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The Nintendo Wii is seriously lacking games that will attract so called “hardcore gamers.” This is causing them to miss out on a huge share of the video game market. However, they’ve almost created an entirely new untapped market of casual gamers and fitness nuts. I can’t even remember how many older people I’ve heard tell me they’re getting a Wii for Wii Fit. It’s really surprising to me that so many people are willing to invest around $300 for something they could easily do without any electronics at all. In fact, you could probably get a better workout by NOT using the Wii Fit than you can with it.

Continuing from my previous post. I’m curious what genres girls specifically would be interested in. There is a lot of overlap with Rock Band, TF2, etc type games that are enjoyed by both genders. However, what is the Call of Duty for women? What genre would attract almost exclusively women but still be main stream? I think this is the question a lot of game developers will be asking themselves in the near future. There is truly a huge untapped market for games targeted towards women. I don’t mean Barbie’s Playhouse type games though. The type of game I mean hasn’t been created yet but whoever figures it out first is going to be rich indeed.

Lately I’ve been noticing a lot more girls playing video games. While this could simply be due to voice chat becoming more popular making it possible to know who is a girl I think it’s more than that. Games like World of Warcraft, TF2, Rock Band, etc are focusing more on topics that girls find fun or interesting. It’s becoming apparent to me that girls do not like war simulators that try to mimic reality. It might be that girls have never been into video games as much because the game genres or topics have always been male focused as that was the percieved “primary market.”

The information and previews available for Fat Princess look really promising. Although there is nothing terribly original or new about the game it looks quite polished and enjoyable for quick game breaks. I’m curious how many classes or abilities will be in the game. If they include a large amount of them it could have a lot more depth than seems apparent at the moment. The PS3 could really use an awesome arcade game like this though.

Apparently Hasbro and Google have teamed up to create a massive online monopoly game. It will use actual city streets by utilizing the Google maps engine. This sounds really interesting but the rules and other aspects of the game haven’t been released yet. I hope this comes out well because it could be so awesome if done correctly!