Nintendo Wii Fanboy

If you've ever played the PC title Alice, then you got a lot farther than this blogger. The damn game only managed to crash my computer, but that's neither here nor there. People who have played Alice have enjoyed the title, for the most part. So you could say McGee has some standing in the games industry.

His thoughts on Wii? "For too long it has seemed that games were becoming more and more hardcore while continually alienating potential new gamers," he says. "The massive success of simple games like The Sims offered clear signs that there was a huge under-served audience waiting for accessible, fun game content. With the Wii proving that next-gen doesn't have to mean more polys, better AI, or realistic graphics, I think there's hope that the gaming 'core audience' might just become the mass audience."

What do you all think? Sure, the Wii is expanding the market, but will the "core audience" he's referring to get left in the dust? Will this "mass audience" of the future find their gaming tastes evolving beyond the casual? Weigh in!

[Via Go Nintendo]

Looks like we'll be waiting a little while longer for any price cut on the Wii. As in, until 2009. Nintendo President Satoru Iwata has revealed to analysts that no price cut is planned for either the Wii or DS this year, and while both consoles are selling out pretty much everywhere, we can't say we're bowled over by that decision.

As yesterday's financial report demonstrated, Nintendo's practically bathing in money, and it expects to make plenty more over the coming twelve months -- $5.14 billion of it, to be precise. If you are still searching for a Wii, looks like you won't even have the consolation of paying a non-launch price!

[Via Joystiq]

The so-called "hardcore gamer" contingent may see any move away from better graphics and story as something of a betrayal, but in a recent interview, Nintendo's Satoru Iwata makes an interesting -- and obvious -- point. "Targeting highly detailed graphics and epic stories are options, and in that situation, the gamer population doesn't increase," Iwata said, according to Asahi.com, and there's a lot of truth to those words. There are many ways to approach video games, and the epic story/epic visuals is one way. It's been the most common path to improvement in the gaming industry over the past few years -- and it wasn't really growing the market. So Nintendo, in an effort to bring in all new gamers, tried out some different options, and thus, we have Wii Sports (and more).

Iwata also says that many people shy away from gaming (or did) because so many games are a huge timesink, and here we agree. Listen, we play games like there's no tomorrow and even we think there's just not enough hours in the day for everything. Sometimes you want to plop down for five minutes and take a breather, and there are a lot of great options for that on the Wii and the DS. Apparently, people who weren't gamers felt a similar need for mental breaks, and that contributed to the rousing success of Nintendo's latest projects.

Does this mean that Nintendo will abandon the older core audience? As we've said before, no, we don't think so. Just as with the strong visual approach, the pick-up-and-play mentality is only another option. Unfortunately, it's one that makes for a lot of cheap games for developers, but we've seen enough goodness on the Wii that we're confident there will be much, much more.

[Via Develop and Kotaku]

And with the DS Lite and Wii, we can't say we're surprised. Those things are selling faster than cigarettes at a truck stop. So, it's not surprising to us that Nintendo's market value is now the best it's ever been, exceeding over 10 trillion yen ($85 billion). This is the kind of money we imagine a mad scientist or super villain has access to.

The Wii and DS have no signs of slowing down their incredible cycle of emerging from warehouse, only to be placed on store shelves for a small amount of time before being anxiously purchased by patrons of these establishment. So, expect Nintendo's worth to only increase over the next indeterminate amount of time.

Nintendo has clawed its way back to the top of the markets in Japan, which may come as no surprise, but even so, being noted as the second-most valuable company in the nation is quite a feat. Of course, the position is tenuous, and considering Toyota is worth three times as much, the top spot seems out of reach, but the Wii and DS show no signs of slowing down any time soon.

Satoru Iwata has led the company in a monumental rise, and he seems aware of how easy it would be to slip up at this point. Can he hold the momentum? Nintendo's shares have more than quadrupled in the short span of two years, and that's a lot to follow up ... but from various remarks, Iwata seems determined to try.

[Via GamesIndustry.biz]

It's not quite hard numbers showing combined Wii/360 ownership, and it's not quite ZOMG WII60 CONFIRMED TOTAL, but we'll take anything that suggests that the Wii may be awesome. According to a survey conducted by Magid Media from March 20th to the 27th, Xbox 360 owners are somewhat more likely to be interested in buying a Wii because of their 360 ownership.

66% of surveyed 360 owners indicated that they were "neutral or more likely to buy a Wii because they now own an Xbox 360." Compare that to the 52% who were "neutral or more likely to buy a PlayStation 3." 19% of 360 owners were "somewhat or much more likely" to buy a Wii.

Wii owners, strangely, were slightly more positive about Sony's system than Microsoft's: 53% were "neutral or more likely to buy a PlayStation 3 because they now own a Wii", versus 44% of Wii owners who felt the same way about the 360.

We think we may have spotted a subtle troll in Gamasutra's writeup: "Results for PlayStation 3 owners buying other consoles were not disclosed in the survey results, presumably because the sample size was below Magid's acceptable levels." Either that's a joke at the PS3's expense, or reality is a joke at the PS3's expense.

Japanese publicatiion Toyo Keizai recently sat down with President Iwata for five questions about the economics of selling consoles what print money (hand over the proverbial fist, even). Since we're stuck puzzling out squiggles Kanji and scratching our heads over the auto-translation, only to discover that there isn't much meat to the interview at all, we thought we'd bring it to you exactly as we read it:

Toyo Keizai: The DS sure prints money, yeah?
Iwata: Damn yeah it does.

TK: But that's just Japan. How's the overseas market?
Iwata: The overseas market also produces fat stacks of cash, only in different colors and shapes.

TK: You guys are really expanding the market, eh?
Iwata: We had to -- everyone already owned seven DS Lites.

TK: So how about that Wii?
Iwata: It also seems to be printing money. We're very pleased, and also, rich.

TK: Is the hit of DS and Wii probably to mean what?
Iwata: Very to recently, the game was thought that the child it is something which the young man enjoys. The woman, not to mention, to forge how no one where the old people touch to the game machine imagined and, the brain, the expectation which the person whom you think that English study can become the game software, is not.

Oh, uh ... sorry, we were too busy giggling at the Google translation. This is the interesting part of the interview, but we've heard this song before: Nintendo is working to expand the gaming industry beyond the artificial boundaries we've set when it comes to determining just what a game is, and who the audience should be. And we approve; in fact, bring more of it over here! Give us the language trainers and games we can play with Grandma, as well as more traditional 'hardcore' gaming fare.

Here we go again, again. Wedbush Morgan analyst Michael Pachter has been running his own sophisticated computerative thinkonometrics regarding the effect of Nintendo's massive success on third parties, and he disagrees with Todd Mitchell's negative assessment.

Basically, Mitchell said that because Nintendo titles dominate Nintendo consoles, that a market with a Nintendo console in the lead would lead to smaller market percentages for third parties. Pachter called the prediction "naive," noting that part of third parties' relative failure on previous Nintendo platform was the fact that they didn't do much publishing. He cited EA and Ubisoft specifically, both of whom are showing more activity on the Wii and DS. If publishers release more games-- and non-games-- they'll sell more!

Eidos bigwig, industry vet, and all around gaming guru Ian Livingstone recently lashed out at the stagnant state of gaming during Tim Wapshott's Games Central podcast. He criticized the industry as a whole, stating that most studios weren't interested in taking risks, and that's resulted in a few genres, owned by a few big titles and a legion of knock-offs. One of the few areas in which we do see innovation is in technology, and it's no surprise he lauded Nintendo's DS and Wii in that area. "Nintendo has demonstrated that you can carve out a new market through innovation. The DS and the Wii will demonstrate that gameplay, gameplay and gameplay are the three most important aspects of a game, and that technology and graphics support that experience." And we fully agree. Slick and stunning graphics are one thing, but the game should drive the graphics, not the other way around.

Though speaking of companies doing the same ol' thing, we kinda want to bring up that whole Tomb Raider thing they have going on over at Eidos ... but since Legend was a vast improvement, we'll let it slide.

Japanese media giant Enterbrain recently surveyed retailers, as reported by Gamefront.de, about their expectations for game system sales this holiday season. We know you're not surprised, but right now? The show is all Nintendo.

Retailers were asked, "Which next generation console do you think will sell better this Christmas?" The results lean heavily toward Nintendo -- 88% thought the Wii would boast better sales, and 11% settled on the PS3. We're not sure if it's worse that Microsoft wasn't even listed (perhaps because the Xbox 360 was released last year) or that Sony only garnered 11% in the poll.

The Wii loses, however, when it comes to all systems ... because 60% of retailers queried thought the Nintendo DS would be the top dog of all holiday console sales. Only 32.8% chose the Wii ... and a shocking 3.3% picked the PS3.

In a continuing cavalcade of Wii dominance, Amazon.jp is reporting that since the price and release date announcements, interest in the Wii has shot up dramatically, finally surpassing interest in Sony's upcoming PS3. Amazon tracks interest through the number of clickthroughs on buttons that offer more information. If the Wii's sales numbers look like this in a few months, then Nintendo's real competition will be ... Nintendo, and the powerhouse DS.