Nintendo of America President: Performance has Absolutely Nothing to Do with Longevity and Support

It's hard to argue that while the Wii was very successful in the first few years of its release, core gamers and third-party support for the console has tapered off to the point that its virtually non-existent. Most people argue that it's due to the Wii's shortcomings when it comes to graphical horsepower that alienates publishers from putting "core" games on it.

This is also the same reason why the Wii needs to be replaced as it doesn't have the legs like the Xbox 360 and PS3.

Will the Wii U be in the same predicament once again? People are speculating that with the Wii U's visuals not leapfrogging those of current-gen consoles, this same issue will once again crop up and third-party support will be an issue once more.

In an interview with Kotaku, Nintendo of America president Reggie Fils-Aime addresses these concerns and thinks that "performance has nothing to do with longevity and support."

You could go back and have the same conversation looking at the original PlayStation. You could have the same conversation looking at PlayStation 2. You could have the same conversation looking at the original Xbox. The fact of the matter is if you look at the generation before this one, you look at GameCube, you look at PS2, you look at the original Xbox. From a performance standpoint, GameCube was, if not #1, certainly #2 from an overall performance standpoint. #3 was PS2. So performance has absolutely nothing to do with longevity and support.

Fils-Aime adds that "The basis is how big is the installed base, how robust is the ongoing conversation with key licensees, that's what's gonna drive the level of ongoing support at least from a third-party perspective, whether or not a system holds up six years or seven years after launch."

While Reggie's statements regarding the installed base does ring true, one can argue that the Wii has the largest installed userbase out of all three platforms, but there's still not a lot of core games on it. 

Do you think the WIii U is in danger of repeating the Wii's mistakes when it comes to third-party support and console life? Can it even hang around for six to seven years with Sony and Microsoft's next-gen offerings looming over the horizon?