Umm.. I don't see it that way. For me MS/Sony = gaming and nintendo is irrelevant.

You're confusing "games I like" with "gaming" as a concept. But as a concept anyway, no company actually is gaming. They just make games.

LordTheNightKnight said: You're confusing "games I like" with "gaming" as a concept. But as a concept anyway, no company actually is gaming. They just make games.

I am not confusing anything. As I said "FOR ME". One company does not make any interesting games and the other companies do make them. It is not that hard to see which companies are about gaming "FOR ME".

Gaming in the way the OP presented it is not a subjective thing, so you are still wrong to declare it that way for you, just as the OP is wrong to declare it another way.

Gaming is about video games period.

Funny thing is with the amount of losses they have sustained over the last few years Sony and Microsoft have actually invested a lot more into gaming than Nintendo...

Ail said: Funny thing is with the amount of losses they have sustained over the last few years Sony and Microsoft have actually invested a lot more into gaming than Nintendo...

Selling at a loss is not investing into gaming. R&D is investing into gaming. In that case, all three companies have invested a lot (Nintendo is making a new facility for R&D after all).

Sony and Microsoft do care about gaming, however they look at it from a different perspective than Nintendo. They have invested a lot on their consoles, fight for exclusive games of game content, because of their interest. It's foolish to consider the opposite.

The real difference comes in their perspective towards gaming. Sony and Microsoft relied too much on technology to deliver a gaming experience and there are reasons to applaud them for that. However, the new consoles offer other nongaming related things making them more of a media hub for different services, and games is one of them. This does not mean that it's not relevant, on the contrary, gaming is their door to customers to offer them other services (Blue Ray Capabilities, media streaming, Netflix, online community, you name it). Their investment in gaming relies on raw power, leaving the games, the software, the experience, to developers.

Nintendo on the other hand is a gaming only company, videogames is their central core and all services and investments revolve around this. This is why the DS and Wii are so different from what we expect of a system, because the focus is gaming experiences only, to give them something new and fresh to as many people as possible. They cannot provide the non-gaming services Sony and Microsoft do on their respective consoles, and this is why they didn't go the HD route. They focus on games for everyone and they should be applauded for that.

 

@the_bloodwalker: Indeed "gaming is their door to customers to offer them other services" and that's what the OP wants to say.

And the reason why Wii isn't in HD is, that they wanted to differentiate and create a platform that's cheap to develop for. That's also the philosophy behind DS.

bdbdbd said: @the_bloodwalker: Indeed "gaming is their door to customers to offer them other services" and that's what the OP wants to say. And the reason why Wii isn't in HD is, that they wanted to differentiate and create a platform that's cheap to develop for. That's also the philosophy behind DS.

I see their strategy working. A lot of cheap games showing up on both wii and ds!

WereKitten said: @theRepublic Thanks for finding the presentation, I was wondering about this "shrinking market" idea.

No problem.

Yeah, I would like to see how the numbers for this generation look.I wouldn't call it shrinking, but looking at it like this I would call it somewhat stagnant.  When the population stops growing, so will video games if it continues like this.  That is a long term concern though, and possibly really really long term.  I think you are right, in that it definitely means there is a bigger potential market, which is probably why Nintendo went the direction they did with the Wii and DS.No clue on methodology.  It would be nice to have.I think a lot of the growth that video games have seen has been in the expansion to new markets.  Nintendo's main focus was Japan and the US during the NES and SNES.  Sony did a lot to popularize consoles in Europe with the PS1 and PS2.  I'm sure in the future there is a lot of growth to be had in South America and Asia.  On the other hand, it is both interesting and useful to see the historical progression of an established market like the US.