Bront said:
I think Nintendo is going to rock the market, and Sony is only hurting itself. With the price, and the way people need to stretch their entertainment dollar, I think the Wii is in a position to make a potential killing.
I'm certainly not a hardcore console gamer, and so I have ZERO interest in the PS3, and the biggest factors in that are a price I am not remotely interested in paying even half of, and grand new features that I am not interested in having (and I agree that push for Blue Ray is the waste of Betamax all over again). So, when they are easily available, I'm planning on picking up a Wii, but mostly because I'm finding fewer and fewer games for my current Gamecube.
One long term drawback to Sony's strategy is the potential that people like me might be a significant portion of the market. You see, not only am I going to make a single purchase of a Wii instead of a PS3, but I am a dad with kids who are now getting really into video games. Although my wife and I originally started with a Playstation, for the next generation we bought a Gamecube, and with this next wave, we're going with a Wii. Both of those decisions have been largely due to price, because like a lot of families, we have to thrifty with things like that.
Therefore, my young little consumers are being raised strictly on Nintendo consoles, not Sony or Microsoft, and the price and lack of unnecessary (to us) feature bloats are the biggest factors in this. So, I don't doubt that Sony and Microsoft will keep capturing the current hardcore console gamers, but Nintendo is gearing itself up much more for wider appeal and with that, families and the the young consumers who will be buying their own consoles in 10-15 years.
There's nothing wrong with Sony's move towards targetting a smaller and smaller niche of hardcore console gamers with deeper and deeper pockets, after all, that's the best way to get the most cutting edge technology developed. I just wonder if that's really a sustainable business model in the long run, especially when they are trying to push a new Betamax.