Wii will rock you: How Nintendo's Wii is beating out Sony and Microsoft

[tongue_of_colicab]

Well I don't know..

Last time I played Red Steel my arm got pretty tired.. (maybe it's because I have long arms.. )

No but I guess it's not as strenuous as i'm making it out, but it's still not the most convenient solution when you've spent the entire day programming and testing camera based games (which require you to stand in front of your desk waving your arms about alot), you get home late and can't even be bothered to get up out of your chair to eat let alone stand up to wave your arms about some more (a la Wii)..

I dont know how you play RS but I never did any more than moving my wrist while my arm was on the couch, lots more relaxed than playing fps with a normal controller.

But I suppose your right too. Than again if after waving your arms all day your to tired to move your wrist, arnt you to tired to sit in a forced position with your hands pressing lots of buttons too? I doubt there is alot of differance in energy spent. But I do understand your point of sometimes not wanting to move though I personally think playing games is pretty intensive anyway so I can never bother to play a game if im tired anyway.

 

[Phil]

People always claim they have to use lots of movement on the Wii, yet they never bother to point out how effortless it can be to do the same motion with a quick flick of your wrist. You have to make outrageous motion for the Wii mote to work. You don't have to know how to pitch/hit a baseball like a pro to play Wii sports. Even Wii Boxing doesn't really require much effort if you don't know to flail at the TV screen like a madman.

No, I did get that, and I'm sure I even mentioned that in one of my previous posts. Even if you're just flicking your wrist for the right movement, it's a lot less convinient, possibly a lot less accurate and more tiring than using buttons - and it's not very immersive either, which is arguably the strong point of the Wii controller in the first place. So, if you're just going to use the Wii controller in a minimalist way by using the least amount of effort/strength by flicking your wrist to play the game - why have a Wii-Controller over a traditional controller that would make even more easier in the first place?

 

[Nesh]

While it's not a substitute for the real thing, it at least does some stuff like the real thing. I got his point, but if you're not interested in movement, you don't buy a Wii, it's that simple.

But that doesn't necessarily make the experience more convincing or more believable. If the atmosphere, and presentation of the game is very unconvincing and fake it wont make the experience any more believable or immersing.

Sound and vision after some point are more important factors. And the more used to people are getting to better AI, sound, physics and visual detail the more these will stand out in games that lack in these aspects.

I remember many years ago when I played Virtual Reality games for the first time (during the 32 bit era). No console game could offer a similar experience. I wore a helmet and held a virtual gun in my hand. If I raised my hand with the controller that was supposed to represent a gun in front of the helmet I would have seen my gun in the the screen. I could aim just like the stick too. But it was extremely unconvincing and less immersing than any good FPS out there on PC or consoles of the time. It looked terrible, sounded terrible, the animation of the bots was terrible. The ability to move, see wherever you wanted, aim like a real gun didnt imporve the experience. TimeCrisis was much more enjoyable than that. Wii is similar although its much more fun and not that bad looking.

Its fun, different but not better.

 

[tongue_of_colicab]

Defenitly not worse either as you try to put it.

 

[_xxx_]

So, if you're just going to use the Wii controller in a minimalist way by using the least amount of effort/strength by flicking your wrist to play the game - why have a Wii-Controller over a traditional controller that would make even more easier in the first place?

There are loads of actions which are just a simple movement with the Wii controller for which you'd need a 3-4 button presses/combos on a normal pad.

But that doesn't necessarily make the experience more convincing or more believable. If the atmosphere, and presentation of the game is very unconvincing and fake it wont make the experience any more believable or immersing.

Not more belivable, just different. More immersing definitely, at least for me. And more fun.

 

[RancidLunchmeat]

Why can't people just give Nintendo some credit for coming out with something new and different? Rather then the repeating of "its a gimmick" comment? I have both ther Wii and the 360 and I love both consoles.

Which goes back to one of my original points which nobody has seemed able to answer.

Why is there all this talk about 'casuals' and 'grandmothers', when the majority of people who are currently responsible for the Wii's large sales figures are gamers.

The Wii has yet to hit the market that they are supposedly targeting, and yet poster after poster in this thread and others seem to infer from the target of Nintendo's advertising and their resulting sales figures, that somehow 'casual gamers' are flocking to this console.

I have yet to meet, converse with, or chat online with a single individual who has only a Wii.

Somebody who didn't own a PS2 or Xbox or 360 or PS3.

This console isn't currently available, and it's not cheap enough for casual gamers. And looking at current production figures, by the time the Wii is readily available, the 360 will be competing with it on price.

Its my opinion that supply is currently meeting demand. Which is why Nintendo is able to sell it for more its absurd price tag, and why there aren't any sitting on the shelves. But that isn't because it is hitting a new market. Its because the market of gamers is a huge market that hasn't been saturated yet.

When people who didn't own a PS2, Xbox, 360 or PS3 or are over the age of 60 are buying Wii's, then we can say that Nintendo's marketing campaign was successful and that the Wii has legs because the population size for Wii Consumers will now be larger than that of previous consoles.

Until that point, I see a console that is still being sold to gamers.

 

[Natoma]

Which goes back to one of my original points which nobody has seemed able to answer.

Why is there all this talk about 'casuals' and 'grandmothers', when the majority of people who are currently responsible for the Wii's large sales figures are gamers.

The Wii has yet to hit the market that they are supposedly targeting, and yet poster after poster in this thread and others seem to infer from the target of Nintendo's advertising and their resulting sales figures, that somehow 'casual gamers' are flocking to this console.

I have yet to meet, converse with, or chat online with a single individual who has only a Wii.

You should see the thread I started several months ago called Video games are not just for kids anymore.

Btw, I know several people who own a Wii and nothing else. And lastly, the sales figures should prove to you that the Wii is reaching more than gamers. No console in the history of videogaming has sold this many consoles this quickly from launch. Not even the PS2.

It can't just be the normal gaming market snatching up Wii's otherwise the sales would be tracking much lower than they are right now.

 

[Diamond.G]

You should see the thread I started several months ago called Video games are not just for kids anymore.

Btw, I know several people who own a Wii and nothing else. And lastly, the sales figures should prove to you that the Wii is reaching more than gamers. No console in the history of videogaming has sold this many consoles this quickly from launch. Not even the PS2.

It can't just be the normal gaming market snatching up Wii's otherwise the sales would be tracking much lower than they are right now.

Both of my co-workers have gotten or are getting wii's for their parents. No prior videogame system ownership on their part.

 

[Phil]

It can't just be the normal gaming market snatching up Wii's otherwise the sales would be tracking much lower than they are right now.

How can you be so sure? There's no evidence that the console is primarely bought by their own handheld userbase or people that are still waiting for the right timing to get a PS3 or Xbox360 (me included), unless you care to prove otherwise.

 

[Natoma]

Both of my co-workers have gotten or are getting wii's for their parents. No prior videogame system ownership on their part.

Yea I did the same for my mom with the DS Lite, tangentially. She say me playing it, had never been a gamer before in her life, and wanted one.

 

[Natoma]

How can you be so sure? There's no evidence that the console is primarely bought by their own handheld userbase or people that are still waiting for the right timing to get a PS3 or Xbox360 (me included), unless you care to prove otherwise.

I can be sure because Nintendo has had absurdly successful handhelds before, and their consoles didn't sell this well this quickly. The PS2 had a fanbase of over 100m from the PS1 generation, and it didn't sell this well this quickly. The SNES had a fanbase of over 60m from the NES generation and it didn't sell this well this quickly. Same with the PS3, the N64, the Saturn, etc.

There has to be another segment of the market that the Wii is reaching that has not been there before. It's the only way to explain them selling almost 8m consoles worldwide in just under 7 months since launch. Particularly considering the fact that historically console sales slow down during this time of year while the Wii's sales are accelerating.

Do I have any hard evidence for this? No. But it is the only logical explanation.

 

[Shifty Geezer]

Do I have any hard evidence for this? No. But it is the only logical explanation.

Though I agree with your reasoning, and that Wii is selling to more than existing gamers, I do think you've missed a possibility as evidenced by forum speak prior to Wii's launch. Wii could also be appealing to existing gamers in a way other consoles haven't because of the control method. That is, Wii's controller does not mutually exclude existing gamers from buying into the platform. Where PS1 > PS2 didn't see as fast adoption as Wii, at launch the PS2 was providing fundamentally the same experience as PS1. In Wii's case it's offering something different that people are keen to experience, and that can include existing gamers. Indeed, it's not hard to image many 'hardcore' gamers keen to try something new with gaming, having had button mashing and joystick waggling for a decade now. We had people here, keen gamers, saying they wanted Wii exactly for the novel experience.

Because of this, we can't point Wii's appeal squarely at new gamers. It could be 50% of Wii owners have never owned a console before, and the rest already have a PS2 or XB or GC or PS3 or XB360 and got a Wii. It could be 80% are new gamers, and 20% existing gamers, or 20% new gamers and 80% conventional gamers. We just don't know. The media reports tell us other people are taking to the machine, but don't give a ratio to existing gamers because they're not newsworthy. So like the busted XB360 fiasco, where we only hear those saying it's broken and never from those who say it works fine, we only hear about new gamers and never about existing gamers also buying into the platform. If for 6 million Wii gamers, 100,000 are grannies, that'll (possibly) be a much larger amount that conventional consoles, so would appear as a blip on the news radar. But it would still be quite an insignificant amount relative to the existing gaming market.

 

[tongue_of_colicab]

There has to be another segment of the market that the Wii is reaching that has not been there before. It's the only way to explain them selling almost 8m consoles worldwide in just under 7 months since launch. Particularly considering the fact that historically console sales slow down during this time of year while the Wii's sales are accelerating.

Do I have any hard evidence for this? No. But it is the only logical explanation.

Couldnt this be because of the price? I dont know know how the price of old consoles would compare to todays machines but I assume they also started fairly high priced unlike the Wii who started somewhat more mainsteam priced. OTOH GC started at 200? and that didnt sell to well either.

Or maybe its a combination of factors. Personally I think the majority of people who bought a Wii are gamers of wich a part probably jumped in early because of the price or the controller (combined with the price) and a relative small part of ''non gamers'' that buy it.

Atleast I got it a launch because of the price (and because of zelda and the controller, but the price is probably what made me get it right away). I havnt owned a console since the SNES because I couldnt afford a psx/n64 (was about 13) and last gen I was pc only.

 

[jandar]

Which goes back to one of my original points which nobody has seemed able to answer.

Why is there all this talk about 'casuals' and 'grandmothers', when the majority of people who are currently responsible for the Wii's large sales figures are gamers.

The Wii has yet to hit the market that they are supposedly targeting, and yet poster after poster in this thread and others seem to infer from the target of Nintendo's advertising and their resulting sales figures, that somehow 'casual gamers' are flocking to this console.

I have yet to meet, converse with, or chat online with a single individual who has only a Wii.

Somebody who didn't own a PS2 or Xbox or 360 or PS3.

This console isn't currently available, and it's not cheap enough for casual gamers. And looking at current production figures, by the time the Wii is readily available, the 360 will be competing with it on price.

Its my opinion that supply is currently meeting demand. Which is why Nintendo is able to sell it for more its absurd price tag, and why there aren't any sitting on the shelves. But that isn't because it is hitting a new market. Its because the market of gamers is a huge market that hasn't been saturated yet.

When people who didn't own a PS2, Xbox, 360 or PS3 or are over the age of 60 are buying Wii's, then we can say that Nintendo's marketing campaign was successful and that the Wii has legs because the population size for Wii Consumers will now be larger than that of previous consoles.

Until that point, I see a console that is still being sold to gamers.

I only have a Wii in the house, my PC is decent (2GBRAM, 1TB HDD space, X2 3800, x1600Pro, etc...), but I don't play games on that anymore (other than some old school stuff).

I sold my XBox when I got my Wii.
I bought the Xbox when I sold my GC.

So right now, I have a Wii, thats it. No other gaming system in the house.

I have been playing video/console games for almost 3 decades now, probably longer than most on this board have been alive.
At one time, I was top 10 consistently on Quake2 servers for average rankings.
I helped my friend build/balance test a UT Map that is still in rotation to this day on quite a few servers.

There is a massive shift to casual gaming, not everyone wants to learn 30 new button combinations to make something do something.
Not every gamer cares about graphics (massive shock to most on this board).

All I want: Games that are fun. If they look pretty and shiny, its a bonus. I care about the fun part first.

 

[Phil]

I can be sure because Nintendo has had absurdly successful handhelds before, and their consoles didn't sell this well this quickly. The PS2 had a fanbase of over 100m from the PS1 generation, and it didn't sell this well this quickly. The SNES had a fanbase of over 60m from the NES generation and it didn't sell this well this quickly. Same with the PS3, the N64, the Saturn, etc.

There has to be another segment of the market that the Wii is reaching that has not been there before. It's the only way to explain them selling almost 8m consoles worldwide in just under 7 months since launch. Particularly considering the fact that historically console sales slow down during this time of year while the Wii's sales are accelerating.

Do I have any hard evidence for this? No. But it is the only logical explanation.

Shifty already covered most of the things I would have said, so I'll just add to the point that you comparing the PS2 that launched at a rather high price without offering anything radical new over the PS1 doesn't say much in this case. The reason Wii is selling so well, is

a.) damn good price
b.) very fun and new experience
c.) it's offering something that won't be nearly as present on other consoles
d.) software that complements their new unique direction

I also have no doubt that Wii is also riding on the success wave of their earlier innovative, somewhat unique and special handheld: the DS. At the price, the unique experience, I see it not only targeting the PS2 & Xbox crowd that just can't resist at that price and what it's offering, but that they're also targeting their handheld userbase - which there are millions of. Just ask yourself how big the handheld market is Nintendo holds - then consider the prce of those products and the age group of them. How can the Wii not be even considered by them? I know enough of them to see that they are the ones most excited about Wii. After all, it's the next step to the DS, while not being a handheld device.

If anything, I think that's where the biggest market is. Is it being bought by people that don't own a PS2, Xbox or GameCube. Maybe by some - but I really doubt it's a large part.

 

[_xxx_]

I only have a Wii in the house, my PC is decent (2GBRAM, 1TB HDD space, X2 3800, x1600Pro, etc...), but I don't play games on that anymore (other than some old school stuff).

I sold my XBox when I got my Wii.
I bought the Xbox when I sold my GC.

So right now, I have a Wii, thats it. No other gaming system in the house.

I have been playing video/console games for almost 3 decades now, probably longer than most on this board have been alive.
At one time, I was top 10 consistently on Quake2 servers for average rankings.
I helped my friend build/balance test a UT Map that is still in rotation to this day on quite a few servers.

There is a massive shift to casual gaming, not everyone wants to learn 30 new button combinations to make something do something.
Not every gamer cares about graphics (massive shock to most on this board).

All I want: Games that are fun. If they look pretty and shiny, its a bonus. I care about the fun part first.

That's exactly how I feel about it too and the reason I bought Wii. Same situation here, comparable PC which I rarely used for gaming since about 1.5-2 years and not at all since I got my Wii.

So there is also some truth in stating that gamers bought Wii, I am a good example. I never would have bought a "normal" console since I can't stand gamepads for the life of me, so Wii was the logical choice. I love it for the simplicity.

Another reason why it sold well besides the price and the fun factor is also that it simply looks sexy and I don't mind putting it next to my TV. That was also not unimportant to me, I don't want my place to look geeky.


EDIT: I don't see the DS in any relation to Wii sales, I for one never even bothered looking at it. That's the today's gameboy to me, no interest at all.

 

[Natoma]

Though I agree with your reasoning, and that Wii is selling to more than existing gamers, I do think you've missed a possibility as evidenced by forum speak prior to Wii's launch. Wii could also be appealing to existing gamers in a way other consoles haven't because of the control method. That is, Wii's controller does not mutually exclude existing gamers from buying into the platform. Where PS1 > PS2 didn't see as fast adoption as Wii, at launch the PS2 was providing fundamentally the same experience as PS1. In Wii's case it's offering something different that people are keen to experience, and that can include existing gamers. Indeed, it's not hard to image many 'hardcore' gamers keen to try something new with gaming, having had button mashing and joystick waggling for a decade now. We had people here, keen gamers, saying they wanted Wii exactly for the novel experience.

Because of this, we can't point Wii's appeal squarely at new gamers. It could be 50% of Wii owners have never owned a console before, and the rest already have a PS2 or XB or GC or PS3 or XB360 and got a Wii. It could be 80% are new gamers, and 20% existing gamers, or 20% new gamers and 80% conventional gamers. We just don't know. The media reports tell us other people are taking to the machine, but don't give a ratio to existing gamers because they're not newsworthy. So like the busted XB360 fiasco, where we only hear those saying it's broken and never from those who say it works fine, we only hear about new gamers and never about existing gamers also buying into the platform. If for 6 million Wii gamers, 100,000 are grannies, that'll (possibly) be a much larger amount that conventional consoles, so would appear as a blip on the news radar. But it would still be quite an insignificant amount relative to the existing gaming market.

I would never argue otherwise. I'm just saying that if it were only selling to existing gamers, the console wouldn't track as well sales-wise as it has. Do we know what that ratio is? Nope, and unless Nintendo has some damn good demographic data, we'll never know.

But given the sales, I think we can strongly infer that a large portion of those Wii gamers (though I wouldn't go so far as to say a majority), are new gamers.

We're saying the same thing I think.

 

[Diamond.G]

Shifty already covered most of the things I would have said, so I'll just add to the point that you comparing the PS2 that launched at a rather high price without offering anything radical new over the PS1 doesn't say much in this case. The reason Wii is selling so well, is

a.) damn good price
b.) very fun and new experience
c.) it's offering something that won't be nearly as present on other consoles
d.) software that complements their new unique direction

Bolding mine

Um, in the US the PS2 was only $50 more expensive than the Wii, and to my knowledge sold like gangbusters (hard to find). But it was not able to carry that momentum through summer like the Wii seems to be doing thus far.

 

[Shifty Geezer]

But given the sales, I think we can strongly infer that a large portion of those Wii gamers (though I wouldn't go so far as to say a majority), are new gamers.

From the sales data alone, I don't think we can infer that. It shows a far greater appeal/uptake but doesn't clue us into demographics. The only way this would show non-gamers are taking to Wii in a big way is if we could say gamers aren't taking to Wii. Or if we could say that gamers would not be quick to buy into Wii hardware. In fact in that respect, one might even say there's more chance that the adoption is by existing gamers. They already have consoles and are likely to be quick to buy into a new, next-gen console to improve their game.

Let's use golf as an analogy (because it's not cars ). There's so many golf clubs sold per month. Now if a new, totally different golf set comes out that is being sold at 10x what any other club has ever sold, would you say it was selling to new players or existing players who appreciate it's appeal? In this example, a new club isn't going to attract new golfers. The hobby is the same and the hardware sells to hobbiests who already like golf but want a different club.

In Wii's case, is the console actually attracting a different set of people into the activity, or is it just popular amongst those who already appreciate the activity but are keen for something new? Is the hobbiest demographic changing or are the tools of the hobby appealing to the existing fans of that hobby? There's a 100 million PS2 owners out there - are they tired of analogue sticks and quick to get a new console that works differently? There's no real way of knowing. Best we can get are anecdotal stories giving some empirical reference as to a few, lots, some new gamers not interested before. We'd also need info on non-traditional demographic gamers too. eg. If we hear of octagenarians playing Wii, that implies an appeal beyond normal consoles, where for all we know there's quite a few octagenarian XB360ers too. We'd need comparative demographics.

It's a very difficult figure to try and estimate. It'll be far more apparent in a couple of years when the machine may be more widely adopted if it's reached a more mainstream group.

 

[Natoma]

Couldnt this be because of the price? I dont know know how the price of old consoles would compare to todays machines but I assume they also started fairly high priced unlike the Wii who started somewhat more mainsteam priced. OTOH GC started at 200? and that didnt sell to well either.

Or maybe its a combination of factors. Personally I think the majority of people who bought a Wii are gamers of wich a part probably jumped in early because of the price or the controller (combined with the price) and a relative small part of ''non gamers'' that buy it.

Atleast I got it a launch because of the price (and because of zelda and the controller, but the price is probably what made me get it right away). I havnt owned a console since the SNES because I couldnt afford a psx/n64 (was about 13) and last gen I was pc only.

Let's look at the launch price and inflation adjusted price of the generations since the Atari 2600 in the USA:

$199 (1977) --- $680 (2006): Atari 2600
$200 (1978) --- $642 (2006): Magnavox Odyssey 2
$299 (1980) --- $800 (2006): Mattel Intellivision
$199 (1982) --- $425 (2006): Milton Bradley Vectrex
$199 (1982) --- $425 (2006): ColecoVision
$330 (1982) --- $705 (2006): Atari 5200
$199 (1985) --- $372 (2006): NES
$140 (1986) --- $253 (2006): Atari 7800
$199 (1986) --- $359 (2006): Sega Master System
$190 (1989) --- $312 (2006): Sega Genesis
$249 (1989) --- $409 (2006): TurboGrafx-16
$649 (1990) --- $1,017 (2006): Neo Geo
$199 (1991) --- $296 (2006): Super NES
$250 (1993) --- $347 (2006): Atari Jaguar
$699 (1994) --- $941 (2006): 3DO
$399 (1995) --- $523 (2006): Sega Saturn
$299 (1995) --- $342 (2006): Sony PlayStation
$199 (1996) --- $254 (2006): Nintendo 64
$199 (1999) --- $239 (2006): Sega Dreamcast
$299 (2000) --- $350 (2006): Sony PlayStation 2
$199 (2001) --- $225 (2006): Nintendo GameCube
$299 (2001) --- $339 (2006): Microsoft Xbox
$399 (2005) --- $413 (2006): Microsoft Xbox 360 (Premium)
$299 (2005) --- $309 (2006): Microsoft Xbox 360 (Core)
$599 (2006) --- $599 (2006): Sony PlayStation 3
$250 (2006) --- $250 (2006): Nintendo Wii

The Super NES, Nintendo 64, Atari 7800, Sega Dreamcast, and Nintendo Gamecube are the only ones that are within $50 of the Wii's launch price, adjusted for inflation. The latter two were in fact cheaper than the Wii currently sells for, but they didn't do so well.

Granted this doesn't take into account price drops over the life of a console, so it's hard to draw conclusions with respect to overall sales. However I figure it's a good starting point.