@Disolitude: The problem is, that the strategy M$ knows, works only when the competition is in a bad financial shape, or you can drive the competitor into one. Against Apple, Google and Nintendo, who all make good profit and doesn't need large share to make profit, they are practically immune to the strategy M$ is using, so in order for M$ to compete, they need to compete with the product itself (and this is where M$ have never been strong).

Since you think M$ could take out Google and Apple, i would like to hear how do you think they would do that? As far as i can see, their attempts have largely failed with integrated Live/MSN search, trying to buy Yahoo, ActiveX for example. To take out Apple, M$ would need to manufacture its own computers and sell them cheap. That would lead to a very bloody pricewar and M$ propably losing a number of its current customers, like HP, Asus or the likes, who'd put out their Linux computers and fight for the price just as well.

You are already fully aware of the changing definition of the word "casual" when applied to gaming, and how it used to be used to describe first person shooters, real time strategy games, GTA-style sandbox affairs, and so forth. Pretending that this has anything to do with what's "traditional" is ridiculous.

There is no such thing as "traditional" gaming unless you want to pull out a pen and paper and play some D&D. Every single generation, every single one, has brought around at least one paradigm shift in terms of what defined popular gameplay. The motion control revolution headed by the Wii is going to be the mosti mpactful since the advent of 3-D, but that does not make it any less "traditional" than Super Mario 64 was back in 1996, especially when those motion controls are applied to radically core titles.

Play Zack and Wiki, then try to tell me that it's not a "traditional" game because of the motion controls. Certainly you can say this, but you would be lying to yourself.

Because in order to be a traditional gamer I have to play online FPS?

Shawn White Snowboarding, Mario Kart Wii, Super Mario Galaxy, The Legend of Zelda: Twilight Princess, Super Smash Bros Brawl, Fire Emblem, Battalion Wars 2, Metroid Prime 3, Resident Evil Umbrella Chronicles, Super Paper Mario and several othe Wii games I have owned and played are still very traditional games and would be at home on any console ... Why am I an non-traditional gamer if I play them on the Wii?

Well, the OP is technically right ... but the source from which it draws is wrong.

Thus, the OP is either sloppy (did not bother to check the original source), or foolish (believing a secondary source which may have a bias without checking the original source), or intentionally trying to misdirect people (checked the original source but decided to make a thread which proved a point he wanted to make).

The quotes are from an interview with Mineo Koda in an interview with The Korea Herald. Koda is the chief executive of Nintendo Korea.

The interview is about Nintendo being recession proof and operating in the Korean environment. The offending quote was found at the end of the original story, almost a throw-away line. What it says to me is that the challenge is not the other consoles but getting people to consider console video games at all. For context, remember that South Korea is a very large PC gaming (especially on-line gaming -- MMOs) country.

Mike from Morgantown

Quite adament.  I don't think we've had as much of a paradigm shift before.  Compared to this gen going from 2D to 3D doesn't even register in my mind.

As you point out, casual gaming's definition has been changing over time.  This is the same with traditional.  As I stated, it will eventually change.  It will be either narrower or wider to accomidate the times.

Just because its got Mario in the title and its a core game doesn't mean it is really comparable to previous iterations.  Mario Galaxy brought a whole new style to what was a stagnating series and that was motion control.  I truly believe motion control games to be a new way of gaming and at least for a while we can consider it not-traditional.

I wouldn't be lying to myself, but others can certainly disagree with me, just as you do.

For me it's motion control.  Most of those are core titles, they were traditional in the past but now have a new style of gaming which is motion control.

Also the games you don't include wii music and wii fit are brand new non-traditional non-game games in their own right.

Google they are going after with Live Search. And while its not nearly as successful, they are gaining market share slowly. I work for a pretty large online advertising company that advertises on both...and while buying keywords on google is still the way to go, Live is getting a lot more bookings from us lately. Not the same volume obviously...more like 60% google, 20% live and 20% yahoo. But MS live is going up, and Yahoo is going down when it comes to advertising dollars...and advertising dollars is what this search war is all about.

As far as Apple, I don't think they need to go after the hardware, but the OS. And having apple computers being able to install Windows on each machine is a huge win for MS. They really don't need to take out Apples Macs as they are making them money.

Ipod is hard to take on as Apple customers are quite loyal. Ipod vs Zune is a clear example of a better product losing out to brand name product.

Also, while Iphone is doing phenomenally, one must remember that MS has windows mobile devices sold by many manufacturers, and while I don't have the exact stats, I believe they are still outselling Iphone. I could be wrong though.

What a lame attempt to make something out of nothing, Outcast! Everyone easily deciphered the meaning behind those words but you want to take them to mean something totally different only because it would be convenient for your fanboy arguments. Lame!

Don't mean to pick on ya, but I don't see the reasoning behind that one.

Consider the current situation - why is the Wii missing out on so much third party support? If we took the 360 out of the picture, would things have turned out the same? Really, how many more consoles could Sony have sold by the end of 07? I can't see the number being that much bigger. The fact is, it's mainly the 360 that really put the HD market into its current (powerful) position.

Btw, just read your Ipod vs Zune comment above, and I think it's silly. Apple customers are loyal? I'm pretty sure most people with iPods have it as their only Apple product. These aren't Apple fans of some sort. It'd be like saying McDonalds is doing well because their customers are loyal.

I tells yah, it's 20 years ago all over again. In the technical sense, Nintendo is competing with Microsoft and Sony. All are 7th-gen game consoles, much like the Master System and the Atari 7800 were technically competition for the NES. However, Nintendo's focus is on fighting gamer apathy now, just as their focus was on fighting the PC (as a gaming device) back then