Wii 2 (or whatever Nintendo decides to call it) is starting to look more and more like a real thing, based on yesterday's report. Nintendo has long insisted that graphical fidelity doesn't matter as much, but now HDTVs are far more common and a number of consumers could feel compelled to upgrade to a new Wii if the system is substantially more powerful, remarked Wedbush Securities analyst Michael Pachter.
"I think that a Wii 2 offers the very large Wii installed base [86 million worldwide - Ed.] an opportunity to upgrade, and gives Nintendo fans a natural progression to an HD console," Pachter told IndustryGamers.
He continued, "However, many of these households undoubtedly have already purchased Kinect or Move bundles, so Nintendo has already lost the opportunity to recapture those customers. I think that the current Wii will sell very well at a $149 price point, much like the PS2 chugged along for years at that price, and think Nintendo can recapture dominant hardware share if the Wii 2 is sufficiently powerful to compete with Xbox 360 and PS3."
M2 Research analyst Billy Pidgeon also believes that Nintendo has a great chance to recapture share and be highly competitive if they launch a new console soon.
He told us, "For a couple years it's been obvious that Nintendo is first in line for a next generation console launch; the only questions are what kind of console and when does it go on sale. If Wii 2 goes on sale in 2011 or 2012, Nintendo may have sufficient time to build a strong base before Microsoft launches the next gen Xbox in 2013 or 2014. It's not going to be easy to transition to next generation, particularly as consumer spending remains low coming out of the recession, but launching soon is Nintendo's best move."
"If Nintendo can establish a large installed base for the next generation, the company will be positioned competitively. Third party software will be very important, as Nintendo needs a higher attach rate going forward. Nintendo should also push to keep the base for the Wii active through the next console's launch, or the company could lose the advantage gained by Wii's strong hardware market share."
