It probably seems odd to credit the Wii with improved quality of titles on HD consoles in the future, but I don’t think it should be unexpected.

I think that everyone today is willing to accept that game development for HD consoles is really expensive and managing development teams of that size is amazingly difficult; this problem is aggravated at this point in time because there are few companies who have been successful for long enough to have (real) experts who can aid other teams and get them up to speed.

How the Wii impacts this is it provides an option to avoid the high costs associated with HD console development. Now, this may not seem like an obvious benefit for the HD consoles, after all wouldn’t this mean that all development would move towards the more popular and less expensive Wii? No …

It should be clear to everyone now that the growth in the industry combined with the polarizing nature of the Wii means that the combined sales of the “runner up” consoles will be very massive; compared to last generation’s (roughly) 55 Million consoles we are (likely) going to see 70 to 90 Million HD consoles sold by the end of 2012. What this means is that developers will still see value in supporting the HD consoles.

What is (likely) going to happen over the next couple of years is publishers are going to be looking at whether developers have the experience and talent to produce HD games before they are green lit. This will (probably) result in the number of developers who are focused on these consoles being a fairly exclusive group who can consistently deliver high quality games. There will be a trade-off though, that the libraries of the HD consoles will be smaller, they will see a slower pace of releases, and the Wii will likely see far more original and unique titles.

When we begin the next generation the development costs will probably not increase as much as they have over the past couple of generations because we will (mostly) be seeing a progressive refinement of the techniques used to create HD games currently. The developers who would struggle (and probably fail) to produce a HD game will have more experience under their belts and will have the ability to consult with experts in the field which will result in a more seamless generational transfer; and the unconventional ideas that were just experiments on the Wii will be taken to the next level and create exciting game play experiences.

Off-Topic: You know, I just noticed that Happy's name is misspelled.

I know ...

I accidentially misspelled my username when playing Unreal Tournament back in the day and have continued with the misspelling since then.

uuu....what?

Appeasing the HD crowd? The wii does not benefit HD gaming. It makes the point that it is not worthwhile to pay high costs for HD games when you can sell cheap shovelware for truckloads of $$$

I see what you're getting at Squrriel, but I can't agree with it. The argument of "quality over quantity" sounds great on paper, but as N64-only owners can tell you it works better in theory than in practice. It's diversity and numbers that seems to most bolster a console's line-up, since with those two things you'll get more, fresh ideas. Sony's strategy of letting publishers throw anything at the wall and see if it sticks has given us some damn fine games, and I'm becoming increasingly convinced that it's the only way to go.

Additionally, the snobcore who are most likely to stick with the HD consoles are also the ones who demand the most constant stream of new games. Quality over quantity would deny them this. They'll either cave in and get a Nintendo system, or they'll leave consoles and head for the PC.

Games are like the reverse of the Movie industry.

In Hollywood, the big budget sure hits fund the hit-or-miss low budget artsy movies that they like to make and win awards.

Gaming, with all it's maturity puts the big budget "art" on the pedestal, but the set up is the same.

Nice but your forgeting a few things:

Install Bases
Revenue != Profit
Investors like turn over.

I'm nitpicking, but I'm pretty sure it's actually a case of all the small and mid-budget movies funding the big budget and artsy movies. Because too many of the big budget ones have been flopping too hard for them to be absurdly profitable as a whole (when they win, they have modest to good profits. When they tank...)