Recent Event Highlights: Miyamoto blames industry slump on game quality., Video game industry sales sink 23 percent in U.S. , Square Soft + Enix= Square Enix, and 8 more...
Created by Qiyambey on Mar 28, 2010
Last updated: 03/28/10 at 08:09 PM
Mario creator says that 2009 sales were down because games weren't as fun, and explains his aversion to making online titles.In an interview published yesterday, Mario creator Shigeru Miyamoto blamed the industry's lower sales for the year not on financial worries, but on the games themselves. As a result, he has revealed that he will now focus more on the online gaming community, which I believe will give a lot of companies a run for their money.
Sinclair, B.(2010 March 25) Miyamoto blames industry slump on game quality. Retrieved March 28, 2010 from Game Spot website:
http://www.gamespot.com/news/6254169.html?sid=6254169&part=rss&subj=6254169
The 2010 Game Developer's Conference, which ended in San Francisco on Saturday, attracted a record industry turn out of over 18,000.
In total, 18,250 industry professionals attended the event - surpassing last year's total of 17,000.This shows that the gaming industry is not dead that through the hard times there are those still working hard.
Brice, C.(2010, March 16) GDC 2010 attracts record industry numbers. Retrieved March 16, 2010 form Game Industry website:
http://www.gamesindustry.biz/articles/gdc-2010-attracts-record-industry-numbers
Web users play games online en masse, helping to make China one of the industry's top markets.Experts say the booming market will mostly benefit homegrown firms, whose products are more closely tailored to the tastes and preferences of the more than 380 million people using the Internet in China. As a result it has made breaking into China's online gaming industry virtually impossible.
Garrus, J. (2010, February 28) Online gaming sweeps China. Retrieved March 28, 2010 from Yahoo News website:
http://news.yahoo.com/s/afp/20100228/tc_afp/lifestylechinaitinternetgames
Electronic Arts acquired Playfish for $300 million in cash and stock. The move gets EA into the social gaming market on Facebook in a big way.The value of the deal — $275 million in cash, $25 million in stock, and up to $100 million in bonus cash if certain milestones are hit by 2012 — reflects the rapid growth of Playfish over the last couple of years. Playfish is the second-largest developer on Facebook, behind only Zynga. It has more than 60 million monthly active users. In this age it is all about socializing and the elements of socializing in video games appeals to the masses more.
Takahashi, D. (2009 November 9) Electronc Arts buys Playfish for $300 million. Retrieved March 28, 2010 from venture beat website:
http://venturebeat.com/2009/11/09/electronic-arts-buys-playfish-for-as-much-as-400-million/
Video game industry sales in the U.S. dropped 23 percent to $863 million in May compared with $1.12 billion a year ago, according to a new report.
This marked the first time since August 2007 that monthly sales dipped below $1 billion.As a result video game developers had to turn up the heat and produce better games that appeal to a larger crowd.
Whitney, L. (2009, June 12).Gaming and Culture. Retrieved March 22, 2010 from news.cnet website:
http://news.cnet.com/8301-10797_3-10263534-235.html
Activision and Vivendi merged to create one of the largest video game publishing companies on the planet. The majority of Blizzard’s success in the games industry has come from the PC market, while Activision has primarily focused on consoles. The result of a merger between these two companies is that their franchises can now more easily be marketed and sold across both types of systems.
Erickson, C. (2008, July 11) Blizztivision. Retrieved March 28, 2010 from ps3 informer website:
http://www.ps3informer.com/playstation-3/news/blizztivision-what-the-activisionvivendi-merger-means-for-games-009044.php
On April 1, 2003, video game company Square merged with the Enix corporation, forming Square Enix.In 2000 talks began between Square and long running RPG rival Enix over a merger between the two companies however the huge financial failure that was the CG movie " Final Fantasy: The Spirits Within" caused Enix to delay the talks. Eventually, on April 1, 2003, the two companies joined to form Square Enix making them the RPG leaders of the world.
MarioFan88(2003, April 1)Square Enix. Retrieved March 28, 2010 from Closing Logos website:
http://www.closinglogos.com/page/Square+Enix
For many years, Square had been a key ally for Nintendo, all the way from the NES days. In addition to all the early Final Fantasy games, who can forget the collaboration of Super Mario RPG? But when Nintendo released the N64 in 1996, Square packed its bags and headed towards the Playstation camp. And partly due to the success of Final Fantasy VIII, the Playstation was able to define itself as the console of choice for Japanese RPG fans, a title that Nintendo once held. The situation has become so contentious that in 2000 President Yamauchi had flat out said that there was no way he was going to consider welcoming back Square. And Nintendo suffered because of this rift. Various industry luminaries in Japan had stated that one reason the N64 lost so much marketshare was because it lacked a good library of Japanese RPGs.
It wasn't until 2002 that Nintendo showed signs of welcoming the once powerful partner back into the Nintendo fold. This outreach was all the more impressive, as Square at the time was partly owned by Sony, which had a 19% stake in the company. Nintendo was able to work around some of the exclusivity outlined in the Square/Sony deal, thanks to Fund Q, a Tamauchi-san funded program to aid development of game projects that use the GameCube-Game Boy Advance link. This fund helped get a new Square-affiliated development house off the ground.
Hapa, K.G.(2002)Nintendos' defining moments of the past decade. Retrieved March 27, 2010 from The Kartel website:
http://www.thekartel.com/kghapa/blog/2009/12/17/nintendos_defining_moments_of_the_past_decade:_part_1
Minoru Arakawa, President of Nintendo of America for 22 years, announced his retirement effective immediately. After many months of consideration, Arakawa felt the timing was appropriate to turn the office over to new leadership. His retirement ment the dawning of a new era for Nintendo.
Editor in Chief, GameCubicle, Confessions of a closet editor.(January 8, 2002)
October 12, 2009, from JGame Cubicle website:
http://www.gamecubicle.com/news-nintendo_minoru_arakawa_retire.htm
16-year-old Spanish teenager José Rabadán Pardo murdered his father, mother and his sister with a katana, proclaiming that he was on an "avenging mission" by Squall Leonhart, a character in the video game Final Fantasy VIII. It was important because it was one case in many in which sensors believe that video games contributed to real-life violence. It is why the ESRB ratings system was created.
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A brief description of the incident at Final Fantasy Wiki"(n.d.)In Wikipedia. Retrieved March 28, 2010, from website:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Video_game_controversy#Crime_and_violence
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