Nintendo Wii Fanboy

Is the Xbox 360 vessel struggling to stay afloat in the murky waters of the console race? Well, not quite, but Microsoft bigwig Don Mattrick doesn't sound convinced that his company will reclaim first place from the Wii. "I'm not at a point where I can say we're going to beat Nintendo," he told Business Week. He's probably correct. The Wii continues to outsell the 360 in every region, with only the small Polynesian island of Tuvalu holding out.*

But Mattrick isn't preparing the lifeboats just yet, to take our tortured ships/consoles analogy one step further. "We will sell more consoles this generation than Sony," says he. Like we care, Mattrick. It's all about number one, baby!

* This just in: Wii took over there as well.

[Via Go Nintendo]

With the Xbox 360 dropping in price later this week, many are looking at one of the console's particular SKUs because, well, it's going to be cheaper than the Wii. For almost 2 years, the Wii has been the cheapest option on the market, so how could this lower price affect the Wii's standing as top sales dog? Lazard Capital Markets analyst Colin Sebastian says Microsoft may see stronger sales, but doesn't "anticipate either Nintendo or Sony to match the Xbox 360 price cut."

The Wii is in good standing and really doesn't need to cut its price, so we're not expecting Nintendo to do so, either. But, if Microsoft manages to start taking away some of Nintendo's sales, we wouldn't be surprised to hear about a price cut early next year or, if sales drop that much, this holiday. We're not expecting sales to shift that dramatically, though.

We usually use the Wii Warm Up to discuss and dissect Wii-related minutiae, but today we want to know more about your non-Nintendo gaming habits. Which other consoles do you own (current-gen or otherwise), which is your favorite (after the Wii, naturally), and what did you last play/are you currently playing through?

Sorry folks, looks like the new game Batman: Arkham Asylum isn't going to be on Wii. It's purely a PS3 and Xbox 360 affair, as well as for the PC. Sorry to crush your hopes and dreams (we felt you needed the closure of knowing, rather than never mentioning the game again), but the title isn't planned for Wii as of right now. That doesn't mean we can't hold out hope that the game will one day be ported to Nintendo's console. Just don't hold your breath on that one.

[Via press release]

Wait for it. Don't leave cover too soon. You're nearly surrounded. Bullets fly in from three directions, ricocheting off the paltry bit of cover protecting your crouched body. A grenade goes off nearby -- too close for comfort. And then it's time to strike back and slaughter another wave of enemy soldiers. You stand up, twist your body to the side, and throw, sending a spinning blade of death towards the hopelessly unprepared, screaming soldiers who soon find themselves lacking torso cohesion.

Released in March of this year for the Xbox 360 and PS3, Dark Sector is a far cry from its original incarnation as the first game shown off for this generation of consoles. It evolved into a Gears of War-inspired, Space Marine-lacking action title with an unusual Soviet setting. While on the surface the gameplay is rather derivative -- you'll be taking cover, aiming, and moving around in a manner that's instantly familiar to anyone who's played a third-person shooter in the past two years -- one thing sets Dark Sector apart from other games of its ilk. That thing is the glaive, a vicious, bladed boomerang that dominates the game's combat and puzzles. And while the glaive is enough to make Dark Sector a solid, though overall unremarkable, action title, it represents an enormous potential: armed with a retooled control scheme and a Wiimote, Dark Sector is, without a doubt, Born for Wii.

NEXT >>

If one was to make an estimation as to the end of the console race today, it would appear Nintendo has things on lock. But, the future isn't always certain, so some folks don't mind coming up with their own guesses as to where we're headed in the years to come. The latest person to toss their 2 pennies into the fountain is former SCEE president Chris Deering. He thinks that come 2011, the Wii and the PS3 will be in a dead tie.

How can this be, with the monthly NPD numbers and weekly Japanese sales figures showing Nintendo selling truckloads of its hardware? Well, for Sony, Deering predicts that combined sales of its PS3, PS2 and PSP devices will be around 240 million units, which he also predicts for Nintendo, but they'll have done it with only the DS and Wii. For the Xbox 360, Deering predicts it will have a base of 40 million units.

240 million units, though? That's just lunacy, in our eyes. But, hey, if anyone can reach that figure, it's Nintendo. As for Sony doing it, well, there are a lot of PS2 consoles out there ...

We guess we'll just have to wait and see!

For all of you keeping track of how many months the Wii has crushed the PS3, maybe it's time you got yourself a new notebook. That thing must be full. But, in all seriousness, Japan saw the Wii selling quite a bit more when compared to the PS3 last month.

How much more? Well, the Wii sold 171,851 units in the four weeks leading up to July 27th (so, really, it could've sold a lot more last month), while the PS3 only sold 54,823 units. And, as one might expect, both totally crushed the Xbox 360, which only sold 14,439 units.

We expect that the NPD data in the next few months will reflect something similar, as all of us in North America are still waiting on Wario Land: Shake It! and Mario Super Sluggers. Both of those, as well as Fatal Frame IV, have already released over there, but they pretty much don't count here as Wario and Fatal Frame released only yesterday. Sluggers released way back in June.

EA's John Riccitiello doesn't mind dishing out the straight talk. In an interview with Mercury News, the EA CEO freely admits that his company failed in projecting the top dog of this current generation of consoles, instead focusing development on Xbox 360 and PS3 titles early on.

"One thing that's different is we typically figured out who the market leader was going to be before the start of the cycle and bet with our development resources on that platform," he said. Riccitiello admitted that EA made a bad call, but says the company is now "catching up" and thinks they'll be "fine." He went on further to add that they've "got some incredibly innovative Wii titles" and "incredibly innovative DS titles coming. And so I think that issue's sort of behind us."

With EA being such a big supporter of the previous Xbox and PlayStation consoles, do they think they can gain similar market share on the Wii? Even with Nintendo's tradition of dominating their own console with first-party titles? "Yes," says Riccitiello. "Tomorrow? No. Can I make a big step in that direction this year? Yes. Can I continue to make steps in that pattern? Yes. Does Nintendo want us to do it? Yes. Does the platform set itself up for that to be possible? Yes. So, it requires focus."

With the All-Play brand, we'd say EA is moving in the right direction for capturing that segment. What else they have up their sleeve, we'll just have to wait and see.

One of the benefits of being a major company is that you get to find out things first -- like how much stuff you sold. When the NPD Group informed Nintendo of the most recent figures, the Big N sent a love text to our Joystiq overlords, bragging about their current sales standings in the U.S.

But we already know that the Wii sells a lot, so what's the big deal this time? According to Nintendo, NPD figures confirm that the Wii has surpassed its competitors as the North American console leader. As of today, the Wii has sold almost 10.9 million units, which was enough to give it the edge over the Xbox 360.

Of course, there's much more to being the king of consoles than selling a lot of hardware, as you need the software to match. However you feel about the Wii's game library, though, this is quite an accomplishment for the little white console that could.

We're already fascinated by the potential of the Wii MotionPlus, but there is one potential sticking point: the price. Gizmodo went to the trouble of calculating how much the Wii would cost with enough Wii Remotes, Nunchuks, and MotionPlus add-ons (the site estimated -- conservatively in our view -- that the device would cost $15) for four players, and promptly saw the Wii's "cheapest console" tag evaporate.

According to Gizmodo's math, a fully equipped four-player Wii set-up would cost $490 -- just $60 less than the PS3 with four controllers and $20 more than the Xbox 360 with four pads; the fact that the Wii is seen as a social gaming console hardly makes thing much better. Maybe a price drop for the Wiimote is in order before the MotionPlus hits stores?

How does one reply to such a comment? Point out that Stringer is obviously incorrect, or just ignore it and hope it goes away? Unfortunately, big Howie S. won't be going anywhere as head honcho of Sony, appearing last week at the Allen & Co Media Conference.

Stringer simply said "I've played a Nintendo Wii," -- betcha he bought one for his grandkids or something -- and he followed that up by stating "I don't see it as a competitor. It's more of an expensive niche game device." Cue inevitable spiel about Blu-ray, and you've got another carbon-copy Sony statement in a nutshell. It's difficult to take anything he says seriously, especially since we've heard it all before.

We could explain that the definition of a niche wouldn't have anything to do with the biggest and most popular console on the planet, or point out that the PS3 is still way more expensive (and will be for yonks), but that would make too much sense.

[Via Gameindustry.biz]

There was a momentary panic in the Wii Fanboy dungeon a few weeks ago, after news filtered through that PlayStation 3 sales had zipped past the Wii in Japan.

Was this it, we wondered, reading the figures over and over again to check that we weren't seeing things. Was this Sony finally rising to strike down the Nintendo hegemony in Japan? Well, no. Not at all, actually. Turns out some old dude had wandered on to Sony's console and sent PS3 sales spiralling. Things are now back to normal, and the data-gatherers at Enterbrain confirmed as much by revealing that the Wii outsold Sony's platform by almost 100,000 units during June -- 235,990 to 139,494 was the final score.

[Via Next-Gen]

Apparently, Korea isn't the only place on the globe where the Wii is selling poorly. Yet even in Korea, the Wii isn't the bottom-feeder of this generation -- not so in New Zealand. Nintendo's great white hope is the country's last-place current-gen console, selling only 16,000 units compared to the PS3's 34,000 and the 360's 45,000.

Perhaps the Kiwis wouldn't be so adverse to the Wii if Nintendo actually showed some love to the neglected country. In the current climate, though, New Zealanders are distributor-less. Phoenix Distribution is picking up the slack for Activision's games in the region, but according to the company's founder, "Nintendo is a lemon." To top it all off, Nintendo doesn't even bother advertising the console to its beloved casual crowd, making the Wii a system for the Nintendo hardcore only. Obviously, the distribution problem needs to be fixed, but will it be?

If any of you Kiwis want to shed some light on the situation, feel free to do so in the comments.

[Via NeoGAF]

Hollywood, eat your heart out. It looks like gaming is lined up to be a big money enterprise come next year (as if it isn't already), according to analyst firm DFC Intelligence. David Cole, one of the firm's analysts, thinks that the driving force behind this sharp rise is none other than the Wii.

"The Wii does not appear to be a fad and it has the chance to be one of the best selling systems of all-time," said Cole. Another analyst, Jeremy Miller, is quick to point out that Nintendo is also a very successful publisher, stating "The Wii not only has unique features and a broad demographic appeal, but Nintendo is dominant as a software publisher." Despite Nintendo's winning formula that is the Wii, the firm sees the PS3 selling more than the Wii in 2012. We know of at least one entity that agrees.

[Via Joystiq]