Video Game Crashes and why Wii Saved the Day

Taken from N'Gai Croal's Newsweek blog is a very interesting linked article for the naysayers who say Nintendo is Dooming the Industry. http://dubiousquality.blogspot.com/2007/06/console-post-of-week.html

I usually talk about data in this post, but for once, let's use our imagination instead of numbers.

I think it's interesting to consider what this console market would look like, right now, if Nintendo hadn't created the Wii. Let's imagine that the Wii doesn't exist, and that Nintendo exited the console market after the Gamecube.

Is it possible that instead of all these magazine articles talking about how the gaming demographic is expanding rapidly, that instead we'd be seeing articles about the "great gaming crash?"

It's not unfair to argue that the 360 and the PS3 would have higher sales, to some degree, if the Wii didn't exist, but their price would still be an obstacle. Microsoft and Sony are doing everything they can to ignore the hard-wired fact that consoles are a $299 market. It doesn't matter if you include a microwave, a snowblower, and a Hemi--it's still a $299 market.

Take the Wii's seven million units in six months out of the console base, though, and you could make a serious argument that console gaming is floundering,

Sure, some people now say "Well, of course it's selling like crazy--it's $249!" In a word: bullshoot. None of those people were saying that before the console was released--almost everyone was questioning Nintendo's ability to survive in the console market.

So take out the Wii. Have a console at $399 and one at $599. Have them selling, combined, about 600,000 units worldwide in April. You know what the story would be? Next-Gen is dead.

It would be the end of days. Newsweek would have a magazine cover with 360's and PS3's being buried in the desert, along with Atari 2600 E.T. cartridges.

So for all these high-paid analysts who claim that the Wii succeeding is bad for the gaming industry, I say think again. Nintendo is saving everyone's ass until Microsoft and Sony stop kidding themselves and price their consoles for the mass market.

I'm sure that Nintendo would've gone 3rd party and both the 360 and PS3 would be doing much better.  Gaming wouldn't be dead... but it wouldn't be cheap, either.

I agree to some extent. You hear a lot on this board "I pay more than $300 for a console."

I'm one of those people...

Of course, gaming would be teh doomed without Nintendo right now.  :roll:Teufelhuhn

You act like you knew this from the start, but I bet you anything you doubted the Wii since its unveiling.

if the wii wasn't around i'd be just a pc and ds gamer.

and i think the industry would because niche rather than becausing more popular. 

If Nintendo exited the hardware biz, does that mean all the Nintendo fans would stop playing games? Of course not. He acts like a lot of them wouldn't have migrated over to a new platform.Sooshy

he doesnt say anyone would stop playing games. He says Microsoft and Sony have no comprehension of the market basically and would price it into the crash

[QUOTE="Teufelhuhn"]Of course, gaming would be teh doomed without Nintendo right now. :roll:Ganon_919

You act like you knew this from the start, but I bet you anything you doubted the Wii since its unveiling.

Of course, gaming would be teh doomed without Nintendo right now. Teufelhuhn

Exactly. 

[QUOTE="Ganon_919"]

[QUOTE="Teufelhuhn"]Of course, gaming would be teh doomed without Nintendo right now. :roll:Teufelhuhn

You act like you knew this from the start, but I bet you anything you doubted the Wii since its unveiling.

Eh.. sarcasm... I'm not the best at detecting it in forums :oops:

If Nintendo exited the hardware biz, does that mean all the Nintendo fans would stop playing games? Of course not. He acts like a lot of them wouldn't have migrated over to a new platform.Sooshy

Yeah, like the hedgehogs. The Dreamcast failed, so they all turned into sheep, because Sonic was going to the Gamecube. 

Huh? What are you talking about? I'm not acting like I knew anything. I'm severely doubting the theory that the industry would be "doomed" without the Wii.
Teufelhuhn

It would certainly be in far worse shape, and it would become even more niche.  Your personal opinions on the importance of "high definition" do not change the fact that it is Nintendo bringing in new people, not Sony or Microsoft. 

                Nothing could be further from the truth; the Wii may end up in the same place as all those E.T. cartriges made for the Atari 2600.

               Bang, Boom & CRASH - you know, IMHO ;)

The new expanded market nintendo is creating cares not for games the gamming comunity does, like the champions Halo, MGS, FF, Zelda. 

Most people aren't into games because they find it hard or frustrating.

And among the people that do like games, they have very specific tastes, like, some only play stunning looking games, some only action/fast paced games, some more strategic games othes more story driven ones, etc...

So what would be the profiles of this new market Wii/Ds is creating? Will games made for these profiles appeal to the 'hardcore' gamers?

It certainly is good for developers, more users means more profit, but like any other media, content that is made for catering mainstream and the biggest possible userbase, more than often suffers with lack of quality. It will certainly be a problem to me if they start diverting funds from 'real' games to develop money milking, less challenging, mass appealing ones. 

The gaming world depends on sony not nintendo....AgentA-Mi6

whatever makes ya sleep at night. if Nintendo left the hardware buisness Sony would have a heartattack. where would they copy ideas from then.

[QUOTE="AgentA-Mi6"]The gaming world depends on sony not nintendo....alecsuba

whatever makes ya sleep at night. if Nintendo left the hardware buisness Sony would have a heartattack. where would they copy ideas from then.

Did Nintendo not save the industry back in the 80's after the Atari crash? Geez, how many times can one company save a industry?jbeen

As often as when the other companies forget what the industry is about and put it into bad positions :-p price wise Sony and Microsoft both chopped thier legs fof at the knee. The market has since the dawn of the market not acceptedprices above a certain point. every attempt has led to failure.

This time 2/3 of the companies opted to go above the accepteable price range. If they were the only 2 sure hardcore gamers owuld still buy it but as shown they lost lots of potential casual sales.

On a side note the reason they say crash is cause it would have a snowball effect. Only poorly selling consoles on the market with huge budgets needed for games would cause many development houses to shutter up the windows and post gone out of buisness signs.

As development studios found themselves facing doom and closing down it would ripple effect and hurt the console sales even more. Theres a reason why gaming until nows always been a fairly cheap and fun hobby. Its what works and what drives the market

The gaming industry does not need a savior.
It was already expanding at an amazing rate, the Wii only increased the speed.

The gaming industry does not need a savior.
It was already expanding at an amazing rate, the Wii only increased the speed.

zombiepigeon

no. the industry expanded at an amazing rate. but this gen it would not have been close to the rate that the ps2 set. they would have shrunk a lot. the wii is the only console able to match and top the ps2 rate when it came out.  

If Nintendo exited the hardware biz, does that mean all the Nintendo fans would stop playing games? Of course not. He acts like a lot of them wouldn't have migrated over to a new platform.Sooshy

No he says that SOME would. Not all though. And he is right. MANY buy the Wii BECAUSE it's cheap. And if the people who buy it because of the cheap price drop from the market the "Next Gen" consoles would be selling less than the PS2. If it wasn't for the Wii i would've finally caved in and gotten a PS2(!!!). So without the Wii the "Next Gen" market would be selling average.  Which then again would be media hyped into "dead".

So i guess he's got some points. 

[QUOTE="zombiepigeon"]

The gaming industry does not need a savior.
It was already expanding at an amazing rate, the Wii only increased the speed.

Ontain

no. the industry expanded at an amazing rate. but this gen it would not have been close to the rate that the ps2 set. they would have shrunk a lot. the wii is the only console able to match and top the ps2 rate when it came out.

[QUOTE="zombiepigeon"]

The gaming industry does not need a savior.
It was already expanding at an amazing rate, the Wii only increased the speed.

Ontain

no. the industry expanded at an amazing rate. but this gen it would not have been close to the rate that the ps2 set. they would have shrunk a lot. the wii is the only console able to match and top the ps2 rate when it came out.

[QUOTE="Ontain"][QUOTE="zombiepigeon"]

The gaming industry does not need a savior.
It was already expanding at an amazing rate, the Wii only increased the speed.

Ibacai

no. the industry expanded at an amazing rate. but this gen it would not have been close to the rate that the ps2 set. they would have shrunk a lot. the wii is the only console able to match and top the ps2 rate when it came out.

savior is too strong a word for now. but it's certainly helping the industry stay in the public eye more than the other two consoles right now. as for expanding and not losing money. that changed near the end of the last gen. publishers started losing money. and even now there are a lot of pubs that are losing money. in fact many are getting on the wii wagon because that's where the money is.

To be fair nobody knows what would have happened if the Wii had never been released. Sales for 360 and PS3 might have been low, they might not have. They might have increased past PS2 levels, they might not have.
Teufelhuhn

anything is possible. but what is likely? i don't think most ppl would truely believe after what we've seen so far that the 360 or the ps3 would be beating the ps2's rate at this point in time if the wii didn't come out. 

This thread is...odd. If I remember correctly, the last console generation had over 150 MILLION console sales, one of those consoles still sells moderately well today. I don't see how the gaming world needed "saving" from anything, other than an overload of awesomeness. :D And I also think Sony, with the vast majority of the sales the last 2 generations, can claim to have done as much as anyone to "save" gaming, surely.ViscaBarcaInter

no one is talking about the industry needing saving LAST gen. we're talking about what would have happened to the industry if the wii wasn't around this gen. would  the industry have shrunk. it's almost certainly so. now that in itself doesn't mean the industry needed saving. but the wii is definitely keeping this gen from slipping below what was last gen. 

This thread is...odd. If I remember correctly, the last console generation had over 150 MILLION console sales, one of those consoles still sells moderately well today. I don't see how the gaming world needed "saving" from anything, other than an overload of awesomeness. :D And I also think Sony, with the vast majority of the sales the last 2 generations, can claim to have done as much as anyone to "save" gaming, surely.ViscaBarcaInter

The article has nothing to do with the previous generations. Its all about the fact that on their own the PS3 and 360 would have a drastic effect of shrinking the market this generation and potentially forcing developers into bankruptcy etc.

It doesnt matter how good you were the prior generation if you screw it up in the current.

Yeah the industry was in serious trouble without the Wii, hence the 120 million PS2 sales. :|Vyse_The_Daring

NPD,media create etc say only 80 million real sales while rest shipped but either way read the article. previous gen does not apply

The new expanded market nintendo is creating cares not for games the gamming comunity does, like the champions Halo, MGS, FF, Zelda. 

Most people aren't into games because they find it hard or frustrating.

And among the people that do like games, they have very specific tastes, like, some only play stunning looking games, some only action/fast paced games, some more strategic games othes more story driven ones, etc...

So what would be the profiles of this new market Wii/Ds is creating? Will games made for these profiles appeal to the 'hardcore' gamers?

It certainly is good for developers, more users means more profit, but like any other media, content that is made for catering mainstream and the biggest possible userbase, more than often suffers with lack of quality. It will certainly be a problem to me if they start diverting funds from 'real' games to develop money milking, less challenging, mass appealing ones. 

lordxymor

This has already started happening. 50 Cent Bulletproof for example.

What a lot of people fail to realize here, is that the hardcore market ain't squat compared to the casual consumer.  That is where these $400 and $600 dollars machines are failing.  It's just too high for the everyday shopper to say "this is something i would like to have".  It's an investment in your living room.  The Wii is techinacally "saving" gaming right now.  The Wii has the love of the mainsteam, like the 2600, NES, and PS2 before it.

Cheap, easy, fun, and afordable.  That's what the consumer truly want because they vote that way with their dollars everytime. 

[QUOTE="Vyse_The_Daring"]Yeah the industry was in serious trouble without the Wii, hence the 120 million PS2 sales. :|alecsuba

NPD,media create etc say only 80 million real sales while rest shipped but either way read the article. previous gen does not apply

The only thing real about this article is the Wii's sales. Of course last gen sales don't count, because his argument would fall flat on its face.The author said "the wii is selling well, I wonderwhat would have happened if the wii had not been around." He then proceeded to provide one possible outcome, and sheep came here to proclaim Nintendo the saviour of an industry that was in no danger of dying.

News for him: prices of consoles drop, and according to VGcharts (hey, if he can make up alternate realities, I can use VGcharts) the PS2 still sold 13.9 million consoles last year. Pretty impressive for a console that was released so long ago.

Face it people, the videogame industry was not in danger of dying.

Yeah the industry was in serious trouble without the Wii, hence the 120 million PS2 sales. :|Vyse_The_Daring

120 million is nothing at all. 

[QUOTE="Vyse_The_Daring"]Yeah the industry was in serious trouble without the Wii, hence the 120 million PS2 sales. :|Willy105

120 million is nothing at all.

[QUOTE="Vyse_The_Daring"]Yeah the industry was in serious trouble without the Wii, hence the 120 million PS2 sales. :|alecsuba

NPD,media create etc say only 80 million real sales while rest shipped but either way read the article. previous gen does not apply

Then who cares? When Nintendo came along with the NES and "saved" the industry...it was because the previous generation's software quality slid, piracy on systems like C64 and Amiga was rampant and people literally stopped buying games.

I remember picking up 2600/5200/7800 games for 25 cents a pop when the crash happened. This time around there was hundreds of millions of consoles sold, and countless million-selling games out there. If Wii never came along, the industry would still survive and remain healthy through this generation.

Would the industry grow as much? No. Would it still grow and prosper? Absolutely. The PS2 and 360 both have great software that appeals to lots of people. They're the two "casual" consoles in my house thanks to games like SingStar and pretty much anything on Live Arcade.

Even with Wii's mass-appeal and great party games it still just sits there when I ask friends what they want to play.

[QUOTE="alecsuba"]

[QUOTE="Vyse_The_Daring"]Yeah the industry was in serious trouble without the Wii, hence the 120 million PS2 sales. :|bryehngeocef

NPD,media create etc say only 80 million real sales while rest shipped but either way read the article. previous gen does not apply

Then who cares? When Nintendo came along with the NES and "saved" the industry...it was because the previous generation's software quality slid, piracy on systems like C64 and Amiga was rampant and people literally stopped buying games.

I remember picking up 2600/5200/7800 games for 25 cents a pop when the crash happened. This time around there was hundreds of millions of consoles sold, and countless million-selling games out there. If Wii never came along, the industry would still survive and remain healthy through this generation.

Would the industry grow as much? No. Would it still grow and prosper? Absolutely. The PS2 and 360 both have great software that appeals to lots of people. They're the two "casual" consoles in my house thanks to games like SingStar and pretty much anything on Live Arcade.

Even with Wii's mass-appeal and great party games it still just sits there when I ask friends what they want to play.

Thank you, I was beginning to think I was the only sane one.

[QUOTE="Vyse_The_Daring"]Yeah the industry was in serious trouble without the Wii, hence the 120 million PS2 sales. :|Willy105

120 million is nothing at all.

Ever see a piece of software sell 120 million? How many albums have sold that much? How many DVD releases?

120 million is a huge number no matter what industry you're talking about.

Yeah the industry was in serious trouble without the Wii, hence the 120 million PS2 sales. :|Vyse_The_Daring