As the final ripples from E3 subside this week (whether for good or for now remains to be seen), Nintendo president Satoru Iwata leaves us with some passing comments that he probably wouldn’t have been caught dead making even just four or so months ago.
“Sony’s PS2 sales of 100 million units is an extraordinary number that our home game console business has not achieved,” Iwata told Reuters. “But if we can make our bid to expand the gaming population a continued success, we could exceed that.”
He’s using an “if” statement there, but even still if the cards all fall into place with this Blue Ocean strategy, then there’s really no telling how many consoles will be sold. The DS, I’d argue, looks like it may have already passed the tipping point, so we’ll see where that little white (and onyx. and pearl. and pink …) gem can go from here, won’t we?
With more than 120 million units sold (except mine; I won mine from an after prom party in 1999), the PS2 defined a generation of gaming. Games were made first and foremost for the PS2, and then developers starting thinking about everything else. If the Wii were to take even half that number with this latest spate of consoles out today, then I think we’ll see some very interesting games indeed.
Is it the “death of the hardcore gamer” as I’ve been reading all over the place these days? Not really. Let’s be all grandiose and bombastic, shall we? Let’s call it the birth of some new innovation.