Nintendo has lost the core market this generation

[The Ghost of RubangB]

The graphics race is a joke that is killing the industry. Most devs who go down that path will end up being owned by EA, and it's their own fault for not liking money.

When people look back at past generations, they will remember the control revolutions and new gameplay/genre elements, not just a graphical leapfrog game. People will play Mario 64 longer than GTA4, as one introduced new gameplay elements and looked ugly while the other looked really pretty while taking them away.

The revolutions were things like the D-Pad replacing the joystick, the analog control stick replacing the D-Pad, shoulder buttons, multi-touch or analog triggers/shoulder buttons, rumble, touchscreen control, microphone control, dance pad controls, guitar controls, motion sensing, IR control, and camera control. Not X pixels, Y pixels, Z pixels. New control methods actually changed gaming. Graphics never changed anything. They just... got shinier.

People will remember Pac-Man forever, because anybody could play it. It had no buttons.
People will remember Wii Sports forever, because anybody could play it. It had no buttons.
In 50 years people will remember Doom, GoldenEye, Half-Life, CounterStrike, and Halo, and not 8237502987525 shooters, each shinier than the last.

And hopefully I'll be forgetting most of this garbage and only remember the Golden Age of Katamari, Mario Galaxy, and Portal. Fresh gameplay ideas. Everything else is trash.

::gets off soapbox, goes back to sleep::