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Wii Hands On @ Penny Arcade
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steviep said:
I think my link above to NINTENDO'S OWN FINANCIAL STATEMENT trumps pretty much all other pie charts...dontcha think?
Nintendo offers PDFs of all finacial reports at the link provided above.
BTW, Nintendo didn't sell it's hardware at a loss at $199, $179 and maybe $149 if you think 2 years of $99 GC sales helped their bottom line then, again, I point you to their financial reports.
sabrewolf732
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Steve said:I think my link above to NINTENDO'S OWN FINANCIAL STATEMENT trumps pretty much all other pie charts...dontcha think?
Nintendo offers PDFs of all finacial reports at the link provided above.
BTW, Nintendo didn't sell it's hardware at a loss at $199, $179 and maybe $149 if you think 2 years of $99 GC sales helped their bottom line then, again, I point you to their financial reports.
I remember seeing somewhere that it cost nintendo roughly $50 to manufacture each gc, that was a few years ago.
Steve said:I think my link above to NINTENDO'S OWN FINANCIAL STATEMENT trumps pretty much all other pie charts...dontcha think?
Nintendo offers PDFs of all finacial reports at the link provided above.
BTW, Nintendo didn't sell it's hardware at a loss at $199, $179 and maybe $149 if you think 2 years of $99 GC sales helped their bottom line then, again, I point you to their financial reports.
I just looked at the 2005 annual report, and it confirmed what I posted. Nintendo, at the end of 2005, did indeed have about 7.5 billion in liquid assets. And I do believe that even at $99, the Gamecube is sold at a profit. Aside from a few examples in history (the beginning of one of the GC's price drops, I believe) Nintendo has always sold for a profit. That is why the website I posted showed that despite the fact that Sony trounced Nintendo in sales, Nintendo made much more profit than Sony did. There is plenty of evidence to back that up, out there. And all that despite the weak sales of the Cube and tons of money being put into R&D.
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Please show me where the GameCube was sold at a profit. Please show me where the GameCube's poor sales (half of it's N64 sales) even recouped its R&D investment. Actually, please just repost the GameCube sales numbers from the Nintendo website for 2001 - 2005.
The GameCube sales, by Nintendo's own records, is the worst selling console they had...by far. It ended up being the #3 console and put Nintendo in the red in 2003. If you read the financial statements it tells you how many CG were sold (and how many N64 and so on).
Nintendo NEEDS the Wii to succeed to remain a player in the console market. They have the handheld market locked down tight, it is the console market we need them to remain competitive in for everyone's sake. Blindly following a company doesn't do anyone any good. Nintendo needs to stay on their game, kick ass, take names and actually stick with it. Like I said, a two player race doesn't do anyone any good.
The GC coming in at a low price kept MS and Sony in line. Nintendo price cuts kept the other two dropping their prices. And so on. From a consumer stand point, we need a three console race (or more)
The GameCube sales, by Nintendo's own records, is the worst selling console they had...by far. It ended up being the #3 console and put Nintendo in the red in 2003. If you read the financial statements it tells you how many CG were sold (and how many N64 and so on).
Nintendo NEEDS the Wii to succeed to remain a player in the console market. They have the handheld market locked down tight, it is the console market we need them to remain competitive in for everyone's sake. Blindly following a company doesn't do anyone any good. Nintendo needs to stay on their game, kick ass, take names and actually stick with it. Like I said, a two player race doesn't do anyone any good.
The GC coming in at a low price kept MS and Sony in line. Nintendo price cuts kept the other two dropping their prices. And so on. From a consumer stand point, we need a three console race (or more)
I don't have sales numbers to show you, I just know that they're bad. If I wasn't in class, I could probably dig up information that the Gamecube was often sold at a profit, because it is Nintendo's usual practice to sell their hardware at a profit. The system was cheap as hell to make in comparison to the XBox, for example, I just don't remember how cheap.
You're completely right, though. Nintendo needs the Wii to do well, and despite their 8 billion in the bank, they can't afford to bleed money like MS does on their gaming division, if they want to stay in the market at all. Handhelds can't keep you going forever.
You're completely right, though. Nintendo needs the Wii to do well, and despite their 8 billion in the bank, they can't afford to bleed money like MS does on their gaming division, if they want to stay in the market at all. Handhelds can't keep you going forever.
Darakian said:Wow... That is so wrong....
Here is a better model
Weak ......................current gen ................................................................ next gen
PS2................xbox/gamecube.............................................................Xbox360/ps3/wii
It has been proven time and again that the gamecube is about on par with the xbox BOTH of which are more powerful than the PS2. The Wii is being designed with a new graphics chip. Thus it will have more function than the flipper in the cube. Granted it won't be as powerful as the gpu in the 360 or the ps3 but then again it is only pushing 480p not 720p. Less power is needed for the same effects.
Without actual hardware specs nothing more can be said about the power of the wii.
I do agree however that gameplay > graphics. I play to download mario 64 for my wii when it comes out
No..no, he got it right, and you are wrong. The wii isn't next gen. I saw them. They are in between this gen and next gen.
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steviep said:
You are confusing "liquid assets" with "money in the bank".
MS has other products to subsidize its gaming division whereas Nintendo doesn't. Bill Gates could write a personal check for Nintendo if he chose to, so trying to critisize MS for "losing money" is a weak argument. But you are right about one thing, Nintendo cannot afford to lose money like that...and that is a scary proposition for them as a company because their competition can.
Anyhow, we all agree the Wii needs to succeed and we all want it to do well.
Steve said:
When the financial reports mention that they have 7.5-8 billion to spend, what does that mean then?
I'm not criticizing Microsoft for bleeding over 4 billion on the XBox, they're trying to get a hold of the gaming market and they believe that throwing a lot of money into it is how they're going to do it - and it seems that the money did indeed buy them a lot of brand recognition in North America and Europe. You are right, though, in that Microsoft is not just focused on gaming, unlike Nintendo, who's entire focus as a company is to make and sell games.
Nintendo doesn't want to lose the money they have, and that's why they almost always sell their products with a monetary gain (even a small one), unlike Sony and MS. Even with poor Gamecube sales, they have nothing to worry about financially. I always laugh when I hear stuff like "Nintendo is going the way of Sega" because Nintendo's conservative business model won't allow it.
Feel free to read the series here called "The Truth About Nintendo" (particularly part 2) if you've got 5 mins to spare, it's an interesting little read.
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steviep said:
Another steviep Ninten-twist
Listening to you it sounds like Nintendo's PLAN the whole time was for the GameCube to have poor sales so the company could show off their awesome management skills. Save that bull for someone who is buying it.
O.K. I officially give up, there is no convincing the intarweb experts. Hell even the people with hands on experience with the Wii are dummies. The intarweb experts got 15 links to reason why what you touched and played was wrong. Holy cow.
The real deal is that the Wii needs to succeed for everyone and Sony / MS fans need to root for the Wii too...it will keep the competition strong, prices low and innovation high.
The eye rolling was un-necessary. I'm not an idiot, and I know that poor sales of the Gamecube didn't help Nintendo at all. But since they, for the most part, didn't LOSE money per hardware unit, they didn't bleed money on that front, no "bull". But what about Microsoft? They LOST $4 billion and only broke a few million more sales than the Cube. Good thing they've got gazillions in the bank. Point is, neither company is in any financial trouble (if anything, Sony's in the most red right now), the end.
Loving the sarcasm, there. All I did was list major sites with reputations at stake that say "the controller can sense depth" - I didn't say any of the games on the show floor used the feature, nor did I claim anyone knows for sure what's inside the sensor and the wiimote (neither you or I know for sure). Certainly if the controller knows how far it is from the sensor, the feature hasn't been used yet, but that doesn't mean that it's a fact that it can't sense distance, either, as you were insinuating. Unless you can prove me otherwise with fact, neither of us can say that we're right and neither of us can say we're wrong - it's all speculation at this point.
Loving the sarcasm, there. All I did was list major sites with reputations at stake that say "the controller can sense depth" - I didn't say any of the games on the show floor used the feature, nor did I claim anyone knows for sure what's inside the sensor and the wiimote (neither you or I know for sure). Certainly if the controller knows how far it is from the sensor, the feature hasn't been used yet, but that doesn't mean that it's a fact that it can't sense distance, either, as you were insinuating. Unless you can prove me otherwise with fact, neither of us can say that we're right and neither of us can say we're wrong - it's all speculation at this point.
Steve said:
You need to understand that a company going into the red for a year does not mean that their total assets is negative (i.e. they have no savings, in debt to bondholders, etc). It means for that year, they had to take money out of the bank to pay for expenses. At the time Gamecube came out, Nintendo had 6 Billion dollars in the bank.
If you want proof, please give me some time - I read it on IGN back in 2001/2002. I can try and find the link for you.
Nintendo's business model almost forces them to pull profit on every product they sell. The reason why they pulled red in 2003 was due to the fact that they produced more Gamecubes than they sold. Sitting inventory that they paid for -> debt until sold.
Nintendo has a gift and a curse. They need to pull a profit, cause they have no other markets to rely on (like software for MS, and TV's, computers, your living room for Sony) but at the same time - they pull profit (except for of course, 2003
).As for your "3rd level dev kit" and "souped up GC question on the first page" -
the first dev kit Nintendo sent out was a souped up GCN - 'overclocked' if you will with some optimizations. the '3rd level dev kit' to my understanding is a dev kit that is almost the final specs - something like 90% of the final power (might be 80%, im not sure)
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rayman2k2 said:
That's OK, no need for the IGN link...we already posted the actual financial statement from Nintendo themselves. That is where the information comes from, that is where the info on the GameCubes comes from. I don't think an IGN link will trump Nintendoes financial statement. The reports are interesting stuff too, give them a read. They have handy bar graphs showing the GameCube sales too, hence my comments about them getting worse every year. Handhelds and games sales are Nintendo's bread and butter. We just want to see them do that well in the console market.
$6 billion in the bank is great, but...as steviep so eloquently put it "Microsoft? They LOST $4 billion and only broke a few million more sales than the Cube"....when a company is readily willing and able to drop more money on its gaming division than you have in total liquid assets....that is downright scary.
And that is why we believe Nintendo needs to succeed. When you are the little guy in a three player race and ALL your money is riding on gaming (where Sony and MS isn't) you need to succeed.
Again, at the risk of sounding like a broken record... the whole industry needs the Wii to be successful because a three way console race will guarantee that the competition stays strong, prices are lower and innovation high. So Sony fans and MS fans need to root for the Wii too.
sabrewolf732
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Steve said:
As microsoft said, the price of a wii and 360 is less than a ps3. Go 360 and wii
As an investor in nintendo I would like to say that the GameCube was a loss for nintendo. They carried a huge inventory surplus for quite some time till RE4 and a few other titles helped move some units.
In response to nintendo needing to have a great deal of success with the wii I think that even if they came in 3rd again they will still be able to push a greater profit. Part of the reason that they aren't in the next gen arms race (i feel) is to hedge their bets against such a loss. By using proven hardware (the beefed up GC) they should have a greater margin of profit per unit sold than their competitors.
In response to some of the speculation that microsoft and sony would be willing or can stand lose their shirts on console launch are underestimating the shareholders of both sony and microsoft. A loss in either of their gaming divisions could be damaging to the company (especially sony, as a great deal of the hi-def dvd format war will more than likely be waged on the ps3). At the 360 launch when speaking to some of the developers they stated that ms would cut the games division if they didn't make good on the 360. And the way sony looks as a company they could most certainly use some good news from their bread and butter segments.
Anyways in closing I would like to state that nintendo is a well run company that seems to be following the apple playbook. Things look very good the big N in the up coming quarters and it will be interesting to see how they do.
In response to nintendo needing to have a great deal of success with the wii I think that even if they came in 3rd again they will still be able to push a greater profit. Part of the reason that they aren't in the next gen arms race (i feel) is to hedge their bets against such a loss. By using proven hardware (the beefed up GC) they should have a greater margin of profit per unit sold than their competitors.
In response to some of the speculation that microsoft and sony would be willing or can stand lose their shirts on console launch are underestimating the shareholders of both sony and microsoft. A loss in either of their gaming divisions could be damaging to the company (especially sony, as a great deal of the hi-def dvd format war will more than likely be waged on the ps3). At the 360 launch when speaking to some of the developers they stated that ms would cut the games division if they didn't make good on the 360. And the way sony looks as a company they could most certainly use some good news from their bread and butter segments.
Anyways in closing I would like to state that nintendo is a well run company that seems to be following the apple playbook. Things look very good the big N in the up coming quarters and it will be interesting to see how they do.
placeboFx said:
When I said that MS and Sony can have their gaming divisions fail, I didn't necessarily mean that the shareholders will be happy with it. But, when it comes to it, should PS3 be such a bomb that Sony lets go, the next day, they still are a company. With Nintendo, they have to be more careful - they do not have other multibillion dollar divisions to back them up (divisions besides gaming). I probably should have clarified
And Steve. I did read the financial statements. All of them. In fact I wrote a 37 page paper (double spaced) on Nintendo's financial performance and business plan. Got an 'A' on it too (it was for Economics)
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rayman2k2 said:When I said that MS and Sony can have their gaming divisions fail, I didn't necessarily mean that the shareholders will be happy with it. But, when it comes to it, should PS3 be such a bomb that Sony lets go, the next day, they still are a company. With Nintendo, they have to be more careful - they do not have other multibillion dollar divisions to back them up (divisions besides gaming). I probably should have clarified
And Steve. I did read the financial statements. All of them. In fact I wrote a 37 page paper (double spaced) on Nintendo's financial performance and business plan. Got an 'A' on it too (it was for Economics)
I couldn't agree with you more bro. We are on the same page. Nintendo doesn't have the luxury to fall back on other revenue streams like the other two companies, that is why everyone (Sony and MS fans too) have to root for the Wii. Competition between Nintendo, MS and Sony is what drives the prices, market and the innovation. If we had one console maker
Two isn't much better Three and one of those three willing to take the road less traveled (Wii)...we got ourselves a enough diversity to gaurantee great games for everyone and various price points.I would like to add:
1. Nintendo's handheld segment could be considered a seperate division.
2. Nintendo's franchises are also not tied soley to home console sales and are continually profitable.
I know that i am going to get flamed hard with talks of how there days are numbered for the handheld market dominance but I wouldn't say that is coming tommorow.
I strongly believe that nintendo intentionally designed the hardware to be cheap enough that upon launch two things could occur:
1. Product is well recieved and will create larger market share for their home console market while enjoying a greater profit margin on console and software sales.
or
2. Product falters like previous gen system however inventory can be managed due to cheaper production cost and if neccessary deeply discounted to increase market share.
The second part of what I believe is nintendo's new "Apple" strategy is:
1. To release generation consoles. If Wii is popular the revenue generated will be used to develop Gen2 systems with further system enhancements ie. HD and other 'next-gen' services. Due to the substantially cheaper product most users may be willing to purchase updated Wii consoles with 'next-gen' features.
2. Virtual Console will allow added revenue to software that has been paid for many times over for nintendo already.
Anyways, that's my take on nintendo. They are a very successful company that has seen little growth in several years though they have remained profitable. If the stir created at e3 turns into geniune console sales the Big N should have an excellent year and possibly years to come.
1. Nintendo's handheld segment could be considered a seperate division.
2. Nintendo's franchises are also not tied soley to home console sales and are continually profitable.
I know that i am going to get flamed hard with talks of how there days are numbered for the handheld market dominance but I wouldn't say that is coming tommorow.
I strongly believe that nintendo intentionally designed the hardware to be cheap enough that upon launch two things could occur:
1. Product is well recieved and will create larger market share for their home console market while enjoying a greater profit margin on console and software sales.
or
2. Product falters like previous gen system however inventory can be managed due to cheaper production cost and if neccessary deeply discounted to increase market share.
The second part of what I believe is nintendo's new "Apple" strategy is:
1. To release generation consoles. If Wii is popular the revenue generated will be used to develop Gen2 systems with further system enhancements ie. HD and other 'next-gen' services. Due to the substantially cheaper product most users may be willing to purchase updated Wii consoles with 'next-gen' features.
2. Virtual Console will allow added revenue to software that has been paid for many times over for nintendo already.
Anyways, that's my take on nintendo. They are a very successful company that has seen little growth in several years though they have remained profitable. If the stir created at e3 turns into geniune console sales the Big N should have an excellent year and possibly years to come.
I don't want to sound like a total dick, but I'm going to anyway.
You guys arguing by pointing to links on the intarweb really need to learn how accounting in the business world works. Steve linked Nintendo's financial statements, and the info there is pretty much all you need. Linking to graphs and piecharts elsewhere will give you misleading results. Like it or not, the financial reports tell all when it comes to teh moneys.
You guys arguing by pointing to links on the intarweb really need to learn how accounting in the business world works. Steve linked Nintendo's financial statements, and the info there is pretty much all you need. Linking to graphs and piecharts elsewhere will give you misleading results. Like it or not, the financial reports tell all when it comes to teh moneys.