So I was looking into the release schedule for the Nintendo Switch and I noticed something peculiar: A lot of the Nintendo Switch games that are going to be released this year are very similar to games that were released for Nintendo 3DS in its third year.
This prompted me to look a little bit more into the lessons Nintendo learned. Maybe we will learn a thing or two from that as well.
Nintendo 3DS was not selling well after its launch in overseas markets. Nintendo made a drastic price cut in 2011 soon after the launch to boost the system into the holiday season. What was interesting is that they claimed it was a momentum problem. Let's take a short look at the timeline of how that went.
Reggie admitted in this interview that Nintendo 3DS had a momentum problem and that they tried to address it with this price cut. Later on, they tried sustaining momentum by releasing New Super Mario Bros. 2 and the Nintendo 3DS XL in 2012. However, this was not enough to keep the momentum going.
Soon after Nintendo presented their battle plan to accelerate momentum in the overseas markets with a list of games that is very similar to the list of Nintendo Switch games that are slated for release this year.
Interestingly, Nintendo did not only announce these titles, but also an "entry-level gaming system" along with the newest core Pokémon RPG. Keep in mind that generally, new models of existing hardware have been introduced around the release of a core Pokémon RPG in the past with Nintendo 3DS:
Their tactics to sustain momentum in 2012/2013 worked very well and are extremely similar to the ones they are using this year. It's really interesting to see what Nintendo has learned from their previous missteps and to see how they implemented it on their current console that already has such strong momentum. Looking at the image above, do you expect any other titles that fit in this list? Or could we even predict the launch month of new titles by looking at this?
This prompted me to look a little bit more into the lessons Nintendo learned. Maybe we will learn a thing or two from that as well.
Nintendo 3DS was not selling well after its launch in overseas markets. Nintendo made a drastic price cut in 2011 soon after the launch to boost the system into the holiday season. What was interesting is that they claimed it was a momentum problem. Let's take a short look at the timeline of how that went.
Reggie Fils-Aime said:
Reggie admitted in this interview that Nintendo 3DS had a momentum problem and that they tried to address it with this price cut. Later on, they tried sustaining momentum by releasing New Super Mario Bros. 2 and the Nintendo 3DS XL in 2012. However, this was not enough to keep the momentum going.
Soon after Nintendo presented their battle plan to accelerate momentum in the overseas markets with a list of games that is very similar to the list of Nintendo Switch games that are slated for release this year.
Satoru Iwata said:We will be able to seamlessly release our key titles throughout the year, so we are confident that we will be able to accelerate the momentum of the Nintendo 3DS platform in the overseas markets as well.
(source.)
Interestingly, Nintendo did not only announce these titles, but also an "entry-level gaming system" along with the newest core Pokémon RPG. Keep in mind that generally, new models of existing hardware have been introduced around the release of a core Pokémon RPG in the past with Nintendo 3DS:
- Pokémon X/Y and Nintendo 2DS
- Pokémon Omega Ruby/Alpha Sapphire and New Nintendo 3DS (XL)
- Pokémon UltraSun/UltraMoon and New Nintendo 2DS XL
Satoru Iwata said:
Their tactics to sustain momentum in 2012/2013 worked very well and are extremely similar to the ones they are using this year. It's really interesting to see what Nintendo has learned from their previous missteps and to see how they implemented it on their current console that already has such strong momentum. Looking at the image above, do you expect any other titles that fit in this list? Or could we even predict the launch month of new titles by looking at this?
