Has Nintendo Cooked the Golden Goose?

[Sabre]

Australia, May 8, 2009 - Complacency in the face of consumer doubt in the marketplace. It's a dangerous thing – particularly for the market leader, Nintendo – the fiscal king of gaming. However, this is exactly the situation the gaming goliath has found itself in at time of writing – precariously balanced atop the tower as two other competitors scramble at its heels.

With the global recession now finally taking its toll against the so-called evergreen gaming market, we're examining the latest global sales trends – and the results are surprising. While still churning out impressive profits, Nintendo may have finally hit its peak with the Wii – and with a lack of stand-out titles hitting the market in the last 12 months, it's possible Nintendo has been too complacent and the market is threatening to move on to the next-big-thing.

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I hate to say it, but I kind of agree. The novelty might be wearing off and the lack of horsepower might finally hurt them.

[Libra Monkee]

I agree also. The Wii was a nice little experiment while it lasted but I decided a couple months ago (around the time Wii Music was released) that it's time to get back to real video games and bought a PS3.

It wasn't so much the "novelty and horsepower" that made me lose interest. It was the fact the vast majority of of Wii titles are casual/ party games. Games where you guide short, cute, pudgy characters through a series of random challenges. No story, no substance, not a whole lot of fun when you're the only one playing.

There were few gems (excluding Nintendo™ franchise titles), No More Heroes comes to mind. Great game, entertaining story, a bit drawn out at times but made fun of itself for doing so. There was also World of Goo. A cool physics-based puzzler where you build bridges and towers out of wobbly strands of goo.

In it's final days I used the Wii mostly for the Virtual Console. To rebuy games I've already owned and can't find on emulators. But now my console sits disconnected and collecting dust behind my TV, out of sight and unused.

Because all-in-all, the Wii is like the board games that you bring out when company comes over. You're not going to play Candyland nor Apples to Apple by your lonesome. Nor should be playing Mario Kart, Raving Rabbids, or Boom Blox in one-player mode. If you do, please let me know. There might be some people at St. Elizabeth's that can help you.

And another one bites the dust.

[complacent]

The last real game I played on Wii was Metroid. They need more "A" titles, STAT. I have quite a chubby for punch-out though.

<--- Fallout 3 addict and damned mad at Gabe about it.

[Libra Monkee]

<--- Fallout 3 addict and damned mad at Gabe about it.

Ditto.

Don't feed the Yao-Guai

[Mr Kleen]

Bethesda announcing a 'really big Wii game this year'

[Sabre]

^^^ Duke Nukem Forever

[Libra Monkee]

^^^ Duke Nukem Forever

Oddly enough, DNF was the third most popular game on on GameSpot, last time I checked.


I also think it's funny how DNF also stands for Did Not Finish.