Pachter: There is not a third party “core” audience on Wii

August 13th, 2009 Posted in News, Posted by Austin, Wii

“The “core” Wii audience is a Mario/Zelda/Smash Bros./Metroid audience, not a Conduit audience. To the extent that the Wii is the only console that the core gamer owns, it’s likely because the only games he/she cares about are first party core titles. Most core Wii owners who care about shooter games other than Metroid already own an Xbox 360 (to play Halo or Gears), or own a PS3 (to play Resistance or Killzone). So when a game like The Conduit comes out on the Wii, these core gamers are making a comparison to Halo or Killzone, and are deciding accordingly. High Voltage did a decent job with The Conduit, especially given the graphic limitations of the Wii, but the game didn’t look and feel as good as games like Halo or Killzone, and if a gamer had both a Wii and either a PS3 or Xbox 360, it’s easy to see why they would pass on The Conduit in favor of a hard core game on one of the other platforms.” – Analyst Michael Pachter

I really have to agree with Pachter on this one. Just from a sales perspective, there’s no doubt that the only core titles that really sell how they should are Nintendo titles, when things like The Conduit and Madworld don’t sell anywhere near where they should.

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  1. 2 Responses to “Pachter: There is not a third party “core” audience on Wii”

  2. By Jason on Aug 13, 2009

    Has Patcher even played the Conduit or any mature Wii game for that matter? Since when does the gaming community put any stock in what some number crunching, dip$hit analyst has to say about gaming? Patcher doesn’t know his a$$ from his elbow. Even from a sales perspective he’s totally wrong. Resident Evil Umbrella Chronicles and Resident Evil 4 both did really well on the Wii, and why? Because they’re quality games, they’re fun to play and they’ve already got an established name with the Nintendo crowd, since the N64. The Conduit is second rate compared to CoD WaW which also did well on the Wii. This guys logic is so full of holes that I’m surprised anyone still listens to a word he has to say, someone should call bull$hit on him. The Wii audience isn’t The Conduit audience?? No consoles audience is the Conduits audience, the game straight sucks. MadWorld was too repetitive, by the time you reached the subway, you had pretty much killed your enemies in every way possible and by then the shock value of the over-the-top violence had already worn thin, so don’t blame the audience, blame the developers because good mature games do sell well on the wii and the evidence is there to support it (sales numbers). Patcher will eat his words if Dead Space Extraction turns out to be a fantastic, worth-owning game, because then it will sell, mark my words.

    Don’t confuse M-rated with “Great Game”.

  3. By Ponkotsu on Aug 14, 2009

    As usual, Pachter continues to be consistent in one thing only – his own inaccuracy. He’s never been good at reading the market, and he’s come across as openly gunning at the Wii at every turn this generation, trying to predict the magical day when suddenly everyone throws it away for something stagnant and high-def.

    There’s a proven core audience on the console, and a very strong, profitable one when devs make an effort. (We established that early in the console’s life with Red Steel and Resident Evil 4 Wii’s sales.) They need to stop putting their big budget major games on the other consoles, start giving Wii games respectable budgets (As many have) and start MARKETING their Wii games. And the media needs to stop trying to use niche titles as “proof” that some audience or another is lacking on the Wii because they aren’t blockbusters. MadWorld was effectively the Wii’s GodHand, and it sold several times what GodHand did on an even more popular platform.

    In short, as usual, Pachter is to be ignored.

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