Shigeru Miyamoto explains that the Nintendo DS and Nintendo Wii were created in response to what Satoru Iwata suggested was causing the low sales of the Nintendo GameCube.
The Nintendo Wii and Nintendo DS were among the most successful platforms in Nintendo’s history. One shared experience across the consoles, beyond their unique approaches to gaming, was their ability to attract players outside the traditional gaming community. As it turns out, the entire intent behind the consoles was to reach beyond “gamers” and draw in more casual players.
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The Nintendo GameCube ‘Only Appealed to Gamers’
Shigeru Miyamoto recently spoke about the vision behind both the Nintendo DS and the Nintendo Wii in an interview with Famitsu.
He says that then-president Satoru Iwata blamed the Nintendo GameCube’s underperformance on the public’s poor perception of gaming. Therefore, the console and handheld platforms that followed were driven by the mission to attract casual users who weren’t used to playing video games.
“Before we made the DS, there was the highly versatile, simple to use, easy for any developer to make games for, cheap to buy, Nintendo GameCube, but it didn’t get the reception we expected,” Miyamoto said (h/t: GamesRadar+ for the translation). “Some consoles sold well for what they were, but there were also a lot of people who bought them to watch DVDs. The GameCube was only purchased by gamers.”
The Nintendo Wii was the most successful console ever released by the gaming juggernaut until the Nintendo Switch eventually eclipsed its sales. Similarly, the Nintendo DS is the highest-selling dedicated handheld system of all time.
It was the second-best-selling console of all time, behind the PlayStation 2, until the Nintendo Switch outranked those numbers as well, selling 155.92 million units. Overall, the Sony PlayStation is still the highest-selling console of all time, with 160 million units sold.
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