If a game is going to be successful on PS360 then what reason is there for publishers to ensure the game comes out on Wii also? You can make a great profit making games for PS360. It's not like not making a game for the Wii means the developer is going bankrupt. Weren't there exclusives that did very well on xbox and GC last gen that didn't come out on PS2. Did these developers go bust because they didn't make for the best selling platform?

Can't we all be happy that consoles are selling enough that there is room for more than 1 platform? Or that you can make money developing games for any of them? If you want games coming out on the Wii or PS3 or 360 then buy a Wii or PS3 or 360.

 I agree completely with this, but I find it funny that even with the combined market share of PS3 and 360 being far from 40% many Wii fanboys already predict a developer exodus, and bankruptcy for those who obstinately stick with HD consoles.  

 Rayman is shovleware? The game is fun. It may be a mini game collection , but it's definately not shovleware. Shovleware/= causual games shovelware= bad games. 

There's a couple of places where I believe you went astray in this post. For starters, there have been more than enough failures to go around on the HD consoles. Rather than name names, I'll simply direct you to the sales page on this site.

http://vgchartz.com/games/index.php?page=1&name=&console=X360&keyword=&publisher=&genre=&order=Sales&picture=

http://vgchartz.com/games/index.php?name=&console=PS3&developer=&publisher=&genre=&keyword=&order=Sales

You'll notice that the 360 does have quite a few games that have done very well for themselves. You'll also notice that there are entire pages full of games whose sales have, to put it mildly, tanked. That trend is even more pronounced with the PS3, where there's a definite divide between the "haves" and the "have-nots." To put things in perspective, Mario & Sonic at the Olympic Games has outsold every single game on the PS3 roster, including Grand Theft Auto IV. In fact, on a comparative basis, Wii games are handily outselling their PS3 counterparts.

But perhaps you'd like to point out, as you did in a previous thread, that many third parties are doing better on the 360 at the moment sales-wise than they are on the Wii. Let us leave aside the indisputable fact that third parties have hitherto put their best teams and highest resources on the AAA HD console games, since the Wii's success caught most developers with their pants down. Instead, let us examine how third parties are faring in the one area that matters most, i.e. profits.

It's no secret that the cost of doing business on the HD consoles dwarfs that of making games for the Wii, with development costs often being about three times higher for the 360 or PS3 than they are for the Wii, with some third parties having to spend as little as one-sixth on the Wii as they do for the HD consoles.

http://www.gamasutra.com/php-bin/news_index.php?story=18389

http://www.gamespot.com/news/6149154.html

http://www.gamedaily.com/articles/features/cost-of-development-greatly-favors-wii-say-publishers/69714/?biz=1

http://www.gamasutra.com/php-bin/news_index.php?story=18247

It is indisputably true from a revenue standpoint that "the price of Wii games being lower probably means developer gets less cash per Wii game sold than per PS360 game sold...", as you put it. However, you're sacrificing one-sixth of the revenue by developing for the Wii, while only paying a third or less in development costs. Simple math tells me that I'm going to be making a profit much sooner on the Wii than I would on HD costs.

But I've been speaking in generalities and hypotheticals up to this point. Allow me to give you some concrete counter-examples to your claim.

http://investor.ea.com/phoenix.zhtml?c=88189&p=irol-newsArticle&ID=1145021&highlight

Here is EA's annual financial report. You'll notice that last year, EA posted a loss, despite being the second-largest third party in the world. This is in spite of the fact that EA's revenue was over a billion dollars; indeed, their revenue was almost 25% higher than they expected at the beginning of the year. And yet, they still lost money. The reason for that is simple: development costs are rising as third parties shift away from the last-generation consoles towrads the HD consoles. And they know this.

http://www.gamespot.com/news/6175764.html

"[This transition has been] harder because of the complexity," {EA CEO} Riccitiello said, "and harder because unfortunately, we bet a little bit on the wrong horse in focusing so much on the PS3 and Xbox 360, and to a lesser degree on the Wii. And let me assure you that almost all of us in the industry made the same judgment. So after so many transitions of guessing exactly right, we got this one a little bit wrong and we're dealing with that now with strong investments on the Wii."

And EA isn't the only company that feels this way. To give you another example, long-time Nintendo rival Sega initially bet on the HD consoles, but it's seen the bulk of its successes nad profits on the Wii, so it is now shifting its resources.

http://www.forbes.com/afxnewslimited/feeds/afx/2008/05/13/afx5000811.html

"As rebuilding our consumer video game business is crucial, we now need to review our game title strategy more flexibly to adapt ourselves to changes in the trend of the market,' Ueda said, referring to Sega's release of more game titles than competitors to the PS3, which lagged sharply behind Nintendo Co's Wii in terms of sales."

Indeed, those high HD development costs are literally shutting down the small and mid-sized developers.

http://www.gamespot.com/news/6189861.html?sid=6189861

"Since January, a host of development studios have closed their doors, suspended operations, or otherwise stopped making games...During that same period of time, the industry has racked up phenomenal sales. NPD's retail software-sales data for the US has been up by double-digit percentages for each of the first three months of the year, with growth of 47 percent and 63 percent in February and March, respectively."

http://next-gen.biz/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=9003&Itemid=2

"{Asked why so many companies were merging, squeezing out the smaller developers} Don't blame consolidation. Blame Sony and Microsoft for jumping the budgets up to $30 million for a console game. That's not consolidation's fault," Lasky said.

But none of that would matter if the Wii wasn't profitable for developers either. But it is. See the examples I posted above, and then add these:

http://www.gamasutra.com/php-bin/news_index.php?story=18144

"Officials from Japanese developer Hudson Soft have spoken of plans to increase the company’s profits by almost 400 percent within three years, by focusing on titles for the Wii...Hudson will release eight titles for the Wii in 2008, to add to a current tally of ten titles for the format. The move comes after operating profits rose 53 percent to ¥2.7 billion ($26m), well above Hudson’s forecast of ¥2 billion ($19m). This was attributed primarily to stronger than expected sales on the Wii and Nintendo DS."

http://ir.majescoentertainment.com/secfiling.cfm?filingID=950136-08-144

"Gross margin was 31.2 percent, compared to 19.8 percent in 2006, reflecting the higher margins attributable to Wii games and Cooking Mama (DS and Wii)."

http://ir.capcom.co.jp/english/data/pdf/2008result_02/e080520.pdf

"In this business segment, "Resident Evil 4 Wii edition" and "Resident Evil: The Umbrella Chronicles" (for
Wii) increased their brand recognition especially in overseas markets. Their shipment surpassed one million
units, greatly exceeding our projection "

In fact, I can't think of any examples off the top of my head of a developer who's been disappointed with the Wii so far, with the possible exception of Ubisoft. Even the poster-children of thir-party failures, No More Heroes and ZXak and Wiki, have exceeded their creators' expectations...

So it would appear that many in the industry feel the opposite of what you do: the Wii is more profitable for most developers, and the HD consoles appear to be killing them off. At the moment, it appears that Squillam is the most accurate person in this thread: the HD consoles can let you win big if you bet the house and emerge victorious, but the problem is, you have to bet the house, and far too many developers appear to be losing.

Edit: I will learn how to type more than ten words per minute. I will learn how to type more than ten words per minute. I will learn how to type more than ten words per minute. I will learn how to type more than ten words per minute...

 Indeed you are, old boy. And your last post was even better,

/me points at boom blox

/me points at Sean Malstrom

 Wii third party support will be better once the companies understand what the heck happened to the market. 

To NoName2200 ( don't want to quote the whole post).

You claim that titles like NMH, Zack and Wiki exceeded the developers expectations.
That is indeed what the developers said after seeing the sales result.
But when you compare the number of units each title sold compared to the available user base, both titles fared significantly worse than others franchises their developers released on HD consoles...
Looks more to me like the developers did not want to admit the titles didn't do as well as expected.

It's the same way when people try to make us believe than 90k sales in 3 weeks for BloomBox is good and that the title is holding up.

90k for a 20 million user base ( discarding Japan) is pityfull if you take a second to look at it....

PS : Quoting EA profits as a reason for focusing more on the Wii is a half truth.

EA has had an issue making decent profits even at the end of the last gen as it failed to come up with new successfull IPs. The fact they still have issues now is not really a surprise. Madden is getting old and they have yet to find anything to take its succession..

Some developers that have betted heavilly on the HD console have however experienced record profit last year, to name two : Activision and Ubisoft...

First of all Grasshopper never released an hd console game, and if you look here. No more heroes is  their best selling game. http://www.vgchartz.com/games/index.php?name=&console=&developer=Grasshopper+Manufacture&publisher=&genre=&keyword=&order=Hits

Look at this on a console with a 100+  http://www.vgchartz.com/games/game.php?id=3586 It sold only about 1,500 copies it's first week. Does that mean games don't sell on ps2? Zack& Wiki is in a genre that has been dead since the 90s.

Most of these games are low budget and have no advertising. Do you ever see these games on tv?  Now halo 3, Assasin's Creed, Haze, etc alll sold well because they were advertised alot. Haze despite being a bad game sold well, do you know why? Because it was advertised. 

I think alot of you are forgetting my original point, I invite you to reread it.

I never claimed in my first post in this thread that third party exclusives could not be successfull on the Wii.

And I actually expect to see more of them being released in the next year and for some of them to be very successfull.

My whole point was around the fact that it is unlikely that many Western developers( Japanese ones might be different) will in the future release their big franchises on PS360 AND Wii.

Mainly because of the expectations of the PS360 crowd...

So each time a game doesn't get a Wii Port ( RE5, BGE, SF4,....) Wii owner shoudn't take it as a slap in the face, from a developer point of view it most often doesn't make sense ( or would require to develop a Wii version from the ground up). 

PS : Yes marketing has been part of the reason of the success of the HD console games. But there's a reason for that I believe.

First when you spent 20 millions $ developing a HD game, dropping 10 millions $ on marketing doesn't seem such a huge cost.

When you spend 2 millions $ developing a Wii console, the idea of spending 10 millions $ on marketing/advertising is probably a lot harder to swallow.

Secondly by now people in the marketing/advertising business have a good idea on how to target HD console owners ( a few gaming magazines, some web commercials in Gamespot/IGN,Amazon, a few commercials on Spike and SciFi.

I don't think they have yet identified which vehicule to use to best target Wii owners as the Wii has expanded outside of the core gamer market which makes it harder( and more expansive) to target advertising at this new population...

 Resident Evil 5 is a japanese game. Capcom is a japanese developer.

It is but it's one of the few Japanese games that actually makes the majority of its sales outside of Japan.

Especially with the success of the movies, there is wide awareness and expectations around the game in NA and Europe.

Instead of separating Western from Japanese developers I should have separated franchises based on where they generate most of their sales ( Japan or non Japan).