Shifting Demographics

Just came across this story about the WWE, and it made me laugh a little.

For those who don’t want to click and read, the title says it all: “WWE’s Shift Towards Families… and Away From Us.”

See, years ago, I noted some parallels between video games and wrestling. Notably, SEGA to WCW, and WWF/E to Nintendo.

WWE/Nintendo, while not the originals, were pretty big innovators and made things mainstream in the 80s, suffering a slump before returning to greater glory. WCW/SEGA were the upstarts, quickly rising to glory of their rivals in the 90s, but it wasn’t to last, even with taking away talent/third parties (exclusivity, anyway) from said rivals.

There’s also that sort of period where SEGA/WCW were the edgy ones, until Nintendo/WWE finally said “alright, you want it? The gloves are off.” i.e. the “Attitude/Austin era,” and Nintendo’s “Play it Loud” phase that brought us blood in Mortal Kombat II and “hipper” commercials, while the underdogs finally started namedropping and bitchslapping the competition back when they were called on it.

Probably more than that, if I dug deep and thought about it. Oh, right: SEGA’s out of hardware, and WCW got absorbed into WWE.

Now, after E3, and even prior to, Nintendo has been getting harped on by numerous people for shifting towards casual gamers/family gaming/etc., and “away from us, the hardcore fans.” And here someone’s drawing the same thing with WWE.

–LBD “Nytetrayn”

David Oxford

David Oxford, or “LBD ‘Nytetrayn’,” as he is sometimes also known, is a freelance writer of many varied interests who resides in Toronto, Ontario, Canada. If you’re interested in hiring him, please drop him a line at david.oxford (at) nyteworks.net.

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