Opening Day and My Thoughts on Wii

 I created this blog today in order to make it an extension to my home page (MikeOren.com). For the moment, I am choosing to host it on blogspot, but in the future I may move the hosting over to my web site. However, even if/when I move the hosting to my web site, I will still keep the two disctint and seperate as they are both being created for different audiences. MikeOren.com is about me, my life, my writings, my research, grad school, etc. It's built for anybody, but it's really targeted towards family, friends, and people interested in my work. This blog is meant for everybody, or everybody that's interested in technology and video games--as that's what I'll be writing about.

I have chosen to make this first post about the Wii and my predictions for this next generation of console wars as E3 is coming up next month and I thought this would be topical. For my thoughts on the console wars, I thought I'd share a bit from an e-mail I wrote to an English professor about a week ago regarding these upcoming events (as to why I was writing an English professor about this topic--we coauthored an article last year regarding games: "Living Art: Commercial Modding and Code-Illiterate Gamers." Digital Gameplay):

"XBox 360: unless something drastically changes, they are slowly bleeding to death. Microsoft is losing money on the sales of the consoles (they never turned a profit w/ the original XBox), and there just aren't any good original games coming out for it. Almost all good games on the 360 are on the current gen systems for $10 less and why spend $10 more just for prettier graphics? The system has failed in Japan and they are relaunching it there this summer, but I don't think anybody expects that to have much of an effect. Currently they are selling about 200,000 per month (almost half of what the PS2 is currently selling) and they are about to try to ramp up production to 1,000,000 per month--that's a HUGE surplus... Microsoft has a huge wallet though, so they can take the hit, but they need something other than Halo 3 if they hope to get the console crown.

PS3: Current guesses are that the it will retail for $500-600 and it will cost Sony $800-900 to make. Sony won't sell it for more than $500 if they're smart (and they're typically fairly smart). If they learned nothing else from the failure of the PSP (and it HAS failed... not in the US yet, but in Japan nobody buys them so game makers aren't making games for it--Square is announcing 3 new games for the Nintendo DS but only one new one for the PSP and that one is a port of a 6 year old PS2 game) then they have learned that pricing a system at twice the price of your competitor will doom you to failure. If they're really smart, they'll cut the price down to $300-350 as everybody will be like "Wow! That's a bargain!", but what people ignore is the fact that Sony is a hardware/multimedia company and they'll be making their money back not just from the games but from Blu-Ray sales and licensing as well. Plus, by undercutting the price of the 360 they'll effectively kill Microsoft off in the marketplace. Also, at this price point the Revolution doesn't seem like it's as much of a bargain. However, if they launch at $400-500 than it's anybody's guess how the market will react to it--especially if the games aren't there. It's worth noting, however, that when the PS2 launch the games WEREN'T there and that the Japanese bought it because it was the least expensive DVD player on the market at the time. Likewise the PS3 will the cheapest Blu-Ray player on the market (most will retail for $800+). Basically, Sony probably should fail, but they'll probably succeed. They'll beat Microsoft for sure, but may not kill off Microsoft as a competitor. The other issue is that with all the new tech Sony is using they may have SERIOUS supply issues and that can only hurt them.

Revolution-this is a wild card. It's specs on paper are somewhere in between the current gen and the 360/PS3, but as Nintendo and some other experts have said: there isn't a HUGE visual difference between current gen and next gen systems like there has been in the past--the graphical differences are subtle at best (smoother/shinier surfaces and such). However, while the 360 and PS3 have simply modified their controllers for the new generation, Nintendo has once again reinvented the wheel in an attempt to provide a unique gameplay experience. Rumors also suggest that the price of the system will be between $100-200 and games won't cost any more than $50. This positions the Revolution to, if nothing else, easily be a 2nd system for anybody who chooses a 360 or PS3. This lower price point also makes it a perfect Christmas present for kids over their more expensive competitors. Nintendo is also working hard to try to capture non-traditional gamers and have been succeeding on the DS with games such as Brain Age (for the grey gamers--this is a fun game, btw) and Super Princess Peach/Nintendogs (for the female gamers). They are also trying to pull in gamers who used to play but have since moved away from gaming due to the more complicated controls/more time consuming games--as such they are offering games from the NES, Genesis, TurboGrafx 16, Super Nintendo, and Nintendo 64 to be downloaded and played on the system (and more classic systems may be added before launch as Nintendo was still negotiating with some companies). They also, of course, have their exclusive franchises that their competitors lack--most of Sony's good exclusive games come from 3rd parties, while Microsoft owns a small handful of developers that each make one or two good franchises. However, historically, Nintendo has ignored the 3rd parties too much and that has been their failing. They have stated that this time they have learned from their mistakes and that they will have a large amount of 3rd party support (with as many as 20 games at launch, which is actually fairly respectable... especially since Nintendo systems normally launch with 5 games, all from Nintendo...) They have 2 things going for them in terms of changing things this time: 1) developers seem REALLY intrigued by the new controller and the possibilities it opens up, and 2) it only costs $2,000 for a Revolution development kit versus $15,000+ for dev kits from their competitors. If Nintendo gets the 3rd party support and the PS3 launches for over $400 then Nintendo will either win or just marginally trail Sony in terms of sales (and definitely win in terms of profit--as even this current generation Nintendo turned the highest amount of profit related to games). However, that's a big if as a lot of these 3rd parties are fairly loyal to Sony and it would require a massive recruitment effort by Nintendo or a major screw up by Sony to win enough of them over. Still, it appears to definitely be a system worth looking into."

It should be noted that the e-mail was authored before Nintendo changed the name of their new system from Revolution to Wii. As to my thoughts on the name change, I thought a post I made on Slashdot recently would be appropriate:

"I've been thinking about this since yesterday (and my initial reaction of hatred of the name/thinking it was a stupid move, etc.) Now that I've had time to contemplate the issue though, I think it's an ingenious move. Here's why:

1) The name is simple, easy to remember, and sticks out like a sore thumb (which for marketing is good).

2) The fact that it's as weird as it is/initial reaction is "wtf" means LOTS of FREE publicity for Nintendo. Before this, NOBODY was talking about the system--there were a few small blurbs about it here and there, but even when the new controller was announced it was ignored by everybody but the gaming press. This new name though generates controversy and EVERYBODY is talking about it. Controversy sells: BIG TIME. Just look at GTA...

3) After awhile, the name DOES grow on you and instead of thinking of it as urine you start thinking of it as "whee" (i.e. fun). It's a nice, silly name. Maybe not "mature" or "hip", but I want my games to be FUN, not necessarily hip.

4) After watching the video and reading the reasoning behind the name, it opens up some great potential marketing ideas and makes sense why they chose this name.

5) People who don't like saying it will just call it the Nintendo. I mean, who ACTUALLY called the Nintendo Entertainment System by it's full name? Or even really NES (now that's used, but while it was their only system, I don't know ANYBODY who called it the NES). I don't see anything wrong with just calling the Wii the Nintendo again... As it pretty much is THE Nintendo (it can play games from ALL of their past systems after all...)"

So those are my thoughts on the matter of the next gen console wars. Do I have some biased toward Nintendo? Yes. Am I a Nintendo fanboy? I don't think so. I started gaming with the NES, but then I moved on to the Genesis and while I had the N64 and got the Playstation late in its life I played the Playstation more (mostly RPG games--as the Playstation introduced me to RPGs with Final Fantasy VII). This current generation though, I play the XBox the most (although mostly titles that were on other systems as well--with the exception of Halo and Halo 2), but I enjoyed the first party/exclusive titles of the GameCube the most (there just weren't enough other games on it/the games played better on the other systems). I ended up selling my PlayStation 2 to my younger brother because I hadn't bought any new games for it in over a year and harldy played it--I no longer had time for RPGs (the PS2 was still the system to own for those), the exclusive games were mostly sequels (although I did enjoy Metal Gear Solid 2, Devil May Cry, EyeToy, and all those), and the cross platform games looked and played better on the XBox. The XBox also made a better DVD player than the PS2 (in my opinion). Basically, I think Sony has been lacking innovation (see the PSP) and I think Microsoft lacks Japanese developer support. Nintendo is taking some huge risks, and IF they can pull this off I think they will win the console wars (if for no other reason then because they will be everybody's 2nd console of choice--so people will own a PS3 and a Wii or a XBox 360 and a Wii, or maybe just a Wii...) However, if they don't pull it off, Sony will win the console wars. Unless Microsoft can somehow throw a huge curve ball or Sony does something to destroy their brand recognition, Microsoft has already lost.