How can you tell a console is dying? Its games start to rock.

And after six long anti-climactic years of bore-you-to-tears, vanilla, family-friendly shovel-ware on the Wii, it’s about freakin’ time.

…that the games started to rock… that is, not that the console died. Admittedly, I’m still not sure if it’s genuinely ironic that consoles ring their death knell the moment game developers begin to master the platform, or if it’s just Alanis Morissette-ironic, but goddamn it would be awesome if there was a way to extend the lifetime of each console another decade beyond the corporations’ cord-pull date. I suppose it is possible, and the growing homebrew scene appears thus-far our only hope, but that’s a topic for another post.

Case in point. Nintendo announces the oddly conceptualized Wii-U, followed by these three game announcements for the Wii.

• The Last Story: slated for release this June
• Xenoblade Chronicles: which Nintendo only released Stateside after the sustained and relentless hounding of North American fans.

and now…

• Pandora’s Tower: not yet announced for North American release, but one which we all hope will require less fan-effort than did Xenoblade.

Will be Interesting to see how long Nintendo continues to facilitate the development of Wii games following the yet un-scheduled launch of the Wii-U –the success of which many industry pundits have already discounted.

If the Wii-U does indeed flop, then it’s perceivable that the Wii’s massive install base will continue to incentivize developers, (and Nintendo for that matter) to continue developing games.

The Wii’s increasingly apparent fugly-factor on HD TV’s, along with the slow-creeping install base of Xbox 360, PS3, and Steam-like PC services are all factors mitigating an extended Wii-lifespan.

Like so many things in the gaming industry, trying to predict definitively what will happen is just stupid. In the meantime, we’ve got three kikkass games to look forward to.

…and of course (not) homebrew.