NYTimes looks at Wii's software sales problem

[R.O.B.]

Filed under: Nintendo Wii, Business

Despite consistently strong hardware sales, the Wii has thus far lagged behind its competitors when it comes to the all important software tie ratio. The New York Times looked into the problem today, with an article highlighting Wii owners' reluctance to buy games at the usual rapid pace.

On average, Wii owners only buy 3.7 games a year, compared to 4.7 and 4.6 for the Xbox 360 and PS3 respectively. "These new gamers are content with the games they have, often going no further than the Wii Sports game that comes with the machine," the Times author states. "They don't buy new games with the fervor of a traditional gamer who is constantly seeking new stimulation."

Analysts say fixing the problem will require changing the way third parties market their games to the new audience of casual Wii gamers. "Advertising on Game Informer and 1up.com just isn't reaching this audience," Wedbush Morgan's Michael Pachter said. Advertising on Joystiq.com, though? Always a great idea!

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Source: Joystiq

[Jogurt the Yogurt]

They've hit the nail on the head with one point: a surprisingly huge number of Wii sales is Wii Sports induced. A lot of casual gamers, older folks especially, love the idea of action-packed waggly fun games, but don't know where to go after Sports (even Wii Play doesn't offer the same experience). My parents got a Wii for Christmas, and they're totally happy to play nothing but Wii Sports. I gave them a copy of Wii Play, which my dad likes for the air hockey, and they're considering maybe getting Mario Kart Wii for my sister, but that's about the extent of it.

Additionally, you always hear about nursing homes and hospitals and places like that installing Wiis, but you can bet they're going to be content with Wii Sports and nothing else. In this sense, the pack-in concept worked miracles, with a single game selling systems by the truckload. But if they want to appeal to these one-off casual gamers, they need to do better than just more unrelated casual games. They need direct sequels of Wii Sports. Wii Fit will certainly help.

Another odd, related problem is that many people who just get a Wii and are happy with Wii Sports sate their meagre gaming appetites with Virtual Console games. As we all know, the VC basically prints money for Nintendo, but VC sales don't show up in traditional software sales analysis. So these new Wii-owner gaming demographics probably are buying software in their own way, it's just not something that gets reflected through traditional means.

[Bonesaw]

I could be wrong here, but I think it might have to do with the fact that 98% of the Wii games are HORRIBLE, mostly due to control problems.

The "motion control" revolution isn't what it was cracked up to be.

[Jogurt the Yogurt]

Originally Posted by Bonesaw

I could be wrong here, but I think it might have to do with the fact that 98% of the Wii games are HORRIBLE

Maybe... but then again that doesn't explain why the equally horrible 98% of PS3 and 360 games sell. So I'd say it's a pretty simplistic conclusion.

Originally Posted by Bonesaw

The "motion control" revolution isn't what it was cracked up to be.

I think it's far too early to pass that kind of judgment. The "revolution" (or whatever you want to call it) is just beginning, after all.

[Kenryoku_Maxis]

The problem with the Wii's 'Third Party' divide is the Third Parties thought this generation was going to either be dominated by PS3 or XBOX360. And for even its first year, they were still sticking to a waiting game of looking to see which was going to 'win' out of the big two, not even putting Nintendo into the equation of a possibility (even when it was beating the other two in sales and popularity in many areas).

Now that there's been some clear market penetration from Nintendo and some clear dividing lines from the 'PS3' Market and 'XBOX360' markets, its like the third parties are playing a big denial game and don't want to work on the Wii eventhough its there. Yes, some companies put a few trial games on there and they didn't do so hot or as well as Nintendo Internal games so people are using that as an example to go 'See, third parties can never do good on Wii!' But also, thse 'trial' games were also 1) Very gimmicky 2) Not as hyped aside from hardcore Wii fans and 3) Just plain not very good.

All the real good, high budget amazing games coming from 3rd party developers are going to XBOX360 and the DS. And sometime in like 2058, when they actually finish production, the PS3. The third parties are throwing mostly just small bones at the Wii and very quirky odd off the wall titles. People claim a third party title could never challenge a Nintendo title on the Wii. Well that's because they're putting all they're Ninja Gaidens, Assassins Creeds, Lairs, GTA 4s, FFXIII's, MGS4s and etc on the other systems. Games like 'No More Heroes', 'Zack and Wiki' and 'Dragon Quest Swords' are not going to be considered titles worthy of sitting next to Mario Galaxy or Smash Bros Brawl in comparison. In either hype or production value (let alone sales).

I for one am getting quite tired of people blaming 'The Wii' or 'Nintendo' for this problem. This is the same stubborn third parties who killed the GameCube going 'I don'r want to work for GameCube because I hate Nintendo and that kiddy s***'. Only now 'kiddy s*** has been replaced with 'waggle'. Excuses excuses.

[Jogurt the Yogurt]

The difference is that the Wii isn't going to die out as easily as the GCN did. The bottom line is that Nintendo is making very, very good first-party titles. Third parties will eventually come to the Wii, but they're going to have to work really hard to match the kind of care Nintendo puts into many of their games, and I don't think they really like that idea (especially when they can just market the same old crap to half-baked PS3 and 360 owners).

Do people not think that FFXIII would sell just as many copies if it were developed as a Wii exclusive? I think it definitely would.

But as I mentioned, and as was touched on in the article, the attach rates are going to be skewed by the fact that so many people have Wiis who don't really want to buy games. If you pare the inflated hardware sales down to levels closer to the other systems, the hypothetical "gamer-only" attach rates increase quite a bit. Enough to show that people certainly are buying Wii games.

[Kenryoku_Maxis]

The Wii won't die. But the Third Parties can still boycott the Wii with it dominating because the XBOX360 has a pretty high user base in America and Europe (eventhough their console sales have virtually stopped) and PS3 sales have actually started to move. Its basically given these Third Parties, or more accurately the developers who don't want to work on Wii, the excuse they need.

Plus, the DS outselling all the other consoles combined doesn't help the Wii itself. It helps Nintendo, but Nintendo needs to pick up at least half the third party support like Konami, better American support and more solid Square games, before it goes into its next console.

[Jogurt the Yogurt]

Originally Posted by Kenryoku_Maxis

The Wii won't die. But the Third Parties can still boycott the Wii with it dominating because the XBOX360 has a pretty high user base in America and Europe (eventhough their console sales have virtually stopped) and PS3 sales have actually started to move. Its basically given these Third Parties, or more accurately the developers who don't want to work on Wii. the excuse they need.

Plus, the DS outselling all the other consoles combined doesn't help the Wii itself. It helps Nintendo, but Nintendo needs to pick up at least half the third party support like Konami, better American support and more solid Square games, before it goes into its next console.

Exactly. I think we're arguing two sides of the same page, here. And I think it's only a matter of time before third-party support picks up. They can't hold out forever when there's a superconsole out there proving everyone wrong every week. Graphics aren't everything anymore. Gamers want their games to be fun.

I think a lot of it is sour grapes, too, actually. Nintendo churns out some really top-grade software when they want to. In this matter, the ball is in the other developers' court, and they're not too keen to help out.

Square support is an odd thing. They're not making all that many new, original, quality games right now. The odd game in the flagship Final Fantasy injects some life into whatever system it's released on, but the rest are all remakes and spinoffs, a lot of which are appearing on the DS. I think their support isn't as necessary as some people think, and I think Nintendo already has a good deal of it (and will probably get more).

But this thread isn't strictly about third party support, it's about the related issue of attach rates. And I think that things aren't as bad as people think they are. When you ignore the people who bought a Wii and never intended to buy traditional games for it, you're still left with big sales figures and far bigger attach rates than those that are being reported through traditional outlets.

[Kenryoku_Maxis]

Originally Posted by Jogurt the Yogurt

Square support is an odd thing. They're not making all that many new, original, quality games right now. The odd game in the flagship Final Fantasy injects some life into whatever system it's released on, but the rest are all remakes and spinoffs, a lot of which are appearing on the DS. I think their support isn't as necessary as some people think, and I think Nintendo already has a good deal of it (and will probably get more).

On a totally unrelated note, Final Fantasy games have been selling at an ever-decreasing rate since the PSX days. Everyone can probably come up with a theory for why this is, but I like to think its because the main titles (numbered titles like FFX, XI and XII) haven't been sticking with the 'formula' or been what most people consider a normal Final Fantasy game. Or what they expected or wanted in a Final Fantasy game. And then, most of everything else Square has been making with the FF name has been endless Sequels and spin-off games. And hundreds of them. Do we really need 6 FFVII titles, 3-4 FF: CC titles, like 6 games that take place in Ivalice and now 3 games connected to the world of FFIV (including a Cell Phone adventure)? Not to mention every system has to have at least half the series remade for it in some way or another.

Its no wonder Final Fantasy doesn't sell as well anymore, even die hard fans would have to limit their buying of the series to certain games and non-fans of the series must be fed up with the series which is as saturated as Mario and Pokemon by now. And has more remakes and spin-off games than both of those series combined.

Originally Posted by Jogurt the Yogurt

But this thread isn't strictly about third party support, it's about the related issue of attach rates. And I think that things aren't as bad as people think they are. When you ignore the people who bought a Wii and never intended to buy traditional games for it, you're still left with big sales figures and far bigger attach rates than those that are being reported through traditional outlets.

Yeah, but people making a big deal about this are the people most likely already who don't like the Wii or felt the Wii 'has no games'. If you like the Wii or looked into the games at all, you'd already have your own opinion of the state of Wii's games.

The real impact of this is how the media is going to handle it and continue to report it over and over again, or not. And if third parties are going to wake up and start working to fix it. Again though, those developers are choosing their priorities and being stubborn over making money.

[The shoemaker]

And may I add that a lot of third party developers don't know how to use the wii's waggle abilities. Nintendo games do them very well, but some third party games have motion control just for the heck of it.look at Brawl and mario Galaxy, they have nearly no motion controls and are selling great. Mario Galaxy only has spin and point. And brawl's motion controls are optional. Of course there are still Nintendo titles but still they are doing great without motion. I like the third party developers who think the motion controls could be cool in the right spots, or think that you should only put them in if there needed. Not the ones who think, "lets see we could make a really great game, maybe add some motion controls for the right areas, hey maybe we could have a good online system too". But then they think "nah that could take a few years, and well we will make big bucks if we throw a whole lot of motion controls in it, and no one even goes online so there's no point, and well we want to save as much money as possible so lets make some blocky characters, and well if we add little beeps and boops to the music, it will do just fine" that's how you don't make a good game, and I really think a lot of developers think like that.