Nintendo’s in a bit of a bind—after successfully beating its competitor’s to the market with motion—enabled controllers by at least two years, the company now has to contend with two relatively inexpensive consoles, both with motion recognition capability that rivals if not surpasses theirs. Their Wii U will not have the hardware to go toe to toe the PS4 or the Xbox 720 in a graphics war when they hit the market. They need their core users to upgrade now before these new systems are introduced and steal millions of potential clients away. So, what’s the most logical thing they could do?

Firebomb their own product, of course!  The company has decided to push in their communications how much better the Wii U is than its predecessor. Because apparently, Nintendo has decided that Americans do not understand the concepts of ‘upgrade,’ or ‘next generation.’

It seems far more likely that American consumers don’t grasp the concept of a controller that appears in the commercials to be the size of an Ipad. It is also more likely that the Wii U isn’t gaining traction because no one really knows why its game mechanic exists. People do not play TV consoles to look or use small screens. If they wanted to play games on their small screen devices, they would, in fact, do so.

So, why did the company even choose to go this route to begin with? It appears that Nintendo is concerned that their games are losing out to handheld electronics. People are more likely to play video games or do work on handheld devices, so it makes sense to give them a handheld device that keeps their attention away from their other handheld devices.  Of course, one cannot tell his customers that he’s intentionally trying to get them off of their iphones.

But what do you think? Is their logic sound? Or will the decision to build the Wii U the way it is, and aggressively push upgrades upon Nintendo customers, ultimately kill the product?