GameCube had a massive launch? Aligning launches, the GameCube was below PS2 at the 6-month point in the US. It was always below the Xbox in the US. I'm too lazy to look at the Japan/Euro sales right now, but using N. America as a standard, there's no way GameCube could have had a "massive" launch. It was a decent launch. And your N64 comparisson is completely off-base. Back then, Nintendo was the status-quo, not Sony. By you logic, the N64 should have had continued development, regardless of the fact that the Playstation was outselling it. Things aren't black and white. There are many factors that contribute to why a developer may or may not chose one console over another. Total sales are a big part of that, and projected total sales as well. Or are you telling me that everything that's happened in the last four months would have still happened if the PS3 and Wii numbers were reversed?

Gamecube's launch was massive by any standards. But it fell off from there quickly. This is one thing people seem to fail to realize is that a system can sell well for a couple months, but it needs to continue to do so in order to be a success. That's why this "Wii's been selling well for 3 months and is now going to dominate the world" BS doesn't cut it. Sony was the status quo by the time N64 launched. As a result, nobody pushed the panic button when Nintendo passed it because they knew it was going to be short lived. Nintendo's always dumbed down their systems. With the SNES, they chose a slow processor, which wrote Sega's marketing for it. With N64, they went with carts. For 20 years, we've listened to them drone on about how only gameplay matters, while the competition provided good gameplay just with updated graphics. Shortcuts have never paid off for Nintendo before.

Hence Nintendo still being one of the best in the business after 20 some years...yeah, their "shortcuts" have never paid off... People always leave out the part where new Wii developers are joining all the time...the Wii will continue to sell when some great games come out later this year and next year...

Please. 500k? These games are mostly multiplatform so costs are much lower. You can't use the same assumption as for an exclusives.

Six Month Totals (North America): Gameboy Advance 3,647,250 N64 2,477,500 PS2 2,450,500 XBox 2,184,500 PSP 2,070,750 Nintendo DS 1,988,750 Dreamcast 1,861,000 Gamecube 1,652,250 XBox 360 1,649,250 Year Totals (North America) Gameboy Advance 7,682,500 PS2 4,643,500 PSP 4,396,250 N64 3,884,000 XBox 3,526,750 XBox 360 3,195,500 Nintendo DS 2,754,000 Gamecube 2,634,500 Dreamcast 2,168,500 Japan 26 week total: Gameboy Advance 3,338,750 PS2 2,911,750 Nintendo DS 2,330,250 PSP 1,566,750 N64 1,403,500 Gamecube 1,251,250 Dreamcast 744,000 XBox 261,250 XBox 360 145,000 Japan 52 week total: Gameboy Advance 5,310,000 PS2 3,867,750 Nintendo DS 3,764,750 PSP 2,336,500 N64 2,191,750 Gamecube 1,580,750 Dreamcast 1,296,000 XBox 378,000 XBox 360 195,500 Combined Totals Japan 26 week and North American 6 month Gameboy Advance 6,986,000 PS2 5,362,250 Nintendo DS 4,401,000 PSP 3,637,500 N64 3,881,000 Gamecube 2,903,500 Dreamcast 2,605,000 XBox 2,445,750 XBox 360 1,794,250 Combined Totals Japan 52 week and North American 12 months Gameboy Advance 12,992,500 PS2 8,511,250 PSP 6,732,750 Nintendo DS 6,518,750 N64 6,075,750 Gamecube 4,215,250 XBox 3,904,750 Dreamcast 3,464,500 XBox 360 3,391,000 Now, this certainly doesn't paint the complete picture (without data from the rest of the world there is a certain slant against certain platforms) but it become clear which platforms are going to be highly successful after about 6 months or a year ...

Well the GC was superior to the PS2 and still it sold like crap (and if you notice my signature you might se what I bought) so no power is not everything. If it was Xbox should have beaten PS2 and GC with tons of sales. We can't be 100% sure that Wii will win anything, but for the moment it has good press and it seems to get some more support. I wont say if we know if the Wii will drop of in one month from now. But we do now that 1, PS3 is selling crap in both USA and Japan now. 2, Xbox360 is selling decent in USA (beaten by the PS2 I can't say that it is selling great) 3, Wii is selling great in Japan and USA. Of course two month from now this might change, but from a devs point if you are going to start a new project point 3 is very intressting. Nothing indicates that Wii will drop of soon. Xbox360 is always a given choice because the good software sales. PS3 can always get a port, but honestly can you see 3rd party devs continue to support PS3 with exclusivs if it starting to sell more?

Uhm, being multi platform DOES add to the development costs overall, just not significantly usually. It mainly increases the potential income, in theory, but that's not always the case. Gundam Masou isn't multi platform, and looks unlikely to hit 500k for a long time worldwide. The multiplatform Virtua Fighter 5 will break 500k total sales worldwide eventually, but it's on the slow boat back to china in that regard. :) Armored Core 4, worldwide, and between 2 consoles doesn't look to hit 500k WW sales anytime soon from what we've seen of the sales.

A few points: PS1 never passed SNES in worldwide shipments until the N64 launched. In fact it had only shipped about 8 million units before N64 came out in Japan and NA. So Nintendo was absolutely still the norm at that time. Furthermore, the N64 never passed PS1 in total sales in any region, at all. ... Today, sales trends are set. We are fast approaching the 6 month mark, and Wii continues to sell-out, while PS3 sales slow down. Strangely, this is not playing out like DS vs. PSP or PS1 vs. N64, where the console which would ultimately win started out much slower. Instead, we're seeing Wii take off right away, with nothing to suggest its about to slow down. And we're seeing PS3 slow down as we speak.

The net result of the slow processor was they gave Sega a foothold in the market while weakening their own brand and destroying what had been a monopoly. The net result of carts was handing the market over to Sony, something which I'm not sure can ever be erased. We'll see if it works this time, but Nintendo's main concern isn't either sales or gameplay so much as profitability. Not a bad thing, but it's not likely the way to the top either. Agreed that Gamecube was the first attempt by Nintendo to compete technologically, and I think that's why we're seeing what we're seeing with Wii. It's not the PR spin that they give us. It's that nobody cares whether they have the technology or not, so they might as well not. That said, the improved technology with Gamecube did reverse the mass exodus of developers from the Nintendo camp... to an extent. Nintendo was still popular with the public and quickly passed Sony's sales in the US during the year after its launch (coming very close in total sales). However, developers had their minds set regardless of this, and they weren't budging just on the basis of a few strong months. The public eventually followed, after realizing that they weren't going to be able to get anything but Nintendo games on a Nintendo system.

I agree with you on this. Every company has its first concern on profitability. I don't think Nintendo is worried in being no1. All they want is making a (very) profitable console. That's why Wii doesn't have a $200 price right now. They could do it, if they wanted it that bad. On the contrary, Sony doesn't want to make just a game console because they are not only on the console market. They're on the HD market and they want to sell tv's, projectors and blu-ray. We have the «romantic» view of this business, but don't doubt that for most of them, it's not all about the games. And i think Nintendo has a better approach than Sony simply because they do need good games to survive. Sony can live of other electronic stuff.