Matthew

You guys (Joystiq) were impressed. If you weren't, you wouldn't have found that it was worthy enough to post on your site. :p But anyway, it doesn't matter how you slice it, those are impressive numbers. Period.

"Hardcore" and "Casual" are overused words in my opinion. A hardcore gamer is someone who has a lot of interest "at the subject at hand", in this case, videogames. And because their interest is so high, they are going to play it alot. A casual gamer is simply someone who has "valid" interest in videogames, but they're thoughts are not almost always consumed by the videogames. Hardcore, or not. You either play videogames or you don't. The difference is in the varying levels of interest. I think videogames are far too "single-minded" at the moment, as Iwata from Nintendo says. It's true. The fact is, a "videogame" is interactive entertainment. Stop with this, it has to have a story, it has to be epic, there has to be an ending, blah, blah, blah... If that was so darn important, the videogame industry would be expanding and growing. It's not. I'm not saying those traits are not important, they are, but that's pretty much all we're getting. For now. But you know what, change is already in motion. I bet in the next 5 years, the industry will be quite different from the way it is now. And once this change starts to become a reality, we will come to realize that yeah, videogames used to be targeted for a very niche group of people. I hate the word "videogames." I want to hear "interactive entertainment" from now on.

dsub, you need to realize that you cannot get the "full truth" by reading a review alone. You are reading something that is a perception from someone else's point of view. If I hated hockey, and you loved it, who's too say that I'm right? I'll try and give you every reason why I think hockey sucks, and you'll try to give me every reason why you think it's good. These days, I really feel you need to at least try the game out for yourself. Rent it. It's like reading a book on how to drive a car, and then telling everyone that now you know how to drive a car. It's one thing reading it, it's an entirely different thing experiencing it first-hand. Especially with interactive entertainment. I think this principle applied to videogames to some degree.

Journalism is kind of a tricky thing though. Most points, I think, will come through in the form of an opinion. I think it's important to separate the "ego" from the "I AM." When it comes to creativity, I don't think there's an ultimate truth. I've had many disagreements with different "journalists" point of view. I think, really, everyone is a journalist. The only difference is some are "concert journalists." Like someone learning how to play the piano, but that talent doesn't go beyond the confines of their own homes. And then you have the concert pianist.

The answer is simple. Yes, the industry would be different without Mario. But really, it's hard to say when the outcome has already come and gone. Mario has not only pioneered the industry in terms of how games are made and played, but is also loved by literally millions of players worldwide. There's a reason why the Mario franchise has sold more than 186 million copies worldwide and counting. There's something different about Mario. It doesn't matter how many games he's come out with, or if a couple of them were crap; people still look forward to his next appearance. Unfortunately, that's a double-edged sword for Nintendo. They have these incredible franchise to fall back on since demand is pretty much always there, but on the other hand, Nintendo wants to work on new frachises. New games. Did you read that interview with Miyamoto. Everyone's asking what old characters he would like to go back to and bring them forth to this generation. I think this geneartion while Nintendo will still cater to their fans with releases like Mario, Zelda, etc., you're also going to see new types of games and franchises. Damn, I just dragged on and on. Sorry about that.

Nintendo is a blessed and cursed company at the same time. They have the ability to come up with new and innovative ideas, and make those ideas work. That's just their nature. They truly are an innovative and pioneering company. Someone's gotta do it, right? With that, unfortunately, comes the immitators, if you will. It's hard to say. On one hand, it might not be so good for Nintendo, business-wise. But on the other hand, it might be good for the entire industry as a whole. It's bound to happen. Your going to start seeing "motion this, motion that" everywhere. But still, even though Sony's controller does have motion-sensing in it, it really just doesn't compare to the Wii-remote. I'm not trying to take sides here, but the Wii-remote really seems like the leap in terms of the interface. Like Miyamoto said, what Sony is doing is similar to what Nintendo did with Kirby's Tilt-n-Tumble years ago.

You know what, Miyamoto is 100% right. If you think about it, everyone's excited. E3's still pretty fresh in their minds. The graphics look great across all consoles, especially the 360 and PS3. But when you get down to it, how excited are you really going to be when your playing those games on your own t.v.? Will it feel like experiences you've had a thousand times before? I feel nowadays more people like talking about games and keeping up-to-date with the companies than actually playing the games themselves.

I have a good idea. Why doesn't Joystiq create a star system where we can review or judge their comments or posts? Sounds pretty good to me, no? :p I'm just kidding. I love coming to Joystiq, one of my favorite gaming sites/blogs. Good job, guys!

The reason they are saying that, is because it's true. I think it's becoming clear that people will either buy Wii as a secondary console, or they will buy Wii as they're only console. Plain and simple. Hater or lover, the Wii looks like a very interesting console. Period.

"Lack of imagination." "It's not original." What about the new Mario game for Cube. These games are different. That's it, I want to become a reviewer.