As Nintendo's Wii continues to dominate the next-gen video game console war, their competitors continue to downplay the Wii's success. In an interview with video game site Gamasutra, Aaron Greenburg, director of product management for Xbox 360 and Xbox Live, comments that casual gamers on the Wii will soon "graduate" to the Xbox 360 experience.
"...there's a difference in the type of customer that is buying the Wii. When you think about it, there's a difference trying to be the number one console with nine year old gamers, and being the console that offers the most experience from 13 to 33.
Everyone says that eventually the novelty will wear off, right? ...[The Wii] is like something they break out when people come over, and it's maybe a fun thing, but it's almost like the same people that buy a karaoke machine, you know? They're not really buying it for games, they're just buying it as a novelty."
Wow, Mr. Greenburg. Way to insult generations of gamers who own a Wii.
To say that the Wii is aiming to be the number one console with "nine year old gamers" is just an ignorant statement and degrading to more mature gamers that also own a Wii. Maybe Mr. Greenburg made these comments to downplay the success of the Wii for the past two years. Before and after it's release in November 2006, many critics remarked how the console was gimmicky and soon the novelty would wear off. Let's take a look at a sales chart from this past January to May provided by local market watcher NPD:
The numbers speak for themselves. The Wii out sold the PS3 and Xbox 360 combined with around 675,000 consoles sold in May. Wii's are still being back ordered almost two years after its release. Is this a fad? Some analysts don't think so.
David Cole, analyst at DFC Intelligence, reported that the Wii "does not appear to be a fad and it has the chance to be one of the best selling systems of all-time." Pretty bold statement, but again, the numbers don't lie. This is definitely getting Microsoft and Sony's panties in a wad, who have been predicting the Wii's eventual lost interest since day one. The thing is, Nintendo has cracked into a bold, new market with its Wii, and interest will only grow.
The Wii introduced video games to the more casual market, ushering the popularity of the "casual gamer," or the gamer who plays video games more as a recreational past time, usually playing games in a shorter time period than hardcore gamers. Gone are the days that only nerdy fanboys were the only ones enjoying themselves. Now our girlfriends, parents, and grandparents are joining the fray. This whole new demographic is being introduced to the video game industry and their interest will only grow. Think about when you started playing video games. More than likely it involved mostly sprites and simple games. Now look how your interest in video games has grown from simple platformers/shooters to complex mechanics and novel-like story lines. I'm not saying your grandma is going to want to bust a cap in some aliens in a first-person shooter soon (although it would be awesome), but a whole new world is opening up for many people.
I personally own both the Wii and Xbox 360 and I will admit, most of the time the Wii is pulled out when I've got friends over. This is something Nintendo has excelled at for the past decade, the "party game" genre, or playing with several people in a room together. From Mario Party to Smash Bros., they know how to bring people together. But their online presence is non-existent compared to Xbox Live. If I want to play with friends across the nation, there's no other service that provides the awesome quality and care in its online community. Also, no one can deny the awesome graphical power that both the Xbox 360 and PS3 hold. But graphics aren't everything.
Nintendo has been innovating the video game world for years. It was the first company to fully jump in the 3D world, it introduced the rumble feature to controllers, has been dominating the hand-held market for years, and after each new innovation, its competitors have fallen suit. Now Nintendo has reinvented the way we play video games with the Wii remote, sending shock waves through the industry. Mark my words- Microsoft and Sony will incorporate the same technology in their systems at some point in the future.
No, Mr. Greenburg, you've got it all wrong. The Wii is not a novelty, it's the future of gaming.
4 comments:
Of course they'd try to downplay the Wii's success.
I find it funny that Microsoft does not considering Wii as competition because, as he says, they cover different markets and its real competitor is the PS3. It some ways it's true- they are battling for second place.
When was the Wii introduced? Do you have a graph of sales before 2008? i personally agree that the wii is a fad. I distinctly remember talking with a bunch of friends over the span of a year or so: we all agreed not to get one. For the longest time, no one i knew had one or liked them (or the idea) very much. All of a sudden though, the wii was everywhere. the easiest way to tell if its a fad is to see if sales dip down to where they were pre-mid 2007.
The Wii was released on September 14, 2006, and has been having shortages since then up until about April of this year. I don't agree that the Wii is fad because it's been selling out ever since its release and it doesn't look like it's going to slow down soon. Nintendo did not expect the huge popularity of the system and have been working very hard to keep up with the orders, but even then, many stores have sold out.
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