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Forums - Gaming - Anti Wii spreading to Techdirt...

Galaki on 23 April 2008

source techdirt

The Wii Is Popular, But Wii Users Aren't Buying Many Games

from the wii-sports-is-plenty dept

The traditional economics of the video game console market are fairly well known. You sell the console itself at either cut rate margins or even at a loss, and then make it up in selling very expensive games for the console. That's worked in the past for the various version of the Sony Playstation and the Microsoft Xbox. But, apparently things are a bit different with the Nintendo Wii. While the Wii has been a huge success, opening up a tremendous new market of console buyers and users thanks to its unique input mechanism and gameplay, it turns out that Wii owners are buying noticeably fewer games than owners of competing consoles. In fact, it appears that many Wii owners haven't bought any games and are satisfied with the Wii Sports package that comes with the Wii. At this point, I should admit that I'm in this group as well, though part of the reason is simply not knowing which types of games are likely to work well with the Wii controller. As such, it's not worth spending a huge amount to find a game that's simply disappointing. The article suggests, also, that since Wii buyers tend to be very different than other console buyers, the marketing and advertising strategy for Wii games is all wrong. The real question, though, is whether or not this is really a long term problem. The Wii itself (unlike the PS3 and the Xbox) is sold at a profit, according to most assumptions. So, while selling more games is important, it's not as important as with the other consoles.

Nintendo pacman is still unknown to a whole lot... 



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akuma587 on 23 April 2008

Someone stop the internet, THEY ARE BASHING THE WII!!!!!!111ONE



We had two bags of grass, seventy-five pellets of mescaline, five sheets of high-powered blotter acid, a salt shaker half full of cocaine, a whole galaxy of multi-colored uppers, downers, screamers, laughers…Also a quart of tequila, a quart of rum, a case of beer, a pint of raw ether and two dozen amyls.  The only thing that really worried me was the ether.  There is nothing in the world more helpless and irresponsible and depraved than a man in the depths of an ether binge. –Raoul Duke

It is hard to shed anything but crocodile tears over White House speechwriter Patrick Buchanan's tragic analysis of the Nixon debacle. "It's like Sisyphus," he said. "We rolled the rock all the way up the mountain...and it rolled right back down on us...."  Neither Sisyphus nor the commander of the Light Brigade nor Pat Buchanan had the time or any real inclination to question what they were doing...a martyr, to the bitter end, to a "flawed" cause and a narrow, atavistic concept of conservative politics that has done more damage to itself and the country in less than six years than its liberal enemies could have done in two or three decades. -Hunter S. Thompson

stof on 23 April 2008

You see this a lot.

Someone makes an article on something, and it's copied or parroted all over. The quality of the arguments and the accuracy of the information they're based on is rarely relevant.

If I recall, this isn't the first time the internet was hit with a wave of "The wii fad seems to be over" articles that quickly proved themselves to be utter nonsense.



I'm a mod, come to me if there's mod'n to do. 

Chrizum is the best thing to happen to the internet, Period.

Serves me right for challenging his sales predictions!

Bet with dsisister44: Red Steel 2 will sell 1 million within it's first 365 days of sales.

FishyJoe on 23 April 2008

The Wii has completely crushed my faith in journalism and analysts.

I guess this is the burden of knowledge.



akuma587 on 23 April 2008

At least some of the bargain pricing on Wii games, like Zack and Wiki at launch, helps bring this effect down. WiiFit will sell a bunch of copies too.



We had two bags of grass, seventy-five pellets of mescaline, five sheets of high-powered blotter acid, a salt shaker half full of cocaine, a whole galaxy of multi-colored uppers, downers, screamers, laughers…Also a quart of tequila, a quart of rum, a case of beer, a pint of raw ether and two dozen amyls.  The only thing that really worried me was the ether.  There is nothing in the world more helpless and irresponsible and depraved than a man in the depths of an ether binge. –Raoul Duke

It is hard to shed anything but crocodile tears over White House speechwriter Patrick Buchanan's tragic analysis of the Nixon debacle. "It's like Sisyphus," he said. "We rolled the rock all the way up the mountain...and it rolled right back down on us...."  Neither Sisyphus nor the commander of the Light Brigade nor Pat Buchanan had the time or any real inclination to question what they were doing...a martyr, to the bitter end, to a "flawed" cause and a narrow, atavistic concept of conservative politics that has done more damage to itself and the country in less than six years than its liberal enemies could have done in two or three decades. -Hunter S. Thompson

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amp316 on 23 April 2008

I blame... wait that hasn't been funny for a while. Seriously, the Wii will be a fad until Wii 2 comes out.



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SJGohan3972 on 23 April 2008

I keep hearing that the Wii has less games being purchased for it than other consoles but seemingly each week I see the Wii as the leader in software sales according to VGChartz data.

Lets look at this week (even though it is incomplete as of yet)

Software Totals:
Console Weekly
Wii 2,383,911
DS 1,378,932
360 1,131,567
PS3 981,652
PS2 397,408
PSP 362,213
Total 6,635,683

And last week:

Software Totals:
Console Weekly
Wii 2,768,038
DS 1,502,897
360 1,149,367
PS3 881,045
PS2 645,694
PSP 534,109
GBA 636
Total 7,481,786

And as far as I can see Wii had the most software sold 3 out of 4 weeks in march (with 360 and DS beating the Wii in the same week).

So who is wrong here the naysayers or VGChartz (I tend to assume the former)? Or is it just a relativly new occurance for the Wii to be getting this much software sold for it because of SSBB, MKWii etc? OR Is it the simple fact that the Wii has so many more hardware units sold that even with higher software sales it still has a lower attache rate?



Currently dreaming of: DKC4 or Sonic the Hedgehog 4 (classic 2D platformers) for WiiWare, Smash Bros. for DSi, New Super Mario World for DSi, a Wii remake or true sequel of Final Fantasy Tactics.

One down, hopefully more awesomeness to come.

dib8rman on 23 April 2008

Maybe all the Wii hate is coming in the winds with GTAIV?

Meh, like I said they can keep screaming about it, just enjoy your games and know they are just trying to justify their 600 dollars.

"Me and my friends don't like the Wii..." - STOP! Their your friends, of course they don't like the Wii and for the record it's "my friends and I."

Guess he and his friends didn't like english either >.>

Oh well articles like that make my day, I remember reading one about Brawl being too "core" for the Wii crowd.

Zzzz.



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The Hunt Begins 4/20/2010 =D

azrm2k on 23 April 2008
FishyJoe said:
The Wii has completely crushed my faith in journalism and analysts.

I guess this is the burden of knowledge.

 What's disturbed me the most is that the NYT let such a horrid article run without checking the facts or conclusions based off of those facts better.  We only caught it because we are so obsessed with video games sales and have accurate information.  Just think of how many other articles we read that we aren't familiar with and therefore accept as true when they could be just as horrid.....



FishyJoe on 23 April 2008

I call it lazy journalism.

Rather than doing any actual work, like contacting Ioi, it's easier just to browse the website for 5 minutes.

Then it's even lazier to take that person's lazy work and use it for another useless article.