@zool Well, what you said doesn't exclude what I said. Actually, I also remember that part about the Wii remote, and that's probably from the same series of Iwata Asks as where the explanation about how they work from a game concept towards what kind of hardware they might need to go with that comes from.

That part was more about the console, and not so much about controllers, although that bit was also related, and was, as you already mentioned, more about giving more people access to it and making it easier for them, because of the instant recognition of the Wiimote looking like a remote control.

But hey, I'm just the messenger. I'm not just making this up to be right or anything. I honestly don't mind either way. It's just that your comment stood out in its, shall we say, conviction of how things are done at Nintendo, when people who actually work there have already explained what Nintendo's philosophy in that regard is.

The reason that stuck with me throughout the years, is because of the whole "top-down pyramid" thing. You hardly ever see that in companies, unless it's a REALLY specific industry, so Nintendo definitely stands out in that regard.

Now, it may not always be the best solution, but as we have now been able to witness with the current success of the Switch, if it pays off, it REALLY pays off big time.

So, I have been searching for some related articles, because I did want to at the very least offer you something that supports what I'm saying, but I came up short for the exact quote, mainly because for some weird reason, all the Iwata Asks pages give a virus warning on both browsers that I use (Firefox and Chrome), but the answers should be mentioned somewhere in here, more or less:

http://iwataasks.nintendo.com/interviews/#/wii/wii_console/0/0

And here are some more articles either outlining or mentioning Nintendo's design strategy, which also clearly show how their hardware design department is taking queues from the software department and vice versa, and how the idea of the games or innovation of how to play them, is more important than the hardware:

With the other two parties, it's always just a matter of external developers telling them the minimum specs, or desired specs wanted, and then they just stack something on top of that, to make sure that the box can run it all, and that's just not how Nintendo works.

They come up with a concept of (new and innovative ways of) entertainment, and think of what they might need to make that happen.

And of course, there is their also famous "Lateral Thinking with Withered Technology" philosophy, which ALSO focuses on game design first, and with hardware as a secondary concern: