Wednesday, June 8, 2011

Wii U perhaps a game of check and mate

    So I am a huge nerd, in case you missed that from all of my other posts, and I have been following E3 news very closely this year. What came as no surprise and made me very happy was the announcement of a new Nintendo console entitled the Wii U. The game system comes attatched with a controller that has a 6.2" touchscreen which can stream the game from the tv to the controller. Me gusta. There are hundreds of possibilites for this not only that but there are ways were people can do many innovative things for this controller. That though is not the point of this post. No what I am speculating about is the way Nintendo has played Microsoft and Sony and placed them in a form of check.

    If you recall five years or so ago Nintendo came out with a graphically underpowered system in favor of motion controls. Some said this was a bad idea some said it was great. The numbers follow the latter (to the tune of 80 Million or so consoles sold at profit...big money). The other two companies seeing how much of a cash cow motion controls are opted to buy into the idea and developed the Kinect and Move. These two companies sunk huge wads of cash and are stuck for the time being in these system add-ons. With the competition stuck Nintendo innovated again to create a more immersive environment for gamers. Now the question that I have is this when will a new system be launched for Sony and Microsoft. Juding by all accounts from developers they don't want anything new for at least another 3 or 4 years. Meaning that Nintendo (if they follow their pattern of five years and out) will have a new console available in the year 2017 a short 2 to 3 years after the new competion consoles are made. Thus making it so that the competition has to lose money twice in 4 years no matter what they do. Check and mate.

This was a brilliant strategy fo Ninty. I believe that they will be "assuming direc control" in a matter of one more console life cycle, if they cater to the "hardcore" and "casual" crowds!

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