My heart says Nintendo, my brain says Sony.

My love for video games is tied to childhood, if Nintendo died, then to me I think gaming would die in a lot of ways. Sure I'd play the odd game or two, but it would just become kind of like a face less industry to me. 

But market wise ... the fact is Sony has pretty much lead the console business for almost 20 years now, with a slighty interruption for a few years with the PS3, but even there they eventually bounced back strong with the PS3. 

Well, of course there were other companies (like Atari) that did video games before Nintendo but they did it wrong. Atari and others basically flooded the market with shit games that were expensive and people hated it. Thats why there was a video game crash and the amount of effort Nintendo had to put in to bring NA into gaming again was redicules and I can go on forever as to how Nintendo saved gaming but you should watch some videos that does a better job at explaining what happened and its quite interesting btw (The second one is more on topic)

https://www.youtube.com/user/playvalue

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0Ge1UzO2AQc&list=UUGAW_bqcFm33_N2ZmygvQsQ

And of course Nintendo is replacable, so is every other company, but I do think they are the most important company just like how others think their respective companies like Sony and MS are the most valuable to them which is perfectly fine with me... But its like what if Microsoft didn't exist? All the Apple fans would be like Apple would replace them instead, but would that lead to a better future? I think not

Agreed. Nintendo basically gave a shot of adrenaline into the heart of the gaming industry and brought it back to life far after it flatlined. 
If it wasn't for Nintendo, gaming would probably be an obscure hobby and nowhere near the level it is today.

Sony because the other two don't make anything that i like

When you look at the big picture, who's been completely dominating the industry within the last 20 years? Who took the concept of gaming out of its kiddie image and made it more appealing to a much broader core audience? Who gave the developers the complete creative freedom and forced little to no restrictions on them, something that was very rare when another company was controlling the industry? Who is responsible for bringing affordable gaming to developing countries? Which 1 and only brand has a strong presence in all 3 major markets?

There's your answer

No, Knack is not a copy Mario they are completely different. I'm just implying that many of the games made by Sony and Microsoft can be in away "imitated" and become successful without legal problems and such. But to be honest, all 3 companies are extremely needed in the gaming division, but Nintendo always has creativity in it's games that just can't be replicated.

That, we can agree on. Wish they would play it more risky though, the software side anyways. Maybe a bit safer on hardware.

Ouya?