I was merely pointing out that a segment of the development audience will not want to develop for the Wii because they want to program on the best graphics hardware they can get, and even when given the choice between Wii and a mobile phone, a graphics guru picks a mobile phone. I think that's pretty telling in terms of how the Wii is perceived by some developers. Yes, Carmack is one guy, but that's like saying that Miyamoto is one guy. He's one HUGE guy in the industry.
Yu Suzuki is a HUGE guy in the industry too. He was one huge developer who really favored the GameCube over the PS2 and the Xbox. this didn't mean much as Sega basically made PS2 games in the majority. It's really no indicator of developer support when established ones pick their platforms, especially for platforms like the Wii and DS which foster new developers to take the place of the old ones who ignored large audiences. And I wouldn't compare Shigeru Miyamoto to John Carmak in terms of relevance today. I mean Nintendogs, just one of Miyamoto's games this generation, has sold more than everything John Carmack's worked on combined (at least according to vgchartz). HE may have been a key person in the industry's burgeoning days but, like Yu Suzuki, but his importance has waned greatly.
Also he and his company's console picks don't seem to become market leaders:
N64
Dreamcast
Xbox
And if id Games never makes a single Wii game, are they going to somehow implode? I don't think so. They're still going to make their money.
Maybe... but how much of it will be MS's "incentive?" As I said before, that's not a very healthy industry model. Sure, they'll survive... maybe (we certainly aren't assuming RAGE or whatever he hell they're working on will be wildly successful, are we?) but they could be having some of that blue Nintendo's got. All they have to do is swallow their pride, bite the bullet, and work for a graphically inferior platform. If they don't want to... that's OK. The Playstation didn't get every developer. Just the ones that became really important.
And my point with that is that the Wii is not the be-all and end-all of video game development.
I don't believe anybody said that, did that?
You don't see Blizzard giving a crap about Wii, but they're still rolling in dough.
You don't see Blizzard giving a crap about consoles either. And Blizzard is a bad example to use. They just got slammed for making Diablo III "colorful," and they are the Nintendo stereotype company. You remember, how Nintendo never makes anything new (they do) and only relies on franchises (not all the time.) Blizzard only has like, three or four franchises.
It's not as simple as just userbase. Like Deg himself has said, demographics play a huge part.
I don't believe I ever said that. What you may be confusing that with is the media's perception of the DS changed from "mingame fest" to "RPG machine" almost overnight due to a crapload of them being made. What that obviously showed was a desire amongst the "minigame fest" DS owners to buy more complex games like RPGs (This is called upstreaming.) The first one to get there won, and in this case, both Nintendo and Square Enix provided the first few RPGS, (Mario and Luigi 2 and FFIII.) This market and "demographic" did not appear to be there at first, but was there to begin with. This si similar to Wii. Wii owners are thirsty and hungry for more experiences, be they shooters (Which apparently can sell a million on the platform. "They'll still get their money," right?) or RPGs or what have you. The first one to get there gets the prize, and no amount of ham-hawing about their failed games will change anything.
Sure, EA laments how they missed the boat on the Wii, but they aren't releasing Super Killer Shooter 2000 now that they're back on board, either. Instead, we're getting Madden 09 with TardPlay, and Boom Blox. EA is giving us exactly what they think the Wii demographics want, which is more family fare. They aren't risking anything.
We don't know what EA has in store for Wii, but I can assure you it probably won't be more mini- and non- games. Why? Because they already tried that with Ninja Reflex and it flopped pretty badly. They are going to have to foster new development efforts and find what will work from a market standpoint and that also includes insight into market that may only be there latently. They might try a shooter. They might try something else. But the non-game boat sailed a long time ago.
Of course, this is all assuming they want to make quality games for the largest audience. The problem lies with the 3rd parties' mindsets about Wii. Nintendo's mindset has always been "Make quality games" no matter WHAT they are working on. This is why there exists Metroid Prime 3 and Super Mario Galaxy, even Wii Sports and EVEN Wii Music (despite impressions and previews.) They put their full heart into whatever they are making. Third parties don't have this mindset. They have a mindset of:
"These Wii owners are idiots, they'll buy anything."
Which is of course both true and untrue at the same time. The Wii owners at large will buy some serious junk, but mostly they've bought quality Nintendo products and good 3rd party efforts.
"The profits from this Wii game will help fund what I REALLY want to work on. (or have been contractually obligated to work on)"
This is, of course, both lacking effort and "sending good money after bad." Capcom's been doing this a bit with ports that are clearly intended to stave off RE5 development costs. Even Square Enix who's been selling the effort of eons gone by in order to fund just one Next Gen project.
"The demographics demand that I make this type of game."
This one is usually only half-believed. Where are the big-name fighting games for the Wii? Smash Bros. is the biggest fighting series around, selling more than all the rest of them released combined. Where are the quality platformers? Mario Galaxy is the only one left? Shooters? 2 have sold a million! Somebody should really exploit a market ALREADY PRESENT. It seems demographics in this case are merely an excuse for half-hearted efforts. No wonder Nintendo dominates their own platforms. Sheesh.
Topic: Theory about third party support (Read 54984 times)
