__---=== MARCH NPD IS HERE! ===---___ Sales Data for all Important Consoles, and also PS3

In February, I pointed out that Killzone 2 didn't hit anywhere near #1 as Sony fanboys hoped, nor did it increase PS3 sales in any meaningful way.

The Sony Defense Force said, "Fryfat you idiot! KZ2 has only been out 2 days, wait until March then you'll see!!!"

PS3, as you may or may not know, peaked in the summer of '08. Since then, it's been selling worse and worse, and is now on a 5 month streak of selling fewer consoles year over year. This usually signals the coming end of a console's lifespan. And when people find out PS3 is a machine that runs 2nd-rate 360 ports, they prefer the real deal. That's why 360 is trending upwards year over year and has yet to peak.

But wait! Were the Sony fanboys correct? Was KZ2's massive effect on the industry to be felt in March, not February? Let's see...

NPD sales data for March 2009

*winners*
Wii: 601,000
DS: 563,000
360: 330,000

*losers*
PS3: 218,000
PSP: 168,000
PS2: 112,000

There you have it, this is the 6th month in a row PS3 posts a decrease in YOY sales, with this March 15% less than last year's. Not even KZ2 can save PS3. Pitiful.

Wii Fit, Pokemon Platinum, RE5, and even Halo Wars sold more than KZ2. Ouch.

And of course, Wii and the new gaming revolution continues to dominate.

The Gaming Revolution Culminates in July

For those worried Nintendo would delay this until Xmas, finally we have a release timeframe.

Wii Sports Resort, the sequel to the most owned game in all history, along with the new MotionPlus addon will be released in July.

That means two of EA's new games, Grand Slam Tennis and Tiger Woods 10 (which are both contenders for Sports GOTY) are scheduled to be out a full month before M+! I wonder if they'll be delayed to July as well.

MotionPlus is going to change the way we play games. We'll start with Frisbee (Disc Dog), Jet Skiing (Power Cruising) and Kendo (Sword Play), as well as 7 other unannouced games, and from there, possibilities are endless. "Skill" is going to mean much, much more than how fast you can press a button, and the traditional gamepad (an old Nintendo invention) as well as the stereotypical image of a gamer sitting lifeless on a couch is going to be a thing of the past.

The release of M+ will also signal the end of PS3, and unless MS has answer, the 360 as well. This is the Wii we all imagined from the beginning. Our wildest fantasies of how great motion control will be in the future is going to become a reality in just 4 months.

Hardcore gamers laugh because there is no blood in Wii Sports Resort, but as we now know, they're a small minority. The rest of the world and I will be camped out in July, eagerly awaiting to see how Miyamoto changes the entire gaming industry once again, in the form of our midnight copies.

Trent Reznor Identifies Why Hardcore Games Suck

Games are not movies. They are entirely seperate mediums, as different as painting and literature. But scores of uncreative game developers, including Tim Schafer, Peter Molyneux, and even Yoichi Wada, think that gaming's greatest goal is to mimic film.

But what is a cutscene? What is a "cinematic atmosphere"? What are beautiful graphics? In film, they are everything. In games, they are a gimmick. That's right - your beloved "hd revolution", games with 600,000 lines of dialogue and summer-blockbuster budgets, have nothing to do with gaming itself. It is a gimmick. G*I*M*M*I*C*K. Everytime you've finished a game and never touched it again, it's because you'd grown tired of the game itself yet hung around to enjoy the story, and once that's over so is your only draw to the game.

Games that focus on gameplay, that require immense strategy or skill are played forever. Look at Starcraft, Guitar Hero, Quake 3. These games don't need any frills, they're simple to pick up yet have nearly unlimited depth in terms of skill or strategy. They celebrate the medium of gaming, and don't try to hide it under frills and makeup.

Many gamers, including myself, used to marvel at watching a cartoon Sonic run around before playing the same old game, and we'd keep playing just to see another cartoon, but the fad is now over. It began with the Sega CD and ended with the PS2. Today's cutscene machines, 360 and PS3, are failing as people are no longer interested in "playing" a movie (except for the moronic hardcore.)

If you enjoy the cinematic experience, you can buy a machine for $100 that streams them to your house 24/7 for free. This cutscene machine has been active since the late 1920's, and there's none of that ho-hum gameplay to worry about.

So as one big gaming company after another lays people off, Sony, THQ, Square, while smaller companies roll around in record setting sales, many gamers are left confused. Trent Reznor is not one of them.

"I think a lot of the big publishers have gone the route of record labels and movie companies where it costs so much to make a game and they're so obsessed with the idea that games have to be cinematic experiences, that lots of money gets spent on the marketing and the rendering, and not a lot of money gets puts into anything innovative and interesting."

Trent knows this because he and his art director pitched their own game awhile back, and this is what they heard from the big publishers (who are no doubt laying people off this year),

"Well, it costs so much to make a game, we're really only interested in sequels or movie tie-ins," Reznor was told.

These days, Reznor says, he's much more interested in the kind of fare one finds on WiiWare and Xbox Live Arcade, things like Geometry Wars, which as Reznor put it, "Have a very simple design, but offer great depth." In other words, Trent likes gameplay.

And so does the rest of the world, according to sales we see every day.

The fad is over. R.I.P. cinematic games.

Reznor's full interview is here:

http://revision3.com/diggdialogg/trentreznor/#seek=1595:1807