shoulda used that line from those beer commercials with the two old guys....BRilliant!!

@zleep

What?

I was just kidding about the Wii fad deal if that is what yo are reffering to, but as far as the rest that is exactly how it went down.

This generation is expanding the market with all three platforms. Of coures it is obvious to see that the Wii is leading the charge, but you can not put it past the PS3 and 360. The one box media aspect of these devices has also pulled a lot of players in that would have otherwise had no intrust in a device branded around gaming.

I think the OP's story is very nice to here, but I just want to point out that it is not the only case in which this could happen. If I had to at some point sell my PS3 to get by, I already know my other grandparents would take it in a heart beat. Right now they are just waiting to pick up an HDTV in april, and the PS3 is their first choice for a Blu-ray player thanks to the PSN.

Wii does a great job keeping a party livly, and that is a good thing for everyone. PS3, and 360 both have networks that can keep families conected, and that advantage is going to get stronger as time goes forward. 360 has already shown the intrest in a device of this nature with its new price point, and it is only a matter of time tell PS3 drops into the same space, and the both will be doing just fine.

"It also explains why not having any big releases doesn't hurt the Wii's sales. Do you think my dad (or similar consumers) are up on the most recent releases for the Wii? Do you think they know anything about the consternation about a sub par Nintendo E3 with no big releases except ::gag:: Wii Music? Probably not, the Wii is, unlike its competitors, semi-immune to bad software years and doesn't live release to release like the 360 and PS3 seem to."

Yeah, like the Wiimote this is another example of one of the best things about the Wii being one of the worst things about the Wii. All most nongamers know about the Wii is its name and that they should have one. However, that also leads to developers being able to make poor games for the Wii and in being able to get away with doing so which in the long run is damaging to the industry as a whole.

haha thats funny. My friend's grandpa (probably 70) is a big PS2 gamer

How is it so damaging to the industry? Shovelware has always been around, it isn't a new thing.

It's not as if this shovelware is taking away from the sales of better games. Most of the blockbuster (advertised) Wii games get sales, the problem is few third parties are actually trying.

I do not think it's an isolated incident. Last year, I was talking to guys in their 60s who got a Wii from a relative and had just WiiSports. I know folks from all walks of life who have never touched a console have a blast on the Wii.

Case and point - at my daughter's party earlier this year, we had a mix of folks - a foreign mom with no video game experience, a mom in her mid 30s - and no interest in video games (her husband has a PS2) and she doesn't play it - and her mom - 60s - and no interest in video games - and my wife - early 30s - and no video game experience. I fired up WiiSports and all of them played bowling and tennis - and had a blast.

That is why the Wii is selling. You can not dupe that on the 360 or PS3, but they are trying.

Impulsvity, cool thread.

   I agree with the shovelware not really hurting the industry as a whole.  I SERIOUSLY doubt there is anyone in the entire world who is having some sort of dilema where they ask themselves "should I get Metal Gear Solid 4 or Imagine Babiez?"

   I've come to believe the Wii shovelware sales (things like carnival games, the imagine games, wii music ect) is primarily to people who would NEVER buy core games with that money.  If that is the case then it is more or less benign as far as the development of good games goes since it is on a parallel but distinct track.  I seriously doubt Hideo Kojima is going to be pulled off the next MGS games to develop Konami's answer to Carnival games.  

   Shovelware doesn't doom gaming any more then shitty romantic comedies coming out every week dooms high octane action movies.  They won't cancel Transformers 2 because crap like Sex and the City makes money too.

All you need to do is look at which games (specifically focusing on their date of release) are at the top of the charts for each console to understand the difference (not just for which console they are, but what type of game they are), and it would be clear why no big releases in holiday season, and crap E3 presentation and this and that means absolutely nothing to people outside of forums..

heck they meant nothing to me prior to this generation, i bought games that I thought looked like fun, whether or not it was released last week or last year

Same applies to DS

Yeah, like Impulsivity was saying the Wii is getting by on shovelware. All of the top selling software on that console Wii Sports (which only gets its sales numbers because it is packed in with the Wii), Wii Fit, it is all shovelware designed to attract the attention of nongamers, while most of the games that are actually good on the Wii languish in comparison. Ie. Mario Galaxy the best game on Wii still under 8 million in sales according to this site while a game like Wii Sports has sold 37 million copies. Metroid Prime 3 selling under 2 million copies. Zelda: Twilight Princess still under 5 million.

     I see many Wii fans saying, "Oh, Nintendo's goal was to attract new types of people to the system and then transform them into core gamers."  However, if they were succeeding in that, then I would expect Zelda:  Twilight Princess to have far more than the 4.97 million copies sold that this site says it has.  In comparison, Ocarina of Time had 7.60 on the N64.  Also, Metroid Prime 3 would be expected to have more than 1.46 million copies sold if the Wii was magically transforming all these people that bought things like Wii Fit into core gamers.  Heck, the first Metroid Prime sold over 3 million copies ( and why does it seem like its sales information has been removed from this site?)  So, the Wii is a console where shovelware Carnival Games, Wii Sports, Wii Fit sell in staggering numbers while much better and more respected games do no better than usual on other consoles.

And if most of the major third party development was to shift to the Wii it would be because publishers would want do so to try to make the same types of games as Wii Sports, etc, that have shown that they sell in staggering numbers on the Wii instead of core games which as illustrated with the examples that I give above haven't really shown that they sell better on the Wii than on any other system, and this would be damaging to the industry.  Heck, unless Nintendo starts showing that they are serious about games like Zelda and a new Mario platformer again instead of a vague announcement of them at E3 followed up by more pablum like a weak version of Animal Crossing and Wii Music, then it is going to seem that Nintendo is following this trend of pushing shovelware that sells instead of trying to develop top flight core games when they used to be the best publisher and producer of core games in the world.

Yeah, if you're going to call Wii Fit and Wii Sports shovelware, don't expect people here to take you seriously. As for people playing Wii Sports only due to the pack-in, Japan's 46% attach rate says otherwise.

You're asking why Metroid Prime 3, Mario Galaxy, and Twilight Princess is seeing poorer sales - it's pretty simple. The franchises have gotten relatively stale. Metroid Prime, Mario 64, and Ocarina of Time were all must-have titles, as they were the first 3D iterations of the series. In case you didn't notice, Metroid 2 took a sharp decline in sales, as did both Mario Sunshine and Windwaker. Still, the Wii versions of Brawl, Mario, Kart, Zelda, Metroid, and even RE4 have/are going to outsell their previous iterations by a large margin.

Btw, Twilight Princess was released on the Gamecube, as well. It sold 1.56m copies, nobody is going to buy the same game twice.

You can whine about the console being a shovelware magnet all you want, that isn't stopping third parties from releasing games like NMH2, MadWorld, The Conduit, Dragon Quest X, MH3, etc. on it. They have acknowledged there is an audience for these games, regardless of what you think.