Why are people so threatened by the Wii?

[shams]

I think its both.

Firstly, there are the obvious fanboys - people will will deny that Sony will "lose" down to the last bitter fight. This is pretty much irrational, as all that does it improve the industry leading to better and more games for all (I doubt anyone here is concerned because they have a lot of Sony stock, and are worried about falling stock prices ;).

Secondly, I can understand people being "worried" about the general direction of the industry. These people in general are "hard-core" gamers, and only want to play hard-core games. If the Wii succeeds, there will be a huge push away from these games to casual/simpler games. This really does make sense, and probably would "worry" hard-core'rs.

In a way these people see gaming as "their" domain. It belongs to hard-corer's - not casual players. "Those casual players should butt out, and stick to their PC's / solitaire, etc". By seeing all these new casual-ers take over the industry (and the focus of it) they may well feel "threatened".

Here is an analogy for you all - say you have a core group of "goth" music followers. They love their music, and hang out in their own club. Next day - a goth song becomes popular. Next thing they know, heaps of people are listening to the same music, and hanging out at their club. But they aren't real goths - they just got caught up by the song. These extra people wouldn't make the goths happy - instead they would threaten them, as the core essense of "what it means to be goth" itself is under fire.

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This is also the main division/difference in the industry at the moment (Wii vrs 360/PS3). Do you focus/service on "hard-core" gamers, and drive your games from their needs? Or take Nintendo's approach, and attempt to widen the industry - getting more casual gamers into it? (surely both approaches are valid - but it also makes sense to imagine that whoever targets the casual console will sell more, and potentially be more profitable).

(of course Nintendo's idea is to target the hard-cores AND the casuals - not to excluse anyone, and try and reach maximum market penetration).