14 DAY TRIAL // One of the leading executives of hardware maker and video game publisher Nintendo has stated that the Wii home console will attract a new group of consumers in the coming years as a result of a further price drop and will continue to lead the overall sales for current generation consoles.
Reggie Fils-Aime, who is the president of Nintendo of America, has stated, “The back half of any system cycle always attracts a higher proportion of buyers who are concerned with price, ease of use and group play.… This late-adopter group is the next audience for the Wii.”
The Nintendo Wii competes in this space with the PlayStation 3 from Sony and the Xbox 360 from Microsoft, which have both become cheaper in the last year while also releasing new versions of hardware which use less energy and are more user friendly.
The Nintendo Wii holds the advantage when it comes to units moved to gamers, benefiting mainly from the initial price tag difference to its rivals and from the fact that it had motion tracking incorporated, although it was not as accurate as some would have liked.
Both these competitive advantages are beginning to dry up and both the PlayStation 3 and the Xbox 360 have gotten more sales on the crucial United States market, suggesting that the hardware department at Nintendo needs to be prepared to also update its product to stay competitive.
Rumors from the video game industry are suggesting that Nintendo knows what the weaknesses of the Wii are and is preparing an updated console which can offer High Definition support while also upgrading the quality of the motion tracking by including the Motion Plus add on in the Wiimote which comes in the package.
At the moment Nintendo is preparing for the late February 2011 launch of the 3DS handheld, the first one to deliver full three-dimensional gaming without any glasses, so any announcement of a new Wii will probably have to wait until E3 2011.