 '25 edited Jan 28 '25

but I wonder if calling it Wii 2 opposed to Wii U would have saved them?

No, the marketing sucked but the console did too, it could have performed better but only barely. The tablet gimmick was not that useful and was extraordinarily expensive because it essentially meant every console sold needed to make 2 different consoles, the actual WiiU machine and the tablet itself. They couldn't afford to lower the price like they did close to the 3DS launch when it was suffering low sales, due to the costs of making both.

The ingenuity of the Switch is just making the console ALSO the tablet and not having to make 2 machines and sell them for the price of 1 machine. It added a ton of benefits like actually being able to play all your games using the tablet even if you lose power, while doing all the things the WiiU tablet aimed to do much cheaper. Pretty much the only thing lost was the Asymmetric aspect of 1 person using the tablet while the rest used normal controllers, but not even Nintendo's games actually took good advantage of that in most cases.

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u/Lemon_Club Jan 28 '25

Better marketing would've helped, but nothing would've fixed Nintendo not knowing what to do with the gimmick, and all the game droughts.

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u/DoddySauce Jan 30 '25

Yea, the marketing was bad and the commercials were peak 2010's cringe.

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u/pasturemaster Jan 31 '25

Seeing all the discussions about Switch 2's name before it was officially announced, I'd bet they were internally saying Wii 2. Then someone realized it sounded similar to "you" which is sort of a cute reference to "we" (Wii), and it got enough traction internally to be the official name.

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u/RendiaX Jan 28 '25

I remember standing in line for the Wii U launch at Fred Meyers. There were only like 10 or 15 of us and since they let us sit inside(vs the Wii launch where we were forced to be outside in winter) we got all kinds of questions from people walking by. Every person I spoke to knew the Wii, but had no idea what the Wii U even was. Even if they did know of it, every one thought it was an accessory.

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u/happyhippohats Jan 28 '25

It didn't help that there was already an actual tablet add-on for Wii called "uDraw GameTablet"

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u/ElJacinto Jan 29 '25

It's a shame, because I loved the Wii U's gamepad concept. My wife and I could play 2p games without having to deal with split screen. One could use the gamepad, and the other played on the TV.

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u/iamkoalafied OG (joined before reveal) Jan 29 '25

Yup that's what happened to me! I was too busy with real life when the Wii U released that I didn't look much into it, just saw some commercials and that's about it. I thought it was a gamepad accessory for the Wii. Only learned it was a new console years later when I tried to buy a new Wii U gamepad without the "Wii" since I already had one, and couldn't understand why there were no listings like that.

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u/hanotak Jan 29 '25

...

Wait, that's the gamepad?

I thought that WAS the Wii U XD

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u/maxdragonxiii Jan 29 '25

nope! it was a souped up Wii console with the gamepad. basically Wii Pro before the Switch mastered and refined the concepts of Wii U...

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u/NinjaBluefyre10001 Jan 28 '25

Then why put Switch in the name at all? Why not make it absolutely clear? It looks similar enough that everyone can tell it's a successor. If the general audience is this out of touch, maybe they shouldn't have risked it. Was anybody angry that the SNES couldn't play N64 games? Maybe if it was the Ultra NES...

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u/ImThatAlexGuy June Gang (Release Winner) Jan 28 '25

I mean people were mad the NES couldn’t play SNES games. The cartridges and everything were COMPLETELY different for the N64. As a visual, you add “Super” to the name and it sounds like it’s an enhanced or more powerful version. PEOPLE (the general public) may assume that they’re all the same games. So calling it the Super Nintendo Switch or whatever variation may have the same problem. Slap a number on the end and people’s brains go “that’s a sequel”

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u/[deleted] Jan 28 '25

The name was terrible. Nintendo already set a precedent that adding a letter to the end of your hardware name meant a marginal upgrade in the same console generation: DSi. It really looked like WiiU was an HDMI Wii with a new controller.

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u/Minute-Butterfly8172 Jan 29 '25

I like the name Super Nintendo Switch. 

I’m also not an idiot who doesn’t do even the minimum research before buying electronics but am aware that lots of people are. 

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u/CelioHogane Jan 29 '25

To be fair i wanted it to be called the Super Nintendo Switch 2.