Why Wii is Winning: Dominant Software Sales

[Sullla]

How many times have you seen someone post, "I don't understand how Wii can be so successful, all the games are terrible!" While personal opinions will differ, the market ultimately determines what succeeds and what fails. I often see people insist that the Wii is excelling in spite of its software lineup. Nothing could be further from the truth; like the games or hate them, the Wii's success is because of its software lineup. This generation is not different from all the others - the Wii is winning because it has the most popular exclusive titles, just like every other successful console in history. This thread is another small attempt to disprove the conventional logic.

What I did was go through VGChartz's software numbers for 2008 and tally up the top-selling games on all three consoles, looking at the entirety of the past 11 months. The Wii's "evergreen" titles often get overlooked because of their unimpressive debuts and steady sales over time. By looking at the whole year to date, we get a better sense of how each platform is doing overall. Here are the results:

Wii

-) Wii Sports (17.45m)
1) Mario Kart Wii (10.43m)
2) Wii Fit (10.37m)
3) Wii Play (7.82m)
4) Smash Brothers Brawl (7.49m)
5) Mario and Sonic (3.30m)
6) Mario Galaxy (2.66m)
7) Guitar Hero III (2.12m)
8) Carnival Games (1.74m)
9) Link's Crossbow Training (1.65m)
10) Mario Party 8 (1.63m)

I put exclusive titles in italics, which of course is virutally everything for Wii. You can count or ignore Wii Sports as you prefer, which is why it's not numbered. Even discounting Wii Sports, the console has had four different games top 7m units in 2008, which has probably never happened before. Older 2007 releases like Mario and Sonic/Mario Galaxy racked up millions more in sales. No matter how you feel about these games, the numbers are extremely impressive.

360

1) Grand Theft Auto 4 (6.31m)
2) Gears of War 2 (3.31m)
3) Call of Duty 4 (2.53m)
4) Call of Duty World at War (2.37m)
5) Rainbow Six Vegas 2 (1.84m)
6) Fable 2 (1.80m)
7) Guitar Hero III (1.66m)
8) Halo 3 (1.54m)
9) Army of Two (1.49m)
10) Madden 09 (1.46m)

The 360 also does very well, with Grand Theft Auto and Gears leading the way. Only three games, all published by Microsoft, turn out to be exclusives though. I think it's most interesting how Call of Duty 4 outpaced Halo 3 by more than a million units in 2008.

PS3

1) Grand Theft Auto 4 (4.97m)
2) Metal Gear Solid 4 (3.54m)
3) Grand Turismo 5 Prologue (2.20m)
4) Call of Duty 4 (1.84m)
5) Call of Duty World at War (1.32m)
6) FIFA 09 (1.30m)
7) Uncharted (1.24m)
8) Assassin's Creed (1.20m)
9) Pro Evo Soccer 09 (1.15m)
10) Motorstorm (1.03m)

PS3 looks very similar to 360, only with lower software numbers to reflect the smaller install base and soccer games instead of Madden (since PS3 is more popular in Europe). Metal Gear Solid and Gran Turismo Prologue both sold very strongly earlier this year - I would argue it's no coincidence that the PS3 was doing better (at least comparatively) when these exclusives debuted. Trouble sign for Sony: none of the four exclusives on this list released in the last four months. Two of the 360's three exclusives above (Gears and Fable) were timed for the holiday season. Everyone likes to talk about "price", but games are always more important, IMO.

All Consoles

-) Wii Sports (17.45m)
1) Mario Kart Wii (10.43m)
2) Wii Fit (10.37m)
3) Wii Play (7.82m)
4) Smash Brothers Brawl (7.49m)
5) Grand Theft Auto 4 (360) (6.31m)
6) Grand Theft Auto 4 (PS3) (4.97m)
7) Metal Gear Solid 4 (3.54m)
8) Gears of War 2 (3.31m)
9) Mario and Sonic (3.30m)
10) Mario Galaxy (2.66m)

Put the lists together and - surprise! - we find total Wii dominance in software. Even discounting Wii Sports, Wii has 6 out of the top 10 and all of the top 4. All of the Wii's games are exclusives, while the 360 and PS3 both share Grand Theft Auto and have one exclusive each. Just look at the top software sellers, and it's easy to see which console is on top. This isn't rocket science: people buy consoles to play games that interest them. Wii's tremendous hardware sales are driven by desire for Wii software.

Of course, you could argue that Wii sells the most software because it has the largest install base - but that's a chicken and egg argument. Does the Wii sell software because of its hardware base, or does the hardware sell because people want to play the software? It's pointless to debate. Just remember that Wii didn't start out the generation with a huge install base advantage - quite the opposite vis a vis the 360, actually. We usually say that people bought the PS2, SNES, and other successful consoles to play the kickass games that came out for them. No one seems to believe that the same thing is going on right now with the Wii. It's time we realized this. 

Long story short: it's the games, silly. Console sales are always driven by software. And this generation is not different from the previous ones.