@ChronotriggerJM: Retro says hi. Nintendo bought them.
And why would Nintendo buy third-party support, if everything is going good as it is? I mean, it didn't help Microsoft become market leader. Why would they snag some more titles? It wouldn't make them more profit, since they're very competent of producing games of their own.
And about ''Nintendo doesn't care about third-parties, or consumers in terms of functionality'': the biggest chunk of customers doesn't even want a dvd-player in their Wii, and they most certainly care for third-parties. They didn't make a console where developement costs surpass the 15 million regularly, where only the big names can mange to get some money, and they don't actually restrict their supporting third-parties in publishing on WiiWare, by not making them pay immense royalties.

Quote from Xponent: "A higher userbase attracts support from developers which means more games for consumers".

My Opinion on the quote: "I totally agree and that statement is so true, its damn true!!!".

@Mariozelda Yeah retro says hi, like what 20 years ago? Sure maybe it didn't help microsoft in the long run, but who cares? The 360 got some great games because of it, and it benefited many a developers. At least they put some effort into it. Unlike Nintendo which I've mentioned seems to care less whether or not third party software sells on they're console. And for someone that doesn't quite like "Nintendo style games", that's quite a burden on me seeing as how I have very little incentive to currently buy the system.

Are you kidding me with the DVD comment o.O? Wii games are already on DVD's for crying out loud! Your honest to god telling me you'd rather your Wii have LESS functionality for the same price? Thats ridiculous! Thats one of the reasons I left Nintendo to begin with. I got so much more use out of my other consoles :/ Nintendo didn't include the feature because it would have cost them a few more dollars per unit, that's a damn shame in my opinion.

ChronotriggerJM said: Your honest to god telling me you'd rather your Wii have LESS functionality for the same price?

I would - consoles are consoles and PCs are PCs. Everyone who would buy a Wii already has DVD players. The lack of DVD functionality incurs no net lossof function to me, but probably DID reduce the selling price (the Wii disc is NOT a DVD so Nintendo wouldn't have to pay license fees), and also not including the hardware itself reduced the cost, size and power consumption of the Wii.

HappySqurriel said: Although this is an interesting comparison on how successful each of the companies has been over the past several years, the chart is overly simplified and doesn't consider the profit/loss from the Nintendo DS, Gameboy Advance, Gameboy or PSP; with how successful the GBA and Nintendo DS has been, it is likely that the bulk of Nintendo's profit came/comes from those systems and not from the Gamecube or Wii.

Whilst true for the GC vs GBA (and vs DS at the same time) the Wii is close to changing that.

for the last fiscal year they actually made more on Wii hardware than DS hardware, and software is catching up. In fact my guess would be most of the "others" part of hardware was due to Wii accessories like the remote/nunchuck, wheras the DS has fewer, cheaper and less popular accessories.

Although I think this is revenue as opposed to profit.

 edit. blast it is too big... right click>view image

@Rollstopable, which is exactly why I want Nintendo to reach out and touch some of these guys :D I want Nintendo to publish a fuck-ton of titles on the Wii, get some real hands on with some other developers and put an end to this nonsense XD It's like everyone embraces the fact that Nintendo games are the dominate form of quality on the Wii and everything else is seemingly garbage by compare. I want them to embrace some third party devs and pull them through this. I don't like Nintendo being the only "quality" company on the Wii.

@Soleron, My facts were mixed then, I thought the Wii read DVD's, but if that's not even the case, then that bothers me even more xD If your not a hardware producer by standard, why not go with a proven format to put your software on? If it is how you mentioned, to "save on licensing fee's", then thats just a damn shame. Nintendo ALWAYS does that crap, and it's exactly why I would have thought, "to save a few pennies". And why on earth would you want to have more devices connected when you honestly wouldn't need them? It's more time, wires, boxes, receivers, and space taken for absolutely no reason. If I had children, and I wanted to put a game system in they're bedroom, why would I not want it to play they're favorite DVD's as well? That just seems silly to want less for your money.

[edit] You were right about one thing in my opinion though, PC's are PC's, and Entertainment Systems should play DVD's >_> 

celine said: ion-storm said:   @Celine I think it would be wrong to say Nintendo are the only ones who can change the industry. The PS1 and PS2 really helped video games go from entertainment for nerds to mainstream acceptance. A trend which Nintendo has really caught onto and run with. This is basically wrong. What Sony did with PS1 was to copy Sega of America intuition that Nes userbase was aging and becoming teens so they needed different type of marketing/games. Genesis/Snes userbase was growing too so SCE focus at first to 16 - 24 year old and then they captured even lower age market thanks to huge PS1 popularity/momentum. If you consider PS1 household penetration in USA or Japan then you note that its quite similar to Nes one ( keeping in mind demographic growth in that timespan ). The expansion made by SCE was a geographical one. Before the PS1, european  gaming was mostly under home-computer influence. Good things did by SCE was to backing up on novel cinematic-trend and  to fix the broke relationship between first and third-party that Nintendo and Sega had at that time. If VG were really mainstream with PS2 than we would never witness the public resistence of society against VG that are so common on mainstream media.

You are confusing mainstream with society in general with all it's different layers.

ion-storm is right. Sony made videogaming cool and hip, instead of something kids and nerds do.

 

The profit matters to the COMPANIES. You think gamers care whether the company is making money or not? No, they care about the games they are getting. Generally who "won" the console war is based on which one moved the most consoles and games...because that means a majority of gamers wanted that console for it's games. Whether the company can continue with another console is irrelevant to that generation.

Face it, as much as some people would have liked Nintendo or Microsoft to have won, the PS2 won that one for the gamers. Profit-wise, Nintendo is a winner, this is true...but what does that have to do with what GAMERS want? GAMES matter to GAMERS. PROFT matters to COMPANIES.

Yes, profit is the ultimate measure of who is doing the best. Companies without profits will tout revenues, etc. For example, if a publically held company really struggles to generate sustained profits iin a specific business over a long period of time, investors might wonder why that company is in that business.

Sales, however, indicate which consoles will have the best third party support. The DS, for example, has awesome third party support compared to the PSP. When the PSP was out for its second year, just like the PS3, a lot of people wondered, "where are the games?" In fact, arstechnica even made an article about it.

So the two big indicators are sales and profit.

Lone_Canis_Lupus said: The profit matters to the COMPANIES. You think gamers care whether the company is making money or not? No, they care about the games they are getting. Generally who "won" the console war is based on which one moved the most consoles and games...because that means a majority of gamers wanted that console for it's games. Whether the company can continue with another console is irrelevant to that generation. Face it, as much as some people would have liked Nintendo or Microsoft to have won, the PS2 won that one for the gamers. Profit-wise, Nintendo is a winner, this is true...but what does that have to do with what GAMERS want? GAMES matter to GAMERS. PROFT matters to COMPANIES.

Tell that to the Investors when they don´t want to play in the games market anymore.

@ChronotriggerJM  My house and most houses I know are filled with DVD players so I honestly couldn´t care less if my Nintendo system played DVD´s as long as it play games, sure if it did I wouldn´t cry about it but it doesn´t add or take away anything from the system for me and most people I know. It´s mostly the generation that grew up with PS (and now MS gamers) that cares and most of the time it seems like an achievement used to boost how good your system is by fan of respective system but in reality it doesn´t add to the gaming experience in generall. Today with PS and Xbox it´s a different thing since they market their system as being more then gaming systems so they need to have it but most gamers don´t care about that because they bought the system to play games and DVD functionality is a + but not a requirement.