• Hey Guest. Check out your NeoGAF Wrapped 2025 results here!

What happened to that 100M Wii audience?

Log4Girlz said:
It should have continued selling well past its five years. The PS2, which was released in 2000, already set the precedent for long lasting sales. Xbox 360 is on its 8th year and sold great just now, after the PS4 and its successor opened to record sales. The market has changed. Wii, oddly, despite being once the fastest selling console of all time and having recently released a $99 ultra cheap SKU and having a legendary library of games...

has fallen off the Radar. How strange.

Sorry, the evidence fits my narrative *jimcarrey.gif* LIKE A GLOVE
Click to expand...

Not that strange. When we see the history of games, most fads like the SNES, Playstation, Genesis, N64, GBA, etc. fall off pretty quickly after their 5th year on the market.

I heard rumors about systems called the En Eeh Es or something, and some Gamedude thingie that had long lasting sales but you can't believe everything you read on the internet, I fear.
 
Old people died off.
Young people grew into the new systems.
Casuals that never played a videogame before the wii, stopped playing after awhile.

That's about 70+% of the Wii's install base.
The ones are left were the hardcore Nintendo fans that stuck through & through over the years.
Which is right in line with the declining slide from the N64 & GC & to the WiiU.
 
Nightstick11 said:
I don't get the point you're trying to make. Are you trying to say those games and the record-breaking profits Nintendo made off of them "don't count"?

I hate first-person shooters, third-person shooters, and football games. Should I just arbitrarily discount sales of those games?

The number starts to drop off considerably but it certainly doesn't get small. Also, you're cherrypicking here. The second highest selling game was Mario Kart Wii at 34 million (it reached most of its sales when it was unbundled), with New Super Marios Bros. Wii at 28 million. Mario Galaxy and Smash Bros. both did almost 12 million apiece. The list goes on DKCR, SMG2, TP, etc. etc. If NPD didn't combine SKUs like in the old days, the top-10 list for the US would look no different from the Media-Create threads.
Click to expand...

I'm saying that perhaps that new audience bought the console for a specific title and that was pretty much it. In other words, they weren't really interested in 'gaming' they just saw this new toy on daytime TV, thought it was cool, and bought it. Now, it's probably collecting dust somewhere.

I did actually mention both Mario Kart and New Super Mario Bros. Both games would have had a particularly high attach rate with Nintendo fans. Mario Kart has always been a high selling game. So has normal Mario titles. I don't know how much that would account for it. They're both very child friendly games, so I could see how the games could have been bought by parents for the children. I don't know when they were bundled, so I can't say if that was a factor or not.

A number of the highest selling games were bundled with something.

Those gamers who bought a Wii probably did so for Nintendo franchises. I would expect a high attach rate for that reason. I'd say a large number of the games on that list would be consistent with those types of gamers.

The Wii Fit games selling over 40 million suggests to me a number of people bought the console with that in mind. It seems an exceptionally large amount for something that wasn't exactly cheap.

Whether those people continued on buying games, I'm not so sure about. I can see them buying a few games, but they may not have been even for them, but rather for the kids.
 
What happened? They bought it after playing Wii Sports at a friend's house, played it for a bit, then it sat there. Saw Wii Fit, bought it, used it for a month, then it sat there. Then they got smartphones, bought Angry Birds and Cut the Rope for $.99 each, and still playing it. They heard about the Wii U, and said "what's this, a peripheral for that system sitting under a pile of dust for 3 years? No thanks, back to Angry Birds."
 
Nightstick11 said:
Not that strange. When we see the history of games, most fads like the SNES, Playstation, Genesis, N64, GBA, etc. fall off pretty quickly after their 5th year on the market.

I heard rumors about systems called the En Eeh Es or something, and some Gamedude thingie that had long lasting sales but you can't believe everything you read on the internet, I fear.
Click to expand...

The market is different. Console generations and how consoles have behave have changed. PS2, despite not having support from Sony sold incredibly well when it hit $99. Xbox 360 is selling incredibly well after 8 years despite its own successor opening up to record sales.

But Wii in comparison to modern consoles, in the current market climate, cannot do the same as the PS2 despite also dropping to $99 and having a legendary library of games. For like, no reason.

In a nutshell. Wii sales fell off a cliff well before its successor released (unlike the other consoles you mentioned, they were quite healthy their entire life-span and never just fell off a cliff before a successor was released). And in today's environment there is already precedent for consoles lasting after well after their successor's arrived.

From fastest selling of all time, to jumping off a cliff before any competitor, including its own successor was released. Unprecedented. All those other lovely devices that you list sold quite well until its successor came out, they didn't flame out like the Wii did and I would argue wouldn't have until a competitor or successor arrived on the scene.

Its a fad.
 
Thunder Monkey said:
Gaming needs a lot more of these then.
Click to expand...

If only you could run this kind of business by guessing what will "click". Most businesses that thrive off fads have low barriers to entry, low cost of doing business. Console business is serious fucking money. Make a mistake, and you buuuuurn.
 
TommyManberg said:
They weren't traditional gamers and thus aren't subject to gaming attchments like we tend to be. Their gaming love is fleeting.
Click to expand...
So fleeting they bought more software than either PS3 or 360 owners.

Log4Girlz said:
If only you could run this kind of business by guessing what will "click". Most businesses that thrive off fads have low barriers to entry, low cost of doing business. Console business is serious fucking money. Make a mistake, and you buuuuurn.
Click to expand...
Depends on how you do it.

Nintendo through this burn hasn't exactly lost much money. In comparison to both Sony and MS with PS3 and 360.
 
sniperpon said:
I used to think this. Now I wish 99% of the people playing games would stop so I could have my hobby back.
Click to expand...

Yes, I think a lot of people feel this way. I think when many people imagined gaming growing, they sort of imagined playing Final Fantasy with their girlfriend or having their dad get in to Elder Scrolls or something of that nature.

Once it was clear that they didn't want to play those games, that our girlfriends wanted to play Farmville, our Dads wanted to play Angry Birds, and our grandparents wanted to play Wii Sports, I think a lot of people decided they would rather the hobby stay just for us.
 
Nintendo should just say fuck it. "Here it is.. the Wii2!! Look at all these great games right here at launch!! Wii2 is backwards compatable with all Wii and WiiU games because it is a fucking WiiU with a new label!!!"
 
Opiate said:
I think we would need to operationally define what the word "fad" means here. People seem to be suggesting that a fad can sell lots of software, have a normal lifespan, and even have a long lifespan, as suggested by Kimosabae above.

What is the operational definition of a "fad" here? How could we measure its existence? What does the word even mean?
Click to expand...

I'm still waiting for someone to take on the challenge of defining exactly what we're supposed to be discussing here (in regards to it being a "fad"). A simple dictionary definition does not cut it.
 
Opiate said:
Yes, I think a lot of people feel this way. I think when many people imagined gaming growing, they sort of imagined playing Final Fantasy with their girlfriend, or having their dad get in to Elder Scrolls.

Once it was clear that our girlfriends wanted to play Farmville, their Dads wanted to play Elder Scrolls, and their grandparents wanted to play Wii Sports, I think a lot of people decided they would rather the hobby stay just for us.
Click to expand...

And that to me is a death sentence for this industry. I don't want videogames to become modern comic books. Though the consistency with which male power fantasies are propped up as the games of any generation it might already be too late.
 
Opiate said:
Yes, I think a lot of people feel this way. I think when many people imagined gaming growing, they sort of imagined playing Final Fantasy with their girlfriend or having their dad get in to Elder Scrolls or something of that nature.

Once it was clear that they didn't want to play those games, that our girlfriends wanted to play Farmville, our Dads wanted to play Angry Birds, and our grandparents wanted to play Wii Sports, I think a lot of people decided they would rather the hobby stay just for us.
Click to expand...

Now the enthusiasts are truly fucked.
 
The local community calendar had a "Wii Bowling" night at the senior citizens center, so at least someone is playing it...

Seeing how the Wii was Nintendo's best selling system ever pretty much unsupported and left for dead really doesn't bode well for the Wii U.

It seems like a really strained comparison to compare the Wii to the Atari 2600, but think of it- both systems were crazy popular with casuals for a couple of years, reasonably innovative, but weak even by the standard of the day. They both had enormous amounts of shovelware, were treated as a cash cow, and crashed and burned spectacularly.
 
Thunder Monkey said:
It you compare it to a lot of consoles actually. NES, PS2, and PS360 are the odd ones. Every other console has had a fairly traditional lifecycle. SNES, GennyDrive, N64, PS1, GCN, Xbox, Wii. Wii just had a much higher start than any of them. Including the longer lasting consoles.
Click to expand...

I think the more appropriate comparison points are consoles that are either in the same timeframe as the Wii (360/PS3) or with a similar install base ramp-up (PS2).

Consoles that sell extremely well early on would naturally be expected to have long legs because they've quickly dispensed with the chicken and egg problem of the console market and there should be a hungry audience for new games. Then you run into a fortuitous positive feedback loop of more software support that makes the platform even more attractive, which sells more consoles. This is what happened with the PS2 and why it trounced its competitors for the entire generation and continued to sell decently well after it had been replaced.

This didn't happen with the Wii, though. Based on the sales data for both hardware and software, the Wii and some of its core games (such as SMG2 & Skyward Sword) had major drop-offs while the Xbox 360 & PS3 were starting to hit their stride. My theory is that a lot of 'intermediate' gamers (the sizable audience between the hardcore and casuals) largely abandoned the Wii and switched over to 360/PS3 as those systems came down in price, and they haven't looked back.

Nintendo never really won over the third parties with the Wii, and most of them did poorly with the Wii (with Just Dance and things like Carnival Games being the exceptions) and gave it up. In the end that's come back to bite them.
 
Sean*O said:
Nintendo should just say fuck it. "Here it is.. the Wii2!! Look at all these great games right here at launch!! Wii2 is backwards compatable with all Wii and WiiU games because it is a fucking WiiU with a new label!!!"
Click to expand...
The "Wii U" name was such a terrible idea because of the confusion it brought (and still brings), but I don't think Wii2 would've made much difference. The Wii brand was only popular for the most casual of reasons. Reasons that don't stick or carry over into another generation unless you have another hit gimmick. The system was entirely irrelevant for most of the generation to a lot of the core PS3/360 gaming audience.

You really could argue that the Wii was a fad. A fad can be a huge success, just short-lived... At this point, even the old reliable OG Nintendo fanbase might be dwindling a bit.
 
Thunder Monkey said:
So fleeting they bought more software than either PS3 or 360 owners.


Depends on how you do it.

Nintendo through this burn hasn't exactly lost much money. In comparison to both Sony and MS with PS3 and 360.
Click to expand...

Lol what are you arguing here and how does it refute what I said as it relates to Wii casuals buying the Wii U?
 
They grew up, my little cousin was 6 or 7 when he got a Wii and he loved it, but last year he got a 360 and the Wii has been dead to him..
 
Zinthar said:
I think the more appropriate comparison points are consoles that are either in the same timeframe as the Wii (360/PS3) or with a similar install base ramp-up (PS2).

Consoles that sell extremely well early on would naturally be expected to have long legs because they've quickly dispensed with the chicken and egg problem of the console market and there should be a hungry audience for new games. Then you run into a fortuitous positive feedback loop of more software support that makes the platform even more attractive, which sells more consoles. This is what happened with the PS2 and why it trounced its competitors for the entire generation and continued to sell decently well after it had been replaced.

This didn't happen with the Wii, though. Based on the sales data for both hardware and software, the Wii and some of its core games (such as SMG2 & Skyward Sword) had major drop-offs while the Xbox 360 & PS3 were starting to hit their stride. My theory is that a lot of 'intermediate' gamers (the sizable audience between the hardcore and casuals) largely abandoned the Wii and switched over to 360/PS3 as those systems came down in price, and they haven't looked back.

Nintendo never really won over the third parties with the Wii, and most of them did poorly with the Wii (with Just Dance and things like Carnival Games being the exceptions) and gave it up. In the end that's come back to bite them.
Click to expand...

There's not much to disagree with there, but a few sticking points I have. 3rd parties never really tried to build on the hardcore base Nintendo had fomented. We never really saw any good Zelda wannabe's, Wii got the short end of the stick on shooters (visuals are part of it investment was another), it did get quite a few under marketed action/platformers, no follow ups to successes like RE4.

The reason there was such a problem with "core" gamer titles on Wii is that almost no 3rd party developer ever tried to make a competent release. I mean early on you got some ports like Godfather Blackhand Edition... that actually sold on par the 360 version and better than the PS3 version. Feature deprived or really late versions of Call of Duty.

They bet on their horses and road them to success. Tossing underfunded, underdeveloped "core" games Wii's way and a bunch of really simple minigame collections.

Nintendo did let Wii die on the vine. But I'm not going to act like 3rd parties even tried on the platform let alone that it failed them.

TommyManberg said:
Lol what are you arguing here and how does it refute what I said as it relates to Wii casuals buying the Wii U?
Click to expand...
Sorry I did not get that you were talking about continued attachments. Which I still find wrong. They still play... on app markets. They had no loyalty to any manufacturer. They didn't to Sony, when they moved to Wii they didn't there either, and they're just as likely to pass on XboxOne as they are to buy it.
 
Zinthar said:
I think the more appropriate comparison points are consoles that are either in the same timeframe as the Wii (360/PS3) or with a similar install base ramp-up (PS2).

Consoles that sell extremely well early on would naturally be expected to have long legs because they've quickly dispensed with the chicken and egg problem of the console market and there should be a hungry audience for new games. Then you run into a fortuitous positive feedback loop of more software support that makes the platform even more attractive, which sells more consoles. This is what happened with the PS2 and why it trounced its competitors for the entire generation and continued to sell decently well after it had been replaced.

This didn't happen with the Wii, though. Based on the sales data for both hardware and software, the Wii and some of its core games (such as SMG2 & Skyward Sword) had major drop-offs while the Xbox 360 & PS3 were starting to hit their stride. My theory is that a lot of 'intermediate' gamers (the sizable audience between the hardcore and casuals) largely abandoned the Wii and switched over to 360/PS3 as those systems came down in price, and they haven't looked back.

Nintendo never really won over the third parties with the Wii, and most of them did poorly with the Wii (with Just Dance and things like Carnival Games being the exceptions) and gave it up. In the end that's come back to bite them.
Click to expand...

I definitely think there is truth to this.

However, I think iOS shows us that for the most part most of the established players In traditional games are just never going to get in to casual gaming no matter how much the games sell. It isn't like you can use the excuse that first party is crowding people out on iOS, and yet there is still to this day no substantial support from Bethesda or Take 2 or Ubisoft or Valve. Activision is just starting to have any presence at all. Only EA really invested heavily early on; the rest vary from "very weak to support" to "literally zero presence at all."

iOS succeeded by basically saying, "Fine, we'll do this without you," and building its own third party publishers from the ground up. Now companies like SuperCell and Rovio are huge billion dollar companies due almost exclusively to their success on mobile platforms.

With iOS as our blueprint in hindsight, that's what I think Nintendo's great mistake was. Their problem wasn't missing out on games from Take 2 and Activision and Bethesda; those publishers are clearly never getting on board platforms tainted by the dreaded "casual" label even if they're as spectacularly successful for third parties as iOS is. Instead, the problem is that Nintendo failed to build their own third parties from the ground up and in their own image, the way iOS has done, Facebook has done, and so forth.
 
Opiate said:
I definitely think there is truth to this.

However, I think iOS shows us that for the most part most of the established players In traditional games are just never going to get in to casual gaming no matter how much the games sell. It isn't like you can use the excuse that first party is crowding people out on iOS, and yet there is still to this day no substantial support from Bethesda or Take 2 or Ubisoft or Valve. Activision is just starting to have any presence at all. Only EA really invested heavily early on; the rest vary from "very weak to support" to "literally zero presence at all."

iOS succeeded by basically saying, "Fine, we'll do this without you," and building its own third party publishers from the ground up. Now companies like SuperCell and Rovio are huge billion dollar companies due almost exclusively to their success on mobile platforms.

With iOS as our blueprint in hindsight, that's what I think Nintendo's great mistake was. Their problem wasn't missing out on games from Take 2 and Activision and Bethesda; those publishers are clearly never getting on board platforms tainted by the dreaded "casual" label even if they're as spectacularly successful for third parties as iOS is. Instead, the problem is that Nintendo failed to build their own third parties from the ground up and in their own image, the way iOS has done, Facebook has done, and so forth.
Click to expand...

Another issue is not having their own IOS and smartphone product early on. I mean, Apple wasn't a cell phone company. Then they arrived in 2007 and started eating face. If Nintendo was really astute, they should have created a competing product, outside of gaming, and become the Samsung of the cellphone world, the sole true competitor to Apple.

I mean, yeah really difficult to do, but they do make hardware, they do have relationships with foundries, they have experience with supply chains. They have made handhelds. They were in a better position than Apple if you really think about it. But first mover advantage and whatnot. They let that slip past them because they are so narrowly focused on gaming.
 
Log4Girlz said:
The market is different. Console generations and how consoles have behave have changed. PS2, despite not having support from Sony sold incredibly well when it hit $99. Xbox 360 is selling incredibly well after 8 years despite its own successor opening up to record sales.

But Wii in comparison to modern consoles, in the current market climate, cannot do the same as the PS2 despite also dropping to $99 and having a legendary library of games. For like, no reason.

In a nutshell. Wii sales fell off a cliff well before its successor released (unlike the other consoles you mentioned, they were quite healthy their entire life-span and never just fell off a cliff before a successor was released). And in today's environment there is already precedent for consoles lasting after well after their successor's arrived.

From fastest selling of all time, to jumping off a cliff before any competitor, including its own successor was released. Unprecedented. All those other lovely devices that you list sold quite well until its successor came out, they didn't flame out like the Wii did and I would argue wouldn't have until a competitor or successor arrived on the scene.

Its a fad.
Click to expand...

Dude. We're on the same team now. Consoles that don't keep selling regularly for 8+ years= fad. I'm on board, I'm buying in.

It's just that the Wii was the best fad of all time, outshining SNES and PS.
 
Opiate said:
I definitely think there is truth to this.

However, I think iOS shows us that for the most part most of the established players In traditional games are just never going to get in to casual gaming no matter how much the games sell. It isn't like you can use the excuse that first party is crowding people out on iOS, and yet there is still to this day no substantial support from Bethesda or Take 2 or Ubisoft or Valve. Activision is just starting to have any presence at all. Only EA really invested heavily early on; the rest vary from "very weak to support" to "literally zero presence at all."

iOS succeeded by basically saying, "Fine, we'll do this without you," and building its own third party publishers from the ground up. Now companies like SuperCell and Rovio are huge billion dollar companies due almost exclusively to their success on mobile platforms.

With iOS as our blueprint in hindsight, that's what I think Nintendo's great mistake was. Their problem wasn't missing out on games from Take 2 and Activision and Bethesda; those publishers are clearly never getting on board platforms tainted by the dreaded "casual" label even if they're as spectacularly successful for third parties as iOS is. Instead, the problem is that Nintendo failed to build their own third parties from the ground up and in their own image, the way iOS has done, Facebook has done, and so forth.
Click to expand...
That's a beautiful and well articulated point Mr drugs.

Part of me will always wonder why there's such a resistance to an expanded market. Probably because they are much harder to read than young men. Much easier to plaster tits and guns on tried and true gameplay with advancing technical flourishes than trying to figure out what my 62 year old aunt might play.
 
Nightstick11 said:
Dude. We're on the same team now. Consoles that don't keep selling regularly for 8+ years= fad. I'm on board, I'm buying in.

It's just that the Wii was the best fad of all time, outshining SNES and PS.
Click to expand...

I wonder when the SNES and PS started taking a dive in sales, hmm, I wonder if it was years before a competitors or its successor came out. Yes, that must be the case.

I'm glad you realize that the Wii was a fad though, because that's all that matters.
 
Log4Girlz said:
I wonder when the SNES and PS started taking a dive in sales, hmm, I wonder if it was years before a competitors or its successor came out. Yes, that must be the case.

I'm glad you realize that the Wii was a fad though, because that's all that matters.
Click to expand...

After year 5, just like the Genesis, Wii, Gamecube, Xbox, GBA, PSP, and all the other fads. According to you, the only two consoles that were never fads were the PS2 and the Xbox 360. I disagree. I think Gamedude wasn't a fad either, although sales spiked after that Pokemon fad.
 
Nightstick11 said:
After year 5, just like the Genesis, Wii, Gamecube, Xbox, GBA, PSP, and all the other fads. According to you, the only two consoles that were never fads were the PS2 and the Xbox 360. I disagree. I think Gamedude wasn't a fad either, although sales spiked after that Pokemon fad.
Click to expand...

The Wii flamed out before any competition or successor came out.

Same cannot be said about

NES
Genesis
SNES
N64
PS1

They were replaced. They did not flame out and die miserable deaths before then.

Since the PS2, the competitor DIDN'T EVEN SLOW THAT FUCKER DOWN

But oddly, Wii is the exception. Its sales died well before Wii U or any other competitor was released. Golly, I wonder why that is.

Fad
 
The Wii was a fad.

Smartphones and tablets, on the other hand, are not. Nintendo is never going to get that audience back.

All those people back in 2006 who were saying it was a fad turned out to be right. Fucking hilarious because I remember how much heated debate there was and fanboys acting smug over whether it was a fad or not.
 
Log4Girlz said:
The Wii flamed out before any competition or successor came out.
Click to expand...

That is pretty clearly untrue unless you think the only competitors in the gaming space are home consoles.

Same cannot be said about

NES
Genesis
SNES
N64
PS1

They were replaced. They did not flame out and die miserable deaths before then.

Since the PS2, the competitor DIDN'T EVEN SLOW THAT FUCKER DOWN

But oddly, Wii is the exception. Its sales died well before Wii U or any other competitor was released. Golly, I wonder why that is.

Fad
Click to expand...

When all of the platforms you listed came out, console gaming was by a wide margin the dominant if not exclusive means of gaming. The relevant point here is that consoles apparently comprised about 80% of the entire gaming market in 2000 -- which is to say, even as recently as the PS2 days, consoles were absolutely dominant in gaming.

Now they comprise closer to 40%, and are likely still dropping. In just a decade, their marketshare has been halved.

Talking about the gaming industry as if consoles are the only thing that exist and matter made some sense a couple decades ago. Other markets existed but could reasonably be considered marginal. This point of view is completely inappropriate now, however.
 
A percent of them were not gamers. They were people who buy into the latest fads. Wii had a lot of hype going for it for a number of years.
 
Opiate said:
That is pretty clearly untrue unless you think the only competitors are home consoles.
Click to expand...

Yes, I was talking about consoles. Though I recognize mobile devices as a major threat to Nintendo's business.

Mobile devices are only be an issue if the Wii was a fad that casuals flocked to while it was considered a craze. Now mobile is the new hot item among casuals, so sure its natural that the Wii imploded while the Xbox 360 seems to be doing just fine and so is its successor and main competitor for the western gaming audience which is not fickle or swayed by novelty and fad crazes.

Again, like many have said, casuals have migrated to mobile. Which is evidence that the Wii was a fad. The rise in mobile gaming has had a detrimental effect on the Wii and may have permanently robbed the casual market from any console developer. Which hurts Nintendo acutely as they have targeted them solely it seems.

PS4 and Xbone have opened to record numbers and the Xbox 360 seems to be doing fine after 8 years. The console market may have contracted, but they may not notice any change, as their final lifetime tallies may actually have the potential to exceed their predecessors.
 
Opiate said:
That is pretty clearly untrue unless you think the only competitors in the gaming space are home consoles.



When all of the platforms you listed came out, console gaming was by a wide margin the dominant if not exclusive means of gaming.

The relevant point here is that consoles apparently comprised about 80% of the entire gaming market in 2000 -- which is to say, even as recently as the PS2 days, consoles were absolutely dominant in gaming.

Now they comprise closer to 40%, and are likely still dropping. In just a decade, their marketshare has been halved.

Talking about the gaming industry as if consoles are the only thing that exist and matter made some sense a couple decades ago. Other markets existed but could reasonably be considered marginal. This point of view is completely inappropriate now, however.
Click to expand...

Well, I suppose it would be fairer to compare the wii sales drop off to the xbox 360 and ps3 sales drop off going forward, then.
 
Log4Girlz said:
Yes, I was talking about consoles. Mobile devices would only be an issue if the Wii was a fad that casuals flocked to while it was considered a craze. Now mobile is the new hot item among casuals, so sure its natural that the Wii imploded while the Xbox 360 seems to be doing just fine and so is its successor and main competitor for the western gaming audience which is not fickle or swayed by novelty and fad crazes.
Click to expand...

That does not follow at all.

How about this explanation: they liked the Wii. A competitor came out and served their needs better, and now they buy that instead.

Again, like many have said, casuals have migrated to mobile. Which is evidence that the Wii was a fad. The rise in mobile gaming has had a detrimental effect on the Wii and may have permanently robbed the casual market from any console developer.
Click to expand...

You very clearly do not understand economics. Products get outcompeted all the time -- it does not mean that the losers in the marketplace are fads.

Sony's Walkman had a dominant market position for years and years, and then their market position completely and suddenly collapsed when the Walkman was outcompeted by the iPod. That does not mean the Walkman was a fad; it was a popular product that eventually lost out to an even better competitor.

I want to emphasize that I'm not necessarily saying that the Wii isn't a "fad," mostly because we haven't precisely defined what the term means. What I'm saying is that your specific definition of fad is not logical.
 
Log4Girlz said:
The Wii flamed out before any competition or successor came out.

Same cannot be said about

NES
Genesis
SNES
N64
PS1

They were replaced. They did not flame out and die miserable deaths before then.

Since the PS2, the competitor DIDN'T EVEN SLOW THAT FUCKER DOWN

But oddly, Wii is the exception. Its sales died well before Wii U or any other competitor was released. Golly, I wonder why that is.

Fad
Click to expand...

Wait wait wait, time out. You moved the goalposts before and I already agreed, based on your sagacious wisdom. I agree with you: a generation is now 8 years long. All previous generations, which were traditionally five years long, have been retconned into "short periods of time" now.

The NES flamed out after 5 years.
The SNES flamed out after 5 years.
The Genesis flamed out after 5 years.
The Saturn flamed out after 2 years.
The Playstation flamed out after 5 years.
The N64 flamed out after 5 years.
The Dreamcast flamed out after, uh, 3 years.
The Gamecube flamed out after 4 years.
The Xbox flamed out after 4 years.
The PSP flamed out after 4 years.
The Wii flamed out after 5 years.

It's pretty clear the Wii was the best fad of all time in video-games. For a rookie upstart, Microsoft did pretty well selling the second-highest selling console of all time.
 
BadAss2961 said:
The "Wii U" name was such a terrible idea because of the confusion it brought (and still brings), but I don't think Wii2 would've made much difference. The Wii brand was only popular for the most casual of reasons. Reasons that don't stick or carry over into another generation unless you have another hit gimmick. The system was entirely irrelevant for most of the generation to a lot of the core PS3/360 gaming audience.

You really could argue that the Wii was a fad. A fad can be a huge success, just short-lived... At this point, even the old reliable OG Nintendo fanbase might be dwindling a bit.
Click to expand...

They can name it whatever they (or you) want, as long as it's exactly the same hardware as the WiiU so games and game development continue on the same path. ...And they need to drop that price to $199 US Dollars. That's mass market appeal and a big part of the reason why the original Wii was so successful, because it's lesser hardware meant more of a mass market price point.
 
Opiate said:
That does not follow at all.

How about this explanation: they liked the Wii. A competitor came out and served their needs better, and now they buy that instead.



You very clearly do not understand economics. Products get outcompeted all the time -- it does not mean that the losers in the marketplace are fads.

Sony's Walkman had a dominant market position for years and years, and then their market position completely and suddenly collapsed when the Walkman was outcompeted by the iPod. That does not mean the Walkman was a fad; it was a popular product that eventually lost out to an even better competitor.
Click to expand...

When mobile devices nearly destroy one company's device, but leave two other, similar devices with a slightly different target demographic relatively unharmed, then I can safely say the former device was a fad.

If the PS4 and XboneOne crater due to mobile pressure, then I will take back my statement about Wii being a fad, it was just the first victim of mobile. But this doesn't look like its the case from the record setting sales pace.

Again, these devices were designed and aimed at a demographic which is far less prone to buying fads and are instead, long term, dedicated consumers.
 
Kimosabae said:
I'm still waiting for someone to take on the challenge of defining exactly what we're supposed to be discussing here (in regards to it being a "fad"). A simple dictionary definition does not cut it.
Click to expand...

A fad to me, is something that can't be predicted, gains almost overnight in popularity, has captured positive media goodwill, has captured mindshare among the general public, but has a short lifespan with a quick drop off in all the things I have listed that turned it into a fad to start with.

Wii was a fad.

Ipod was not a fad because Apple had the ability to iterate on what made the original successful, and keep improving the product over the years.

Nintendo did not do this with Wii. Its mind boggling as to why. Its almost as if management said...as a follow up to our best selling product of all time....we are going to throw everything out the window that made it successful and give you something different. And just to prove that we are completely out of our fucking minds, we are going to give it a very similar name and hope it doesn't confuse people. When what they should have done is taken the very things that made Wii a success and improved on them incrementally. More precise waggle controls, high definition graphics, possibly a camera, or any number of other things.

Do you know why the media fell in love with the Wii to start with? One of the big tag lines you always heard, was because Wii with its motion controls, got people up off the couch and introduced gaming to an audience of non-couch dwellers. So what does Nintendo do with the follow up? Make a game pad the centerpiece of the console that puts people squarely back on the couch. And by doing so, they eliminated millions of people from the market who don't care to spend hours sitting on the couch.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.

Similar threads

So what happened to Hindustan Electronics, the studio behind The Last Guy?
4
181
Hudo replied
Laura Fryer - From Midnight Magic to Grave Dancing: What Happened to Gamers and Devs
Social  2
98
947
DeepEnigma replied
What happened to Lego Games?
43
2K
Just_one replied
Switch Insane Bundle! What happened to Nintendo's Seal of Quality?
7
2K
Wolzard replied
  • Poll
What happened to the PlayStation Platinum/Nintendo Selects/Xbox Classics?
34
759
Hudo replied
Top Bottom