Epic Games spent Niero0 million on Gears of War and has sold over 3 million copies at $50. Do the math for a second and then sit there in self-loathing for a little bit. Once the jealousy and nausea passes, check out this interview with Epic's VP Mark Rein about what it's like to kick that much ass, the future of the Unreal Engine 3 in the hands of developers like Midway and Square-Enix (whoozah!), and their love for two consoles that also have the number 3 in them.

Near the end of the interview I spotted a passing kick to the Ninty nuts:

WN: It's also tough to ignore the success of the Wii at this point. Do you guys have any plans to be in that space?

Rein: Hey, we're in that space! Red Steel, Splinter Cell -- those use our previous engine technology. But it's not in our plans to bring Unreal Engine 3 to the Wii. It's really designed for next-gen, high-definition.

Ouch. I'm sure that there will be a significant amount of Wii owners that will read this and write it off as a "we don't want your FPS ports anyway". There are greater implications, though. I brought up the money Gears made because, at the end of the day, that's what most game studios care about. They will want to use that technology to make that kind of return. Square-Enix and Midway are not using UE3 to make FPS -- they're using it to improve their long-loved franchises, obviously.

Without putting words in Rein's mouth here's what I'm taking away from this: Epic knows they need to be on the Wii but they believe that the future is HD gaming on other consoles, not necessarily Nintendo's new controller scheme. The fact that Red Steel tanked reinforces that further. Epic holds the keys to significant technology that doesn't appear to be making it's way to the Wii, so Nintendo's new console will obviously have less games and third party publishers supporting it as a result -- something that made the PS2 shine and the Gamecube sink. 

Make no mistake, fanboys -- I love my Wii to death, but I can't help take this as an omen of what's to come.  Do I think Epic views the Wiimote as a passing gimmick? Look at where they are putting their money now and you tell me.