I've been debating this "revolution" all day. I'm not sure what to make of it.

A little clarification... I am a video game developer. I usually don't like admitting this publicly, but there you go. I also am a Nintendo Fan-Boy uber alles. I have an original Donkey Kong upright. I think Mario 64 is the greatest thing to happen to video games since the invention of the quarter. Still, I am both excited and frightened by what this portends.

Nintendo has been slipping into a strange niche since the Playstation was introduced. I have always championed their decisions, but this one leaves me stumped. As a game player it is pretty much decided I will buy this. It looks fun. Fun and different like the DS is fun and different. If anyone has a chance of pulling this off it is Nintendo... but Nintendo is a definitive "#3' in the modern console wars. Developers will not develop for gamecube because of their insistence on keeping their weird proprietary storage paradigm and relatively small market share. This is just going to make it worse.

So if you have predictably small third party development you run into the issue of market focus. Nintendo claims they are focusing on the "non-game player" with this new console. A revolution to be sure, but how many mothers and grandparents are going to walk into Toys R' Us and see the wall of Xbox360/PS3 games and opt for the Nintendo Revolution with their 3 launch titles?

Don't get me worng... I am actually excited by this... and it will probably be a very fun console to own. I'll be there launch day with money in hand, but I personally fear this is the end of Nintendo's relevance in the video game market. I want them to survive more than anything. I can only hope that this innovation will allow them to carve out a profitable niche in which they might survive... where they will not have to compete with MS or SCEA.