Gaming and Culture

Is the Wii a viable third-party platform?

(Credit: Nintendo)

The Nintendo Wii might be leading the video game market, but at least one game developer is suspect of its software.

Lightning Fish Games CEO Simon Prytherch sat down with GamesIndustry.biz in a recent interview discussing his company and the state of the gaming industry. Lightning Fish Games develops "family-oriented" games for major consoles.

After discussing what he has learned about the industry, he shared his opinion on the state of the Wii and its market.

"Wii is a very casual, wide market," Prytherch said in the interview. "It's a market that doesn't care about flashy graphics--it cares more about the gameplay and experience, and potentially the characterization."

But Prytherch had much more to say. The developer told the site that he doesn't "think you can ever write Nintendo off," but the console's games market "from a third-party software developer and publisher perspective, is oversaturated with product."

Unfortunately, Prytherch asserts, consumers have suffered most. He said that they "have been damaged by a lot of substandard software," which has caused them to "only trust big Nintendo brands."

Those are some awfully strong words from a developer that has so far failed to attract the kind of market attention larger companies Ubisoft or Electronic Arts have. But he's not alone in his belief that Wii gamers aren't attracted to third-party games.

Speaking at a conference call last month, EA CEO John Riccitiello said that "the Wii platform has been a little weaker than we had certainly anticipated. And there is no lack of frustration (about this coming out) at precisely the time where we have the strongest third-party share."

Riccitiello went on to say that his company was trying to work with Nintendo "to push third-party software harder." He then echoed Prytherch's sentiments, saying "very, very few multiplatform titles are succeeding on the Wii so far, and collectively, Electronic Arts and Nintendo need to tackle that." Yikes.

We've heard from the developers, now let's hear from you. What do you think about the Wii's position in the gaming business? Is its game library weak? Do you buy third-party titles? Let us know in the comments below.

The preorder has long been a staple of the video game retail industry, and with good reason. You get a customer to purchase a game ahead of its release in return for a small trinket. The hope is that buyer will keep coming back to the store, and in turn the store can provide more accurate supply numbers to the publisher and thus ensure an adequate stock. It's also been a great way for retailers to sit on that cash long before ever handing over the product.

What has made this more interesting over the years is how far some retailers and game publishers have gone to get people to come to them, and them only. This arms race has lead to some great, and some not-so-great, trends in preorder goodies. Here are five of the best and five of the worst in the last couple of years.

The best

1. Getting the game before its release date

What is easily the holy grail of preorder goodies is getting the game ahead of its official street date. Very few games have ever done this intentionally, though. This usually happens only when a retailer mistakenly sells the title without knowing there's a specific release date, or when games are shipped by mail and the snafu is committed by the shipping company.

In the case of Call of Duty: World at War, which was released last November, GameStop sold the title a day ahead of its official release to those who had preordered it. According to Planet Xbox 360, the game retailer went directly to FedEx's shipping facilities to pick up the game ahead of its slated delivery time.

Also, customers who prebought Mythic Entertainment's Warhammer Online: Age of Reckoning got to build their characters and start playing on the game's servers four days before the game launched--if they bought the collector's edition, while preorderers of the standard edition got a two day head start. The same went for those who preordered Pirates of the Burning Sea, who got to start playing the MMO 15 days ahead of people who simply bought it on its release day.

2. Free games

Coming up just short of getting the new game early is publishers who offer a copy of one of their previous titles free of charge. That was the case for Rockstar games, which through Valve's Steam online game store gave PC gamers who preordered Grand Theft Auto 4 a free copy of GTA: Vice City, a title from earlier in the GTA series.

Preorderers of Banjo-Kazooie: Nuts & Bolts on Xbox 360 got a free code for the original Banjo-Kazooie game on XBOX Live Arcade a whole two weeks before it was officially released to other gamers.

Lionhead studios gave preorderers of the Xbox 360 version of Fable 2 a free (normally $10) Xbox Live Arcade title that let them play some of the title's in-game minigames ahead of the release, as well as put any gold they earned to use in the game once they got it.

Earlier notables include: Preorderers of Red Alert 3 getting a free Red Alert 2 download, and the Zelda: Ocarina of Time disc that came with the Zelda Wind Waker for Gamecube, which had been one of the top games of the year four years prior. Nintendo went through the effort of porting it from the previous generation's system to the GameCube, as well as throwing in a more difficult variation of the game that had previously been unreleased in the U.S. just for those buyers. Now that's cool.

3. Getting the "better" edition of the game, free of charge

The "limited" editions of games almost always cost more, and come with a few extra goodies like a download code from extra in-game content, or a spiffy case with things like concept art books and soundtrack CDs.

This time last year, Ubisoft surprised gamers who had preordered the latest Prince of Persia game with a free upgrade to the limited edition, which featured a making-of featurette, digital art book, and the soundtrack. It certainly wasn't as lavish as some other limited-edition packages, but it was free.

Developer Arksys did the same thing earlier this year with its 2D fighter BlazBlue: Calamity Trigger. Prebuyers who purchased the normal game ahead of time got upgraded to the limited-edition free of charge, which included a video strategy guide and two-disc soundtrack with close to 50 tracks.

PS3 sales are slumping, but not as bad as the Wii's sales, which have been cut in half.

(Credit: Sony)

Sony latest earnings show that it continues to be hammered by the worldwide recession and strong yen, suffering a net loss of $390.5 million in the quarter that ended June 30.

The bright spot was Sony's motion picture division, which saw a 6.5 percent boost that was largely attributable to the relatively strong showing of "Angels & Demons" at the box office. But almost everything else, including TV, video game, and computer sales, was down in a big way.

In an article, The New York Times highlighted the 37.4 percent year-over-year slump in gaming and computer sales (Vaio PC). The article noted that PlayStation 3 game consoles were "particularly sluggish" and that software sales had dropped.

According to the report, Sony said it sold about 1.1 million PlayStation 3s and 1.3 million PlayStation Portables in the latest quarter, compared with 1.6 million PS3s and 3.7 million PSPs in the same period a year ago.

The wane in PSP sales is particularly brutal, although part of that slowdown may have been due to rumors earlier in the quarter that Sony would release a new PSP later in the year. (And sure, enough, the PSP Go was unveiled in June at E3.) Also, the constant spate of rumors involving the potential arrival of a new PS3 Slim certainly hasn't helped sales of the current game console.

On a more positive note, we recently attended a PlayStation preview in New York that highlighted the PSP Go and the exclusive titles available for both the PSP and PS3 platforms during the upcoming holiday-shopping season. Overall, it looked pretty good.

Sony can also be consoled by the fact that sales are also way down for the Wii, as Nintendo reported a 66 percent fall in quarterly operating profit on "slowing demand for its Wii console and a stronger yen."

Nintendo sold 2.23 million Wii consoles in the quarter, compared with 5.17 million the same quarter a year earlier.

However, Nintendo still posted a profit of $445 million and is forecasting that it will sell 26 million Wii consoles before year's end--along with 30 million DS handheld game players, which, by the way, is seeing increased competition from another handheld device. Nintendo didn't mention the PSP as the rival in its earning call, but rather Apple's iPhone.

Comments? Is the PlayStation franchise in serious trouble or will it pull out of its funk this holiday season? Does Nintendo need to cut the price of Wii?

Revenue from U.S. video game sales dropped 31 percent to $1.17 billion in June, compared with $1.7 billion a year earlier, according to data released Thursday by market research firm NPD Group.

The ongoing economic recession and a lack of blockbuster game title releases were blamed for the drop, the fourth decline in video game sales in as many months.

"This is one of the first months where I think the impact of the economy is clearly reflected in the sales numbers," NPD's Anita Frazier said in a statement. "This level of decline is certainly going to cause some pain and reflection in the industry."

Hardware sales suffered the greatest hit, falling 38 percent to $382.6 million from $617.3 million in the year-ago month. Only the Microsoft's Xbox 360 game console managed to record a slight sales increase, while Nintendo Wii sales dropped 45 percent, and the Sony PlayStation 3 dropped 59 percent.

Game sales revenue suffered the second largest hit, falling 29 percent to $625.7 million from $875.8 million a year ago. Sales of video game accessories also declined, falling 22 percent $158.2 million from $202.8 million a year ago.

Once seemingly recession-proof, the game industry has fallen on hard times. Video game sales dipped below $1 billion last month for the first time since 2007.

NPD also suggested that part of the decline may be due to gamers moving to online gaming, but said that trend did not represent a significant threat to console makers.

"While some of the decline in retail sales could be a migration on the part of consumers to acquiring content via digital distribution, our reports on downloads and subscriptions reveal that it's not yet having enough impact on the console market to be an overly meaningful factor in the retail down-turn," Frazier said. "That said, there are increasing avenues for consumers to game, including via mobile devices, and it's clear the industry is sorting through how to manage all these opportunities while deploying resources appropriately."

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, NPD Group said Thursday in its report.

The drop was felt across the board as gamers coughed up less cash for hardware, software, and accessories. Sales for hardware fell 30 percent year over year to $302.5 million. Software revenue was down 17 percent to $449 million, while sales of gaming accessories tumbled 25 percent to $112 million.

"The video games industry continues to struggle with difficult comparisons to last year," NPD analyst Anita Frazier said in a statement.

NPD blamed most of the decline on the lack of blockbuster games rather than the weak economy. The report noted that last year's sales were boosted by the launch of popular software titles such as Grand Theft Auto IV. Nintendo's Wii Fit also was a hot commodity in 2008.

"While there were some very strong new releases this month," Frazier said, "this month's top 10 games sold 2.6 million units combined, whereas last year the top 10 sold 3.7 million units. Again this illustrates how tough the comparisons are to last year."

Nintendo's Wii was the best-selling system in May at 289,500 units, though sales plummeted from last year. Microsoft's Xbox 360 found 175,000 new customers, a gain of 22 percent from a year ago. Sony brought up the rear, selling only 131,000 PlayStation 3 and 117,000 PlayStation 2 consoles.

Despite the sluggish sales, NPD has a positive outlook for the rest of the summer.

"Looking ahead to June, there are some promising games coming out this month between Sims 3 (PC), Prototype, Red Faction, Virtual Tennis, Ghostbusters, Transformers and Tiger Woods just to name a few," noted Frazier. "June comparisons are still likely to be tough, but the wide variety of new content could help reinvigorate things somewhat."

The May report followed NPD's analysis for April, which showed that video game sales had dipped 17 percent year over year.

Correction at 8:30 a.m. PDT: The release dates for Fallout 3 and for The Chronicles of Riddick: Assault on Dark Athena were incorrect. They have been removed from the list of 2009 and 2008 releases, respectively.

The video game industry is going through some tough times. When NPD Group released video game sales data for April last week, the results were disheartening.

According to NPD, total industry revenue was down 17 percent, year over year. Software sales for the month were down 30 percent, compared to April 2008. Wii sales were off 43 percent, PS3 sales slumped by 42 percent, and Xbox 360 sales were down 47 percent, compared to March 2009.

So what happened? Is the video game industry finally being affected by the recession? It's possible that it has some impact. But I don't think there's any better reason for the decline than the games themselves.

If the games aren't compelling, consumers won't be buying.

Thursday's launch of a games trade-in program by Amazon.com has already begun to make waves in the games resale business. Shortly after the program was announced, competitor GameStop's stock took a dive, dropping nearly 14 percent by end of day Thursday.

As a follow-up to the announcement, GameStop's CEO Don Matteo went on the record telling Edge Online he had no faith in Amazon's model based on his company's earlier attempt at a similar program. Matteo was, of course referring to sister site TradeStop. Back in 2005 the site featured a similar offering, where users could get cash for games which the company would then turn around and re-sell on GameStop.com. The service also let people send in DVD movies and music CDs. GameStop discontinued the program at the end of 2005.

Strengths
Amazon is bringing something to the table that brick-and-mortar game resellers cannot easily match: Gamers who send in their used titles can spend their Amazon credit on things that aren't video games. For people who are selling games for a system they no longer have or use this is a clean break. It's also a chance for Amazon to make some extra cash when a user buys something that costs more than the credit they earned.

Another thing users may flock to is transparency. Amazon is showing users exactly what it will pay and has made this list able to be searched. Both GameStop and Game Crazy, two of the largest game resellers, offer no such feature on either of their sites. Instead you're limited to a list of hot games or promotional trade-in values, or you have to go into the store to find out the game values. Both companies will mail larger trade-in value lists, but the lack of an online system has led to users creating wikis to chronicle the ever-updating prices that can fluctuate by supply, demand, and retail price drops.

There's no special membership program. Both GameStop and Game Crazy have special memberships that its customers can join to get special discounts or receive a higher trade-in value for their games. Amazon doesn't offer this, which some may find appealing. Amazon pays everyone the same price in return for them logging-in with their Amazon.com account credentials. There's no annual fee, and the cost of shipping your games in is free.

There are no up-sells or pushy salespeople. You never have to talk to a human being in the entire exchange, which can be seen as a step up. Games retailers typically push paid membership programs, game pre-orders, and certain titles based on sales deals or events. For someone trying to offload their games and buy something new Amazon is letting you skip this.

Despite a slowing economy, sales of U.S. video games and hardware soared 18 percent from the same month a year ago, according to data released Thursday by market researcher NPD Group.

Hardware sales were up 5 percent to $494.7 million, led by Nintendo's Wii game console. Wii held onto the top spot by selling 803,000 units in October, up from 687,000 in September. The Wii, which has been plagued by shortages, has sold more than 13 million units since its release in November 2006.

Microsoft's Xbox 360 held onto the No. 2 spot by selling 371,000 units, a 7 percent increase over September following a price cut that month. Sony's PlayStation 3 came in third with 190,000 units sold, an 18.2 percent increase over the prior month.

Software sales were up 35 percent to $696.8 million, led by Microsoft's Fable II, which sold 790,000 units. Second place went to Nintendo's exercise game Wii Fit, which sold 487,000 copies.

Meanwhile, sales of portable video games were down 14 percent.

The video game industry faces a tough holiday shopping season, following a bankruptcy filing by retailer Circuit City and a revenue warning from rival Best Buy.

Sales of video game software and hardware in the U.S. rose 9 percent in August to $1.08 billion, the smallest monthly increase in more than two years, according to data released Thursday by market researcher NPD Group.

Hardware sales were up 3 percent to $395 million, led by handheld Nintendo DS, which sold 518,300 units. Nintendo's Wii came in second with 453,000 unit sales, and Microsoft's Xbox 360 claimed the third spot with 195,200 unit sales.

Software sales were up 13 percent to nearly $551 million, led by Electronic Arts' Madden NFL 09 and Nintendo's Wii Fit and Mario Kart. Sales of accessories rose 13 percent to $137 million.

The video game industry has weathered the economic downturn better than most industries, but August's sales increase is the first rise below 10 percent in 27 months, NPD analyst Anita Frazier said. However, she said projections for 2008 are still looking strong overall.

"Despite smaller growth this month, the industry is up 32 percent year-to-date and remains on target to achieve annual revenues in the range of $22 billion to $24 billion," Frazier said in a statement.