The Wii games and Mario Kart are all quality titles that have mass appeal. It shouldn't be a surprise that they continue to sell well. One thing that hasn't been brought up in this thread is product differentiation. Sales of a game like Gears of War are hurt somewhat by the fact that there are literally a thousand other shooters on the market right now. But if we look at Nintendo's big first party offerings:
- How many other games offer the same experience as Mario Kart? Zero.
- How many other games offer the same experience as Smash Brothers? Zero.
- How many other games offer the same experience as Wii Sports? A few, but they're mostly greatly inferior shovelware.
- Ditto for Wii Fit. You can't get the same thing from any other game out there.
It doesn't hurt either that Nintendo has hardware bundled with a lot of these games. Even if someone did create a Wii Fit clone, how would it work without the balance board? Nintendo's ability to craft first-party software around their own proprietary hardware has always been their greatest strength. Microsoft and Sony simply can't copy them in the same way.
Wii Fit will easily cruise past 20m sales, and Mario Kart will almost certainly do the same. Don't expect these games to stop selling any time soon.
End of 2008 totals: Wii 42m, 360 24m, PS3 18.5m (made Jan. 4, 2008)
