According to former Nintendo of America president Reggie Fils-Aime, the NES and SNES Classics were specifically made to help the company out during the end of the Wii U years.
This may have been something that many have concluded on their own. That said, we haven’t heard about Nintendo comment on this in an official capacity.
Nintendo was not in a good spot business-wise towards the end of the Wii U’s lifecycle. After its first year, the console’s sales saw a massive drop off and things never recovered.
Enter the NES Classic Edition. Featuring 30 built-in games on one device, Nintendo released the system in 2016, which proved to be very popular. The SNES Classic Edition then launched the following year.
Reggie was speaking at the NYU Game Centre Lecture Series and commented on different efforts Nintendo tried out during the Wii U era. This included killing the 8GB Wii U model at retailers due to lower consumer interest and working more closely with indies.
As for the NES and SNES Classic Editions, Reggie said:
“The other thing we did is, in two successive years, we launched those micro legacy devices. If you remember those, right? The small NES and then the following year the small SNES. We did that to sustain our business because we needed something to sell at volume come the holiday season. So it was a series of commercial ideas, knowing full well that… you know, the Wii U was on life support.”
Some fans had hoped that Nintendo would continue releasing similar devices by revisiting systems like the N64 and Game Boy. However, that has yet to happen. The company probably didn’t think it was necessary given the massive success of Nintendo Switch, and tons of classic games can be played on that system (and now Switch 2 as well).
Reggie also recently revealed why Nintendo stopped working with Amazon during the Wii and DS era, including an illegal demand the retailer had. We have more on that here.