Another thread lists 11 fitness games that are due out for Wii over the rest of the year. The biggest profile release is of course Wii Fit Plus.

However, Wii Fit Plus will be the last fitness game from Nintendo. As a market becomes a red ocean, Nintendo exits and searches for a new blue ocean.

Interestingly, in an interview after E3, Iwata said that fitness games are becoming a red ocean, but that motion control games are still a blue ocean. The reason why is the ineffectiveness of third parties in imitating Wii Sports. Third parties thought success simply lied in making "casual" games, and treated the so-called "casual" customers like they were stupid. To put it another way, they treated the new market like it was the low-end of the old market, instead of learning the new market's values. Even the successful follow-ups to Wii Sports, including Mario and Sonic, Mario Party 8 and Carnival Games, were all unique from the rest of the games available in some way, but did not challenge Wii Sports head-on for the best motion controls. Iwata says that 2010 may be the year that motion controls become a red ocean, as Microsoft and Sony certainly want to beat Wii Motion Plus with their motion offerings.

The glut of rip-offs was the same thing that happened after the success of Brain Age and Nintendogs. The number of low-quality "casual" brands that have failed this generation is staggering. While the Petz series and the Imagine series from Ubisoft saw some early success, they quickly squandered their opportunities by releasing too many games that tried to cover the gamut of supposed interests of new demographic groups. They did not try to fulfill specific jobs, which may or may not be tied to a demographic, and try to be the best at fulfilling that job.

But some interesting things happened with Wii Fit. First of all, before Wii Fit even came out, a fitness craze grew up around Wii Sports. So when Wii Fit came out, it seemed to build on Wii Sports directly. Second, Wii Fit had some obvious shortcomings as a fitness tool. Nintendo still designed it as a "game" which explored the possibilities of the balance board, instead of as a fitness tool to provide the best possible workout. Unlike Brain Age, Nintendogs and Wii Sports, which provided a single data point, Wii Fit seemed to be an early step in a progression, with obvious further steps to follow.

Despite this, third parties rushed to the market with crappy "casual" fitness games, instead of trying to correct the mistakes of Wii Fit and build a game which provides a better workout. Nintendo themselves observed that players wanted to be able to string together exercises to build a personalized workout, instead of having to re-navigate menus and pick exercises individually, and so they created Wii Fit Plus.

But before Nintendo could even get to market with Wii Fit Plus, a third interesting thing happened. Peter Moore happened. After becoming the head of EA Sports, Moore made all the right moves. He has made sure that his core brands of Madden, FIFA and others are protected on PS3 and XBox 360. And then he has moved to understand the success and the shortcomings of games on Wii, to compete in that new market. Unlike Nintendo, EA is comfortable fighting in a red ocean, and their success of the PS2-era was built on winning many red ocean battles and gaining the "King" franchise of many genres. Moore's All-Play branding of last year was an attempt to take Wii Sports head-on. However, EA Sports' traditional advantages (liscensed sports leagues, realistic simulation) are disadvantages in the motion control war. All-Play did not do away with those traditional advantages, and was a failure.

But EA Sports Active completely abolishes EA Sports' traditional advantages, and takes Wii Fit Plus head-on.

Amazingly, a second company has also recognized the progression of fitness games, and this holiday will try to go head-to-head with EA Sports Active and Wii Fit Plus. The company is Ubisoft with the game Your Shape.

Ubisoft has frequently been closer to understanding Nintendo's new market than anyone else. In areas where Nintendo is going unchallenged as franchise King, they are happy to keep releasing games. When no one challenged Brain Age, they released Brain Age 2. When no one challenged Wii Sports, they released Mario and Sonic, Mario Party 8 and now Wii Sports Resort. When no one challenged Mario Galaxy, they are releasing Mario Galaxy 2. But as Iwata says in the interview at top, Nintendo plans to leave the fitness war and leave the motion control war as they become red oceans.

Why did Nintendo stop releasing follow-ups in the new spaces they opened up on DS, which in retrospect went largely unchallenged? The biggest reason is probably that they were shifting focus from DS to Wii at that time, as DS could provide a guaranteed cashflow, and they didn't know how much support Wii would need. But the other reason was Ubisoft. Nintendo thought that Ubisoft was going to win the emerging red ocean battles by fighting with new market values. At GDC 2008, Iwata actually said that Ubisoft were treated as a Nintendo internal team. Ubisoft was also the first to jump on the Wii bandwagon, and they were the early leader in the new market red ocean battles on DS with the aforementioned Petz and Imagine series games. Ubisoft has been close to understanding the new market many times.

So this holiday season, for the first time, there will be a battle over the new market with games that truly embrace new market values. Wii Fit Plus, EA Sports Active (and it's first expansion) and Ubisoft's Your Shape are the contenders.

And the winner?

For this holiday alone, Wii Fit Plus will be the winner. By being the first to make a great fitness game, Nintendo gained de facto genre "King" status, and in the short term, this will be unstoppable.

But into 2010 and beyond, Nintendo will be looking for new blue oceans, and the fight will become between the follow-ups to EA Sports Active and Your Shape.

The early advantage goes to EA Sports Active. In fact, I think if Nintendo kept making Wii Fit sequels, EA's series would even be able to slowly overtake Nintendo. The reason is that EA Sports Active focuses on non-electronic peripherals, which can more cheaply offer a wider range of practical exercises. The Wii remote and nunchuk in leg band are "good enough" for giving feedback on whether exercises are being performed correctly. The balance board and Your Shape camera have little to do with key purposes of fitness software like providing motivation and building personal workout routines, and can also provide inaccurate assessments of personal health, as has been complained about with Wii Fit. And with Wii Fit, there has been a tendency to focus on games with a sometimes tenuous connection to fitness, with the attitude of exploring what is possible with the new peripheral. The celebrated Wii Fit Plus platforming game, for example, almost looks like it belongs in WarioWare.

EA Sports Active sequels could include things like hand weights, balance board leg extensions for step aerobics, exercise balls, or other established and proven, inexpensive home exercise equipment. Other series could as well, but this seems to be the direction EA is taking moreso that Nintendo and Ubisoft, who are focusing on technology and gadgets, which would risk becoming seen as gimmicks and fads if many more were on the market. Exercise gimmicks can still sell more than almost any videogame, but would undercut and ruin the brand.

EA Sports Active's success will be important for stabilizing Wii sales in America and possibly Europe, which have fallen a long way from the highs of 2008. In order to create explosive growth, a new genre "King," with no competition, needs to arrive for the console. This may come with New Super Mario Bros. Wii. But in order to simply stop the decline of sales, a genre like Motion Sports or Fitness needs to be developed from simply a seed game like Sports or Fit, and into an actual genre, with many games exploring every potential facet. For the first time since Super Mario Bros. and platformers on NES, a complete, fully-formed new genre may now be developing on a Nintendo console.

I don't know if you watched the Ubisoft conference Atson, but the crowd was pretty impressed with the Your Shape demonstration. The other interesting thing is that Yves claimed Nintendo helped Ubisoft make the camera for the game, which to me speaks to great trust between the two parties.

If Your Shape/EA Active remain big hits through 2010 though, my issue it is that Microsoft may try to get the games developed or ported to their Natal set up.

Nice article. And i agree the second half of this year is shaping up nicely for the Wii, and last year's levels could be retained. Lets wait and see

EDIT: whats up with me and my double posts today!?

I want more games I can play with my bum.