It's hard to overstate the importance of momentum in the console gaming market. A new system has to come out of the gate fast, selling enough units of both hardware and software to prove to publishers that there's a good reason to focus at least some of their development efforts on it. If those initial sales aren't there, publishers may start ignoring the system altogether, which makes players even less likely to buy the system, and on and on, until the console is a barely remembered footnote in the ongoing console wars.

There have been plenty of signs that Nintendo's Wii U is in exactly this kind of death spiral, where poor sales lead to poor support, which leads to even poorer sales. The latest sign of this comes from Need for Speed Rivals Creative Director Craig Sullivan, who noted in a recent interview with The Sixth Axis how poor sales of the Wii U version of Need for Speed: Most Wanted led directly to the decision not to do a Wii U port for this year's Rivals.

"[Most Wanted] didn’t really sell that many in terms of the Wii U market," Sullivan said. "I would love for it to have, because we put so much effort into that, trust me. I’d love for it to be way bigger than it was, and the same for the Vita. [Rivals] is going onto new hardware, and you have to work out where you focus your efforts. The 200 people working on this game are only capable of making so much and doing so many different versions of the game, so we had to go with where we think the biggest audience will be for the game, and that’s where we are."

It's worth noting that the Wii U version of Most Wanted didn't come out until March, almost five months after the game launched on practically every other platform during a holiday marketing blitz. Such caveats hardly seem to matter to the publisher, though; once a system gets a reputation as "the one where multiplatform games don't sell well," it's an uphill battle to prove that impression wrong. Not that the impression is necessarily wrong in the first place: leaked sales data suggests that the Wii U version of August's Splinter Cell: Blacklist accounted for only 1.6 percent of the game's total sales in its launch month.

Not every third party has fled from the Wii U. Publishers like Warner Bros. and Ubisoft are sticking with the system, launching versions of Assassin's Creed: Black Flag, Batman: Arkham Origins, Lego Marvel Super Heroes, and Just Dance 4 this holiday season. Sega is even pushing Sonic: Lost World as a Wii U exclusive for home consoles. Even so, the third-party lineup is much weaker than Nintendo would like going into the system's second holiday season, a fact that can be traced back to poor hardware and software sales months ago.

If Nintendo is going to turn the Wii U's fortunes around, the change is likely going to have to come from within. First-party exclusives developed by Nintendo itself have always been the company's strong suit, and they have helped rescue other Nintendo hardware that seemed destined to languish in the sales doldrums. Look no further than the Nintendo 3DS for evidence that such a turnaround is possible. Many attribute the system's revived sales (it was the best-selling system in the US in September) to a drastic price drop, but the release of big sellers like Mario Kart 7 and Super Mario 3D Land were probably just as important.

A similar turnaround may be starting with the Wii U. The system saw its first price drop last month alongside the release of The Legend of Zelda: Wind Waker HD. The system also saw a 200 percent increase in US sales from August to September, according to Nintendo. That's probably not a coincidence.

It's telling that Nintendo trumpeted a percentage increase rather than any raw sales numbers. The Wii U was rumored to have sold only about 30,000 US systems in August (lining up with similar sales figures from earlier in the year). Given that, a 200 percent increase would put sales at around 90,000 in September, below the 96,000 units of the aging Xbox 360 that Microsoft sold in the same month (rumored numbers notwithstanding, the Xbox 360 was the top console for the month, putting a rather low ceiling on even the Wii U's increased September sales).

Still, the increase is a rare sign of positive momentum for the Wii U, and it's one Nintendo would be wise to continue by pushing additional first-party exclusives. Unfortunately for Nintendo, recent exclusives like Pikmin 3 and The Wonderful 101 haven't been the kinds of massive system sellers that Nintendo was hoping for, and warmed-over holiday season releases like Wii Party U and Wii Fit U also seem unlikely to really set the system apart. Nintendo's best hope to attract attention this holiday season is probably Super Mario 3D World, which combines a well-known name with some innovative new features and multiplayer support.

Aside from Mario, though, many of the system's most anticipated titles are not hitting store shelves until 2014. Even Donkey Kong: Tropical Freeze, which was originally planned for this holiday season, was recently pushed back to February, further eroding the Wii U's holiday lineup.

By then, it may be too late to reverse the downward momentum that is still plaguing the Wii U nearly a year after its initial launch. The release of more powerful (if more expensive) console hardware from Sony and Microsoft is only going to make it harder to pull out of what looks to be a death spiral. If Nintendo is going to prove the value and marketability of the Wii U to gamers and outside publishers, now is the time.