HappySqurriel said:
@Zeljedi and Squlliam
There is nothing saying that the either company will go out of business immediately because of their moves to copy the company that disrupted the market, but over the next 5 to 20 years their attempts to attract gamers outside of the demographic they control can destroy the companies existing fanbase to a level where they may not recover.
There are (probably) many ways that this could happen, but the most likely situation at the moment would be that Sony and Microsoft release their add-ons and only really develop competition for the simplest and most gimmicky games that the Wii currently has. Being that the Wii's userbase is so large, for every one of these games Sony or Microsoft release the Wii will see several similar titles which are (generally speaking) higher quality in the same timeframe. The result of this is that Microsoft and Sony would be seen among these gamers in a very negative light heading into the next generation.
At the same time, since Nintendo made their control method the focus of the console every game is designed around it, and the steadily increasing third party "Core" games support starts to find ways to use the Wiimote (and Wii MotionPlus) in ways that greatly increase the quality of the game and can't be replicated on a conventional controller. Over the next few years, the Wii gains "Cred" with the "Core" gamers and maintains most of its support from the mainstream and expanded market.
Now, since Sony and Microsoft release these add-ons to their system late in the generation they believe that the momentium from these systems will prevent them from having to release a new system in the near future; and since the systems still have good graphics then there is little motivation for people to buy newer hardware. Nintendo takes the opportunity in 2012 and releases new hardware which greatly increases the quality of their overall control method and makes a (very) noticeable improvement on all the technical features of the PS3 and XBox 360 while retaining a very affordable price of $300 while bundled with a game.
Much like the release of the PS2, their next system quickly kills of both conventional and expanded interest in their competitions products and they rapdily build a large userbase. By the time their competition ramps up to release their next console there could be 30 to 60 Million systems already on the market, and even after their competition releases their systems their total combined sales is below that of the next-Wii which means that they are falling further and further behind.
I don't know if this is going to happen, but the decisions made by the companies do not seem unrealistic, and (in the past) similar things have happened. When you compare it against the SNES the N64 didn't do that poorly, and the Gamecube seemed to be a step (or two) towards correcting all the problems the market had with the N64, and yet the disruptive nature of the Playstation and the earler release of the PS2 meant that the generation was (basically) over before the Gamecube could launch.
|
Theres a problem with judging a successful consumer product like the Wii in that in many cases its successful simply because its successful. There were just as many people praising Sony's strategies with the PS1 and PS2. Everything Nintendo does now, looks extremely successful because the overall success of the Wii hides any flaws in the strategy, just as the success of the PS2 hid the flaws in Sony's strategy. I don't think its appropriate for anyone to believe that Nintendo is unbeatable, at their own game, even now. Once you stop thinking you can just as easily be blindsided, just as many people were by the Wii.
I disagree with your opinion that the new interface technologies that Microsoft and Sony are looking to employ with the PS3 and Xbox 360 would alienate their userbases because they already cater to the people that own their console so well. This fact is unlikely to change, just as Nintendo is unlikely to stop catering to the people who are non gamers as well. Now, im challenging you. I respect you immensely as a poster but I feel that you've stopped thinking about this issue. The Wiis success will earn Nintendo at the very least a strong and well thought out counterattack so please stop considering any attempts by Microsoft and Sony as gimmicks which would alienate their respective userbases.
I do not believe in any of the catch phrases, core, casual or whatever. To me there are just varying degrees of niche and wide market appeal. I know you've had casual thrown at you a lot, but please lets drop the stupid preconceptions at least between us. Im not a marketing person, im an economics person if you want to understand my perspective. To me theres a multitude of reasons why a game like Mario Kart sells like it does. Its a fun game which can be enjoyed by a lot of people in that its a wide market game, its also valuable to people because of asynchronous information in that before purchase someone will know that they will likely enjoy the game and they do not have such information available to them for other games which makes it a more appealing purchase. Essentially Mario Kart is a lower risk purchase and people in general are risk averse.
In a lot of ways many of the enthusiast gamers on this site are more likely to take risks in their gaming purchases than people in the general population. You have people that got the Wii first on the idea of the interface, a risk. You have people willing to try niche games, another risk. For the general population of gamers/not yet gamers, the Wii is the least risky purchase because most Wii owners have played the Wii before at a friends house and since everyone is getting one its a safer purchase than the PS3 and Xbox 360. This isn't the only factor, but it needs to be mentioned because its hardly ever considered.
The Wii and Nintendo aren't safe. As im more familiar with Microsoft I will ignore Sony and just focus on them. For the Wii and Nintendo to have been safe they needed to have captured >60% of the market like the PS2. The fact that they didn't indicates that in spite of the massive momentum behind their console they cannot currently cater to all the needs in the market. So if you believe that Nintendo could invade the space occupied by the HD consoles currently, then you would also have to respectfully believe that they too could invade the space occupied by the Wii. If the capabilities of both companies are asynchronous then you would expect the market to segment, but if the capabilities of the companies are more synchronous then you could expect the market to potentially unify like with the PS2.
