@Riot of Blood

It's growing on you.

Offtopic: Can you please review Brawl. I'm waiting excitedly. 

Either way, the big N is finally starting to wind up. Dont you think Ninty knows about the size limitations on the Wii? Why would they be courting developers if they didnt have a backup plan?
When the Wii2 comes out, it will definitely give XBLIVE a run for their money, thats just my opinion.... so... dont ban me...
AC

The XBL has new games too, while the virtual console only has old games, so it is not a fair comparison.  Also see bolded part of quote for the thing that really stood out to me as wrong, as eventually it is possible that the wii will have a userbase equal to that of the PS3 and Xbox 360 combined.

The revenue issue is a lot more complicated than the article indicates. But they aren't wrong that MS changed the rates. Basically indie devs gave up a sizeable chunk of the 70% for localization and ratings help along with some other stuff. They didn't ask for or want the change though which is probably why some are voicing displeasure.

Now as I said in the OP the memory issue is one they need to address, but do you seriously think they are going to put the effort into making this thing a success only to ignore the biggest roadblock to making it work? Basically what you're saying is that even though Nintendo is taking a step in the right direction to making this work its not good enough for you because its not the move you wanted them to make. Thats just looking for a reason to ignore the positive in the article.

The article actually says that Wii dev kits are cheaper than PS3 & 360, which to my knoweldge is true, albeit misleading given the subject of the article. As for XNA, from what I could find on the net XNA currently doesn't allow you to make commercial games for the 360 in any capacity. Here is a quote from the official XNA Creator's Club FAQ.

"Q: Can I use the XNA Game Studio Express or XNA Framework to build a commercial Xbox 360 game?
A: XNA Game Studio Express lets you create Windows and now Xbox 360 console games much more easily. These games are limited to non-commercial scenarios for 360 titles created with XNA Game Studio Express. However, XNA Game Studio Express may be used to create commercial games which target Windows. We plan to release XNA Game Studio Professional next year which will allow developers to create commercial games for the Xbox 360 in addition to Windows. "

But there was a new development according to a mod on that site since that was added to the FAQ. Basically they cancelled the Professional version they were planning and now you have to deal with them on an individual basis. See below for a quote from that site....

"So this should pretty much kill any rumours of XNA Professional as a separate sku that will be available for sale, at any price. With XNA Game Studio 2.0 supporting networking and other Visual Studio skus the 'missing' parts that make up what a commercial XBLA developer would need are only now relevant to someone with a signed publishing agreement in their hands and Microsoft have stated those parts exist once you have the agreement."

And that XNA kit that doesn't let you make commercial 360 games is free only if you're a member of "The XNA Creator's Club" which is $100 per year per dev. But since you can't make a commercial game with those tools its somewhat pointless, the only real benefit is you can make commercial windows live games....but anyone can do that for free already with tons of other tools already available.

Nintendo's WiiWare dev kits are $2k, which I from what I understand is considered dirt cheap. I can't find anything on what it includes but I know for sure you can make commercial WiiWare games with it.

Sqrl -

http://www.engadget.com/2008/02/20/first-xbox-360-community-games-to-hit-live-immediately/

Games are already hitting Xbox Live Arcade via XNA under Community games. Currently, the games are free demos/betas. But since Microsoft is doing this, it's very logical that the best will become full XNA-made Commercial games. If you use Xbox Live Arcade, under the blade browser, it even states that games are created using XNA exclusively.

Pikazoo -
Although the Wii does indeed have a larger userbase, it does not have a larger online userbase . I apologize for any confusion. Wii online attach ratios are a bit lower than the X360 or PS3.

Xbox 360 - 11,427,000 Users (65% Attach Ratio)
Wii - 9,040,000 Users (40% Attach Ratio)
Playstation 3 - 7,052,500 Users (65% Attach Ratio)

These are via Microsoft, Sony and Nintendo's own admissions on attach ratios, using VGC current Install Base figures. So even though the Wii obviously has 5m+ Wiis sold to consumers, it's still has about 2.5m less users Online, as Wii users have not gone online, as often, as Playstation and Xbox counterparts.

I'm not sure what you're point is, the link mentions there are games but that doesn't contradict anything I posted from what I can tell.  So those developers all made deals with MS to make games and got the tools needed, but that doesn't tell us how much getting those tools costs them.

Perhaps I am missreading what is written on their site, but the info I linked was from the official site and I don't see how a vaguely written article contradicts what I posted. Perhaps I am missing what you were trying to say? 

My point was that Microsoft's already allowing non-commerical XNA games onto the XBLA Service. And because of that, I do tend to think that because of the XNA Community Development, and such, would/will allow for the same XNA to publish commerical titles...I assume that this is why Microsoft dropped the royalties for titles that needed published via Microsoft.

^^ I agree with the fact that there are commercial games built using XNA, but just XNA isn't enough according to their official site. If you want to make a commercial game you have to sign a deal with MS and then they sell/?/give/ you the remainder of the tools needed to finish the project, the developers still use the XNA tools but if they want to be a commercial title they have to sit down the MS and sort out the details.

The problem I see with that is not everyone is business savvy and a lot of folks will be intimidated by the process and potentially not even bother. I'm not saying that their process doesn't have advantages (ie weeding out some of the crappy projects) but its not exactly a model of accessibility and we really don't know how affordable it is or isn't. With developers coming to them with an almost completed project that can only run on their platform in its current form, MS will have a lot of leverage to use against these smaller, often struggling, companies.

At the same time Nintendo is going to have to deal with some amateurish crap and potentially hold some hands through the localization and ratings processes, so its not like I'm saying their system is top dog either. But it does allow anyone who is at least moderately serious about making a game the opportunity to do so and I think there are going to be some awesome titles that we never would have seen without that accessibility. But most importantly with Nintendo's process you know what the deal is before you start, so long as you make a quality title you will be released and you know the royalty rates and everything up front.

no where in there says that they are trying to take away PSN devs. I think more devs are going to the PSN as it offers higher royalties (asked Capcom on it; apparently Sony does like 80/20)

First paragraph:

"March 18, 2008 - As it prepares to launch WiiWare, its original downloadable games service, Nintendo has apparently been trying to woo developers away from Xbox Live Arcade and the PlayStation Network. According to a report from Develop magazine, Nintendo is addressing concerns that have been expressed about the competition and painting a rosier picture for WiiWare. "

I don't know what they are basing it on but the article does say it.