While there were some reports of a largely pessimistic nature, suggesting that, maybe, Nintendo was realizing the whole Wii U thing was turning into a disaster almost from launch day and thus was planning its next console release, the reports have emerged suggesting that, indeed, the company is planning a new console for an as-yet-undisclosed future launch date. But the word comes from about as close to the top as we're going to get, and that doesn't necessarily mean the Wii U is now an abandonware box.

The word came straight from Shigeru Miyamoto himself, and while interviewing with the Associated Press, Miyamoto did indeed confirm that Nintendo was hard at work on the Wii U's next successor. Naturally, Miyamoto rushed to reassure those who'd already bought a Wii U that the focus is still in fact on the Wii U--really! they mean it! honest!--already Nintendo has groups considering the future of Nintendo's next system, and just what should go into such a device. This is being regarded as standard operating procedure--it's a reasonable bet that Microsoft and Sony each have groups considering the future of the PlayStation 5 and the Xbox I've Lost All Track of the Nomenclature, possibly the Xbox 14 Billion at the rate it's going--seriously, how do we go from nothing to 360 to One?--but it's not exactly encouraging news all the same.

But still, it's not a bad idea. Considering the future of the line isn't unwelcome at any point; knowing what should be a part of things now and what shouldn't be is likely to be a smart move, and considering how the Wii U just turned out, that's not a great situation. The Wii U is pretty much the bottom of the heap right now, and though it's recently gained some popularity as the result of terrific new releases, it's not going to be a front-runner candidate any time soon, of course, but it's gaining all the same. So what should go into the next Wii, whatever extra it gets in the way of appellation?

The first thing Nintendo needs to do is get the software ready to go. In order to scrub the failure out of Nintendo fan's minds--and let's face it, this was not a good run from the get-go--Nintendo needs launch titles and a raftload of them. Since Nintendo has probably blown about eighty percent or so of its credibility thanks to this sadly game-light launch and beyond, it needs a huge new game presence just to keep everybody on the same page. Thankfully, Nintendo has an enormous array of IP to draw from, and it needs to draw from that array just to keep people interested.

One thing that's been made quite clear is that extras like video and the like are welcome, but for game systems, it's mostly about the games. So what Nintendo needs to do is focus on the games. Sure, include things like Netflix and Hulu, include video conferencing, all these little bits. But Nintendo's biggest problem is now what it was from the beginning: a lack of clear focus on gaming. Whatever gets into Nintendo's next system isn't quite so important as what needs to get into it after its release, specifically, games.