Nintendo Wii is still the most successful current-generation video game console, however, a large designer of games plans to refocus itself onto high-definition titles since further success of Wii is not exactly clear. Even though so far EA Montreal is the first studio to reduce support of Wii, this may become a trend going forward.

“The Wii market is a little bit unpredictable these days. We are going to see how Christmas is going to do and while with the Wii we have had very successful titles, we are going to focus on big, blockbuster-type titles. It doesn't mean that we are going to abandon the Wii, but as a studio we want to be ready for new challenges. […] [We plan to refocus the studio on] action titles and HD-quality products,” said Alain Tascan, the general manager of EA Montreal, in an interview with Edge Online web-site.

EA Montreal, which belongs to EA Games label, is well-known for its popular Wii titles and the claim that the studio wants to concentrate on high-definition blockbuster video games may mean two things:

• The era of Nintendo Wii popularity is beginning to end and EA Montreal wants to refocus to games for Microsoft Xbox 360 and Sony PlayStation 3.
• Nintendo is preparing a console with high-definition gaming support and performance on par or higher compared to currently available systems. As a result, EA Montreal needs to prepare new blockbuster titles ahead of the release.

At present Microsoft Xbox 360 Arcade costs the same amount of money as Nintendo Wii, Sony PlayStation 3 costs just $100 more and next year both PS3 and X360 will get motion-sensing gaming, an exclusive feature of Wii today. No surprising that competitive position of Wii is decreasing in general. The question is whether it is the beginning of the end for Wii, or the console still has prosperous future.

Tags: Nintendo, Wii, Electronic Arts