With Wii Fit having officially outsold Halo 3, the usual panic across the comments section of the cesspool that is Kotaku, heralding the death of gaming.  The (incredibly flawed) logic goes as follows: Since Wii Fit and the Wii are doing so well, all companies will abandon "hardcore" gaming in favor of cheap cash-in titles.

I would like to think that the Giant Bomb audience is a bit smarter than that.  Hopefully we should all realize that gaming is not going anywhere.  In the two years that have passed since the Wii's launch, the 360 and PS3 have had a barrage of wonderful and successful games.  Indeed, 2007 and 2008 are among the best years gaming has had in a good long time.  2009 looks to be a pretty damn nice year too, with the release of sweet games like Killzone 2, Street Fighter 4, and Resident Evil 5, with more coming up, including Uncharted 2, Rock Band PSP (AKA Amplitude 2), Halo 3: ODST, and many others.  The continued profitability of 3rd party gmaes, as well as the continued successes Microsoft have had with the Xbox 360, prove that Nintendo's success has not damaged gaming one iota.

Also worth noting is the toning down of the "wii-ification" talk that surrounded the other consoles some time back.  I remember a year and a half ago the prevailing rumor around the gaming industry was that MS was going to put out a wand-like peripheral for the Xbox 360.  Those rumors are nowhere to be found now, and this without solid denial from Microsoft.  Also, remember when the PS3 first came out, and every game was trying to shoe-horn in the Sixaxis motion controls?  There were several games I bought on 360 to avoid that nonsense where it couldn't be turned off.  That practice is also gone, with Killzone 2 being the first game in a long time to require motion controls.

The fact is that both Sony and Microsoft have figured out that the Wii is a different demographic entirely, one that has proven to gravitate toward a far smaller offering of titles, usually 1st party and usually not games.  The reason many of us have been dissapointed with the Wii is that it wasn't designed with gaming in mind.  Nintendo's aims are removed from our desires, and you know what?  That's fine.  There are probably more workout DVDs sold in any one year than even the biggest of Hollywood movies, but we still get great movies.  The two markets are mutually exclusive, with perhaps some overlap, but not enough to make a huge shift.  Games are the same way.  Just because Nintendo's making money by moving out of the game industry doesn't mean that the game industry will collapse on itself or anything stupid like that.  Gaming isn't going anywhere.  Take off the tin foil hats, pick up the game pads, and enjoy.