{"id":137318,"date":"2026-05-25T10:30:00","date_gmt":"2026-05-25T10:30:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.nintendolife.com\/#article-201575"},"modified":"2026-05-25T10:30:00","modified_gmt":"2026-05-25T10:30:00","slug":"the-wii-u-was-on-life-support-reggie-restates-the-nes-snes-classics-true-purpose","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/sickgaming.net\/blog\/2026\/05\/25\/the-wii-u-was-on-life-support-reggie-restates-the-nes-snes-classics-true-purpose\/","title":{"rendered":"&#8220;The Wii U Was On Life Support&#8221; &#8211; Reggie Restates The NES &amp; SNES Classic&#8217;s True Purpose"},"content":{"rendered":"<div class=\"media_block\"><a href=\"https:\/\/images.nintendolife.com\/84d4b061949a5\/large.jpg\"><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/images.nintendolife.com\/84d4b061949a5\/small.jpg\" class=\"media_thumbnail\"><\/a><\/div>\n<div><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/images.nintendolife.com\/84d4b061949a5\/large.jpg\" class=\"ff-og-image-inserted\"><\/div>\n<aside class=\"object object-twitch\">[embedded content]<\/aside>\n<p>It&#8217;s no secret that Nintendo was in a bit of a dark time at the end of the Wii U era. With sales down and everyone awaiting the next console (or should we say &#8216;NX console&#8217;?), the company needed something to bring in the big bucks over the holidays. The answer, alongside amiibo, was the NES and SNES Classic systems, and boy, did they work.<\/p>\n<p>Ever ready to give a cracking PR response, Reggie was ready for the mini systems&#8217; launch. We all knew that they were something of a stopgap for the big N while the Switch was still in the oven, and the then-NOA president told <a class=\"external\" href=\"https:\/\/kotaku.com\/nintendo-s-reggie-fils-aime-on-hopes-for-an-n64-classic-1830465672?utm_source=Kotaku_Twitter&amp;utm_medium=Socialflow&amp;utm_campaign=Socialflow_Kotaku_Twitter\" rel=\"noopener\">Kotaku<\/a> as much <a href=\"https:\/\/www.nintendolife.com\/news\/2018\/11\/reggie_n64_classic_mini_is_not_in_our_planning_horizon_but_wouldnt_ever_rule_it_out\">at the time<\/a>: &#8220;these were limited time opportunities that were a way for us as a business to bridge from the conclusion of Wii U as a hardware system to the launch of Nintendo Switch&#8221;.<\/p>\n<p>One decade on, Reggie touched on the topic again in a recent addition to the <a class=\"external\" href=\"https:\/\/www.twitch.tv\/videos\/2761065620\" rel=\"noopener\">NYU Game Centre Lecture Series<\/a> (found around the 57:30 mark in the above video), though the gift of time has meant that there&#8217;s less need for business pleasantries in 2026 \u2014 he can be a lot more to-the-point these days, it seems (thanks for the heads up, <a href=\"https:\/\/nintendoeverything.com\/former-nintendo-exec-confirms-nes-and-snes-classics-were-made-to-sustain-the-companys-business\/\">Nintendo Everything<\/a>).<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;We did that to sustain our business,&#8221; Reggie said of the NES and SNES Classic launches, &#8220;because we needed something to sell at volume come the holiday season&#8221;. A rather candid breakdown, we&#8217;d say, but there&#8217;s more. These systems, alongside cutting the 8GB Wii U SKU and advertising more indie content, were &#8220;a series of commercial ideas,&#8221; he continued, &#8220;knowing full well that the Wii U was on life support&#8221;.<\/p>\n<p>It was a smart move, it turns out. By late 2019, the two classic systems had combined for <a href=\"https:\/\/www.nintendolife.com\/news\/2018\/10\/snes_mini_and_nes_mini_combined_global_sales_surpass_10_million_mark\">more than 10 million sales<\/a>, tiding Nintendo over as the Switch picked up steam. There were those of us who believed that more classic systems were in the pipeline (never forget those <a href=\"https:\/\/www.nintendolife.com\/news\/2018\/11\/reggie_n64_classic_mini_is_not_in_our_planning_horizon_but_wouldnt_ever_rule_it_out\">&#8216;N64 Classic Mini&#8217; rumours<\/a>), but with business booming and NSO expanding every month, we think it&#8217;s safe to assume that such merch is a thing of the past.<\/p>\n<p><!-- cache: html:nintendolife.com\/ssl\/snes\/related-articles:200707,83099 @ 1779727760 --><\/p>\n<aside class=\"block object-related\"> <\/aside>\n<p><em>Did you pick up an NES or SNES Classic console in the Wii U trenches? Let us know in the comments.<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>[embedded content] It&#8217;s no secret that Nintendo was in a bit of a dark time at the end of the Wii U era. With sales down and everyone awaiting the next console (or should we say &#8216;NX console&#8217;?), the company needed something to bring in the big bucks over the holidays. The answer, alongside amiibo, [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[27],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-137318","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-nintendo-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/sickgaming.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/137318","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/sickgaming.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/sickgaming.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sickgaming.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sickgaming.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=137318"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/sickgaming.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/137318\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/sickgaming.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=137318"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sickgaming.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=137318"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sickgaming.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=137318"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}