I think gaming has gone too far. Last generation we had three options (four depending on how you think the Dreamcast fits in): You had your PS2, which you knew would be a reliable console for third-party gaming. You knew it would probably dwarf the libraries of it's competitors like PS1 dwarfed N64's and Saturn's, but that seventy percent of the games would be like 'Barbie's Beat-mix 3000' or some cheap-o crap, useless crap, and the still enormous thirty percent would consist of plenty of great games. If you went for Gamecube, you were banking on playing plenty of well-established, exclusive game series (serieses?, seri?) and you got Metroid Prime and Windwaker and SSBM and did pretty well. If you got an X-Box, you probably played Halo for a few days until you got bored, had fun using your own entrance music in Raw 2, and then your XBox probably stopped working because it was a piece of shit.
Now, I wouldn't go out and call Wii a winner at anything. It "won" because it's the only videogame system you can buy without taking out a second mortgage. Let's take your average twenty-ish male Wii owner, and for "friendly" purposes, we'll speak in second person. You bought the Wii because you could. You thought it was nifty when you played those Mii games (tennis, find the fastest swimmer, etc) and you liked it because it's the only games your girlfriend will play with you that don't involve a flat, foldable piece of cardboard. But when you're not with her you swear to yourself everytime a multi-console game comes out because you know you're going to get the limpd*ck "shake a stick, wave a chuk" version of the game that's probably going to kick ass on the other two consoles. You realize it doesn't matter to you anyway, because your sensor bar broke and you've realized that piece of "hi-tech" hardware can be be replaced by pointing the wiimote at the lamp, or maybe you will light some candles just long enough to load a gamecube game or Fire Emblem: Radiant Dawn, neither of which do you have to gimmick out on.
PS3 and 360 "lost" because one, not everybody can afford a couple of thousands of dollars on a high-definition television and an extra half a thousand on a videogame system. And, two, not everybody wants to pay monthly charges to play against other nerds online. The problem Sony and Microsoft have now that companies didn't have when we were all children, is that nobody has the money for the kind of devotion these companies are looking for. Nintendo released their console at a reasonable price, and the sly bastards got away with murder because they basically just re-released the gamecube with a remote control add-on.
The reality is that nobody won, everybody, most especially your average gamer, has lost.
Now, I wouldn't go out and call Wii a winner at anything. It "won" because it's the only videogame system you can buy without taking out a second mortgage. Let's take your average twenty-ish male Wii owner, and for "friendly" purposes, we'll speak in second person. You bought the Wii because you could. You thought it was nifty when you played those Mii games (tennis, find the fastest swimmer, etc) and you liked it because it's the only games your girlfriend will play with you that don't involve a flat, foldable piece of cardboard. But when you're not with her you swear to yourself everytime a multi-console game comes out because you know you're going to get the limpd*ck "shake a stick, wave a chuk" version of the game that's probably going to kick ass on the other two consoles. You realize it doesn't matter to you anyway, because your sensor bar broke and you've realized that piece of "hi-tech" hardware can be be replaced by pointing the wiimote at the lamp, or maybe you will light some candles just long enough to load a gamecube game or Fire Emblem: Radiant Dawn, neither of which do you have to gimmick out on.
PS3 and 360 "lost" because one, not everybody can afford a couple of thousands of dollars on a high-definition television and an extra half a thousand on a videogame system. And, two, not everybody wants to pay monthly charges to play against other nerds online. The problem Sony and Microsoft have now that companies didn't have when we were all children, is that nobody has the money for the kind of devotion these companies are looking for. Nintendo released their console at a reasonable price, and the sly bastards got away with murder because they basically just re-released the gamecube with a remote control add-on.
The reality is that nobody won, everybody, most especially your average gamer, has lost.
