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EA - Wii Caught Us By Surprise
A Next Generation story details comments by EA's CEO John Riccitiello about the surprise hit that is the Wii. The exec as much as admitted that they 'bet on the wrong horse' by focusing on the PS3 and 360 during the console transistion, and now are turning the mighty corporate ship as fast as they can to stay with Nintendo's success. "Nevertheless, Riccetello said that EA had the second-largest market share on Wii as of March with 19 percent, thanks mainly to Tiger Woods PGA Tour. Only Nintendo had a larger share. The firm shipped six new Wii titles in fiscal 2007. EA also shipped eight titles on Nintendo DS. The emergence of online, wireless and geographical differences in the console realm also made things complicated in fiscal '07."
The Wii caught them so off gaurd that they nearly pissed themselves.
Thankyou, thankyou, I'll be here all week.
Dedicated Cthulhu Cultist since 4523 BC.
Thats what she said!
In a way, this could be a really good thing for Wii that EA missed the boat to a degree. Without the EA juggernaut from day 1, it may have left enough room for younger, more innovative companies to get a solid foot in the door. That little moment of bad judgment may well reverberate through the lifespan of the console, and I can't say I expect it to be in a bad way.
(...oh, and...first?)
Unpleasantries.
Just proves how far detached big game companies are from their userbase and how little do they understand entertainment.
Considering the hype surrounding the PS3 and 360, it wasn't really stupid to back them or anything at the start. But the price annoucement changed everything, and they should have noticed that immediately. Instead, EA made the same mistake in judging the market that Sony did when they thought "well, PS2 dominated the market while pricier than the GCN, so at that rate people will gladly pay 2x as much for 100x the hardware." What they SHOULD have noticed is that people on the whole clearly don't care nearly as much about graphical firepower as other things, and the PS2 made that crystal clear!
EA had the luxury of changing teams while Sony had to figure out how to stick with theirs, and so far the haven't been able to do so.
I like basketball!!1!
EA exec says "D'oh!"
Seriously, even Nintendo didn't plan for the Wii's level of sell-through
How odd. I would have thought that Madden was the EA leading title. While the graphics aren't as nice as the 360 and PS3 versions, players often report how cool it is to play the game with actual football movements rather than overly complex controller commands. I know a lot of non-sports gamers actually picked up the game just for the innovative controls. (I have to admit that I was also tempted. But I'm too much of a miserly scrooge to spend the money.
Then again, one of the things I really wanted when I got a Wii was a true Mario Golf type of game. Perhaps the serious golfers all played the Wii Sports version and fell in love with the idea? A relative of mine told his wife on no uncertain terms that they were getting a Wii, after he played a few holes on the Wii Sports Golf course. So I suppose it's possible that the Golfers like the idea even more than the football fans. (That's a shocking thought.)
Javascript + Nintendo DSi = DSiCade
I'm trying really hard to think of a studio that accurately predicted the Wii's success and oriented themselves accordingly, it wasn't just EA. Proof of this is that after all this time after the launch there are still very few truly stellar games for the system apart from Nintendo's titles.
Instead they're all running around in a panic and screaming: "Titles for the Wii are coming, don't worry!". The problem is that this is a re-deployment of resources brought upon by the unexpected market share of a system, instead of that system's uniques features. Or in other words, it was a bean counter along the corporate hierarchy who said "Holy cow, this is thing is selling like hot cakes, we need games out NOW" instead of some developer taking a look at the cool new control system and saying "You know, I could really do something amazing with this" and proceeding to annoy bean counters to realize his idea.
The end result is that this first flood of titles is crap, taking very little advantage of the Wii's control system. Things will get worse before they get better, as was the case with the DS's early life cycle.
The trends clearly showed that the PS3 and XBox 360 were too technologically advanced to be the winners of this generation. That left Nintendo and a possible newcomer. Since no newcomer arrived, Nintendo got to take the crown.
It's an interesting thought experiment to think what might have happened if, say, Sega introduced a new console with a competitive price but more traditional controls. Would the Wii still be selling like hotcakes, or would it be playing a more modest role in the market?
The stiffest competition in history was between the Genesis and SNES. The two were similar enough technologically that their respective superiorities didn't much matter. They were both affordable consoles with strong game libraries. I have a sneaky suspicion that if such a competitor were available, Nintendo's magic Wii Remote would not have been as successful of a draw as it ended up being.
Javascript + Nintendo DSi = DSiCade
Can someone tell where my NHL 2008 on the Wii is? The controlling scheme would be so simple - Use the analog stick on the nunchuck to move, like every other NHL game. Configure the game so it knows whether you are left or right handed. Hold the wiimote and nunchuck in parallel, as if you were holding a hockey stick. Move the hockey stick around to stick handle. To help the Wii system understand what you're trying to do with the puck, hold down B to shoot and Z to pass. A quick flick of the wrists for a wrister, and a windup for a slapshot. It seems so obvious to me that this would be a killer game on the Wii. I almost want to get my hands on the Wii developer kit just so I can build a prototype of the controlling scheme to get EA Sports on the right track.
Right now, I'm stuck playing Nintendo Ice Hockey (circa 1988), and it just isn't cutting it. I've considered ponying up a few dollars for a couple Gamecube controllers and NHL 2006, but I can't say I'm that excited about the idea, since I already have NHL 07 on the PC.