The Nintendo Wii’s success story is quite unusual.  Rather than making a conventional upgrade, Nintendo chose to take the innovative road for the Gamecube’s successor; that is, instead of ramping up the horsepower on the machine like Sony and Microsoft, Nintendo chose to completely change the way we play games.  And although innovation may be honorable in the games industry, it is financially risky.  Individual games speak volumes of that; look at Mirror’s Edge: the game was one of the most innovative of the year, yet it tanked at retail.  What made Nintendo’s system not only the top selling gaming console, but one of the hottest products on the market?  Surprisingly, it was one game: Wii Sports.

Wii Sports was really the first time people connected with the Wii’s abstract control method.  Understand this: most people aren’t comfortable with drastic change.  Innovation is drastic change.  Therefore, most people aren’t comfortable with innovation.  They would much rather stick to something they are familiar with then force themselves to familiarize with a new thing, in this case, a new control scheme.  So at first, people looked at the Wii’s separate controllers with funky motion controls and were immediately turned off.

However, the first demonstration of Wii Sports changed that.  After seeing demonstrators swing the Wiimote like a tennis racket or a golf club, people immediately connected with the controls.  It didn’t matter that the controller was unlike any other video game controller that had come before it, as soon as those people realized that it wasn’t overtly complicated, they flocked to it like pigeons to bread.

So it’s obvious that Wii Sports is the reason people were introduced to and loved the Wii control scheme, but would the Wii have been as successful without the game?  Probably not.  No other major game on the console uses the Wiimote and Nunchuck as intuitively as Wii Sports.  If any other game had been the title game for the Wii, even say Zelda: Twilight Princess, people wouldn’t have been as attracted to the system.  Zelda’s Wii controls are fine, but they are nowhere near as intuitive as Wii Sports.  People (particularly casuals) would have associated the Wii’s controls in general with Zelda’s controls and thought that the control system of the console was wonky.

In the end, Nintendo made a brilliant decision by making Wii Sports the mascot game of the Nintendo Wii.  That one decision made this innovative console successful.

Still don’t believe the hundreds of rumors that claim Metal Gear Solid 4 will be ported to the Xbox 360?  Well hopefully this will push you over the edge, because we have it from a good source that Metal Gear Solid 4 will be hitting Microsoft’s console this fall.

If “NOOO, why would Konami do this?” was this first thing that came out of your mouth after reading the title to this story, you’re probably a Sony fanboy.  Nevertheless, I asked my source the same question to which he responded that this isn’t to stab Sony in the back; Konami is “just looking to make money”.  Fanboys may call this traitorous, but I call it logical, especially with the way the economy is.

When will it release?  “Sometime this fall, probably October or November”, according to our source.  Apparently, Konami and Microsoft will be trying to market this “like a console exclusive”, even though it already hit the PS3 last year.

We’ll see if it makes a bigger splash than Bioshock on PS3 did.

As you may have noticed, we haven’t been doing a very good job of posting daily in the past couple weeks. That’s because mine and my fellow co-writers’ lives have gotten quite hectic recently. Our schedules have been packed to the brim and, unfortunately, that means we don’t have enough time for our hobbies, this blog being one. Our goal was to never make money with this blog, but rather to talk to the community about our thoughts and feelings of the gaming industry. Unfortunately, with the current state of the economy, we can’t afford to have time-draining hobbies (and, let me tell you, this one is time-draining).

But that doesn’t mean this blog will cease to exist. Oh no, after all the hard work I’ve put into it I won’t let something like a global economic meltdown get in the way. It will just be different. First of all, we will probably not be posting daily: look to see updates three or four times a week. And secondly, we will not be reporting on as many news stories as before, mostly because we can’t compete with sites like Kotaku and Joystiq who have the huge amounts of resources necessary to churn out breaking news. Instead we will be writing editorials. These editorials will be longer, deeper discussions on various issues in the gaming industry (or any other relevant thing that comes to mind).

And since this is all for you readers, we would like your input. If you any specific editorial topics you would like us to talk about, shoot us an email at SecondStoryGamer@gmail.com. In fact, if you think you’re up to the task, send us your opinion on the topic and we may include it in the published article (hint: that’s a really good way to get a position on our staff).

So all in all, thank you all for your continued support of this blog. I know it’s cliche, but really, if it wasn’t for you readers, this blog would be completely meaningless.

In somewhat unrelated news, if you need a catchy song about The Office, look here.

Here’s some surprising information you may want to know (particularly if you are someone who, if faced with the decision between the Xbox 360 and food, would choose the Xbox): Xbox Live generates more revenue than the PlayStation Network.  A whole lot more.

According to Variety, in the course of the PlayStation Network’s lifetime, it has generated $180 million in revenue.  Xbox Live’s lifetime sales have totaled close to $1 billion.

At first, it looks like tricky numbers: the PSN has been around for roughly two years compared to Xbox Live’s five and a half years; of course Xbox Live has generated more revenue.  However, look closer: PSN has been around roughly 40% as long as Xbox Live but has generated 20% of its revenue.  Average it out and PSN makes roughly $90 million a year compared to Xbox Live’s $180 million a year.  And remember, the first few years of Xbox Live were on the original Xbox, where there was very little to download.  In reality, Xbox Live’s revenue average on the Xbox 360 alone is probably much higher.

But just how much of that revenue comes from Gold subscriptions?  Let’s look at 2008: Microsoft said in January that it had 17 million Xbox Live subscribers.  Recently, information has come out that a little over half of those users (something around 60%) have gold subscriptions.  That gives us roughly 9.5 gold subscribers for 2008.  Multiply that by the $50 each of them pay to keep their Gold subscriptions and you get a grand total of $475 million.  Sure that’s a guesstimate but it can’t be far off the actual number.

So nearly half of Xbox Live’s lifetime revenue came from 2008 Gold subscriptions.  Still doesn’t take away from the fact that Microsoft is making a lot of money from the service but it does weaken Xbox Live’s head-to-head matchup with PSN, which is free.  Still though, money is money, no matter where it comes from.

At least now we know why Microsoft is dying to keep Xbox Live a pay service.

One of the side effects of the hyping of Killzone 2 was the questioning of the Xbox 360’s graphical power.  You’ve seen the articles that have been popping up the past few weeks, the ones that say that with the release of Killzone 2, the 360’s era of having games with equal (or, in some cases, better) graphics than PS3 games is over.  And after seeing Killzone 2, a game that is graphically far superior to anything on the 360 (or anything ever seen on consoles, for that matter), it’s hard to argue with them.

Till now: Microsoft realizes that public sentiment is that their console’s graphics are inferior and is responding accordingly by releasing some game trailers that are stunning.  Let’s start with Capcom’s big reveal on February 23rd, Lost Planet 2.  The game was revealed exclusively on Xbox Live (which may point to the game being a timed 360 exclusive) in trailer form.  Here’s the trailer (note: click the button on the bottom right and scroll up to “HD” to view it in high definition):

As you can see, the game looks beautiful.  Not sure how the gameplay will hold up (I didn’t like the original much) but there’s no doubt that the game is beautiful.

Moving on, let’s talk about Alan Wake: the game has been in development for ages and often delayed.  It was even rumored that the game was cancelled.  Hopefully, that’s not true because here’s some footage we saw nearly two years ago:

Beautiful no doubt, but some people have claimed that the game wasn’t actually running on an Xbox 360, but rather a maxed out PC.  However, given that it was two years ago, I’m sure that the developers could have worked it onto the 360’s hardware by now, and can’t wait to see more footage of this beautiful game.

With the graphics ball rolling towards Sony’s console, it’s not surprising that Microsoft is trying to slow it down.  However, even with these two very pretty games under their belt, does the 360 have enough in the visual department to face the onslaught of Heavy Rain, Uncharted 2, and God of War III, all very graphically intensive games?  I guess we’ll see at the end of the year.

About a month ago, we told you about the whispers we heard of the Mass Effect trilogy heading to Sony’s console.  Now it seems Bioware is implying the same thing.

In the first trailer for Mass Effect 2 (which is viewable after the break), Bioware gives us some interesting tidbits about the story: apparently, your character, Shepard, is assumed dead.  It also seems many of the characters from the original game will appear in the sequel.

However, the most interesting thing about the trailer was the information it didn’t give.  First of all, Bioware failed to mention a release date, which points to a 2010 release date; if Bioware was planning to release the game in the fall, they would have probably included the date in the trailer.  And secondly, the trailer fails to flash a console’s logo.  If Bioware was still in cahoots with Microsoft there would definitely be a big green “X” somewhere in the trailer.

Obviously, this is far from solid evidence.  However, this coupled with the previous rumor (and other rumors that have subsequently popped up) makes it seem very likely that Mass Effect 2 will be playable on the PS3 whenever it releases.

Xbox 360 owners have come to dread the color red.  See three quarters of a circle of red on your console and you’ll be console-less for roughly three weeks.  So you can see the irony in the rumor that Microsoft will be releasing a red-colored console (Sony fanboys, that one was for free).

Well 360 owners, according to Aaron Greenburg, it’s time to come out from hiding and embrace the color red again, because the problem is “behind us”.

Speaking to Edge, Greenburg stated that because Microsoft has bolstered the repair process of the 360, the Red Ring of Death problem will no longer be an issue.  Said he:

“We’ve improved that [repair] process.  It’s very quick, and they may upgrade your system with the latest technology.

…What we do in general, the way that it works, is that they will fix it with the latest [hardware] improvements that we’ve applied [to current Xbox 360s].

What it comes down to is isolating and figuring out the issue, fixing the issue, and the more that we can fix the issue, and know it’s fixed, then we’re good going forward. We’ve put the worst behind us on this, but we know there are a few lagging systems, and so we want to take those and make it right.

Unfortunately, the Red Ring of Death is not really a thing of the past because like he said, there are “a few lagging systems”.  Oh and by “a few” he means everyone who bought a 360 before late last year.  Those people still have the problematic old hardware and will likely get those hated rings once again.  However, that should be the last time they see them, at least if what Greenburg is saying is accurate.

I’d like to know what happens to us owners when our three year warranty is up.  Mine expires later this month and my Xbox has been giving me some problems.  Here’s hoping it fails sooner rather than later.

One strange thing about gaming companies is the fact that they never state the obvious, except when the obvious is positive (cough Nintendo).  Look at Sony: January’s NPD’s are grim for the PS3 yet Sony hasn’t muttered so much as a peep.  They know that nothing they say can help the situation.

This is why it is so strange to hear Microsoft admitting that they will be negatively “affected by the economy”.  Sure, everyone knows it’s going to happen, but most companies would never say that.  Why give stockholders even more reason to fear in this economy?

Speaking to Reuters, Microsoft’s CEO Steve Ballmer said, “Revenues in our industry, and in our company, will be affected by the economic conditions.”  Note that he was talking about Microsoft in general, and did not elaborate on how the Xbox division in particular would be “affected”.

So was it a good idea to come out in front of this obvious, but potentially serious problem?  Or would Microsoft have been better off keeping their mouth shut?

In other news, Nintendo is laughing at us mere mortals.

Before I get death threats from lovers of the black box, let me tell you that I don’t wish for death upon the PS3.  In fact, I want the PS3 to thrive, primarily for two reasons. 1) I have a PS3 and would hate to have spent $400 on a console that is no longer supported.  2) The gaming industry needs competition to keep companies in check.  Without Sony, that leaves Microsoft and Nintendo, and since they are both so different, they could run a muck of the industry.

However, sometimes you have to put your personal feelings aside and look at the facts.  And from what the facts are telling us, the PS3’s future is looking pretty bleak.

What facts, you say?  Why don’t we start with the NPD’s; probably the most shocking part of the NPD figures released last week were the PS3 numbers.  They weren’t just low - they were down 25% from January 2008.  Of course, the economy gets the brunt of the blame here (obviously, it’s hard to sell a premium product in a recession).  However, since the economy doesn’t look like it will turn around in the near future, Sony needs to find a way to pick up sales.

Usually, this wouldn’t be a problem for a console manufacturer.  Just look at Microsoft: last year, when sales were slumping, they implemented a massive price cut, which stimulated sales once again.  Couldn’t Sony do the same thing?  Probably not, because the company as a whole isn’t in a very good position; they are expected to post a $1.1 billion loss for the current financial year, and are planning massive restructuring plans to stay in business.  Sony just can’t afford to drop the price of the PS3, which just recently became profitable.

In spite of all of this evidence, I still believe that Sony can save the PS3.  They just have to play their cards right.  Let’s think about it: if the company needs to do something to entice customers to buy PS3’s but can’t implement a price drop, what can they do?  Add value to the console, of course.  For example, they could bundle films into each SKU.  Sometimes gamers forget, but Sony has a huge film division.  With every PS3, they could bundle in several films, either Blu-ray discs or sitting on the hard drive.  Not only would this give customers more reason to purchase the console, but it would also showcase the PS3’s ability as a multi-media unit.

Other things they could throw in: a game or two, an extra DualShock 3 controller, Blu-ray remote, PlayStation Eye, or an HDMI cord.

But, in the end, it doesn’t change the fact that the PS3 is on the brink of failure.  To drag the console away from that potential pit, Sony has to take drastic and sudden action.