Many have long believed that Nintendo has avoided operating within the same 'console war' landscape as PlayStation and Xbox, and while one analyst agrees, he argues that it isn't to the extent that you or Nintendo themselves might think.
When asked in an interview with GamesRadar+ whether he agrees with the sentiment that Nintendo is running its own race when it comes to consoles, Mat Piscatella, executive director of games at Circana posited that it isn't all black and white, saying "I think, to an extent, yes. Maybe not as much as Nintendo themselves might believe."
Rather than viewing Nintendo as a second-choice console of sorts, Piscatella argues that this plays heavily into Nintendo's hands, and is what allows the company to operate as it does. "These are devices that – you use the word supplemental and people think, 'Oh no, that's, like, secondary to you.' And that's not the case at all. But they do supplement a player's gaming life, right? Not in a subservient way or a second-level way. They could be the most-played device, but they're a device that's often owned with other types of gaming devices. Which is great, it offers that variety. [Where] they operate in and their sales curves are just different, and the factors that may be impacting PlayStation and Xbox might not be impacting Nintendo in the same way."
