I agree, and then i don't: The Wiimote is so dramatic a difference from gaming that i don't think it has been milked for what it has. But then the wiimote isn't the only controller on the wii, the balance board and the standard game controllers are there. What makes the wii isn't the controller, it goes a long way, but there is more to it.

The graphics are not awesome ... well some are worse than others. No More Heroes looked like pixel vomit and Paper Mario looked simple but nice. Okami, Mario Galaxy and Zelda although definitely not 360 or PS3 in quality get the job done. There is more to the games than just graphics, but at the same time so many games are junk. Casual gamers i would argue just don't know any better and accept it. I don't want to say that their taste's are less refined, but there is a greater acceptance of flaws ... 'that control grates but hey it's a game, that's how they are ... right?' is an attitude i seem to observe when friends showed us Mario and Sonic at the Olympic games (or whatever the title). The game is painful to play and it isn't a fitness issue... i don't know a single sports game of that persuasion that hasn't been on par with movie tie ins ... except you know the events will be boring, and it's the controls that really turn your stomach. But my friends think it's an awesome party game ... and i have to admit ... it is cute and fun in that setting. I have also yet to bring myself to play Mario Kart Wii on my own... it just does not appeal to me in that way...

One way or another, if they updated to a new system NOW, after only so short a time, i would feel a little betrayed... AU$350 isn;t that cheap...

Belcaw - valid point, and you might be right about the modifications ... well at least the Motion Plus and new software anyway. Increased internal storage i'm not so sure about... might make sense...

However i don't see the first two as being something that would need a sell-down of stock but as an alternate box, maybe new Wii mote with the motion plus integrated, (i assume the nunchuck still plugs in the bottom), but even that would not require a sell-down. The internal storage ... maybe .... but it's just a chip, so that could be addressed with a revision, and even then they wouldn't need to bridge the gap because they could drop the price on the lower spec, bundle the motion plus and new game, and if they were really THAT worried, add an SD card. In that case, they might not need to change the price at all...

You have a point, but i'm guessing that they have seen something else about the economic situation or market saturation. Maybe they've realised the can't make a release date on a killer app. The decrease sounds dramatic ... but i don't see it as being a bad thing as such...

Maybe you're right ... it does have a good ring to it, the more i think about it...

Like it or not PC Gaming is dying. It has been for a fair while now. It is true that the console experience (at least initially) always sets itself apart on graphics. It is also true that online gaming is (not the future but) a major component of game play, it makes it communal after all.

However, graphics get caught up on and the PC surpasses. This must be a shock to all the console developers ... it's only been happening since the birth of consoles. And it would appear to me that the three major console systems have decent online play support. Live (on the Xbox) is probably superior to what PC offers, although in truth PC online gamers are a little more skilled (by necessity) to broker games so although PCs are superior there is an issue of casual gamers getting to the party. Since we are pointing out the console flaws, lets include the PC ones.

One way or the other though, consoles have the advantage that. They power on fast. They are less prone to viruses and so forth (i'm sure that's coming given the install base). They are less of a problem with regards to piracy (RROD was a great ploy to prevent mod chipping ... who will void their warranty when the consoles are dropping like flies? [no i don't believe it's a conspiracy, but i do like the theory]). And some are genuinely more immersive. The Wii in particular (oh and it's graphics were not that great at launch).

PCs as a whole aren't going away, and as a result people will have those hunks of hardware and will use them to play games. And great games will come out. The dying is not about death, the dying is about decline. The situation is more complex than PC anyway, the different OS's are their own little islands, and no one is developing for Linux or Mac. EA's DRM masterpiece Spore and other efforts barely count, though i like the game as a diversion ... a casual game ... it won't ever get the attention of say Fallout 3, but it's still good to have there when i'm traveling for work and don't have my PC (Vista and Linux) or my consoles (360 and Wii).

But PC gaming death is largely brought on by the big publishers like EA with their constant anti piracy drm crap. Spore, cute yes, but not my kind of game. If it was on console i could have traded (and would have traded) it. Like i said it's nice, but at the price i could have bought other casual games which (granted) are less clever, but just as good a time killer.

And besides, who cares? Diversity has always been the key to survival, if a company puts it all on PC, odds are they will decline in the long run...

nolim ... it's not stealing ... its evolution :) few games have new and unique concepts ... though portal comes to mind...

No, the problem with Doom 3 was not Doom 3, it was that it was not what people expected. The "no duct tape" issue cited is the prime example. id wanted us to choose gun or flashlight, have the gun and shoot as soon as something comes at you, have the light and see where you're going. It was a design choice and if you accepted what they had decided it was a great feel.

The game itself was not overly long but it was fun. I don't believe it was a bad game so much as people wanted something simpler, and that was the problem for the vast majority. Maybe not group think but once it was given voice that "i want to see where i'm going while carrying a gun" people dissented, but it was not because the game was flawed.

There was a lot of new stuff in it, like the User Interfaces in the environment itself. Granted this could have been done differently, but it was something that aided immersion. The environment was rich and scary and although the story was not Shakespeare, who would have hoped for that from an FPS?

id aimed high and succeeded well. People bought the game, and now having just played Dead Space, i was thinking "everything Doom 3 should have been" ... but that's because Dead Space "copied" so much from Doom 3 (though not the story) and really Doom 3 was great then, and Dead Space is great now. And maybe that's an unfair comparison.

As for carg0 ... yeah ... i agree, i don't think any game ever has been worth upgrading a computer for.