@ckmlb

Ive got to ask, why are 'casual' and 1st party games touted off as unimportant to your argument? !st party games aren't magically pulled out of Nintendo's ass and sell like crazy just because a hardly visible red logo is on the box art. 'Core' 1st party games sell because of brand name, and the positive relation with that name. If Zelda was as close as the best gaming franchise ever (in terms of quality), it would't sell millions.

People are afraid of the unknown. Thats why familiar and cheap products sell. If a cheap game is poor, then the personal investment (like $20) isn't as massive loss. EA sent out Dead Space Ex to sink like a rock. Its not a reflection of the Wiis user base, its poor management.

"Ive got to ask, why are 'casual' and 1st party games touted off as unimportant to your argument?"

Because "Nintendo can't get third party support" has been a way to put down their home systems for the past 3 generations, and was even done to the DS until that picked up.

What is a good sellin game, on Wii, or on PS360? As you said yourself, dev costs are more affordable on Wii, but that doesn't tell us anything...

The 1st party games like Mario Galaxy and Twilight Princess are expensive AAA games in the same way as most higher-end PS360 games, and so will need two millions sales to get in the profit zone, just as the "average" PS3-X360-PC release... while the most expensive games on HD consoles, like GTA4, CoD MW or FFXIII, will need even more to make profits, and would be a flop with only three million sales...

Now, with the 3rd parties on Wii: i think that success may begin as low as 100k-200k for some cool but low-budget releases... the scale here is very different from one game to another, and devs don't give us any numbers when it comes to dev costs... but as i've played many Wii games, all i may tell you is that most 3rd parties efforts didn't need 1 million sales, and even less 1.5 million...

Companies aren't against making profits, as you've said: but they sometimes are against risky business, and you may view most 3rd parties efforts on Wii as "cheap" efforts with very limited risks, to test the market... i think the most expensive 3rd party game after three years is STILL Red Steel (the first)... with maybe Monster Hunter 3, Rabbids Go Home and Crystal Bearers in the same league... those needed or will need between 500k and 1 million sales...

The next "really expensive efforts" will be... Epic Mickey, and Red Steel (the second)... those are REAL expensive games, and will maybe even need 1.5 million or 2 million sales... just like the best AAA Nintendo games... but they are the ONLY examples so far... after three years...

No More Heroes, the Conduit, Mad World, HotD Overkill? I'd say 250k-500k needed... Boom Blox, De Blob, Little King Story, Muramasa, Zack and Wiki, Tales of Symphonia: same league, maybe in the lower end... and last gen ports like RE4, Okami, Klonoa: even less...

Now, it's true that this "risk-averse" strategy is due to the fact that it ain't easy to port the PC-PS3-X360 games on Wii... Capcom just announced that their top engine will now run on Wii, and that their multiplatform games will cost from 20% to 30% less... but it's three years after launch, and Wii had to be the market leader, especially in Japan, to be taken seriously... finally, i could add...

But that's on the japanese scene: in the West, most devs won't take the time, won't take the risks, because they have put Wii in a "casual niche" of its own: puzzles, sports and physical activities, music games, kids and family games...

For all the rest, for all the other "genres", the userbase found on PS360 and on PC is indeed larger than the "Wii userbase only"... so unless they go the "multiplatform route", including Wii as well, they won't do any real AAA EXCLUSIVE effort on Wii, with a game really designed to use the console at its best... which is a shame, as that's what we expected when Wii was released: originality and creativity...

It's sad, and you have to think that all of us, "core Wii gamers", are the first to know the situation, and to have to deal with it...

Now, in 2010, things seem finally a little bit brighter: as i've already posted before in this thread, our "want list" for 2010 is finally a REALLY good looking one... but for three years, yes, it hasn't been a permanently HUGE line-up, especially for such a successful console...

Once again, it's a shame, but in the same time, it's EVERYONE'S FAULT...

Nintendo didn't take any risk with the costs of the hardware, as they weren't sure that the Wii would be a success... 3rd parties didn't take any risks, because of the same thing, and have invested all their money on PS360 projects... and "core Nintendo gamers" as well as new "mass market gamers" didn't take any risks with the games they've purchased: the Nintendo games offer a kind of "guaranteed quality", and are quite a logical priority for most of the Wii owners... especially when you sometimes purchase poor efforts, and don't want to waste your money ever again...

"You can fool some people some time, but you can't fool all the people all the time": remember that song? I wish all the people who've released shovelware or poor efforts or "just average" efforts on Wii could remember this as well... and could stop blaming Wii owners, for once...

'Adding on to that post, Nintendo has promoted third party games in the west before, for example Professor Layton.'.

Erm, Nintendo PUBLISHED Prof Layton in NA.

Are you saying Nintendo are going to publish MH3 in the west?

Why would they try to buy MH3 with advertising in the region it will release in way later, and almost certainly sell less in? More likely Nintendo is doing this to build a better relationship with Capcom by trying to expand a series that clearly has sales potential. Small risk for a large gain in inter-company politics that have not always been the best.

In other words, they are buying future games.

I wouldn't be that surprised if Nintendo is beginning to do similar things to encourage quality third party support this generation that they did in the previous generation, potentially with better long term results. If Nintendo gives Monster Hunter a moderately large marketing campaign, and "loans" Capcom an IP for them to make a high quality exclusive game, in exchange for two more high quality exclusive games released it is a good move for Nintendo all around; and if Nintendo does this will multiple publishers (Capcom, Namco, Tecmo, Sega, ect.) and they all take advantage of the opportunity Nintendo could end up with several big "Nintendo" games in a year, along with many more big third party releases.

The unfortunate thing is that Nintendo should have never stopped this strategy ...

The whole argument was about the performance of 3rd party core games that's what I said in the beginning and people argued that I wasn't looking at the whole picture, I never said 1st party or casual games aren't selling.

The back and forth was about 3rd party core games which this game is an example of hence why I mentioned the performance of 3rd party core games which, by the way, the game developer himself was pointing out: the market for 3rd party games on Wii... I'm sure he meant games such as Final Fantasy and not games targeted at the casual audience then people are arguing with me that third party is doing great even though there are few 3rd party core games that have sold a million copies on a system with a 55 million user base.

Square Enix: Of course we would love to succeed, but seeing the current Wii market, it will be no easy feat.

That's straight from the developers' mouth and I'm just pointing out why a big developer like SE would call an FF game selling not an easy feat.

Seriously, Square Enix?

Let's just recall all the games SE has so far released for the Wii. Not even 1 high budget release. All spin-offs, low budget, casual titles. Instead, they solely focus on HD development (and mainly on the 360 OMG), barely having profits even with the DS cashcow and the endless software they release on it.

And if the Wii market is so damn casual, how come SMG, Zelda and SSBB have sold millions upon millions? Do you actually think they'd get into games like that? There are millions of both hardcores and core gamers owning a Wii system waiting for a AAA game to purchase, be it a Nintendo or a third party one.

And guess what? Third parties have so far released only 1 such game, of fine quality and what the market wants, and it sold over a million and became the best selling third party console game this gen. Not even MGS4 did that. The market is there. It's just that 3rd parties don't have the balls to explore it.

I didn't look at every post in this thread, but has it been brought up that Dragon Quest: Swords sold over 500k in Japan? That really should end the debate about whether spinoffs of high quality Square Enix series can sell well in Japan.

you cant blame the market. There is clearly a market on wii for lightgun zombie shooters. the trouble was EA didnt hit it or didnt have the right brand