The Wii and the Baby Boomers

Something unexpected has happened with the Nintendo Wii. For whatever reason, this console has snagged a demographic long deemed irrelevant to the game industry: The over 40 crowd. While the XBox 360 and the Playstation 3 have yet to attain significant numbers of consoles sold to people over 40 for their own enjoyment, the Nintendo Wii has started popping up in unusual places like retirement communities and the homes of empty-nesters. Why is this?

It's easy enough to see why the so-called "edgy" consoles haven't been performing well with an older audience. the XBox 360 and PS3 are designed with the core gaming demographic in mind. Namely, males ages 12-25. They have sleek, rigid designs and sport frenetic, violent games.

Compare that above to the most popular fare for the Wii. The innocuous, white box has scored its highest numbers with Wii Play, a glorified party game consisting of several mini-games, and Wii Fit, a workout program. The only game to out-perform those two is Wii Sports, technically the best-selling game in the history of the industry, but those numbers are misleading. Nintendo has counted the number of Wii Sports discs sold as part of the starting package with the console itself along with those copies of the game purchased separately. Regardless, there just aren't many people in their middle years who are interested in blasting bloody holes in aliens, or at least in standing still while doing it.

The other element that I believe has brought the Wii to the non-gaming Boomers is the Wiimote. See, I come from the NES generation. In those slim days we only had two buttons and a direction pad. Even then, my folks and their friends had little interest in video games. They indulged in the occasional game of Mario or Duck Hunt only every now and then. By the time the 16-bit consoles rolled off the line there were far too many buttons and complicated maneuvers involved with gaming for a non-gaming generation to really take interest. My parents' generation hadn't grown up with computers and the button-centered society that resulted. Having to fiddle around with an ABXY system on an ergonomic slant (plus shoulder buttons) was just too much of a learning curve.

Fast forward to the modern day. Both the XBox 360 and the PS3 have yet more buttons while many applications of the Wiimote don't require any buttons at all. It's the very definition of pick up and play. Combine that with the frequent on-screen instructions and you have the perfect console for non-gamers.

So, my parents (and sometimes their parents) can be found swinging the Wiimote around and having a blast playing video games, of all things. They even purchased a Wii for their own enjoyment without prompting by a younger person. Meanwhile, I'm just exiting the core demographic of the other consoles.

Despite being released a solid year after its competitors, the Nintendo Wii has turned out to be the most successful console on the market. Without those new gamers and new gaming demographics, this quite likely wouldn't be true.