The sales charts show that really crappy titles haven't been selling on Wii.  So any company thinking that they can make a quick buck (yeah, looking at you Ubisoft with all your ports) better think again.

Not to defend the terrible Wii ports we've been seeing but just because most gamers consider a game to be bad doesn't mean fans of that genre wouldn't enjoy it.  As DRJ mentioned that was one of the PS2's biggest advantages, the only genres it didn't dominate were Nintendo games and Halo.  If what we are seeing is the beginning of 3rd party devs moving their generic low budget games from the PS2 to the Wii then that won't be bad for the Wii in the long run. 

I agree that the mass-market games and such are essential to the console's success, but at the same time Nintendo and the 3rd party get more "core" games out for the platform.  Personally I'm fine with things right now since I JUST bought a DS Lite, but seeing things pick up for them on the Wii would make me happier at the same time. :)

Actually, I really wanna see what games developers are making, not only Nintendo but other parties as well.  I want to know what Konami's unannounced Wii RPG is, I want to know whatever happened to Square-Enix's Final Fantasy Crystal Chronicles : The Crystal Bearers.  We know far more about many 360 and PS3 titles in development, but everyone is still mostly quiet about Wii game support. :(  Hell, I'm excited to know that Nippon Ichi is now doing Wii/DS development.  Now all I need is some Armored Core and Gundam games for Wii and I'll likely be set for this generation. :)

 I don't know where you get off claiming that UbiSoft isn't putting any effort into their games opposed to EAGames.

UbiSoft has indeed ported many games and continues to do so but they also brought us origonal properties like RedSteel as well as an exclusive version of Rayman:RavingRabbids. UbiSoft already confirmed numerous new IP's and titles in the works for the Nintendo Wii they should be revealed shortly. UbiSoft began developing RedSteel back in 2005 on the earliest GameCube dev kit at that time Raving Rabbids and other titles followed suit. None of the games were built using Alpha kits which means none had final hardware to work with.

 EAGames single exclusive title SSX-Blur was started in early 2006 with finalized Alpha kits, these finalized alpha kits are Wii's true power yet we saw a SSX game that wasn't much of an improvement graphics wise then the ones on GameCube. EA descided to cheap out just like all the other companies are right now giving us crappy ports like NeedForSpeedCarbon and Madden07.

In the end I think third parties could be killing Wii and Nintendo's image of quality!  Nintendo themselves are making a conceded effort to draw third party support such as giving third parties huge periods of time without first party competition. NintendoI suspect is also cutting the quality of their own first party games to give third parties a better chance at competing this is very very bad. Nintendo's first parties are well respected but for example the screen for Disaster:DayOfCrisis looked awful!

Right now the only third parties really carrying their weight are Konami and Sega. UbiSoft and EAGames have improved their tactics but neither company is really putting fourth genuine effort! 

Rayman is exclusive to the Wii? That's news to me!

Second, crappy 3rd party games sell horrible? I'd say all 3rd party games sell horrible.

Rayman - Wii - 375,250
Rayman - 360 - wtf? no sales data?

madden - 360 - 1,554,750 - 70%
madden - PS3 - 335,250 - 15.2%
madden - Wii - 311,250 - 14.1%

NFS: Carbon - 360 - 512,000 - 62%
NFS: Carbon - PS3 - 185,500 - 22.5%
NFS: Carbon - Wii - 128,250 - 15.5%

360 - 5,692,750 - 63% total
Wii - 2,107,500 - 26.8% total
PS3 - 1,160,500 - 13% total

Total next gen consoles: 8,960,750

Why on next gen multiplatform game sales... is the Wii at the bottom? The percents mean alot. Becuase the Wii has almost double the sales. It should at least be BETTER than PS3. 

well, first off, "short sell" is NOT screwing over the company. saying something so fundamentally misunderstood does nothing to further his credibility in piecing together arguments.

and indeed his argument is flawed. "financing" "real" games? that means your "real" games are losing money, or at least requires such big up-front commitment the risk might not be acceptable. look at majesco and its disastrous advent rising and psychonauts.

he arrived at the above conclusion that they need to make "real" games because they can't outcompete nintendo on its home turf. that's a ridiculous argument. yes, nintendo will be innovative with its games and is tough competition. but he implies that by moving away from nintendo means lessened competition. huh? competition is less fierce on the XBox and PS3? sony and microsoft, even if they aren't out-innovating you, they're gonna out-spend in graphics, design, everything. and there are established big devs like rockstar who knows their stuff. the competition is tough no matter what.

the consumer is smart--the consumer does not buy crap. the blogger seems to have a number of fundamental flaws in his lines of reasoning.

if he wants to make an argument that 3rd part can kill the wii, he should take a difference line of attack. his arguments just don't stand.

he can phrase his arguments better by emphasizing "growth" through "developing for wii", evuatually graduating to major IP's, whether it's the wii or PS3 or xbox or PC. but the bottom line is, IP's are driven by ideas and innovation, not by the sheer will to make an IP just because you have the financial wherewithal.

as for the "gag reflex" factor--it's highly unlikely.  we haven't seen it for the PS2, or any other dominant console, despite that fear, and it's unlikely to happen for the wii.

well, i think you know the answer yourself but just trying to raise a point.  multiplatform games on the wii are, well, generally big productions that need to spread out the cost.  the wii not only gets an inferior port, but also, many games that are neither built for the console or the audience.  NFS is such an example.  madden is a less obvious example, and indeed, in my opinion, its sales is a good indicator of the "traditional gamer" percentage on the wii console.  there are probably better indicators, but to me madden is pretty good.

by that, i mean, i'd expect that if the ratio of the PS3 and Wii holds constant, when, say, something like NBA 2008 comes out, the through sales on the two consoles will be close madden numbers on the two consoles.  for madden, 360 has been out too much longer to make comparisons, but even then, the ratio is close to US console ratio for 360 vs ps3.

 and rayman... well, it might as well be called a wii exclusive since it only shares a name with the other platform games.  the gameplay is so different.

 each case is different, but there are generalities you can find if you dig just a little deeper.  it's not hard to find trends.

oh yeah, in my previous post i mentioned the "traditional gamer" percentage.

 i think it's ridiculous for a publisher to say "wii has 2x bigger install base than ps3.  thus i expect this game to sell 2x as well".

 fortunately for the nintendo and the wii, this is what they think, since it does start the snow ball effect.  unless the gameplay experience is so drastically better on the wii, and i sure don't think that's the case for say Godfather Wii, the two audiences are so different such interpolation is utterly naive.  for a game like katamari, maybe, its appeal is probably close to uniform across the consoles.  for something like godfather?  or GTA, DMC?  do publishers have no understanding of the wii audience?  utterly ridiculous.  i'm sure publishers know this, but just say it anyway.  

 it's been understated the target audient differences between ps3/360 and the wii.  i think the madden sales highlights this point.

  that being said, it's also exactly why Fils Aime (nintendo of america president) emphasizes on getting more "mature" games for the wii.  he needs that game genre to start snowballing for the wii.  in the longer run, those gamers are likely to purchase more games, as opposed to casual gamers (like me), who are quite satisfied with 1 game every, say, 4 months or so. 

That may not necessarily be true, but if the Wii keeps outselling the PS3 2-1 or better and continues to outsell the PS3 and 360 combined then the 3rd parties will take notice and move more games over (which will sell more consoles and start the upward spiral). At some point it just becomes a numbers game and even if a game will sell a smaller percent on the Wii, as the Wii gets a huge install base it will still translate into more sales.

 And to the person that said Nintendo would reduce the quality of their games to help third parties, don't be stupid... Nintendo will help the 3rd parties but not by lowering their quality.

yeah, that's what i was saying in the first sentence in the next paragraph in that post :)

 but the point is that 2x install base does not translate into 2x game sale across all games.  it's utterly obvious, but game developers like to make those kind of public statements.

 it WILL be when the snowball effect reaches a certain point, which is why i mentioned fils aime's effort.