Earlier today during the media briefing from Nintendo and DeNA president of Nintendo Mr. Iwata confirmed that their next dedicated hardware platform was in development:
As proof that Nintendo maintains strong enthusiasm for the dedicated game system business, let me confirm that Nintendo is currently developing a dedicated game platform with a brand-new concept under the development codename "NX." It is too early to elaborate on the details of this project, but we hope to share more information with you next year.
We expect the timing of this statement is to put out fires regarding the announcement that Nintendo are going to start developing apps and games for smart devices. The way they pitched them was that any smart phone apps/games would be there to 'bridge' the gap between smart phones and dedicated gaming hardware, using the vast reach of mobile devices to bring consumers to dedicated hardware.
The most interesting part about this statement is that it doesn't mention handheld or console. It's long been the suspicion here at Nintendo Life that Nintendo's next console will be a single combined platform, either at a software or hardware level - no more 3DS or Wii U.
"NX", "Nintendo Cross Platform"? It makes total sense to us.
At least we know what Nintendo will be showing at E3 2016.
