Should Nintendo have become a third-party developer, I honestly would not have minded seeing either Zelda or Metroid in either HD consoles... [My own personal opinion, of course]
Though, I will say this:
Without the Wii, all consoles would have been competing with same audience it had last generation.
Therefore, none would have dipped as much into casual market as Wii did.
Without the Wii, would the gaming industry have increased in software sales overall?
Despite the recession, Yes, it still would have but not to great lengths Wii had done in the past years.
Without the Wii, would the gaming industry have increased in hardware sales?
With the recession, slightly and not as dramatic as it did the past years. PS3 Xbox360 would have performed as it is performing now. Gamecube 2, though, would have fared much better than Gamecube did...
A very opinionated observation to a hypothetical scenario..
None of us would truly know what would have happened.
There are so many factors to consider (small & big) that would have affected the industry
@Cobretti2
In terms of Nintendo itself, I would have to agree with you. Nintendo is smart business-wise
