Iwata said Nintendo’s main challenge was to try to meet demand for its Wii console, noting that once demand for the system was being satisfied in the core markets Nintendo plans to launch the Wii in China.

"We're still focusing on how to meet booming demand," he said. “We barely have enough Wiis to meet global demand this year. But next year, I think we can bring the Wii to China."

So if anyone believes hardware sales will slump next year you have got to be kidding.

India's got PS3 for twice the price as Wii, xbox launched 06 same price as wii

China's got neither system so Wii has got some good odds

Yes, the Wii will begin to slow down in 2009 (well actually it has already started to slow down -- see its recent sub 30,000 weeks sales in Japan). It will have a couple of pops during 2010 when the next Zelda and Mario are released, but it will never be as successful as it once was due to the immense quality of the games coming to the PS3 over the next few years. The PS3 will actually pass the Wii by January 31, 2011.

What has caused this slowdown of the Wii. They seemingly had everything going their way heading into this year's E3. Then they totally failed to unveil any new high quality games other than their nebulously setting future release dates for the next Maro and Zelda.

The Wii has already seen one of its its two biggest games from E3 2008 turn into a worldwide flop and there's a good chance that other big Wii announcement from E3 2008 will also fail to become the same type of huge game that a few earlier Wii titles did.

The downfall of the Wii has resulted from Nintendo's cockiness (stating that they were going to unveil several "Core" games at E3 2008, then utterly failing to do so), their own inability to deliver great games (only four of their games this gen have managed to receive 9 or better review scores from the leading publications and three of the four are based on franchises that are over twenty years old and the last incorporates twenty year old characters into a fighting game.

Nintendo failed to make Wii versions of some of their popular titles as good as recent versions on the Gamecube and DS. Mario Kart Wii, Metroid Prime 3, and I predict that Animal Crossing will be one of these as well.

Nintendo also utterly failed to attract third party support to the Wii as most third parties wanted to make their best games on the super consoles of this gen instead of on a console that in many ways is still a last gen system.

Lastly Nintendo's downfall had to do with their trying to combat much more powerful consoles with an arguably last gen console and a gimmicky controller.

Of course during the early days of the Wii it was able to generate quite a bit of heat for itself as developers struggled to find out how to properly program a much more complex piece of technology like the PS3, but now as key developers have learned how to make great games much faster and easier on the PS3 than in its early days, the Wii is finding itself to be much like the wrestler Christian Cage in that it will begin to burn out quickly whereas the PS3 is much more as Ric Flair always described himself, "A 60 minute man," and the PS3 will bring the PS family's title of leading console of the last two genereations back home.

Point 1: It spent alot of time last year in the sub 30,000 range in Japan last year. Much to the delight of Sony/360 fans giving a great many "I told you so! It's a fad" topics. This isn't new, it's an expected cycle.

2: The wii is selling more than half a million units a week and it's not even black friday yet. I think it's hard to say that the wii has slowed down.

All of your reasons as to why the wii is obviously failing, and why the HD systems are now picking up steam all sounds good. However it's contradicted by reality. Look at the chartz.

Yes, this year even won't be as good as 2008.

There is going to be a drought for good games for the wii in 2009 (at least compared to PS3's GoW3, GT5, KZ2, etc)

I think the Wii did a great job getting its good games out early, but now they don't have much else left.

 Wow the GOP could really use people like you in their ranks, they need those who are good at ignoring reality

"Wow the GOP could really use people like you in their ranks, they need those who are good at ignoring reality"

Wow the Wii is really turning up the quality of the JRPGs that it is getting. I mean Tales of Symphonia: Dawn of the New World scored a whopping 67 at IGN. That is a really high score for a jrpg on a Nintendo dedicated console in the post Super Nintendo era.

 All they need is Wii sports 2, their other games, like Wii fit are still going strong

Nothing lasts forever.

 And the score for tales matters because....?

No one cares, Wii fit, Wii sports and the like are going to keep the system selling like gangbusters, who cares if Tales is a flop?

considering the fact that the ps2 last gen sold over 140 million consoles, and all 3 systems this gen combine match half that total. that means there is still plenty of people that haven't either decided to buy a system, or can't afford one.

MS i don't see them going over the wii cause the 360 acrade is cheaper than the wii, but 360 is still barely outselling sony which obivilously isn't a good thing. as for sony, they need to dig in the war chest of theirs cause 2009 is probability the last chance they get a chance to dominate once again this gen