President of Nintendo Satoru Ivata has revealed that the performance gap between Wii U and the competition's next-gen consoles will be smaller than it was with Wii, PS3 and Xbox 360.
Ivata said the company hasn't been sucessful in keeping the Wii's momentum in the last two years. He attributed the problem to smaller number of titles, brought about by the launch of 3DS and Wii U.
As far as sales go, Wii has been beating PS3 and Xbox 360 silly for most of its career, but did not get far from the casual gaming market. This means that although the console sold like hotcakes, it never actually catered to serious gamers.
Microsoft and Sony, on the other hand, raked in plenty of dough from multi-platform titles not available on Nintendo's console. The reason for this was Wii's lack of horsepower, something which Ivata claims will be fixed on Wii U. Unfortunately, Ivata says he cannot guarantee that Wii U will not end up just like Wii when it comes to multi-platform gaming.
He said the performance gap between Wii U and the competition will not mimic the scenario with the original Wii and its competitors, and will in fact be much thinner. He conceded that the competing consoles may indeed be faster, especially since they will launch in 2013 or 2014. However, he said that future console support for 720p and 1080p will mean Wii U will not lag behind the competition.
Ivata once again talked up Wii U's GamePad controller, reminding the world of just how practical it can be. He pointed out that game consoles "have long been 'parasites' of TV sets at home", and I bet many a mother would agree with this. So, gamers will now be able to continue games even after that cranky person who pays for their upbringing takes over the picture box.
In related news, the company revealed that its 3DS hasn't had the desired momentum in the States and the EU, and, when we're already stating the obvious here, I'd like to add that the sky is very blue, or at least it seems so most of the time.
More here.