Nintendo changed the game on developers. The other major consoles are locked into a arms race of sorts with graphics. Nintendo with the wii said, "give me content, give me interesting controls and worry about the graphics later."
I am sure at onset of the Wii Nintendo said lets give them new controls and the most powerful graphics and sound, but then they quickly realized that they would have the most expensive console on the market. Not a position they wanted to find themselves in.
This turned out to be a very advantagous choice. I can't tell you how many parents I work with who have come to me this season for christmas purchase advice. Their kids are asking for Playstaion, but their parents can't justify the nearly $500 price tag. So their parents are looking at the wii. The other side of it is younger parents who like the family friendly image of the Nintendo product. All that means a lot of Wii's leaving the shelf this holiday season.
It seems like the developers were caught in the dark when it came to the wii. These developers have built their houses around stanard controller games. And as we know ports do have potential, but they will never compare to a pure Wii program. In order to really utilize the Wii's full potential. The control scheme has to be discussed right with concept.
As we know ground up game develop can take around 2 to 3 years. Now factor in to this that some development companies have hedged at throwing valuable programing resources at Wii games during the initial release of the console, that puts us at 4 to 5 years out until we start seeing amazing content across the board. Some of those companies may still be holding their breathe.
Even with the Wii's insenent demand there is still a lot of doubt as to what the wii customer looks like. We have all witnessed the creation of the term "causal gamer" to catagorize the new wii user. I feel that this term is inaccurate. The term should be "new gamer". These "causal gamers" are just people who are new to gaming and have the potential to develop into real honest to goodness customers.
I see this in a proper case study thru my inlaws. Two out of three of their children have left the house. Only their 18 year old daughter remains, not a traditional gamer by any means. They purchased a Wii to entertain my children when they visit. At first it was just wii sports, and this lasted almost a year. Why did they go a year before buying another game? Because Wii Sports is so darn rubust. It is packed with hours and hours worth of entertainment. They were completely entertained with wii sports. They didn't have a need to be fulfilled by another game.
Now since then they have moved on to other games, Guitar Hero, Wii Music, and some other kids games. They have even most recently picked up Zelda, which I consider their first step into the deep end of the gaming world.
As a development company, that inital period of exploration with wii sports is scary. They are concerned that these customers will never become the software purchasing hogs that M$ and Sony users have been.
I believe as these "new gamers" mature in their experience they are going to come wanting for more and more sophisticated software. Hopefully the 3rd party developers have the forethought to see this wave coming.
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