Blue Ocean.... then What?

[Erik Aston]

The Blue Ocean itself has 3 tiers.

Nintendo has only moved up to the second tier so far.

We need to do away with this idea that the entire new market exists downmarket of the entire old market, and that by moving upmarket Nintendo will start making more traditional games. This is not the case.

As yushire said, in a moment of understanding Malstrom, the first tier was fringe gamers. The fringe gamers caused the explosive launch of Wii. These people were the most overserved by the old market, but they were still interested in gaming on some level, and so they were the most quickly excited by Wii. We know fringe gamers fueled the early going because of the sales of Mario Party 8 and Mario and Sonic, which non-gamers would not care about.

The second tier starts with Wii Fit. Think for a second: Wii Sports comes with a console. Wii Play comes with a Wiimote. They each just have a handful of games. They serve no practical purpose. Meanwhile, Wii Fit costs $90. It comes with a dedicated peripheral. It has far more games than Sports or Play. It serves a practical purpose, which demands better performance than Sports or Play. It is upmarket of Sports and Play. And, it is built to excite non-gamers. Nintendo views non-gamers--those who previously totally rejected gaming--as being upmarket of fringe gamers.

The third tier will involve aggressively moving into traditionally non-gaming markets. We don't know how Nintendo will do this yet.

This is all Blue Ocean. The Blue Ocean will create a new high-end market just as it created a new low-end market. Stop looking for mere IR or motion controlled versions of old games with old values.

The bridge games bring gamers over to the new market from the old. There may eventually be some FPS or RPG bridge games, but much of the hardcore will reject them like they have past bridge games, notably MK Wii. They see all new market values as being downmarket. There could be an amazing FPS game for Wii, with tons of gameplay and the best controls ever, but they will reject it because it focuses on social play, specialized controllers or even a practical purpose, instead of graphics, storyline or "owning" people online.