That was a console released following the video game industry crash of 1983 — a crash associated with total pessimism of games everywhere (at least in the US, but that was the most important console market)
It’s likely they were very deliberately trying avoid direct association with the game industry. Afaik, they’ve always intended their consoles be percieved as more toy-like, but the nes was a particilarly hard stance on that (even bundling it with a toy — R.O.B.)
>Nintendo's critical error: failing to understand the customer in America isn't children, it is their parents and grandparents, who have no fucking clue what the difference is between "the Nintendo" and "the super Nintendo."
You say this.. but outside of the wii u and n64, hasnt nintendo outsold its competition in every console generation so far? Although, I suppose it could also be said thats better attributed to the bigger shitshow of microsoft/sony/sega/atari, than nintendo’s own doing