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Wii's Longevity, Competition Questioned
Gamasutra reports that, despite the Wii's breakaway sales success, some analysts are skeptical of the Wii's staying power. Other analysts are, of course, pointing out that many of the 'hardcore' titles are expected later this year. "[They] not[ed] that 31% of Wii owners surveyed in March said they expected to play the Wii more often a year from now, compared to 21% of Xbox 360 owners." At the same time, Nintendo of America's George Harrison is questioning the staying power of Sony and Microsoft. According to Harrison, the two larger companies 'lack the DNA' to move with the industry, and keep with the the demand for casual, more family-friendly titles. "'They're really good at reaching a certain customer, and have a real difficulty understanding how we succeed with the customers that we have,' said the senior vice president of marketing and communications. With the sales of Wii and DS hardware crushing the competition in the US, Harrison is confident that Nintendo could take up to as much as 50 per cent of the market for this latest 'next-gen' cycle."
I reserved and got a Wii on the launch date along with Zelda and Red Steel. I have also bought Monkey Ball, Excite Truck and Wii Play games. Currently, I am waiting for a good RPG... I was looking forward for the Dragon Quest game but so far there is no sign of it. I do not like the "mini games" as I have enough of them with Wii Play/Sports and MonkeyBall... also I do not have lots of people to play with... WHERE IS THE INTERNET PLAY!!! THIS IS 2007...
I got bored of my Wii... I am still waiting for a good game, the problem with consoles like this with so few games is that sometimes it is impossible to get a game you like if your "tastes" are not standard... Also, I do not have the £40 to spend on some wannabe game without testing... how am I suppose to see if I like that game? considering that these days, online reviews are less worthless...
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I'd play ALOT more a year from now, as I figure that's about when i'll finally get my hands on one!
Analysts make sweeping unfounded generalizations to get their daily 15 mins. Must be a slow news day for Slashdot.
The Wii is here to stay and dominate. Especially once they start doing some cool DS to Wii integration. It's base is huge, is constantly growing and still a huge demand which outpaces the supply.
I have no interest in one but may be buying one once Animal Crossing 2 comes out (its like crack for my fiancé). Unless Nintendo comes out and says they kick puppies, love Nazis, and wipe their ass with every nations flag in the world they are not likely to drop the ball.
So...on the one hand, we have a couple of analysts vying for first prize in the unorthodox-opinion contest, because, well, because it's their job to sensationalize things so people talk about their opinions, and on the other, we have the head of one major gaming company that has taken an brilliantly unorthodox strategy (and done very well by it) questioning his competitors' ability to continue to succeed in the market.
C'mon, guys, all that we accomplish by publishing non-news like this is giving both parties exactly what they're looking for in free publicity. Adding together two non-stories doesn't create a story unless there's some really interesting counterpoint, and here all we have is a parallel phrase structure in "questions staying power".
I'm not trying to flame here or anything, I'm just saying that I think we could at least do a little better than this. Analysts and senior figures are always going to try and get themselves into headlines by saying controversial things; is it to much to ask that we don't actively facilitate this behavior?
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Are these the same analysts who predicted that Nintendo would be a distant third this cycle?
Funny how you don't see them making a statement of "Oops, sorry we had no clue what the hell we were talking about."
These analysts are as good at predicting the future as any random person off the street, they just get paid a lot more.
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I'm not going to sleep outside of stores or get raped on ebay just to join in, either.
I just checked every time I walked through Wal-Mart or Target (once or twice a week) and after a couple of trips I picked one up. There were 3 or 4 in the case. I haven't looked as much since then, but I think anyone who takes the trouble to just look around a bit ought to be able to get one. Then again, maybe I just got really, really lucky.
In any case, I am not super-impressed with the titles so far. The Wii Sports game is a lot of fun (tried it out on my non-video gaming parents last weekend, they were hooked) and Super Paper Mario is also a lot of fun. But I'm still not extremely psyched about the titles coming out. (For comparison, I own a 360 as well and my favorite game so far is Call of Duty 2 and I have the legendary edition of Halo 3 (yes - the $125 one) on reserve).
I will say that there's one point to consider: Nintendo is in a much better position to come out with a new system before MS or Sony can. I think we're talking what 5 years? 7? until we see Xbox 720 and PS4. I would be shocked if Nintendo doesn't come out with their own hi-def capable system in 3 or 4.
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Graphics will become outdated? Or you mean the other haters will overhype their 500W GPUs to shadow their other shortcomings? I dunno, I guess I must be the ONLY person who still plays retro games from the 80s and 90s.
Only non-innovators push their GPU strength as the main selling point. Let me guess, the PS4 will consume twice the energy, require it's own air conditioning unit, and be able to render 2600x1400 images at 200fps? OMG CRAZIES!
Tom
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I am bored with my Wii at the moment but my wife and daughters who never play anything beyond popcap games on the web are still playing it regularly. I dont have many games and do play it alot when I get a new one, but they dont seem to have the staying power with me that they do on the rest of the family. Nintendo really has managed to capture an untapped market and because of that I think you can toss probabilities and gamer opinion out the window, its not a gamers console, its a non-gamers console. That may change as more high profile titles are released, but so far my wife and my parents (who picked up their own after their last visit) would be happy if nintendo just kept cranking out minigames. My mother mentioned that what her Wii really needed was a trivia game and some board games. There are so many of the non-gamer genre's out there that are untouched and dont have to rely on gimics. Imagine "Pictionary" where you could sketch the "clue" on the screen with the remote, the secret word could be given quietly via the remote speaker. Maybe Wheel of Fortune where you can zap away the letters to select them, chess where you can just point to the piece you want to move, Jeopardy using the remote as the buzzer, the possibilites are endless.
Regardless of the AAA "hardcore" titles that come out later, the Wii has all the possibiilty of being the casual gamers ultimate game center.
I guess I could be considered a "hardcore" gamer... Been playing games since the early 80's and never really stopped. It's nothing to log close to 100 hours in a good RPG.
That in mind, I wanted a Wii from when I first saw it, looked to be a very fun system that would give a chance to be more "social".
I would casually look for one from time to time - then last month, one showed up at my local Walmart (very small store, not one of the new big ones), and I picked it up along with Zelda TP.
Immediately, I began to see the way the console changed the way people around me thought of video games... My wife is absolutely hooked on Wii sports, and the neighbors come by at least a couple nights a week for some tennis or bowling. Most interesting however, was the interest of my parents. Both nearly 60, they never liked video games in the past. Could never even get them to try one out. The Wii was different. They watched my wife and I play a game of tennis, and wanted to try for themselves. Now, every time they stop by there will be quite a few games of bowling played.
You shouldn't underestimate the attention span of the casual gamer, look how long SOL.EXE has been around.
"They do have a point after two or three years the Wii is going to be seriously outdated (graphically)..."
Yeah, but early PS2 games looked like shit compared the Dreamcast, late PS2 games looked weak compared to the Xbox or Cube, and PS2 games were always blown away by the PC. The DS has laughable graphics compared to a PSP. The Wii and PS2 look seriously outdated right now compared to the 360 or PS3 yet are still selling very well. Graphics mean very little as far as popularity is concerned.
There are alot of gamers who bought the Wii, cracked out on Zelda and Wii Sports, and are now waiting for other games worth playing to show up. The publishers, meanwhile, are trying to figure out who exactly is buying these Wii's.
Nintendo has set its self up to be able to ration out what it considers strong releases, but has history has proven, what it considers to be strong is often not what traditional gamers will go for (Warioware, Mario Strikers Charged). And of course, its monster hits have not materialized yet (Metroid, Mario Galaxies, Smash Brothers Brawl).
On the flip side of it, the 3rd parties are rushing to step up. But they did so a bit too late, so we are getting alot of ports of PS2 and Xbox games. The 3rd parties are going to try their hand at the casual games, of course, but it may yet be a while before they start showing up with the kind of games that the traditional gamers want.
Demand has been quite strong though, so I have no doubts that we will see the kinds of games we want. The real question is whether the publishers will be able to make any money at it. There is a very real danger of all the more traditional games only showing up on the 360 or PS3.
There are a great many Wii's being sold, but until everyone figures out who the hell is buying them, there will be a lull. Are they being bought by Core gamers who also own a XBox 360, or Casual gamers who are only ever going to play Wii Sports? Either of those does not help the Wii in the long term.
END COMMUNICATION
I think you are missing it.
The Wii's graphics are currently good enough. They will be good enough for a good number of years.
The Wii's strengths are that it is fun and it is cheap. I have a feeling Mario Party is going to be at the top of the sales charts. I have my Wii hooked up to my HDTV and guess what? The graphics are just fine for me.
I still have a sneaking feeling that there will be a WiiSP or a super by 2010 or 2011. It will play all the Wii and GC Games and support HD graphics. It will cost about $250 an probably have more CPU and GPU power than the 360 or PS3. Sure Microsoft and Sony will be working on their next gen by then but just like the Gameboy the Wii will just keep selling and selling because it is the right solution at the right price. I think Nintendo wants to keep the price of a console around $200. To do that it shorten the cycle but keep compatibility.
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Ironically no. XBLA has a MUCH better selection of games for casual gamers than Nintendo's VC, or main library. This is despite the VC already having more titles available. Nintendo needs more casual titles in the mix, and they simply aren't there yet, despite the console being MUCH more casual friendly than the PS3 or 360.
To say there isn't 'mental room' for more than 1 console, is rather demeaning, but I do agree that people tend to stick with what is 'familiar'. This is the Wii's #1 issue with the gaming press, Nintendo is challenging what they are confortable with. If the Wii becomes the dominant player in the market (like the PS2 did) then the market will shift in ways they don't like.
This I doubt. XBLA has Solitare, Bejeweled, Online Poker, Online Uno, Online Hearts... The issue isn't that they don't exist it's that it does not exist to them. It's like having the food they enjoy served at the wrong resteraunt where (for whatever reason) they simply won't go to eat.
To summarize my point, it doesn't matter if the PS360 adds a ton of casual games, and marginalizes the price difference AND even bolts on their own Wiimote like controller... These systems will not gain the Mindshare back from Nintendo. Nintendo is bringing people in with a fun, intuitive system that they are confortable to use. Once that mindset gets established brand loyalty strengthens and the other systems effectively don't exist.
People shop for a Wii, not a 'Video game system' much in the same way people shop for an iPod and not an 'MP3 player'.