So something has to have inferior hardware to be popular? It's all about what's there first and how easy it is to develop for. N64 used carts, which made it more difficult for programmers to utilize it's hardware due to a lack of space, so they jumped boat to the Playstation (the same thing happened with Saturn with a lot of developers as well).
Since the Playstation was immensely popular as the PS2 was announced, obviously most of the PS1 customers wanted a new PS2. It played DVDs without any add-ons and by 2001 (around a month or so before Xbox and The Cube were released) had a damn good lineup of games. And there's quite a difference between PS2 and Xbox and Wii and PS3 if you ask me. PS2 handled the same stuff Xbox did with more lag and not as good graphics, but it was still on level with the rest of the consoles, not an entire generation behind it's rivals.
Really, what I'm trying to say here is that it's up to the company making the console to make it developer-friendly, or that unfriendly console could be a curse. As for innovation, I honestly would rather have standard controls. I do like the Wiimote with some games. I'm not really big on using a stylus while playing a video game.
And I'm disappointed in Nintendo because they really switched from satisfying the hardcore Ninty fanboy over to the stereotypical "Californian family of four" type, and the fact that it's the best selling console and that Gamecube still has much better 3rd-party games when it was a 3rd place console.
The Wii has specifications similar to that of the Xbox's, with some more ram. I think that we'd definitely see better Nintendo 64 emulation on the Wii, but as of now, Xbox is still the homebrew king. All I have to recommend is XBMC, MedafenX NES, ZSNEXBOX, NeoGenesis (Gen, SCD, 32X), Surreal, FBA-XXX Pro, and CPX3.
The Wii will have a scene, no doubt, but there really won't be anything I will freak over. Xbox 360 and Playstation 3 could really do a lot more if they ever got hacked.