They're not losing their luster or appeal; in fact, all signs point to them being more popular than ever. 

You and I personally might not like specific things, but again, the innovation has been through the roof, and the insane sales and wide audience appeal are just proof of that. There's lots of Nintendo stuff that I didn't like this gen, some I really loved, though. Galaxy being a prime example, along with Prime 3 and its incredible controls. 

We have one important body of facts to work with: sales figures. At the end of the day, no matter our personal arguments or tastes, Nintendo has been dickpunching everyone in sales.  That's pretty cut and dry, no gray area to argue over. Compound that with the fact that Nintendo games never go down in price until years after release. 

Almost 28 million just on Mario Kart Wii, more than the top 7 Sony published PS3 games COMBINED.  1 game, 1 IP that shows up 1 time per console. 

Tastes are fine and dandy but they're not much help getting to the truth of a question. 

Did like the song and vid, thanks for the link :D

First party software sales for the three companies are approximately:

Nintendo: 350 million

Microsoft: 90 million

Sony: 90 million

I didn't bother to look them up, but that's about what they are. Remove 170 million of bundled games from Nintendo's tally for ease of calculation (two games per console sold) and you still have twice as many games sold by Nintendo than either Microsoft or Sony.

You lost me at sales are subjective. The think about what cAPSLOCK says is spot on is that Nintendo's sales are compound by the quality of their games (recognized universally by both the reviews its games get and by the community at large). I mean, you may not like the games, but you can't deny their quality, that's not a subjective measure.

I never said sales = quality, reread my post please. Sales are not a subjective measure of popularity, they're quatitative fact.

Reviews are opinions, but when you mass together a lump of reviews from different angles and perspectives, you get a consensus. That's what metacritic is there for.

Wii sports is a great example where sales <> quality, which supports what we both say. However, Wii sports has a charm and tapped into innovation, a different measure from which popularity (sales) can stem.

Thanks bud.

For the meaning of Sales in terms of the content of a game, usually high sales means that people take high interest in its content. The content could be good or bad, as we both agree, but one thing is certain is that it attracts consumers. Something in the content gives it that ability, and that something varies from game to game.

Though it may not indicate quality, it could be considered another positive force of the IP, adding to its superiority from another angle. You could call it market appeal. Quality is one, market appeal another, they can cross but also work independently.

that's funny as fuck.