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As many media have been reporting, this year's hottest topic was the battle between SONY's PS3 and Nintendo's Wii.
SONY and Nintendo's press conference live movie from gamespot.
http://www.gamespot.com/news/6149663.html (Nintendo)
http://www.gamespot.com/ps3/action/insomniacshooter/news.html?sid=6149470 (SONY)
Other than their new system and controller, SONY and Nintendo have totally different marketing strategy and target audience from each other.
As CEO of Nintendo Satoru Iwata explains, Nintendo came up with a totally unique marketing strategy. They tried to reach "people who have never played game" and "People who used to play game". Those audiences were considered impossible to reach.
...but it was wrong.
Nintendo DS games such as "NintenDog" and "Brain Age" became huge hit (millions of copied were sold instantly) not only in Japan but is rapidly getting popular among western consumers. This proved that Nintendo's new marketing approach was effective.
Like Nintendo DS, Wii is also a console for everybody.
Wii is easy to be played by people who have never played a game or have no idea how to operate controller. (For examples, your Mom and Grand parents!)
Wii's controller is extremely easy to use since most of the games are motion based game such as tennis, baseball, golf, etc. The only thing a player has to do is swing the controller.
Also, Nintendo's goal is to increase the population of people who play game, as a whole. This is a very innovative approach within game industry. Until now, game companies were trying to share the pie of already existing players, not looking for possibility to make the pie itself bigger.
When PS3's price was announced at SONY's press conference, the first impression of people were, "that is so expensive!". The price of almost $600 is unreachable for kids. I believe there will be many people who would just rent the machine to play couple of their favorite games.
I personally love MGS and FF series, and look forward to "Metal Gear Solid 4" and "Final Fantasy 13" that are coming exclusively with PS3.
My point is that I am not buying PS3 for the console, but more for the titles.
On the other hand, I would buy Wii for console itself, but not particularly for the titles. Many of the games designed for Wii are very casual games, such as Tennis, Golf, Baseball and Orchestra. Though, those simple casual games are great when it is played with Wii controller.
Wii is indeed not the "next generation console", but is the "New generation console".
Wii controller senses motion and its movement reflect the game play. The controller also has a speaker built in so that when you swing the controller you hear the sound of the ball being hit just as you are really serving the ball.
As Reggie Fils-Aime, Executive Vice President of Sales and Marketing of Nintendo America repeats many times, "Change is good". To create the new generation product, product can not be just upgraded product in terms of system, but needs to be totally modified from the concept.
Wii controller brought sensation to the whole game play. It became an extremely exciting revolution to the game industry.
So far, I have been praising Wii all the way, but please do not get me wrong. There are also many people who are very excited about PS3, especially for its sophisticated system.
I would like to mention that, I am writing this article from the point of view as a mediocre gamer, with mediocre knowledge in gaming system. I am neither casual gamer, nor expert in technical aspect of game system.
In terms of expected user share and innovative aspects, Wii might be winning over PS3. Although, the real battle between PS3 and Wii has not started yet.
PS3 is planned to be released in November in the USA, and Wii will be released in the 4th quarter of this year. Wii's price has not been announced yet.
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