Can Nintendo Court the Casuals Again? 132
An anonymous reader sends this quote from Eurogamer:
"Do you remember the last time? When the Wii launched at the tail end of 2006, it was to an air of excited curiosity that went well beyond the borders of core gamers, with Nintendo conjuring what ran close to a full-blown phenomenon. ... Nintendo's masterstroke, of course, has been resurrecting the ultimate hardcore poster girl with the announcement that Bayonetta 2 is heading exclusively to the Wii U. There's something slightly incongruous about an over-sexed, incredibly violent action game rubbing shoulders with Mario and co., but then again that's exactly what makes the proposition so very exciting. ... There's still one very important section of the market that may prove a little tougher to persuade. Right now it's harder to see the broader appeal of the Wii U, and it's not simply a case of fearing that it'll fail to replicate the success of its predecessor — there's every chance that it could endure the same rocky start that plagued Nintendo's 3DS."
already sold out (Score:5, Informative)
Best Buy and Target have already stopped taking orders for both the deluxe and regular systems, and Gamestop has sold out of the deluxe systems. So it's already eerily similar to the Wii's pre-launch situation, and that console was very hard to find for months.
So no, there's little evidence that a rocky start is in store.
Bayonetta is a button mashing game... (Score:4, Informative)
...with lots of automated violence. It's more casual than something like Pikmin by miles.
Re:already sold out (Score:5, Informative)
Best Buy and Target have already stopped taking orders for both the deluxe and regular systems, and Gamestop has sold out of the deluxe systems. So it's already eerily similar to the Wii's pre-launch situation, and that console was very hard to find for months.
So no, there's little evidence that a rocky start is in store.
Yes, and even the rhetoric is similar. Both pre- and post- launch, as sales of the Wii consistently far outpaced those of the XBox 360 or the PS3 [wikipedia.org], self-defined "gamers" continued to talk about the Wii as if it were a minor player in the market. It's like these guys are sitting there covering their ears and shouting "LA LA LA LA I CAN'T HEAR YOU!".
Re:Jumped the shark (Score:3, Informative)
The 97% pirated number comes from an idiotic Ubisoft executive who was lying about how necessary DRM was. Please do no promote this myth.