By using this site, you agree to our Privacy Policy and our Terms of Use. Close
Legend11 on 07 September 2007
Edit Thread
RolStoppable said:
Legend11 said:
1) The situation is a lot more complicated than many of the people here seem to realize or want to admit. For example Nintendo is extremely strong on their own platform and that is a cause for concern among third parties.

For example read the following article to see what I'm trying to get at:
http://www.gamesindustry.biz/content_page.php?aid=28438

2) Also things are very different from last generation when the three consoles were relatively close in power compared to the current consoles and also the fact that the two highend consoles this generation are seeing some kind of merging with the PC market with many games coming out for all three platforms in relatively short periods of time. It's slowly becoming harder to make multi-platform games as the expectations on all three consoles changes.

3) And finally while the marketshare for the Wii is obviously going to be high, especially for the next two years, as prices come down for both the 360 and PS3 they will keep coming into the reach of more and more consumers until they eventually reach the mass market price points where all consumers are finally able to consider their consoles and they're finally able to compete for the same consumers as Nintendo.

1) What I get out from that article is that 3rd parties are concerned because a success of the Wii would mean they would have to deliver new and innovative content in order to keep up with the quality of Nintendo's games. Simply put, they would have to make good games which apparently some companies don't want to do. Instead they would prefer to keep making sequels and/or clones of popular games.

2) I think 3rd parties prefer to make exclusive games, rather than multiplatform games. Because exclusives usually result in higher quality and therefore are more hyped (and sell better) among the dedicated userbase of a given platform (see Wii, 360, PS3 owners on this forum, the most anticipated games most of the time are exclusives, whether they are 1st or 3rd party). If the console with the highest userbase also happens to be the one cheapest to develop for, all the better for 3rd parties, more profits.

3) The Wii will drop in price as well. By the time the 360 and/or the PS3 reach the $200 price point the Wii will most likely be available for $150. Also, two years from now the Wii will be the console with the most (good) games and the most new released (good) games. At this point most people will be going to purchase the Wii, similar to last gen when most people started to ignore the Xbox and GC in favor of a PS2.


1) True but I was pointing out the fact that Nintendo's 1st party titles dominate it's platform.  The article also mentioned it along with the fact that because the Wii's userbase is more diverse companies will have to work harder to find games that will appeal to them.

2) I'm not sure about that, otherwise companies like EA wouldn't be remotely as successful as they are.  Multiplatform titles are able to be sold to more of the potential audience for a game than those on a single platform.  Also unlike the other console makers Nintendo doesn't usually offer anywhere near the same kinds of incentives, I think that's a big reason why the vast majority of the big budget games are appearing on the other consoles.

3) There's a pretty big difference between a console that sells for $399-$499 eventually dropping to $200 and one that is $259 and eventually dropping to $150.  One is moving into the range of the mass market while the other is already there or extremely close to it.  Anyone who thinks that the prohibitive prices of the 360 and PS3 aren't playing a factor in sales among the three consoles are kidding themselves.