MCP: IF YOU BUY WII MUSIC I'LL MURDER YOUR FAMILY

[Erik Aston]

Slowly but surely, the hate is convincing me.

It isn't just the potential sales numbers--though I'm starting to wonder if 15 and 20M are in play. (At the least, Wii-brand games should go 5-for-5 in reaching 10M sales when Music and Sports Resort reach it.)

No, the best part is that just like Brain Age, Nintendogs, Wii Sports, Wii Play and Wii Fit, this game could have chapters devoted to it in future game design textbooks. It just has to sell really well, and it will have imitators, it will be analyzed for how it found it's success, and once the hardcore reach the last stage of grief, acceptance, and finally shut up, it will be recognized as a revolutionary moment in videogames.

It's already happened a bunch of times. People wondered why Miyamoto was making a dog game. Now it's his most successful non-bundled game ever, and is a prime case study in applying established gameplay concepts to different content and contexts. People still accuse Nintendo of trying to trick people into buying a crappy tech demo in Wii Play. But it was recently voted by consumers one of the 20 favorite games of all time, and will be a case study in Keep It Simple Stupid. Wii Music could be a future case study in how to engender creativity by removing objectives. That's the best part. In 20 years, all the academic types (who the current hardcore want to be) could be preaching the gospel of Wii Music.

I'm not predicting all that to happen. I really don't know how it will pan out. It will be fun to watch it play out. No one was paying attention to Brain Age or Nintendogs when they came out, and everyone expected the success of the first 3 Wii-brand games. But when people say of this game that "it will probably be a huge seller," they aren't necesarily putting it in that 15M+ sales range, which is the new measure of success for Nintendo.