How important are exclusives when the top games are multiconsole?

[Words Of Wisdom]

Depends.

When a consumer is looking to purchase a video game console, they look at a variety of factors: Price, games/exclusives, and other features.

If you have two consoles which offer nearly the same feature set at the exact same price, then you will make your selection based on which has the better game line-up and that is determined by exclusives.

However, this generation doesn't have that. This generation has two low-priced competitors versus a high-priced competitor. The Wii easily differentiates itself with its games, its IR/motion controls, and it's price-point which, at one point, was the lowest of the three. The 360 differentiates itself with the lowest entry price-point and quite a few features the Wii isn't capable of. The PS3 can't differentiate itself based on price so it has to rely on exclusives and other features.

So, to answer the question, exclusives are very important to the Wii and PS3 but less important to the 360.