NHL 2k9 wii gets a 6.0 "passable"

[famousringo]

Groucho said:

I'm feeling fairly certain that Madden '08 will not keep selling much longer, since um... Madden '09 is out, and has been for several weeks.

On pro-sports games, those "legs" last one year, and no more.  Look at Madden NFL 08's numbers here on the site.  I guarantee that they are not going to change much from here on out, and the same has been true for the past decade with annual sports titles.  The X360 sold 3x as many as the Wii, despite having a smaller install base.  The PS3 sold more than the Wii, despite having a *signifigantly* smaller install base (and being shorted by 3 months on the chart, relative to the Wii!).  The PS2 sold 2.5x as much as the Wii, despite having not much more than that as an installed base (in America, where Madden is relevant), and being nearly 9 years old.

The Wii version was the worst performer of the pack, by far, discounting the portable console versions and old consoles, and american football is much, much more popular than hockey in the US.  The Wii versions of these games are probably fairly expensive to develop, since they are the most different, from a development perspective -- the games are certainly developed on the HD consoles primarily, and watering down the game as much as is obviously needed (to produce results like the one we see here) is *very* time consuming and expensive.  

As a matter of fact, if it wasn't for the PS2 version (which requires the downgrade work, but still yields a good profit), I wonder if the Wii version of Madden would even exist.  Sports games *must* sell a ton to make a profit... guess who else, besides the hardware manufacturer, the retailer, the developer, and the publisher,  gets a hand in the profits? (the licensees -- and they take a hell of a chunk, if you hadn't figured that out)

Sorry, but sports just aren't the Wii's forte.  Its a great console, but I have to say that its pretty apparent that sports obviously don't appeal as much to the typical Wii owner, as they do to the typical X360/PS3/even PS2 owner.  I'm fine with the Wii not being everyone's favorite sports console -- I don't really think of my Wii in those terms.  I do understand the mentality of the sports gamer, as well -- HD, and more photorealism, is awesome for sports and so is the classic dual analog style controller.  The Wii doesn't cut it (to date).  Sorry, but its true.  Why do you think pro sports franchises are constantly trying to provide the "you're watching the sport on TV" experience?  Those are their fans -- and yep, the HD consoles just cannot be beaten by the Wii in this dept.

To this I say... "oh well."  I'm pretty sure that's "okay" for the Wii.  It has a heck of a lot of other stuff going for it.  It doesn't need to rule every genre to succeed wildly.

 

 

Yes, the game designers have to change the playstyle from "watching the game on TV," to either "you're the athlete," or "you're the coach" if they want to succeed on Wii. And they're starting to get a hold on that concept.