SMG is a great example of a game that's as difficult as you want it to be, and that's accessible to a wide audience. But just because the Wii is supposed to appeal to everyone doesn't mean that every game has to appeal to everyone. In fact, that's the last thing I want. Most of the time, padding a hardcore game with content for the casual gamer will only make it less interesting for someone like me, and vice versa for tossing hardcore content into a casual game. There's nothing wrong with just making both kinds of games, and letting the people who want each buy them.

And I think you have a different take on Zelda than I do. The number of times you die in it isn't how you measure its difficulty -- the challenge of the game has never been about the combat or RPG elements (in fact, if you judge it based on those things, it's a pretty weak game). Zelda is primarily a puzzle/exploration game, and in that sense there's nothing wrong with its difficulty level.

The part in Zelda where you have to put out the moving flaming caravan from horseback with your boomerang while getting harassed by enemies. If your friends didn't die at least 5 times at this part they are not casual. That stage required as much coordinated control as many of the difficult stars in SMG.

It really doesn't. You hit left or right to point your horse in the right direction and you tap A when you want to start going forward. When you see fire, you aim the boomerang, and then you can't do anything other than aim, and, when you're generally over the target (it's pretty forgiving), you fire. At no point do you have to be doing a lot of things at once or a very fast sequence. Meanwhile, you can deal with enemies by holding Z and then taking your time about throwing the boomerang at them.

This is related to the two sorts of difficulties I discussed. What makes the carriage bit hard is that you have to quickly figure out the best strategy. Casuals are no less capable than regular gamers of doing this. Smart playing helps, and fast reflexes are useful, but you're not doing anything very complicated on the controller. The other weird bit - the jousting match on the bridge - is also something that casuals aren't much worse than regular gamers at. The difficulty of these parts is almost entirely down to thinking and timing.

Similarly, Guitar Hero is a game that casuals can play. It requires a great deal of coordination and skill, but, because the buttons are arranged on the controller exactly as you see them on the screen, casuals don't have problems with the controls. Casual gamers aren't necessarily worse than regular gamers when it comes to what we normally consider skill; they just have problems interfacing.

The carriage part of TP was intense.

I died like 30 times on that part o_O

both Twilight Princess and Mario Galaxy are the easiest game of the too biggest franchise ever!!! I've played Zelda I beat it at 100% and Mario Galaxy from in 36 hours playin' I got 115 stars !!! well I think that Nintendo has put a huge effort to make both zelda and mario playable for both casual and hardcore gamers!!!

PS: Even they are the easiest I enjoyed them!!! very very much!!!

@Aidman

so... does that mean you skipped the hardest stars? the purple coin stars

All I really care about is if the game is good or not, and Zelda TP is easily better than Mario Galaxy.

Call me a troll for that if you want, but I have every right to think Zelda is better.

Neither game is demonstrating inherent philosophies to the Wii.  They're demonstrating themselves.

Mario has always been as you describe since the very first games where you could take pipes to different stages or use warp whistles to skip entire lands.

Zelda has always been a straight dungeon-to-dungeon adventure with sidequests along the way.

There is nothing new in the actual design of these games.

One just happens to fit your ideal of Wii gaming more than another.

Yeah--these big 2 page posts are overanalyzing what should be obvious--

Zelda has always been geared towards older players. Look how hard Zelda 1 was--it was crazy finding the levels and getting the triforce pieces. Super Mario Bros was hard, but nowhere near it. Additionally, Mario has always had tons of hidden areas/secrets which is akin to what the harder to find stars are all about in SMG. However, hidden areas are not exclusive to the Mario series--Zelda has tons of examples of this as well. Mario has always been more accessible than Zelda, that doesn't mean it's a better Wii-style game.

I'd also like to say that for a real example of the RIGHT way to make a Wii game to look past both Mario and Zelda and check out Metroid Prime 3!  The controls on MP3 REALLY take advantage of the unique capabilities of the remote and nunchuk.  Although, I do feel Zelda utilizes the Wii better than Mario (arrow aiming, grappling, etc), Mario pretty much just spins.