If you say so, dude. I'm merely pointing out two things here: that there are several multi-plats that have done better on the Wii than on the (combined) HD consoles, and that consequently this comparison means nothing. But if you insist on sticking with that, knock yourself out.

I see your point, but there are two things you have to understand here. The first is that Nintendo's best games have always sold more than everyone else's. This is true now, it was true with the NES/Gameboy, and most likely it will continue to be true for the foreseeable future.

Shoot, it's true for the DS as well, and no one complains that third-parties aren't doing well there. And yet it is only recently that this has come to be regarded as a "problem." It's not. Nintendo takes the biggest slice of the pie, as it always has, but there's still enough pie to go around for everyone else.

In fact, this dovetails with your second point. In support of your position, did you know that the top-selling software on the Wii grabs a larger share of the total software than on the HD twins? Unsurprisingly Nintendo, which has multiple games that have sold over ten million copies each on the system, has nearly all of the top slots on the system. This means that, indeed, the Wii's software sales are experiecing Nintendomination.

And yet, in spite of this, the Wii still sells more third-party software than even the 360 (the PS3 doesn't really belong in this conversation, I'm afraid). It's not a matter of Wii-owners buying Nintendo software to the exclusion of everything else: they're buying everyone's software, even if Nintendo gets a higher share than everyone else. When you combine this with the fact that on average Wii games cost a quarter as much to make as HD games it would appear that I, as a businessman, would opt for the Wii over the HD consoles.

But then I flatter myself by thinking that I, as a businessman, would not be one of the many whose decisions have led to so many studio mergers and foreclosures this generation.

NoName, that is an excellent post. You address every argument with a counter and a logical conslusion to boot. That is what I would consider a check mate.

2 noname

lets crank some numbers? and these are all vgchartz numbers not some articles about 2008.
wii sold until now 271 millions games and from that only 115m are from 3rd party
xbox360 sold 225m with "only" 176m are from 3rd party
and last but not least ps3 sold 121m and "only" 92m are from 3rd party
frist - 92 + 176 =268m 3rd party ps360 sold against 115m of wii
second - per console ps360 as sold 6.8 games and wii 5.8 games and NOT ALL ps360 consoles are bundled with a game like ALL wii consoles are...
so ps360 users buy more games... buy more 3rd party games... are better 3rd party games costumers...
ps360 are more difficult and expensive to do but not all cost 4 times more... will have more chances of success in future franchises if stuck to the same console maker and lets face it nintendo has almost no 3rd party success franchises...
like i say in my first post... want better games in wii from 3rd partys ... buy more 3rd party games for wii... as i am not a wii owner... cant help you with that... but you all that own a wii can...

Or third parties can continue doing what they've always done and keep getting what they've always gotten. Excellent revenue and shrinking profits.

Here's a few reasons:

I could list my family budget if you like, but I think I've made my point.

Who the heck knows what Wii gamers want? The diversity of people who own a Wii can make it hard to figure out what games will work.

Only in this last year due to the accelerating sales of the Wii can developers safely say that the install base is large enough that they could probably make good enough sales to take the risk of developing for this new fangled market. Despite what anyone says, the Wii install base is not the same as one of the HD console's install base.

For crying out loud some of the highest selling Wii games out there are no better than the 'crap' people are crying developers are shoveling out. Wii Sports is not that great a game. It is basically a demo for what can be done with the wii-mote. I got bored with it after 10 minutes.

For those that don't appear to get it...

1. The Wii may have the most third-party sales but it also has a lot more games being released for it in a typical month than either the 360 or PS3.

2. Those sales are overwhelmingly casual titles (Guitar Hero, Sonic & Mario, Carnival Games, My Fitness Coach, Carnival, etc, are casual)... The others are mainly licensed titles in which the Wii already has droves of them.

3. Wii games cost less to make but people seem to like throwing around numbers without actually backing them up. Is the 1/3 development cost for a hardcore game on the Wii vs. a hardcore one on HD? Or were the people talking about a casual game made for the Wii audience vs. a hardcore one for HD consoles?

4. Front loaded games vs. slow burners. Most games drop in price over time and depending on how many times the title is reordered the amount of profit per copy sold can drop drastically.

5. The affect DLC has on a game's profits. For example it's an established practice on HD consoles but on the Wii it really still is in it's infancy.

6. The game everyone throws around. Resident Evil 4, as the reason for making HD games was actually a budget title (debuted at £20) compared to HD titles.

7. You simply can't compare the Wii installed base 1:1 against the HD installed base when it comes to hardcore titles. I can assure you there are a lot more women, elderly, etc, in the Wii installed base which results in a much more diverse audience. So please enough with that kind of nonsense comparison.

8. The userbases are different in other ways as well. Simply put some people seem to believe that if you take any game from the HD consoles and sell it on the Wii it'll sell better. Please wake up and look at actual sales of games like Madden, Call of Duty, etc. The Wii may hold it's own for casual third-party titles but that is meaningless if what the people here are demanding is hardcore third-party titles.

9. Be happy with the games you have rather than constantly looking at the other side. There are games on Wii that I'm sure some HD owners would like such as Madworld, Zack & Wiki, and No More Heroes, but you don't see them whining about it.

10. For those thinking that third-parties focusing on HD development is an automatic death sentence need to stop with the nonsense. Some studios will close but some companies are doing very well. It's funny how some people choose to ignore the studios doing well because it doesn't fit their belief system about what third-parties should be doing.

11. Money hats... People can say what they want but if Microsoft or Sony or Nvidia or whatever company is willing to help finance third-party game development then more power to them and they deserve the games.

I could list even more things (such as a Japanese customer being different than a Western customer so the installed base there shouldn't be added in a 1:1 comparison, etc) but I imagine I'm just wasting my time since most people will choose to believe whatever they want to anyways. So good luck and have fun discussing this topic to death in what I'm sure will be many more threads like this one.

I'm afraid we disagree on several fronts. First, I cited the article I did because: it is compiled by a source that every console manufacturer cites to in its official PR (NPD), it covers only 2008 (the latest year, and the one third-parties will look at), it makes the playing field more even (by eliminating the one-year head start that the 360 enjoyed over the Wii), and finally because it's focused on the only region in which 360 software sales will come close to the Wii's (recall that for half of this year, the 360 still had sold more consoles in the U.S. than the Wii. Again, see the head start).

To put it more plainly, in the latest year the Wii has sold more software than the 360 has in what is far and away the 360's strongest market. (And these figures exclude the Wii's bundled game, Wii Sports.) I have absolutely no doubt that the Wii's domination is even more pronounced in all areas. True, the 360 remains a bit ahead in third-party sales because of its large head-start (and infamous Wii shortages...), but that gap is disappearing very quickly. How much longer do you wager it will last? My guess is not all that much. And not to belabor the point, but if you were a businessman in 1996, would you be more impressed by the lifetime sales of VHS vs. DVD, or by the dramatic surge of DVD in the past year?

I also note, but do not otherwise comment on, how you must bolster your argument by combining the PS3 and 360's software sales as a single monolithic entity.

So I submit to you that from this point forward, the Wii will be selling more third-party games than its two rivals. There's certainly nothing in the data that remotely argues to the contrary (unless you'd care to bring it to my attention?). Add to this how the cost of producing a Wii game is a small fraction of that of producing an HD game (let alone the added cost of porting it to one, possibly two, other systems), and I believe we can see why development resources from third-parties are already shifting.

But note this; it's taken several years and multiples studio closures/acquisitions to bring this about, and I've no doubt that many of the developers who are shifting are doing so through necessity rather than through their free choice. I also have little doubt that, unless those developers begin to adapt to the new values Nintendo's introducing, their games will not do so well. Indeed, if they keep trying to please one another, rather than trying to please us, the Wii's lower development costs may keep them afloat a while longer, but they'll still drown in the end. It's put up or shut up time, gentlmen.

Additionally, I'd like you to tell me how serious you were when you said that "nintendo has almost no 3rd party success franchises." If you're being serious, you're also being grossly incorrect. Grossly.

Finally, you are correct that greater third-party sales will beget more third-party games. However, in one respect you are placing the cart before the horse here: do we not agree that if the game isn't great, it does not deserve to be purchased? And do we not have proof that, even on the HD consoles you (mistakenly) believe are more fecund for third-parties, high-quality games still underperform, fall short of expectations, sell poorly, and flat out bomb. This is not surprising: fantastic games on all platforms often don't sell well.

Don't expect this to be different on the Wii.

well i think we will not agree ever, and you take me as a wii hater and i am a wii "dont matter to me" ...  as you give me examples of games that sold poorly on hd consoles... i ask... how do you know that they would do differently if they where out for wii? and yes i put together ps3 and xb360 as one because 90% of 3rd party games on ps3 are on xb360 and the other way around... as for valkyria... is very hard to find at a decent price and the day i find it is the day i buy it... by the way... i own 9 games for my ps3... 5 of them 1st party and 4 3rd party as one of them is MGS4 as it might be consider 1st party... so as you can see i am like alot of wii owners...

you will keep thinking the way you think and i the way i think... if we were game devs you would go your way and i mine... theres a possiblity that you would end up richer than me... but not much.

Again, I think we're talking past each other. I honestly don't think you hate the Wii, but I know that your viewpoint about it is flawed. The data don't support many of your beliefs, and I'm trying to explain why.

You also misunderstand the point of the examples I cited. I am in no way offering them as examples of games that would have sold better on the Wii; I'm doing so to point out that quality games do not always sell, regardless of which system they're on. In that regard it's pre-emptive, as many of the discussions I've had with others on this topic inevitably end up discussing Zak and Wiki (it's always Zak and Wiki. Why the obsession, I don't know).

In the end, I'm also willing to go our separate ways, if you are.