Î expected some more interesting and surprising thoughts from one of the world's best developers of the late 80s and 90s. He just repeated what others said and wrote several times before.

The most surprising about all these similar systems comparisons in speeches and articles by industry people is the fact that the exclusive libraries of the different systems (you know, those libraries which sell the systems) are mostly ignored.

Like me.

Well Will Wright, all your games belong in the toy market as well because playing the Sims is just like playing with Barbies.

/sarcasm

I be sorry if i am misinterpreting your words, but did you just say that console exclusive titles are ignored?

I didn't know GDC already started.... And since this is in the Nintendo section, when is Nintendo's going to start?

my mom thinks it's a device to loose weight, like they ones the advertise on TV :p

I think it's kind of cool that they decided to go off and find a different sandbox to play in; I think it's been very good for the industry."

Ah finally I read something good in this article. He is right. It is a new and seems to be bigger sandbox at that. IF only more companies would learn this they also could be rolling in the money. Although I must say I enjoy many of the core and "niche" titles myself. However, if you had told me I would enjoy a game as much as I have like Wii sports Wii sports resort before I played them I would have thought hm maybe? lol.

I almost did not bother with the Wii after the Gamecube It had some games I liked but my PS2 and GBA got way more play time. But, I thought hey why not and Now It is the best console since SNES to me. OK I am done rambling back to The Legendary Starfy!

I guess, a lot of people are misunderstanding him here.

Though it's pretty obvious that the word "toy" became a disguised insult (how and why it became this way I've attempted to answer here), Will Wright has used it in different meaning. Look at almost any book on game design and you'll find at least one chapter that discusses toys vs games in game design aspect.

In short, all games are toys, but not all toys are games. The rest part of entertainment software that aren't games usually called non-games or just toys in a restricted sense, though I prefer the former. Non-games serves mostly as sandbox that allows people to entertain themselves rather than follow a preset path of missions, some toys even do not involve gameplay to be fun (to some extent you may call GTA a toy). In fact, Will Wright is one of the few people in the industry besides his colleague (and, maybe, friend?), Shigeru Miyamoto, who actievly push forward and idea of "toys" in gaming. SimCity serves as best example, furthermore once he called it a toy himself and said that it more appeals to adults, which is true.

Wii and DS both have one of the best examples of entertainment software with "toyish" approach to game design, and this's definitely one of the strengths of software library of these platforms.

Whether you read the article or not, keep in mind this is Will Wright talking. He can't offend a game by calling them "toys," because those are basically the type of games he makes. Just about all his Sim games are virtual playgrounds (toys).

Unfortunately, the way he worded it makes it bound to get negative attention from both sides... I guess that's the industry for you.

I agree with much of what he said, but I do take exception to one specific point. Will argued that Nintendo decided to lean, or focus more on a younger crowd. I think this is an oversimplification. What Nintendo actually focused on was were those who were not interested in games as they were being made.
This crowd not only includes younger people, who were being left behind by increasingly complex games and control inputs, but also older adults, women (for this crowd I believe the focus on violence played a much larger role), and to a lesser extent, lapsed or ex-gamers.

No one would accuse Wright of designing toy (aka. simple) games, although the expanded market his games sell to might disagree, but i think he's just confused by the fact he is actually developing toys through his new company.

The thing thats missing, and is bleedingly obvious to anyone who hasn't targeted, and therefore profited from, the market is family frendly games. The market decided Nintendo was the best choice, and this prob. won't change over night.