The winter months of January and February once provided a welcome retreat from the holiday season's annual onslaught. But the game market's periodic lull in years past has been converted recently into a year-end report bragging grounds for companies looking to boost their stocks and generate buzz for the months ahead.
The once-fallow pre-spring period has also become a fertile pasture for publishers seeking a low-competition release period. Releases, in the Gamer's opinion, tend to center on franchises consumers have come to know and love. After tiring of the latest December discs, gamers tend towards the comfortable gameplay and familiar stories of long-running series in the winter months.
This year, games like R-Type Final, James Bond: Everything Or Nothing and Worms 3D, all for the PS2, will be released nearly on top of each other in February, while Activision will cash in on nostalgia with the release of Pitfall: The Lost Expedition across multiple platforms. In short, over the next few weeks, game developers will return to the ever-replenishing well of gamer goodwill toward known products.
And can you blame them? Publishers need revenue to start the new year with a bang, and cash cow derivative sequels can be a financial shot in the arm. Companies milk the same gullible audiences year after year because, despite the dubious quality or originality of these sequels, gamers will still vote affirmatively with the almighty dollar. But the motivations behind these impulse or reminiscent-motivated purchases are a topic for another week.
This week's news brought to you by Business Wire and Gamespot.
Viva la Online!
University gamers perplexed by their consoles' inability to play games over the Internet via Xbox Live or the PS2 Network, rejoice! Some dorm residents experienced difficulty connecting or maintaining connections to online play for games like Dance Dance Revolution and Madden 2004 last semester, but folks at the University's Information Technology and Communication team have inadvertently rectified the problem.
In a decision made for academic purposes, ITC now allows computers to be placed outside the Residence Hall Network Firewall. The Firewall automatically blocks certain ports within the computer for systems within the wall, preventing or slowing certain connections between the computer and outside sources. Though computer placement outside the Firewall is strongly discouraged for security vulnerability reasons, consoles should not have problems with hack attempts or viruses. Now, once-stymied online console gamers, whose systems are a computer at heart, can experience the glory of online play by simply finagling their IP addresses.
More Money than God
The game industry's 2003 annual reports are out and the state of the industry is strong. (Big ups to NPD and Gamespot for all numbers, except for Nintendo's European and American sales figures, which were self-reported.)
The NPD Group, a market-tracking company, recently released 2003 game industry sales figures. Nintendo was the only console-maker to see an increase in consoles sold, with sales up 39 percent after slashing GameCube prices to a bargain $99 last fall. Microsoft's Xbox annual sales fell 2 percent and Sony's PS2 lost the most steam with a 26 percent decline. Total game industry software sales rose only 5 percent, compared to double-digit increases in volume for each of the past two years. Numbers for December 2003, however, were 13 percent higher than the same period in 2002, lending credence to the thought that, as the game industry becomes more mainstream, it becomes increasingly seasonal, much like the movie industry.
Sony sold five billion dollars worth of PlayStation and PS2 games in 2003, including a 24 percent jump in PS2 software to almost 80 million units worldwide. Sony's PlayStation brand sales represented over 60 percent of the game industry's revenue last year and Sony's super-system PS2 sold three times more games than its closest competitor, according to NPD Funworld. In addition, Sony now claims an average 12.4 games owned per PlayStation 2, a new standard in the industry. Sony's icing on the cake is the PS2 online community, with 2.4 million consoles, expanding three times as fast as its rival Xbox Live, which boasts 750,000 users.
Xbox has shipped 13.7 million consoles to date worldwide and sales shrunk 17 percent in Q4 2003 compared to the same time last year.
In Europe, Nintendo went gangbusters in 2003, moving an astounding 88 percent more GameCubes, 45 percent more GC games, 33 percent more GBA and GBA SP handhelds and a whopping 104 percent more GBA games.
Domestically, a Nintendo of America spokesperson put December 2003 U.S. GC console sales at 1.1 million, Xbox at 991,000 and PS2 at 1.8 million. The Game Boy Advance sold 8.2 million units in 2003, 2.5 million in December alone.
Land of the Rising Sony
On the other side of the world, Japanese sales of Sony's uber-system PSX reached the 100,000 mark in less than one month of release despite initial rumors of low consumer interest. The TIVO/PS2 device now holds more than one-third of the DVD recording market in Japan.
In China, the PS2 was supposed to go on sale in late December, but Sony indefinitely postponed the launch two days after the official release date for unspecified reasons.
Double Your Pleasure
After months of vague statements intended to build anticipation, Nintendo recently revealed the Nintendo DS, which will be formally introduced at E3 in Los Angeles this May (Gamespot). The handheld console will utilize a pair of three-inch LCD screens, one for general game view and another for a more focused, or zoomed-in, view of the field.
Nintendo's announcement received a mixed reaction from the game media, which had hoped for some word on the speculated Game Boy Enhanced, a rumored handheld system capable of playing both Game Boy Advance and GameCube games. The DS (for "Dual Screen"?) is expected to launch in late 2004, putting it in direct competition with the much-hyped PlayStation Portable from Sony, also making its debut at E3.
Virtual Worlds, Real Money
Multiplayer online game blogs across the Internet are ablaze with news that Internet Gaming Entertainment. Ltd. (IGE) just bought out chief rival Yantis Enterprises Inc. (Business Wire). The pseudo-merger is rumored to have cost IGE several million dollars and represents a consolidation of the two most powerful purveyors of weapons, items, characters and currency in the online worlds of games such as EverQuest and Ultima Online. Rumor has it Sony Online Entertainment, the force behind EverQuest, is looking to get in on the lucrative market for virtual possessions, which rakes in millions of dollars each year selling leveled-up avatars, rare items and in-game currency.
Small Month, Big Games
February is home to the release dates of some of the most highly-anticipated games of the spring season. The GameCube's Final Fantasy: Crystal Chronicles from Square Enix will allow simultaneous four-player action and Game Boy Advance connectivity on the ninth. That same day, Nintendo also hopes to see strong sales of Metroid: Zero Mission for the GBA, a revamping of the original NES game.
What's in a Name?
Take Two Interactive, publisher of the best-selling Grand Theft Auto series, recently registered the name GTA: San Andreas with the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office. Look for the next innocent bystander-stomping urban romp to take place in a fictional hybrid of (in)famous West Coast districts.
It Does Matter if You Win
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