In the previous article, we explored the success of the Nintendo Wii against the spec-sheet wars, a generation that also brought massive breakthroughs for Sony and Xbox. Sadly, these battles claimed a major casualty: Sega. One of gaming’s true pioneers was reduced to a mere software publisher—a hardware exile that Nintendo itself would dangerously risk repeating just one generation later.

Now for the fateful eighth generation: the Wii U was a total failure. Consumers simply didn’t understand if it was a brand-new console or just a weird accessory for the original Wii, leading to a complete crash-and-burn that forced Nintendo to adapt quickly. Indeed, its technical specifications compared to the PS4 and Xbox One put it at a clear disadvantage; a setback that almost drove the big “N” to retire from the home console market entirely, running the risk of abandoning a legacy of more than 30 years in gamers’ hearts.

The lessons of a gamer’s heart

Speaking of gamers’ hearts, at that critical moment, the sensei president of Nintendo, Satoru Iwata (December 6, 1959 – July 11, 2015, R.I.P.), decided to cut his own income in half to mitigate the failure. Iwata slashed his salary as an apology for the poor Wii U sales, protecting the short-term job security of Nintendo’s workers in the process. Before passing away in 2015, the former president participated in conceptualizing the next-gen hardware that would again revolutionize the definition of a gaming platform. I want to remember him through a profoundly heartwarming phrase he delivered ten years before his death, a masterclass in both humility and genius: “On my business card, I am a corporate president. In my mind, I am a game developer. But in my heart, I am a gamer.”

A Darwinian mirror for gaming

Fast forward to 2017: the PS4 dominated, Xbox struggled to keep up with three years left in its cycle (the “all-in-one” multimedia center demanding an internet check-in at least every 24 hours was a disastrous choice in the eyes of players), and PC gaming had become a massive trend—complete with obnoxious LEDs resembling a disco or a badly tuned car. This was the stage for the modern “state of the art” in video gaming: blinding users with raw graphics and specs while frequently forgetting the value of a well-told story and a true gaming experience.

Then, on March 3rd, 2017, Nintendo launched a device that rescued the best ideas from their past errors. With a portable screen, TV connection out of the box, and detachable controllers for an instant two-player experience, the Switch was born from the ashes of the Wii U. (Indeed, looking at the Wii U GamePad alongside the Switch, it looks like a natural evolution adapted for the modern mobile era—pure Darwinism, if you ask me.)

Fig 09. Looking forward to analog photography for my own self-authenticity.

The epiphany of self-authenticity (wow… breaking news)

Finally, here is the epiphany that hit me, accompanied by an angel descending from the skies with a parchment while celestial trumpets sounded in the background. Nintendo’s choice to step out of the aforementioned war (without leaving the industry) and break away from the traditional console generation cycle was almost poetic. Sure, the desperate need to recover from the failure of the Wii U was likely part of the motivation, but choosing to set aside that toxic behavior, rejecting the next-gen hype machine, and saying “not again” was a masterclass.

Of course, they are a company (they have profit margins, stakeholders, and board members to answer to), but they decided to prioritize the gaming experience. They focused on the core of the video game: the fun, instead of throwing out raw “specs” and highly detailed, graphics-heavy games that all too often lack a soul. They are still very much in the game, not fighting a war, but teaching new ways of entertaining their users.

Discovering the art of being true to yourself

It is 2026 at the moment I write this article. The new Nintendo Switch 2 came out a year ago, and it is another great iteration of the original idea. (As I wrote this, news broke that Nintendo is raising employee salaries by 10% to invest in their people. As a software developer currently sitting “on the bench”—feeling the weight of an industry that often overlooks human talent—that simple gesture hit me harder than I expected, almost moving me to tears for reasons that go far beyond business.) Because of this, I have decided to keep only the Nintendo brand in my living room, stepping aside from all that specs yelling. Trust me, I have tested the PlayStation and Xbox iterations, and I have thoroughly enjoyed several of their titles at different moments of my adult life. I am conscious of losing some exclusive content from other manufacturers, but in the end, that sacrifice releases me from exhausting marketing traps (and lets me play anywhere). It reminds me that being true to yourself is far more important than trying to “please everyone” in life. Nintendo runs things completely on their own terms. They aren’t following a decades-old trend (while still being wildly successful in their field); they are just staying loyal to their principles in a market more worried about the package than the content.