Alright I know the topic is going to drag tons of angry gamers into this thread but its a legitamet question. Before and during the Wii's launch Nintendo had a fantasy style view of the industry a view of a world that may no longer exist. What world am I talking about? THe world of games consoles, now stay with me a second. What world exactly am I refering too? The world of non-competition.

Back at TGS 2005. Iwata stated that Nintendo would not be competing with third parties on the Wii. He stated that Nintendo alone could push the Wii and that third parties didn't nescessarily need to jump on the bandwagon. This view seems to have changed as we see Nintendo triumphing huge sales of third party titles and bending over backwards to get third party support. Nintendo didn't origionally believe they needed or maybe even wanted third party support for the Wii.

Then jump foward half a year to E3 2006. Iwata and Miyamoto both came out with both barrels blazing. The Wii is a revolution in gaming and not a competitor with the PS3/360. I remember Iwata saying that Microsoft and Sony were no longer competitors that this was going to usher in a new way of thinking in the games industry. Sure Nintendo was right the Wii did usher in a new way of thinking when it comes to games. But does the magical land where Nintendo doesn't compete with Sony and Microsoft still exist.

I remember Peter Moore going into a press conferance for Microsoft back when he worked for X-Box. He incouraged 360 owners to buy a Wii. He talked extensively about how Microsoft and Nintendo were not competitors and encouraged gamers to pick up Wii's. To a lesser extent Iwata, Miyamoto and later Reggie all talked about buying 360's or owning multiple platforms. Just a little while ago in Reggies interview he said he plays all forms of entertainment regardless of platform and even through complements at his competitors products.

So the question is, does this world of peace and non-competition exist today?

If Microsoft's current president was asked whether 360 owners should buy a Wii on the side would he say yes go for it. Vice Versa if you went up to Iwata and asked him if you should buy Natal and a 360 would he jump up and say "We are not competing!"!

Is the era of non-competition over? As Natal and Sony's wand come to the market it seems Nintendo has no choice but to compete. No longer does Nintendo have the niche of revolution as Microsoft and Sony are trying to usher in revolutions of their own.

Also was the fairyland of non-competition ever really existant? I remember when I bought my 360 I went on the N-Sider forums and said I was so happy Nintendo had decided not to compete with Microsoft. Right aways tons of Nintendo fans called me a traitor and said that Nintendo was still competing. Did Nintendo ever stop competing to begin with?

Was this fairytail land ever existant? Were the PS3/360 and Wii really in a stage of Non-Competition or was it something all in Iwata's head?

I just wrote half an essay as a response and then remembered.. If you don't understand Nintendo's reasoning after 4 years then you aren't gonna start now.

Not competing isn't a "magical" thing. It's that they aren't trying to top the other guys, because they couldn't afford it. And the other systems losing around $3 billion each says that's very much a reality.

Nintendo was always competing. It was marketing dribble all that 'we're not in competition blah blah blah'. They just were so much better than the competition and offered something that was unique and different to anything that had gone before. But the competition always catches up. Its inevitable.

they are trying to make the other company feel worthless and not worth their time. describing them as 'not competition'

wasn't this obvious?

Nintendo will create new fresh markets. Their view is they're competing with everything that is entertainment, and not participating in some kind of back and forth battle. I'm sorry if you think it's marketing dribble, but it's the truth. Now that they're trying to fight Nintendo they'll firstly focus on creating new Blue Oceans, and then they'll either let the guys trip over themselves while they retain their turf just doing their thing or they'll eventually leave it for them to split it, a smaller version of it at that. It's not gonna be a direct competition so to speak.

You know what's a great analogy for Revolution? In the game of President, if you offer 4 cards of the same value, you create a Revolution. In it the values of all cards reverse. Weak becomes strong, and strong becomes weak. That's exactly what Nintendo did at E3 2006, and they're still playing that today.

You know, I'm far from claiming to know everything about what Nintendo is doing, but I suggest you learn a little more if you wanna keep posting topics of this kind. You're just coming off as a whiny negative nancy to me.

you do that in lost oddyssey too

It isn't that much of a fantasy land as it is harsh reality.

The post was good, but the premises were all wrong. "Non-competition" isn't literally about not competing, it's about creating new markets. Nintendos literal non-competition was over the day Twilight Princess came out.

The non-competition is Nintendos growth strategy, where they seek growth from overshot consumers and consumers who haven't been interested in videogames earlier. After getting a foothold on these markets, they take a step towards the core audience, where they intend to push the competition to a nice little niche and potentially pop them out of the market.

Considering 1st party games have been practically the only system sellers on Wii, Nintendo wasn't off at all saying they don't need 3rd parties. The 3rd parties do play their part in Nintendos strategy, if not in other ways, by making core games to compete games on the HD consoles.

There's also a term "secondary gamer", that is important to Nintendo. Nintendo wants the primary gamer to get the console to the house and get the secondary gamers to buy games for it, along with the primary gamer (someone bought the console for Wii Fit and some other in the family buys SMG, as an example).
Due to these secondary gamers (and how Wii differentiates itself), it's much less relevant for Nintendo if a competing console is in the same house with Wii, than the other way around.

They were always competiting with each other, as in the traditional meaning of the word, "fighting with each other".

What Iwata was talking about, is the blue ocean strategy. That is not about finding a new industry, a new market, and living in peace with the old market, but finding different VALUES instead of competiting OVER THE SAME VALUES.

An asymmetrical battle. It is still a battle, but not based on being better than the other one. It is being different than the other one, an destroying it this way.