Some developers like profitability of Wii, but Xbox and PS3 supporters have something to say
The Wii’s low game development costs
According to a Reuters article (which you can read at the Reuters site), Wii games sell for about US$ 50, while PS3 and Xbox 360 games cost more (about US$ 60 for most new games). So you spend 17% less on a Wii game than on other games. But game development costs for the Wii are about half of game dev costs for the PS3 or Xbox 360. Sometimes, game dev costs for the Wii are even less, says Reuters.
The Wii’s powerful allies: the game developers
Do the math. If you’re spending 17% less on a Wii game, but game developers spent 50% less on that Wii game, then it looks more profitable to make a Wii game. This is why some game makers are Nintendo’s new “powerful allies.” Not only are these developers excited about the Wii’s innovative features (Wii remote, etc.), they’re really excited about the profits.
And what about the high game development costs of making games for the Xbox 360 and PS3? Reuters says, “In their attempts to future-proof their machines with gee-whiz technology, Microsoft and Sony are forsaking the immediate profits Nintendo will reap with the Wii.” In other words, the Xbox 360 and the PS3 are trying to tempt game developers with better graphics than the Wii. But the Wii has convinced some game developers that you don’t need to have better graphics – you only need to be cheap, fun, and profitable. Yeah, that’s why I think the Wii is easy like Sunday morning.
Is cheap fun the way to go? Some game developers think so. And we have some ideas about this too. We discuss these in the Full Article version of this blog entry (click on the “Full Article” link below to read it).
The response from the Xbox 360 and the PS3 side: POWER WINS!
The graphics and the power of the Xbox 360 and PS3 translate to higher ramp-up costs for game developers. But then, the big, confident, and consistently good game developers might not care because they often come up with stunning games like Gears of War (or Viva Pinata) and Resistance: Fall of Man. In other words, there are developers willing to invest because they know they’ll get stunning games that will sell well.
We got lots more to say about this… read the rest of the article by clicking on the “Full Article” link below!
The Wii’s low game development costs
According to a Reuters article (which you can read at the Reuters site), Wii games sell for about US$ 50, while PS3 and Xbox 360 games cost more (about US$ 60 for most new games). So you spend 17% less on a Wii game than on other games. But game development costs for the Wii are about half of game dev costs for the PS3 or Xbox 360. Sometimes, game dev costs for the Wii are even less, says Reuters.
The Wii’s powerful allies: the game developers
Do the math. If you’re spending 17% less on a Wii game, but game developers spent 50% less on that Wii game, then it looks more profitable to make a Wii game. This is why some game makers are Nintendo’s new “powerful allies”. Not only are these developers excited about the Wii’s innovative features (Wii remote, etc.), they’re really excited about the profits.
And what about the high game development costs of making games for the Xbox 360 and PS3? Reuters says, “In their attempts to future-proof their machines with gee-whiz technology, Microsoft and Sony are forsaking the immediate profits Nintendo will reap with the Wii.” In other words, the Xbox 360 and the PS3 are trying to tempt game developers with better graphics than the Wii. But the Wii has convinced some game developers that you don’t need to have better graphics – you only need to be cheap, fun, and profitable. Yeah, that’s why I think the Wii is easy like Sunday morning.
Is cheap fun the way to go? Laurent Detoc of Ubisoft thinks so, and it looks like EA is starting to think so. “Does it have to have high-end graphics to be fun? No,” said Detoc. Ubisoft, according to Reuters, will release eight Wii titles within the month of the release. Meanwhile, Electronic Arts‘ Nick Earl said EA’s support for Nintendo is the highest in over a decade.
Being cheap can be a good thing
We all have to admit that a console must be profitable to stay alive. This is one lesson in the Wii. Low costs make it easier to turn a profit. It’s an intelligent business model, and it makes the Wii attractive to developers who might be more willing to innovate, experiment, and invest real money when it comes to Wii games. In other words, they’re more willing to push fun (instead of investing heavily on graphics) so we can have fun too.
The response from the Xbox 360 and the PS3 side: POWER WINS!
I can’t see that far into the future, and who knows what else the companies might have up their sleeves. But what if the Wii is only poised for a short-term lead while the Xbox 360 and the PS3 are geared up for the long marathon?
Look at it this way…
The graphics and the power of the Xbox 360 and PS3 translate to higher ramp-up costs for game developers. But then, the big, confident, and consistently good game developers might not care because they often come up with stunning games like Gears of War (or Viva Pinata) and Resistance: Fall of Man. In other words, there are developers willing to invest because they know they’ll get stunning games that will sell well.
Game developers for Wii games have to invest less, but they’re working with a less “powerful” system. Yes, the Wii has The Legend of Zelda: Twilight Princess (with downloadable content and all) and some cool games, but Nintendo’s speakers (by that we mean Shigeru Miyamoto, Satoru Iwata, Perrin Kaplan, the Wii hardware designers) have already said (again and again in so many interviews and conferences) that the Wii is not as powerful a machine as the Xbox 360 or the PS3 – although the Wii remote does appeal to many developers as a new avenue to explore.
Still, the problem with small, inexpensive, and low-power gadgets is that it can (it doesn’t always, but it can) seem disposable. You want a clean shave? Buy this cheap electric razor – its got cheap technology and will be obsolete in a couple months (in which case you get it fixed or, more likely, throw it away). You want a clean shave each day of your life? Buy this powerful razor because nothing else will be more powerful than this for a long time to come.
In the same way, if you want to have some fun, you can buy any platform you want (heck, you can dust off the old SNES on an easy Sunday morning or – gasp – even read a book with no pictures). But Xbox 360 and PS3 supporters will tell you this: if you want a platform that is technologically competitive, then don’t go with the Wii. “The Wii’s graphics barely compare to seventh-generation standards!” they say. “Its processing abilities are barely higher than that of a GameCube!” they exclaim.
Conclusion
The Nintendo Wii. Affordable fun for all families and everyone (rich or poor, woman or man, young or old, servant or free) – and you have an innovative Wii remote thrown in – and you have developers considering the (profitable) possibilities and giving support to this platform – and maybe they’ll even experiment with different gameplay possibilities too!
And, to put it so noobly, so simplistically: the Wii is so small and sleek that Nintendo could, theoretically, produce them by the millions without losing money (unlike other console makers of the past and future) because it’s so affordable that families worldwide will buy most of them – and that would just make game developers happier because they have a bigger market to sell to, right?
So that’s it? Wii for the win?
Not so fast! Technophiles will tell you this: technology is always growing, and anything you buy today could be obsolete tomorrow, so the best chance you have of being able to enjoy tomorrow’s developments is to buy something that can handle the technological advancements. Imagine that Lockheed Martin (you know, the Trident missiles and F-117 stealth fighter “Black Jet” people) make a game console: the Lockheed XR-720 Blackbox with graphics and processing power so high and advanced that you have to pass an FBI and CIA check before you can own one.
If you own an Xbox 360 or PS3, the “powerful” games being made for your platform could still compete with our imaginary XR-720 Blackbox. But if you own a Wii… well, you tell yourself that graphics were never that big a deal and you go on waving your stick at your TV. Or read a book.
Finally, we tried to make this article as fair and unbiased as we could. If you got problems with that, all the blogger of this entry can say is this: Everybody wants me to be what they want me to be / I’m not happy when I try to fake it / No ooooh that’s why I’m easy / I’m easy like Sunday morning…