The Wii U sales haven't been steller. And I mean in terms of most Nintendo hardware. Saying the Nintendo product "isn't selling as expected" is like saying that Donald Trump is losing money. There is no real reason to worry.
However, this is a pattern that has emmerged in the youth of the eighth console generation. The 3DS had similar sales issues, and the Vita had them in spades. If what Sony says about PS4 specs is any indicator, this selling issue will hit it like a wrecking ball. Microsoft will fair no better than Nintendo. As for the fabled Steambox...er...we can download Steam onto our computers, so Valve will need to throw one hell of a sales pitch at E3.
I think what happened was that gamers in general have gotten wise to this ploy. Developers long believed they always needed to be on the cutting edge of inovation. New graphics, new control mods, new features, ect. But thanks to the development of technology, inovation can take the back seat. We certainly still need inovation, just not in the form of new tech every seven years. Sure Nintendo needed a new console, but do Sony and Microsoft really need it? Nope.
The bad news is that the console providors will be in denial of this fact for quite a while. We might indeed, have to watch Sony go bankrupt. We my have to suffer through more of Microsoft struggling to come up with "hip" names for new consoles. We can only hope EA makes a botched console that we all comfortably laugh at.
The good news is that, once they figured this out, we won't be seeing new consoles for a long time. A console generation will last for an average of 12 years, instead of 8. We might see a few upgrade parts, like the ROM addaptor for the N64, but not as much new consoles. Game devs will clue in soon after and step in line, focusing on just making good games rather than being on the cutting edge 100% of the time.
A man can dream...a man can dream...