I wouldn't call Wii Play a AAA title, but I would call it a no-brainer purchase for $10.

I'll respond to the original post with my own experience.  For me, Gran Turismo 3 was a system seller.  I bought a PS2 and only GT3 with it.  That was all I needed.

...except, it really wasn't.  GT3 was the one game that pushed me over the edge to buy the system, but I knew the PS2 had a massive library of games, and that I would later buy more games for it and get my money's worth on the system.  And indeed, I ended up buying 3 more games for it over the next year, as well as borrowing plenty of games from friends of mine who owned PS2s.  I borrowed a lot of PS1 games, too.

Here's the major difference between my example and, say, the PS3: When I bought my PS2, it was $180.  At that price, it took a massive library of games plus one game I was completely nuts over to get me to buy it.  If you want me to spend $500 on a PS3, it's going to take ten games that I'm completely nuts over.  And I'm sorry, but I don't go completely nuts over that many games.  On average, there is maybe one game per year that fits that description.

The other thing to consider is, when GT3 came out, it was unlike anything I had ever played before.  GT4 and GT5 are evolutionary changes, not revolutionary.  Sure, there are good reasons to buy GT5, and if I already had a PS3, I wouldn't hesitate to pick up a copy.  But is GT5 reason enough for me to spend $500+ when I already have GT4?  The biggest selling point for me is online racing (which was supposed to be in GT4, but nevermind that now), but I want to race against my friends, not strangers, and none of my friends have PS3s or plan to buy PS3s.  All of them have PS2s.  Think about that...

I agree with much of the logic that has been shown here, but also want to throw out another point to consider.


If you think about it. If there's a game you are absolutely GOING to buy, you tend to go out and get the console even before the game is out. There might be a small initial boost in sales for those that have been specifically waiting for the individual game, but that doesn't change the slope of the sell rate, it just creates a bump in it.

For me, Smash Bros Melee was a system seller. Simply put, that was the game I played, and I played it often enough that it justified the purchase of both the game and the console.
This game also changed my entire perspective on vs battles. Everything that I hated about those games, the random combos, the set limit health meter, the limited ability to avoid attacks, the inability to have an actual strategy. All of the problems I had with fighting games were gone when I played this game.

A game that can change the way a genre is played, or the way a console is viewed in general, will be a true system seller. No matter how good a game is, how critically acclaimed it is, or how eagerly anticipated it is, it will not be a TRUE system seller without this.

People are pointing to final fantasy XXLMD whatever and Metal Gear 5 and all these other games. Yes, they are good, and with all of them they may begin to push sales a bit better, but it's not going to suddenly reverse which side has the advantage.

As far as I'm concerned, I see Little Big Planet being a TRUE system seller for the PS3. It's the one thing that I've seen for the PS3 that honestly looks FUN, and it looks like it uses the high def graphics to actually look PRETTY, instead of gritty and shitty.

Wii has the advantage here because the console itself is changing the way genre's are payed, Sports games, racing games, simulators, exercise games, brain games, FPS, TPS, Adventure, Minigames, everything is getting overhauled. There wil be a bunch of people who come out with crappy games, but as soon as someone does get it right, they're going to rake everything in, big time.

 I'm sorry, I have to disagree at a fundamental level with this statement.

 Sony was positive the PS3 would sell on brand name alone.  Look where that got them.  "Five million consoles at launch, even with no games" has turned into "Five million by Thanksgiving... maybe."

I think there are system sellers, but I think that there is one major system seller that outweighs all others, and it's not a game per say, but an amount of games: the most games. Simply having the largest wall of games at EB Games, or the most cabinet space in the front cabinet at Walmart, is what REALLY sells systems and determines a winner.

Edit: 2000 posts! 

Still, the amount of people that will buy an expensive console for a few games are not enough. Casual gamers are far more important, which has been shown by sales of Madden, GH, WiiSports, etc. Those "system sellers" don`t matter to them, and they will pick the cheapest console. You say PS3 will take the lead when it goes down to $300-250, but when that happens...Wii will likely be $50-80 adn 360 $150.

Definitely agree with that.  I think that can really be seen in Nintendo consoles.  People are extremely excited about the first party games that they know are invariably coming and purchase the console around launch even if the games out then aren't that great.  While the Wii had Zelda at launch, I'd have bought it on launch day even if it Zelda wouldn't be out for three more months.  I guess you could argue I had Wii Sports, but no one could imagine exactly how fun Wii sports was/is before they played it so it's not really a realisitic argument.

First, there is no game that can save a console, not even two, three of four great games coming out in a year...

They will help sales, boost them a little (Like LoZ:OoT, great game but dont save the N64) the only thing that can save a System is a Huge Amount of Games, good ones, bad ones, games for every kind of possible costumer...

Yes, there is such a thing like a System Seller, but they dont save a console or drive the market...

@TheSource, Super mario 64 was a pack in, i remember seeing it like that.

I think GTA4 is the biggest game that can make people buy a console for just 1 game.

True system sellers do exist, but they are rare. Mario64 was absolutely a sysseller, as was GTA3. However, consider the circumstances- early in the generation, when the competition had thin libraries, and each offered gamers something truly new and "next gen". In other words they arrived at a time when there was a balance waiting to be tipped (temporarily for the N64, as they couldn't follow through with a solid library, permanently for the Ps2 because it did).

The question then for this gen is whether such a situation exist now? I think it does, at least between Sony and MS. If one system can pull out this gen's "mind blower"- the successor to SM64 and GTA3 - it may be enough to tip the scales (Right now I could see Bioshock being that game, but gamers have disappointed me before). And since all the systems seem able to follow through in 2008, I can see such a shift being inalterable ala the PS3.