I use "lifestyle" because I hate the term "casual" because it fails to describe the market adequately.

Heres what I "know"

1. The Wii owners buy software at a similar rate to other systems. I did a calculation and the software market share is dead on with the hardware market share.

2. Mini-games, sell well on the system - Mario and Sonic, Wii play, Carnival games, Petz etc and these games are hated by the Wii owners of this site.

3. If the userbase wasn't being catered for by the software market the attach rate would be lower as they would buy fewer games.

4. As Wii games generally have legs, it means that the software which sells well tends to be software which proves itself to the userbase. Unlike on the PS3/360 games aren't bought without people knowing what they're getting into for the most part so I would assume people are buying Carnival Games etc because they are satisfied with it, not because they are being "duped".

I don't have anything to back up the estimates because even the data at Vgchartz isn't good enough. So really all I can say is the simplest answer is not that the Wii is being dumped upon, but the Wii is getting games which the Wii userbase here doesn't like. My estimates are just working backwards from that.

Interesting article. I think the writer is right to an extent. Ninendo are to blame for the third party offerings, but think nintendo, totally planned for this, and even expected it. For example, at the end of an article IGN had on Miyamoto and Iwata before the wii was released, it said "Finally, Iwata spoke on the Revolution's unique interface and if it would alienate third-party developers. 'Well, of course, the idea is that the Revolution will sell and sell and sell so it becomes the standard in the industry," Iwata mused. "However, at least for the launch period, we designed the controller so it can play any of the different conventional styles. After all, we are talking about it playing games from our past machines (i.e. the virtual console). So don't worry.' http://uk.cube.ign.com/articles/636/636350p1.html (Link for anyone interested) Nintendo knew this whole third party situation would happen. I think thats is very important. This seems to be part of their disruption strategy. One thing i do know about industries that are disrupted, is that they never are the same again, they may retain a few of the old values, but for the most part the old ways are shattered and gone. Right now it seems nintendo are building a games industry catered towards their strengths. Look at this chart

This chart alone should send alarm bells ringing in the games indusrty. If you study this chart we have Nintendo out profiting the entire industry. Look at thier competition, Sony and Microsoft at the bottom with  huge losses. In todays world, money is power. That chart speaks for itself

 Nintendo sees the wii as as disruptive force to this industry.I can't help but notice the last time they had a system like that, the whole landscape in gaming changed.

Like i said before, Ntendo seem to be trying to change the game industry to fit their needs, and it seems it is working, year by year. The consumer is behind nintendo, that much is obvious, so this little problem third parties are having is not nintendo's problem, but thier own. 3rd parties now need to shape a business strategy that will keep them healthy and in profit. 

Can HD consoles do that for them? maybe but look at the cost at what Microsoft and especially sony have payed I do not know what Nintendo are planning, but they are just getting started. They've been extremely  secretive this whole gen.

Personally i am interested to see what they'll do with wii connect 24. I think that will be one of their most powerful killer apps in the future. this feature can not be copied by the other consoles, that alone prooves to me that they have something big install for it.

In regards to 3rd party support, we are already seeing a turn around in japan. I don't think western 3rd parties will eva fully embrace the Wii though.

The future of Nintendo's gaming industry is looking bright, but as for the other industry, the industry we seem to be in today, it seems we are seeing an end of dayz. Though this seems a bit doom and gloom, its just my opinion.

A couple of things:

1. The graph is out of date.

2. The industry saw a massive increase in sales over that time, in the order of 80-100% between the start and end of that period.

3. Games in development before release still count as expenses.

4. There are a lot of one off costs which publishers/developers incur at the start of a generation.

5. EA are idiots. They could probably lose money on Mario.

6. Most of the games they were paying for development at the time were due to release now or early next year.

Hi Squilliam

But do you think that would dramatically change that chart. Do u see any one coming even close to Ninendo's profit.

Obviously Nintendo would still be rocking, EA would still be failing.

The average quantity of software sold is much greater this year than last so you would see a lot more profit from the publishers. Also Microsoft would show a profit as well.

The above chart I have a hard time believeing is representation of 'software' as Halo 3 alone was a massively + source that put the entire MS gaming division (quarter 3, quarter 4, and 1st quarter 2008) in profit (as a matter of fact, Halo 3 has a significant positive impact on MS stock last year this time (along with Vista). Thus the only negative quarter would have been quarter 2 2007, and I think that was when MS put a $ 1 billion loss for the RRoD issue. MS gaming software has been significantly + and what has been keeping the gaming division afloat. I think the same applies to Sony as well, as Sony published software has sold well. Those numbers likely represent the entire gaming division of Sony (hardware), not just software.

So basically, you argue that nintendo made a system that only they could profit from then you argue that no one else knows how to profit from it. Hmm....

@Pristine20

If thats how u interpreted what i said ,  then i will not tell you otherwise. But i appreciate u took the time out to read it.

@Squiliam: You brought out some valid points. But i'd like to point out few things that you didn't take into account:
2. Minigame collections/party games aren't the only games that sell on the system. SMG, Paper Mario, Twilight Princess, Brawl are also in the top sellers. There's also two things to notice, which are that the core buys blue ocean games and party games and that Wii is supposed to reach families, which gives Wii a bigger userbase than the competition with the same amount of consoles sold.

4. People propably buy Carnival Games for reasons that everyone knows how fun carnival/funfair is and the game was budget priced since release. Sure it may sell due word of mouth, but the word of mouth haven't reached Carnival Games: Minigolf.

About the conclusion, it takes us to the point 2, reaching larger audience per console. Of course, this was just my estimation.
Personally, i don't have really anything against any kind of games, except the ones that are made as cash-ins. I have both Brain Trainings, Wii Fit, Nintendogs, SMG, NSMB, Twilight Princess, Phantom Hourglass, Metroid Prime 3, REUC, Mario Party 8, Starfox Command, 42 All-time Classics, to name a few. And planning on buying more games from different genres.

@BornFirst: I wouldn't say Nintendo planned it, they just were prepared. This isn't the first time this happens to Nintendo. They had quite an uphill battle with NES and they watched how 3rd parties tried to avoid PSX a little more than decade ago.
So Iwatas statement actually is telling (the investors) that they know their industry.

@Pristine: I don't think a game needs to be especially innovative on Wii in order to have success, it does help and is preferred naturally. Old popular IP sell as they do on the competing consoles, which is proven by how much Twilight Princess sold. The game just needs to have a certain level of quality in it.

It still makes sense to have the best selling console as a leading platform. It's only about a lot of the devs/publishers not wanting to.

@hanafuda: Well, Nintendo learned the hard way that unnecessary high quality control doesn't work, if the competitor allows shovelware on its system. Quality control helped Nintendo in the 80's but hurt them badly in the 90's. In any case, the crash, which can be caused by shovelware, is unlikely to happen, if the high profile titles are good quality. The US market crashed 25 years ago, not because of the amount of shovelware, but because the high profile games were just plain bad.