Read Cube_of_Moon's editorial first. Its a very good read.
Done? Good.
Nice read - wow - lots of replies, too. Now that being said, I would like to point something out: making a game that would rate 9+ is a moving target. As gamers we get used to things very quickly; gameplay, graphics, etc. Each new high-water mark, especially with AAA games, becomes harder, more difficult and more expensive to surpass. A game that would've rated a 9 last year might become an 8 this year, especially with Gamespot's rating policy of lowering sequels/updates. The Guild Wars series is a good example of this; even though GW: Nightfall is by far superior to the original game on all counts, it rated lower because, well, its another Guild Wars game. What would've been a 9 last year becomes an 8 this year, possibly a 7 the year after that. Or, put another way:
"We can't be optimistic about the game market. No matter what great product you come up with, people get bored. I feel like a chef cooking for a king who's full." - Satoru Iwata, President of Nintendo Co. Ltd., June 7, 2002
I would argue, however, its not the high-end that we as gamers should be concerned with so much as the "B" rated games - the games that make a system truly worth owning. Any system can have AAA titles; the Jaguar, 3DO and 32x did; some would argue the Dreamcast and Neo Geo Pocket Color had an enviable Crap:Quality ratio in game titles and selection. However, it's those 2nd tier titles that make all the difference in my opinion. If you look at the successful systems over the years, they all had an abundance of excellent games that weren't big names with oversized budgets and multimillion dollar marketing campaigns. You could walk into a store and after pointing out the major titles, could go around and show a new gamer a dozens of games that they would be great buys as well. You can't do that with an unsuccessful system.
Likewise, many games that are colorful, inventive, and just spread out aren't always the 9 rated games. I'm sure we can all think of titles that showed enormous potential, and maybe only needed a sequel or more polish to truly make it great. Or perhaps they're examples of niche genres in high-form. A lot of these titles are made with lower budgets and smaller staffs than the latest Final Fantasy or Halo, but are still exeptional games.
Finally, we must recognize that critical acclaim is no guarantee of commercial success. The original Prince of Persia (Sands of Time) wasn't a rousing commercial success, but fortunately Ubisoft continued on with it. As I recall Unreal Championship 2, another Editor's Choice game, didn't exactly do that well commercially also, overshadowed by Halo 2. Sleepers are called sleepers for a reason.
We're always going to have the extremes of superb experiences and titles better off forgotten. And, to be honest, I agree with some of Cube of Moon's worries about the lack of games rated 9+. However, I feel that its the middle ground, games rated 7 through 8.9, that provide a much healthier barometer of how a system and how the generation is doing.