Microsoft Says Wii Users Will Graduate to the Xbox 360

In the battle for casual gamers, Microsoft is stepping up its rhetoric, specifically targeting the Nintendo Wii. Aaron Greenberg, the director of product management for Xbox 360 and Xbox Live at Microsoft, has told Gamasutra that those using the Wii to play casual games will end up "want[ing] to graduate to an Xbox 360 experience" as time goes by.

Microsoft believes that casual gamers, meaning people interested in gaming experiences that are easy to get into and do not suck up a lot of time, are a continuously growing category. As such, the company is eager to create games and other content that can attract them to the Xbox 360.

Greenberg said that "we don't really see the Wii as a direct competitor, we actually very much complement the Wii experience. It's obviously clear that we're going head-to-head with the PS3 in this generation. I think what Xbox will be able to do as well as the Wii is grow [sic] the market."

The thinking is that, as casual gamers become more experienced and try more and more games, they might be interested in going beyond what Nintendo can offer to them with the Wii. Microsoft wants the Xbox 360 and its services to be ready to deliver what they need, meaning better graphics and a more intuitive gaming experience.

Greenberg also pointed out that the typical Wii gamer is not interested in buying videogames for their console, mainly because they rarely use it. "They're buying it, it's like something they break out when people come over, and it's maybe a fun thing, but it's almost like the same people that buy a karaoke machine, you know? They're not really buying it for games, they're just buying it as a novelty." he explained.

Obviously, Aaron has not been looking at the software charts over the last six months. Most big launches for the Nintendo Wii, from Super Mario Galaxy to Mario Kart and the Wii Fit, dominated the videogame charts for weeks, if not months. The Wii console is still hard to find in stores and there are people out there willing to pay double price to get their hands on a copy of Wii Fit.