It may be difficult to comprehend now, but it was only two years ago that many in the video game world had given Nintendo up for dead. Despite the early success of the DS handheld, the company’s Gamecube had finished in distant third vs. its same generation competitors. And with the next generation of consoles dawning, the XBox 360 was lighting up the charts and the Playstation 3 was about to become reality. Then at E3 2006, Nintendo unveiled the Wii and the rest is history.
While nothing unveiled at this week’s Siggraph conference in Los Angeles will have that level of mainstream consumer impact, the event may feature a similar underdog story that will have far-reaching consequences for the business of video game development.