Jack Tretton's at it again.

[Bodhesatva]

grandmaster192 said:
Someone tell me how Nintendo is expanding the adult market. This is something that I strongly disagree with. I think it's Sony that is expanding the adult market. This is something I'm very intrested in. What Nintendo is doing is expanding the market by targeting kids. Keep in mind that I don't consider Nintendo kiddy, so you don't flame over it. Now notice how each generation the market get bigger and bigger. This was even before Nintendo turned into Nontendo. Think of all the new gamers out there. many of them are kidds who rely on their parent to buy them consoles. The Wii is the console that has the games that are kid friendly, plus it has the price as well. the Wii is doing great with kids.

First, the generation's aren't really getting "bigger and bigger." For example, the Playstation 2 was approximately as strong as the Playstation 1 when you account for population increases (the population increased by about 5 percent during that time frame, so the PS2 sold a tad more, but not much). There are two generations where we have, thus far, seen a major jump in size: the NES and PS1 generations, respectively. In short, we haven't made much headway into the adult market in 12 years, since the PS1 was released.

You seriously overestimate the Playstation's appeal to adults. This was shown quite clearly in a recent poll:

http://biz.gamedaily.com/industry/feature/?id=16691

The relevant quotation:

Interestingly, the Heavy Gamer segment is a lot younger than one might think too. "What always seems to surprise people, especially those that talk about the 18-34 year-old 'core gamer,' is that a majority of the heavy gamer segment is kids ages 6-17! This is true also for the 'Avid Console' gamer segment. Alternatively, the Avid PC gamer segment is older, with just over 40% represented by 18-34 year-olds," Anita Frazier, NPD industry analyst explained.

The average "hardcore" and "console" gamers are 6-17! It's the PC Gamer crowd that has upped the age, as this clearly shows. What games on the PC are adults playing? Based on press, the clearest games are "The Sims," "Bejeweled," and "Civilization," all of which have boasted about their older -- and more feminine -- audiences. Please note that these games are lacking in violence almost completely.

http://www.actiontrip.com/rei/comments_news.phtml?id=070507_8

As this survey shows, children are actually the ones most interested in violent games. Violence is, I suspect, I direct impediment to mass adult adoption of video games.

Less importantly, I work at a Toys R Us, and can absolutely garauntee you that I sell many more Wiis to adults than I do PS3s to adults (I ask who the purchasers are buying it for, so that I can sell them warranties. I have only a handful of adults tell me they are buying PS3's for themselves, while I've had dozens of adults say that about the Wii). Keep in mind that I mean adult adult -- I sell a goodly number of PS3s to 24 year old males, for example, just not many to 36 year old ones, and literally zero to women.

Now -- most importantly, simply watch the first portion of this:

http://www.ign.com/index/e3/2007/videos/

Nintendo's penetration in to the adult market has literally doubled in two years. Doubling your penetration of any demographic in that short a span is unprecedented. There is no better evidence that Nintendo is leading the charge into the 25+ demographic right now (although clearly, they were not leading the charge before then, as you suspected). 

http://www.destructoid.com/get-your-poor-grandmother-out-of-that-home-and-into-a-wii-bowling-league-30687.phtml

You can also find a ton of stories like this one, if you're looking for more small evidences.

The anecdotal evidence -- and more importantly, the statistical evidence -- all suggests that console gaming was effectively stuck as a young male market, and that the DS and Wii are very rapidly pushing past that. The Playstation 1 was very important in expanding the market from 6-14 year olds (where the SNES was, effectively) to 14-25 year olds, which is where we have been stuck: but gaming has made very little headway beyond that 25 year old age bracket since then, as the similarity in sales between the PS1 and PS2 shows (the PS1 sold almost twice as many systems as any system in history had done before then. That is market expansion. The PS2's 5-10 percent increase over the original PS1 is not market expansion). This is the first time we've seen real, substantial evidence that video games are moving considerably beyond the 30 year old age limit.