LOL, this rules, but in all truth this seems to be the year that Nintendo is giving to the third parties, so exect a great 1st party effort next year.

I never had a bad Christmas since I don't game solely during Christmas.

Besides, I always end up with a large backlog of games that I haven't played through in all gens.

me as well. i have a boatload of possible 1 year or older choices i could get for christmas.

Nintendo has never quite had a holiday season as barren as this, but if you look at the latter half of 2007 and the first half of 2008, you can understand why. Good games take time, and they essentially burnt through all their development assets across that span of time

This is not your father's Nintendo. When Iwata took over, everything changed. Even the release strategies. That said, Nintendo is using the same basic tactic now that they used in the early years of the NES: make games that people will buy as early as they can make them, then have them sell throughout the lifespan of the system. The holiday line-up for 2008 only looks sparse to somebody who has been buying games as soon as they come out. To the gamers who are just coming onto the scene, or ones who only keep a casual eye on what's coming out, pretty much every game released so far is fair game.

^That pretty much is how I feel when I buy a new game on the Wii. I only played LoZ:TP in mid 2008, so long after it came out!

 im from the UK, we didnt get goldeneye until november if i remember correctly. Having said that we didnt get the n64 until march '97 and i didnt pick mine up until may.

so basically 1997 was one of my best nintendo years ever. mario 64, pilotwings 64, mario kart 64, killer instinct gold, lylat wars, goldeneye and diddy kong racing. happy days!

Diddy Kong Racing was an amazing game. If that was all there was in 1997 then it is still a million times better than what we have this Christmas (Wii Music, Animal Crossing, CODWAW)