Wi Fit PLUS, Wi Sports resort, another NEW SMB....Nintendo simply isnt taking risks when it comes to current Wii success.

As far as ninty introducing motion controls, yeah it was a risk entering this gen that way, but thats why the released Zelda on the gamecube as well in case it didnt catch on with the wii, which it obviously did. Also the wii launched with a standard control set to fall back on. Also why the wii probably didnt launch with 1:1 if it would have been too much money they werent sure if the wii would become a phenomenon thus not wanting to really no motion control right until nearly the 3rd year out. There was plenty of room for a more "riskier" ambitious wii launch, imo. Hindsight is always great though, and nintendo seemed to make the right decisions, but to say it was risky overall simply due to it being motion controlled isnt entirely accurate.

Nintendo made great business decisions, but that doesnt necessarily equate to risk in terms of ambition, pushing new things at the expense of the bottom line. Nintendo left itself room for plenty of outs, a good business decision, but it truly negates risk, imo.

Innovation doesnt necessarily equal risk. There is truth to Trettons statements and there is also falsehood due to the introduction of Wii itself.

However, lets be honest, the Wii launching with no DVD playback, with little upgrade in processing power of the gamecube and now the milking of Wi fits, another new SMB, and the release slate and or schedule......Ninty still relies on its 1st oarty to rally the troops, not really introducing new IP's, new characters to the family etc.

It needed saving??? From what??? 

Sales were better than ever... Gaming had become a completely main stream form of entertainment. It looked less likely to die than the movie industry... 

There's a difference between risks and risks.....

You said sales, but you didn't mention profits, profits are the lifeblood of companies, and companies like Sony and MS are bleeding money in the gaming market, notice the number of mergers going on, its a sign of a market in danger when the companies have to be massive in order to survive

Im not so sure i understand. Are you saying the Wii helped MSFT and Sonys bottomline or something? I havent researched, but it seems to me as this gen was berthing, there was a lot of software being sold from the same devs and publishers that are around now.......I dont ocmpletely understand your argument in terms of industry aid or profits as a whole...

Saved nintendo? I dunno, it helped grow nintendo, but nintendo didnt need its bottomline saved either. Care to ellaborate how the wii has really "saved" the industry? I think as a videogame industry it may have helped it grow with penetration in peoples homes, but those people arent buying Madworld or other games other than a lot of NINTY Ip's or maybe some shovelware like carnival games and the such.

The most remembered "games" of this gen will likely go down on other consoles regardless of the Wii.... IE, Assassins creed, Uncharted, Gears of War etc.

Most 3rd party games are going on 2-3 platforms at the exact same time... Playstation3, Xbox360 and often PC. Nintendo's most likely making more profit than ever but they're also having their best sales ever. I don't see what they're doing for any other company on the Wii. There doesn't seem to be that many companies putting any extensive effort on the Wii when compared to PS360/PC. So I really don't see how the Wii is helping to save anything but Nintendo themselves. It' hasn't made that big of an impact on the industry in general for me to say that it "saved it".

The DS doesn't seem to be doing drastically amazing enough to say it's really boosting the industry compared to the GBA. I will say that software sales on the DS is quite impressive though.

Very good points. Some of which I left out in my above post.

This actually exposes a weakness in the market, most companies need games to be on multiple systems to make a profit, and are releasing a lot of sequels and franchises that they know will sell, so in fact this shows the problem with ballooning costs.  The fact is, if they lose the ability to make multiplats and cheap ports between two or more systems most of these companies will be faced with even more staggering losses, and that time will come, in fact NATAL and the PS3 Wand are a sign of that change, you won't be able to easily port between those two.  Nintendo on the other hand has found a way to appeal to the market and keep costs down, their  games sell more than the competition in most cases, and yet cost less to make.

Now the issue with third parties on the Wii is due to the third parties themselves, they not only guessed wrong at the beginning of the generation, but they also don't know how to appeal to the Wii base, so most of their games flounder, a few of the wiser companies have found success and profit on the Wii.

No Wii didn't help Sony or MS, because Sony and MS have only hurt themselves, Nintendo has helped gaming, most of those games you consider well remembered aren't even well known outside of core gamers, Wii games are known by everyone.  A lot of those devs and Publishers have ended up merging this gen in order to survive.  And you yourself just admitted how its helped gaming, more penetration and more growth and the profits are there as well if other companies learn from Nintendo

What about the huge shift in software itself? In this generation, most titles move closer and closer to "blockbusters". Most of them implement popular aspects of different genres to appeal.

Most games nowadays contain shooting or RPG elements to appeal to the broader audience, the "hardcore". The "core" gamers on the contrary seem to flee the industry as there's nothing to interest them after gaming for 20 years or just growing old.

On the other hand, huge wave of "casuals" has entered the market with the Wii, them only interested in really mainstream IPs (like Mario, CoD, Sonic) or just casual titles, like Wii Fit, WSR and EA Sports Active.

In my opinion, the shift in software and consumer tastes has been very significant this gen. Casuals on one hand (through the Wii), and hardcore through the other (via HD) have squeezed the core gaming population out of the equation.