At the time of its release, the manner on how it they’d marketed that was confusing as they showcased the Wii U gamepad as if its a portable console (its not) since its rather the main controller for the Wii U console. I was in high school when the console was first revealed, my reaction to that was “WTF?” as I thought the gamepad was portable, as the ads often flex that it can be (or the way they showed it came off as that).
Super, Color, Advance all describe the console. The customer knows what they are getting.
U is a letter that gives no information. Is it a themed Wii for college kids? Is it a U shaped controller upgrade? Is it a screen addon? Is it an online social media thing?
If you had asked me before coming into this thread what the Wii U actually was, I wouldn’t have been able to tell you. I knew it was a flop. I knew nobody who actually had one. I didn’t even remember it had a screen. I knew I wasn’t interested in getting one at the time even though I had a Wii and a 360 but didn’t have either the PS4 or XBOne. So I think both the weird name and the fact it wasn’t wanted or needed by anyone are to blame for its failure.