People are just impatient.

When its the platform holder advertising games it serves a double purpose, to sell the system and sell the software so more extensive and greater marketing efforts are immediately justified. For the third parties their marketing dollars don't serve this double purpose so they must be more scarce with them. As the Wii platform increases in sales and the third parties become more sure about reaching a far greater audience with their marketing dollars they will be more willing to part with them, because as the Wii install base increases the cost/benifit ratio of third party advertising improves markedly. Therefore it does follow that with vastly increasing userbases third parties will find far greater luck selling their games and the incentive for Publishers is to time their marketable releases for when their marketing dollars are most effective.

That is my simplest explanation of why there has been a "so-called" third party problem on the Wii.

P.S To reach a wider/varied audience it is more expensive and effective to use TV advertisement which is expensive in both implementation and design. They can't easily throw a bunch of advertisements all over IGN and expect to reach their audience can they?

The userbase is already here. The advertising isn't hard to do. It's making the games after the system was clearly a hit. So you're right, but for the wrong reasons.

I was just wanting to point out that as the Wii userbase increase the cost/benifit ratio of advertising increases so you would expect to see more of it. I was also explaining why there wasn't as much in the past.

See the advertising costs the same whether there are 10M or 30M Wii users, but the potential effect is trippled. Third parties don't have the added incentive of trying to sell the system itself so it makes less sense for them to advertise their games early on. In effect the aparantly nasty ratio of high selling 1st/3rd party games is caused in a significant part because of a lack of advertising which only becomes justifiable as the userbase increases.

It's all pretty true.

Whether upping their marketing budget and trying to take on Nintendo (And supposed other third parties) on a saturating market with a growing second hand market is viable remains to be seen.

Third parties will be upping their anti as the userbase grows, what sort of software this restuls in, and whether it reaps the benefits some would like to believe the Wii offers remains to be seen.

The games which will be most heavily advertised are the ones believed to be able to be enjoyed by the highest proportion of Wii users. So yes, the games that do hit that mark will probably be wide appeal, excellent titles that will probably sell a load of copies (If they judge it right).

Okay, I understand. That's why Activision is doing more marketing now for CoD on the Wii than on the other systems, since the userbase is there.

Yep, pretty much they are also investing in the future success on that platform with the real deal COD MW 2 (WoW, so acronymy) I would predict that the next installment will sell heavily or close to parity with the Xbox 360 version. If a game like Halo 3/COD IV sells heavily its because it has a wide appeal, therefore they should do well on the Wii.

So yes, the real deal shooter on the Wii at this point that I am aware of is likely to be... COD! Congratulations, as of this moment its the top shooter franchise in the world.

 It's just whether third parties are going to be quick to put up the money to research the software developement / marketing and then market it. I'm sure they'll all dip their toe beyond their current approach of releasing games and hoping to get sales from the core audience via strong press reception and from the expanded audience by shelf-shopping buyers.

 I'm quite looking forward to it really, companies trying to actually take Nintendo down at what they seem to do best. I can't see many third parties having a greatly positive experience from upping their marketing and trying to get the gigantic sales of Nintendo's big hitters, but the financial benefits that potentially reaps are hard for them to ignore.

 When you start thinking about third party release like this, scale though, it does put the whole Wii developement costs being cheaper argument type thing as irrellevent. Hmm.

A problem is only a problem when its a problem.

The Wii literally could not be doing better right now, even if it had ten times the third party support. Indeed, from Nintendo's POV more third parties at this point would likely cannibalize sales of their own software.

What do Halo 3, Call of Duty IV and Gears of War 2 have in common?

1. They are all easy to play.

2. They reach a wide audience otherwise they wouldn't sell, so wide appeal.

3. They are all considered top of their class in game design.

4. They have a big name, but in every case its well earnt.

5. They are some of the most "casual" shooters on the market!!!!

Any one of those games would sell on any platform you put them on because they are fundamentally right. You don't need niche software on the Wii, you just need FUN software. Core/Casual is B$, really now... Put that away. There are people who will enjoy the game and there are people who will not, those are the only two categories which really matter.

They don't need to beat Nintendo, they just need to release games that a lot of people will enjoy so a lot of people will buy them. Development cost has never been an issue anywhere... Talent sells games. Its not about attracting the bottom dollar, it has always been about attracting the best talent. Btw if you have an Xbox 360 go play Castle Crashers! (Best 1200 points I ever spent)