It’s not that this is some major revelation or anything — I think at this point we’re all pretty clear on the average quality of games for the Wii — but to hear it spoken so matter-of-factly by the Global President of 2K Games means it’s more than an unspoken truth, it’s… well, a spoken one.
Christoph Hartmann of 2K had this to say in a recent intervew:
Where people go wrong in the casual market is that, while the development costs are exploding on the casual side, they’re treating the Wii like the old PC market – making cheap, accessible games. They think if they make ten titles and two are hits, they will finance the other eight. “But they forget these eight crappy titles will flood the market and will lead to problems in terms of production – and upset retailers. Also, the consumer will be pissed off because they’ll be confused.
The Wii has had such a meteoric rise to success that many developers have been caught with their pants down over the last couple years. The longer they waited, the worse their games were when they finally committed. And as the bar lowered and more and more casual/mom and pop gamers picked it up, their naivete was ripe for exploitation. Thus we have 100 terrible golf games and 2 good ones, and how is dad supposed to know which to buy without checking 1up or IGN? And of course they have no idea what those sites are, if they even use the web much.
I guarantee the flooding will continue. I think human sacrifice may be necessary at this point.
[via Kotaku]