3rd Parties on Wii

IG: While Nintendo software continues to sell on Wii, third parties seem to be feeling the pinch. EA's John Riccitiello recently said he was frustrated with weaker than expected Wii game sales. Do you think third parties are going to start pulling back on Wii? How will this affect the console war?

Pachter: I don’t think publishers will give up on the Wii, at least not unless and until they figure out whether the Wii installed base is just not going to buy software.  It doesn’t really make sense that the installed base is uniformly disinterested in software; rather, it’s far more likely that they are not the normal “hard core,” and that they are more difficult to reach.  I doubt many of them read IndustryGamers religiously, for example.  It’s most likely that they will be more seasonal in their purchase behavior, and will respond more to mass media advertising, and the publishers haven’t really excelled at this form of advertising in the past.  When the publishers learn how to attract the casual consumer, I am confident that Wii sales will rebound.