I'm curious - what is the reasoning for those of you that are putting all 3 of Nintendo's "Big Three" together in the second half of the year? Putting them together in any single year is already a massive thing that a lot of people think isn't a good idea... putting them together all within a few months difference of each other seems insane, IMO.

As for those putting ANYTHING in the December timeframe, why on earth so late in the year AND after Black Friday? I can almost guarantee you'll NEVER see that happen, particularly with titles such as these.

Lastly, Roar of War, note every single Nintendo first-party "hardcore" game this generation. They've all pulled epic sales during their first week of sales. NSMBW, Mario Kart Wii, and Super Smash Bros. Brawl all well surpassed 2m first-week. And NONE of those catered as much toward gamers that front-load sales quite as much as Zelda Wii does. Frontloaded sales are always heavily caused by the "hardcore"-type gamers that preorder games in advance and wait for them to release. Zelda is the epitome of that sort of game for Nintendo. It WILL break 2m first-week, and it MAY set a record for Nintendo. Count on it.

Zelda Wii should definitely be last and for November IMO. SMG2 to be before Metroid Other M or vice versa.

Mario, Metroid and Zelda all released in the same year? That is big.

Releasing SMG 2 10 months after NSMBWii will not hurt the sales of SMG 2 nor will it cut off the legs of NSMBWii.  Both of these games are different experiences.  Plus, NSMBWii is an evergreen title (like Mario Kart or Wii Fit), while Galaxy 2 is not.  Customers see these as two very different types of games (like Mario Kart vs. Paper Mario-- very different games that happen to have the same character in it).

I originally thought Galaxy 2 would release in the Summer, but cosidering that Nintendo has opened a website up for Other M, I have rethought that position.  I currently think this:

Other M-- Summer, late July or August.  This will allow Nintendo to hype it up to the gamers that follow E3.

Galaxy 2-- September or October.  I think September will be more likely because I don't see Other M performing that well (2 million ltd will be lucky for this game) and Nintendo will need something to release to pick up the slack in the traditional gamer area.

Zelda-- November, perhaps on black friday in the US.    This, along with Wii Vitality, will be the big Christmas games for Nintendo.

That was less than the time difference between WSR, NSMBW, and WF+, as I recall, and all of those were and are and will be much bigger than any game named in this topic.

Zelda can easily break 2m first week. Twilight Princess was 1.1mil between the GC and Wii versions. If the game turns out well, I can't see it not being a big hit, and Zelda is probably as frontloaded as it gets, anyway.

As for releasing all three within a small window, why not? Metroid Other M is actually not a very big game (it won't move hardware, and its sales won't be high), while SMG2 is merely a sequel to a game already released this gen. If we see a hardware bump, it won't be big. Zelda Wii, on the other hand, is the first Zelda truly built up for the Wii, so this is more important.

People seem to be in disbelief as these are all highly anticipated core Nintendo games, however this is generally how their releases operate. Look back to the bombs dropped earlier in the gen - in the U.S., we got Mario Galaxy in Nov, Smash Bros in March, Mario Kart in April, and Wii Fit in May. In America, all of these were the best sellers of their time, only eventually topped in sales by the other trifecta late 2009, of WSR in July, WF+ and NSMBWii in November.

The first round was definitely bigger for hardware pushers, though - within 6 months, we saw the first 3D Mario, Smash, Mario Kart, and Wii Fit. This will probably never be topped.

It's time for another. My guess?
Metroid Other M: July
Super Mario Galaxy 2: September (room for Zelda)
Wii Vitality Sensor: Oct-November
Zelda Wii: November (required time to finish the game)

It just may happen... this round more set on capturing the traditional core.

Negative.

WSR came out in June.

WF+ was released in October.

NSMBW became available in November.

Additionally, all of those are extremely casual-friendly games that cater to the millions and millions more casual gamers there are than the "hardcore" crowd. They won't be hurt anywhere near as much by close releases because they depend incredibly more on legs and less on the release-window sales.

While SMG2 and Zelda Wii will be capable of long-legs, all three titles are still much more frontloaded than the titles you just listed.

They still all came within six months of each other, which was the point.

Yes, they're not as front-loaded, but the Big 3 of last year sold better and faster than the games mentioned in this topic will.

Yeah, but within six months and within three or four months are two entirely different things.

Those games were spread out more, and were ones that didn't have to worry as much about overcrowding.

These ones are the very type that need to worry about overcrowding the most. You can't group them so close to each other and expect them to do well.

None of these three will appear before the E3 games occupy the media promotion ..... ...... if all three games out this would be a massive success selling season much more than that Smg - SSBB - MKwii