More niche because the audience is smaller, that´s all.

But, back to casual and not-niche. How can a casual game not be not-niche, since casual appeals to everybody?

While $400 is still expensive, it ain't what it used to be.

OT: I think this theory is flawed as hell. The first game in the new console always makes the biggest splash, that's why MGS2 sold more than MGS3, FFX sold more than FFXII and GT3 sold more than GT4, despite the latter iterations having the advantage of being released on a bigger install base.

This generation GT5 will be tricky though as there was no GT3:Prologue, but I still reckon that GT5 will sell superbly just like the rest of the series.

Exaccccttttllllyyyyyy. Thank you Darth, I thought I had accidentally stumbled into CrazyLand again.

Bro, I am not especially disagreeing with what you are saying I only hope that you never will be in the position where you have to present the sales of a product to your stockholders/colleques/boss and call it niche when it has sold 10-20% of the market.

dude, the PS2 went from 11 mill to 120 mill and sold 15 mill GTA3s, GTA5 might do so too, but only if the PS3 reaches +100 mill, so that userbase is an argument for the total numbers, but can't be used for many specific releases. If the PS3 will stop around 50 mill, you won't see GTA5 selling 15 mill.

Does casual appeal to everyone?

Personally, I don't even know quite how to define "casual". It's such an abstract term for a group of people who happen to buy one product. There's absolutely nothing that ties them together other than one purchase.

Which, in itself, could make it non-niche... Dunno. I'm still trying to sort out exactly what is a "casual gamer". 

Actually, I'm in marketing and have used the term before to describe a very successful product. :D

"We're selling through extremely well to our expected niche", stuff like that makes complete sense, no matter how many products you're selling. Or, more apt for my current company, "We ain't selling shit to our niche right now." :(

Fucking Euro.

For me it's about data that we have. Somehow most of the games thus far have under preformed on the ps3 this gen. MGS4 is the FIRST game to actually have this good sales while also severely raising HW sales(Even GTA4 didn't manage this). If you look at GT4 it sold a lot less than GT3 and the same happened with FF12 compared to FF10. No wonder that some don't believe that the series will sell better than a couple of years ago.

And remember, we have yet to find out just much the games WILL end up selling. All will become clear in a few years time ;).

 Me too, that´s why I was asking. I thought you would know, nevermind though. I wanted to know if a game like GTAIV could be considered casual or not and what are the criteria for labeling a game casual. 

I think you're right - they will.

This gen, we are seeing less big sellers, and more huge sellers.

The big sellers last gen will see bigger sales, but there will be less new IP monsters. We have already seen signs on this so far.

For the PS3, I think it should make it fairly easy - look here.

MGS 4 should be able to make 5M ish sales, perhaps more due to the bundle. That makes it equal the earlier installments on Ps2

FFXIII should make 5M quite easily, making it equal FFXII. 8M to equal FFX might be a tad high, but within reach.

Gran Turismo 5:P has sold 2.5M already. 5M should be a shoe-in for the full version, with 10M, beating GT4, a possibility.