With only a couple weeks to go before the 2008 E3 Media and Business Summit, video game publisher Electronic Arts is giving the press a sneak peek at its new video game lineup, including products resulting from its partnership with Hasbro.
Mr. Potato Head hosts EA's game Hasbro Family Night.
(Credit: Electronic Arts)In the forefront is the Hasbro Family Game Night video game for the Nintendo Wii and Sony PlayStation 2, a result of the 2007 teaming of the board game company and the video game company. With Hasbro's Mr. Potato Head as host, EA said families can partake in classic versions of Connect Four, Boggle, Yahtzee, Sorry!, and Battleship, as well as versions of these games with new twists.
The game publisher will also debut a digital version of Sorry! Sliders, a board game that Hasbro will be selling this fall.
NCAA Football '09 is just one of the new "All-Play" games for Wii.
(Credit: Electronic Arts)Other games displayed by EA at recent coast-to-coast press events include Wii- and PlayStation-adapted games Boogie:Superstar, Littlest Pet Shop, a new Monopoly game, and Nerf N-Strike, which comes with a Wii remote and Nerf gun duo.
All the above titles will hit shelves during the fall of 2008.
Casual gaming aside, last week EA also announced a new lineup for its "EA Sports All-Play" series, which is introducing games specifically designed for the Wii. EA said the new games will level the playing field between advanced players and new users, because players won't have to remember complicated series of button combinations.
The five All-Play titles will debut starting this month, including '09 versions of Tiger Woods PGA Tour, Madden NFL , NCAA Football, NBA Live, and FIFA Soccer.
The two-day E308 conference kicks off in Los Angeles on July 15.
Video game giant Electronic Arts on Tuesday posted fourth-quarter revenues that beat Wall Street expectations and looked ahead to fiscal 2009, when it expects to release 15 new games.
Net revenue for the quarter was $1.127 billion, up 84 percent as compared with $613 million for the prior year, the company said. Net loss for the quarter was $94 million, widening from a net loss of $25 million for the prior year.
"On balance, we're very pleased with our revenue growth, but not yet happy with our profit margins," EA CEO John Riccitiello said in a statement. "In fiscal 2009, we expect to deliver another $1 billion in revenue growth and to double our operating profit on the strength of our slate of titles."
Electronic Arts, which is based in Redwood City, Calif., is attempting to buy Take-Two Interactive Software, maker of the blockbuster Grand Theft Auto series, for $2 billion.
Shares of game publisher Take-Two were up Monday on the heels of positive reviews of the forthcoming video game Grand Theft Auto IV, which is being released to the public at midnight Tuesday.
Take-Two plans to launch "Grand Theft Auto IV" on Tuesday.
(Credit: Rockstar Games)Shares of the game publisher traded as high as $27.10, 3.4 percent higher than Friday's closing price. That trading price is also a good dollar a share above the offer made by Electronic Arts when it launched its hostile bid for Take-Two last month. Take-Two rejected that offer, calling it "inadequate." Take-Two owns GTA creator Rockstar.
The excitement surrounding the release has hit a fever pitch, fueled by the positive reviews. The New York Times called the game "violent, intelligent, profane, endearing, obnoxious, sly, richly textured, and thoroughly compelling work of cultural satire disguised as fun." My CNET colleague Dan Ackerman got his hands on the final shipping version and offered initial thoughts on the game's pluses and minuses in his blog.
Analysts are expecting the action-driving video game to sell more than 9 million copies and top last year's record $300 million first-week sales of Halo 3.
Check back Tuesday morning when my colleague Daniel Terdiman delves deeper into the controversy surrounding the popular video game franchise.
After a quiet few weeks, Electronic Arts and its takeover target, Take-Two Interactive Software, are back to sparring.
The latest round between the video game makers got into full swing on Friday morning, with word from EA that it would extend its Friday deadline for buying up all Take-Two shares by a month, to May 16. But even as it gave with one hand, it took away with another: EA said it would trim the per-share offering price to $25.74 from $26, given newly OK'd stock grants to Take-Two's management, ZelnickMedia.
Take-Two plans to launch "Grand Theft Auto IV" later this month.
(Credit: Rockstar Games)On Thursday, Take-Two shareholders approved a proposal to issue 1.5 million shares of restricted stock to ZelnickMedia.
As of Thursday, just 6.4 million shares of Take-Two had been tendered--that is, about 8 percent of the outstanding shares.
Take-Two, the maker of Grand Theft Auto, responded quickly Friday to EA's deadline extension/price reduction.
"The minuscule number of shares tendered, as well as the strong vote in favor of the proposals presented at our annual meeting, offer indisputable evidence that our stockholders regard our efforts to enhance Take-Two's stockholder value as superior to the EA offer," Strauss Zelnick, chairman of Take-Two, said in a statement.
Zelnick termed Friday's offer as "the same highly conditional proposal" put forth by EA a month ago, which Take-Two rejected.
The new offer continues to be inadequate and undesirable, according to Take-Two. "It undervalued the company at $26 per share, and it certainly undervalues Take-Two at $25.74," he said in the statement.
EA launched its unsolicited bid, valued at roughly $2 billion, in late February.
In midmorning trading Friday, EA's shares were up $1.08, or 2 percent, to $52.53, while Take-Two's shares were up 30 cents, or just more than 1 percent, to $26.11.
Electronic Arts has amended its takeover offer for smaller video-game publisher Take-Two Interactive.
According to an EA representative and an EA filing Friday with the Securities and Exchange Commission, the offer has been extended to Friday, April 18, instead of Friday, April 11. (EA's own press release incorrectly states that April 18 is a Wednesday. Oops.)
In addition, EA added a new condition to its offer: Take-Two must chuck its "poison pill" shareholder rights plan designed to deter the takeover.
Earlier this week, Take-Two officially rejected EA's bid, adopted the poison pill, and moved its annual shareholder meeting from April 10 to April 17. EA is apparently following suit with its date change.
"The actions of the Take-Two Board may increase the risk for their stockholders by delaying a potential transaction," Owen Mahoney, EA's senior vice president of corporate development, said in Friday's press release. "We continue to believe that our $26 per share offer price is full and fair, and that a transaction between Take-Two and EA is the most compelling combination financially, strategically and operationally for all parties."
EA's attempt to take over Take-Two has been an ugly one, with back-and-forth press releases doing much of the negotiation.
Updated March 13, 12:45 PM PDT, to reflect the announcement by EA.
Electronic Arts has launched a $26-per-share tender offer for all outstanding shares of game publisher Take-Two following the rejection of an unsolicited bid.
The bid for the rival publisher of the Grand Theft Auto game places the value of Take-Two at $2 billion. Announced Thursday, the EA tender offer is set to expire April 11 at midnight Eastern Time, unless extended.
The news was first reported by The Wall Street Journal on its Web site Wednesday night, citing people familiar with the matter.
In February, EA issued a public statement saying it had made an earlier offer to Take-Two that was rejected and that it was boosting the per-share price it was willing to pay to make the deal worth $2 billion. But Take-Two quickly issued its own announcement, saying it thought EA's offer was too small and that it would prefer to wait to have any negotiations with anyone until after the April 29 release of Grand Theft Auto IV, which is expected to be a hit.
Over the past decade, video game popularity has grown at an exponential rate. Instead of being the niche market that only a select few cared about, the industry is now worth billions of dollars and has become mainstream.
But as that has happened, video game developers like EA and Take-Two Interactive have become far more business-savvy and done their part in ensuring that they can maximize shareholder value and create an environment where video games are an extremely profitable product.
In the process, the video game industry has been damaged by a slew of mergers and acquisitions and in the process, some of the most profitable genres (first-person shooters and sports games, for example) have been copied and refreshed so many times over that gaming has quickly become derivative and bereft of innovation.
And although the main culprit for the lack of innovation is obviously the Almighty Dollar, another culprit is lurking in the shadows and quietly damaging the foundation of gaming as we know it--acquisitions.
... Read moreDon Reisinger is a technology columnist who has written about everything from HDTVs to computers to Flowbee Haircut Systems. Don is a member of the CNET Blog Network, and posts at The Digital Home. He is not an employee of CNET. Disclosure.
The New York Times reported on Wednesday that the board of directors for video game publisher Take-Two Interactive Software, facing a buyout offer from Electronic Arts, approved new compensation packages for its management firm that would take effect with a merger or acquisition.
The new measures, approved within days of EA's initial offer, concern Take-Two's agreement with management firm ZelnickMedia. Under the revised terms, in the event of a takeover, ZelnickMedia would be awarded two restricted stock grants of 780,000 shares.
At EA's $26-per-share offer, that would be worth $20 million. Additionally, Take-Two's monthly management fees to the firm would rise from $62,500 to $208,333; the annual bonus to ZelnickMedia would rise from $750,000 to $2.5 million.
Take-Two representatives say the move has nothing to do with EA's proposed acquisition. "The board discussions surrounding the ZelnickMedia management agreement began well before the company received a formal offer from EA on Feb. 6, 2008," Take-Two spokesman Steve Lipin told the Times, "and were not initiated as a result of conversations with any potential acquirer."
He added that Take-Two's shareholders have not yet approved the new compensation packages.
According to a weekend report on Ars Technica, leading game maker Electronic Arts has decided to give their pioneering game SimCity to the One Laptop per Child project for installation on every machine distributed to children in developing nations).
You probably played SimCity as a kid. Remember laying out your own city, making decisions about geography, building roads, residences, and commercial areas? You got to watch how your choices play out over months, years, and decades.
The game also reveals the importance of city planning and civic policy-making to ordinary citizens, making it likely that at least some children in developing countries could be inspired to begin a career in that field. Placement of homes, schools, hospitals, water supply, and shipping docks, for example, is a central part of the game and may shed light on children's own civic situation, as it has for students and users in "developed" countries.
Don Hopkins, who will make the game available on the machine's Sugar interface, has also suggested the game be used to teach children how to code their own games, Ars reports.
This story has been updated from its original version.
In order to get back on top of the video games market, Electronic Arts is willing to pay a hefty price. Namely, $860 million.
The Redwood City, Calif.-based publisher announced on Thursday afternoon that it had agreed to acquire VG Holdings, the parent company of two game development companies, BioWare and Pandemic Studios, from private equity firm Elevation Partners.
This deal, expected to close in January and originally reported by the Wall Street Journal, is the largest in EA's 25-year history.
For more coverage from CNET News.com's sister site Gamespot, click here.
Among BioWare's already-released titles are the Baldur's Gate and Neverwinter Nights series as well as a number of Star Wars titles; Pandemic Studios is also responsible for a handful of Star Wars games in addition to Mercenaries and Destroy All Humans. But of greater interest to EA are the ten upcoming games in the two companies' collective pipeline, including Mercenaries 2 and the hotly anticipated Mass Effect.
"Mass Effect has an enormous amount of buzz right now," said Brian Crecente, editor of gaming blog
EA is in need of a blockbuster. In July, research firm The NPD Group released figures showing that it had been toppled from its number-one position in video game sales for the first time in over a decade; rival Activision had cruised ahead, fueled by the success of the blockbuster Guitar Hero franchise that it obtained when it purchased publisher Red Octane in 2006. From January through June of this year, the NPD stats showed Activision raking in $397.8 million in sales in comparison to EA's $365.7 million.
"It's all Guitar Hero," Crecente said of Activision's recent winning streak. "I don't think Mass Effect is Guitar Hero, but Mass Effect is in my mind a very, very big title."
"I think this transaction is a big plus for EA," CEO John Riccitiello said in a call with investors and analysts on Thursday. It's also a very intimate deal for Riccitiello, who had left his CEO post at EA in 2004 to become a founding partner in Elevation; he returned to the top spot at the video game publisher this past April.
It didn't take long for Riccitiello to close his first deal with his former partners at Elevation, who include famed Silicon Valley investor Roger McNamee, former Apple CFO Fred Anderson, and Irish troubadour Bono. He's no stranger to Pandemic or Bioware, having been responsible for bringing those two studios into the Elevation fold in 2005. As a result, even though he wasn't involved in the financial negotiations, he's very well versed in the history and potential of what the two studios can bring to EA.
Not only may the deal strengthen EA, but Riccitiello will probably personally benefit from the deal. He remains an investor in the Elevation Partners fund, and could stand to make $4.9 million on the deal following the distribution of the profits to fund shareholders, according to a
Bret Pearlman, managing director and co-founder of Elevation, said EA was in a competitive bidding situation for the two studios down to the wire, although he declined to name the other suitors. He also declined to specify how much Elevation invested in VG Holdings over the time it was owned by Elevation.
The deal marks the second high-profile move for Elevation in the last several months. In June the firm closed a unique deal for 25 percent of Palm, which has struggled trying to extend the success of the Treo as other rivals have regrouped.
In this new deal, Elevation is receiving about double what it originally invested in BioWare and Pandemic, which the firm acquired individually under Riccitiello's auspices before merging them into VG Holdings. EA will pay up to $620 million in cash to VG's stockholders, about $155 million in equity to select VG employees, and will assume approximately $50 million worth in VG stock options as well as lend the game company about $35 million.
In the short term, the deal will knock about 30 cents to 40 cents off EA's net profit for the 2008 fiscal year, the company said in a press release. But on the conference call, executives said the deal is expected to add to EA's earnings during its fiscal 2009 year.
Gaming insiders say it's a good move for the company. "EA is acquiring two pretty strong publishers," Crecente said. But gaming fans might think otherwise. "For whatever reason, I guess because EA's a large company, there is an enormous amount of backlash," he observed. "I think the problem is that gamers' biggest fear is that a good franchise will come under the control of a sort of corporation mentality that cares more about money than it does the product. Whether or not that's really true with EA is debatable."
Crecente pointed out EA's famous Madden NFL football title, which it revamps and re-releases every year in order to drive up sales.
EA spokeswoman Tammy Schachter insisted, predictably, that gamers have nothing to worry about with the BioWare/Pandemic Studios acquisition. "Being part of the EA family won't change the creative side of these games," Schachter said. "It will only open up the publishing and distribution opportunity for the games."
But enthusiasts like Crecente say that it's still troubling as a few huge companies control an increasingly bigger share of the games market. "It's like Hollywood in that the more you have this conglomerate sort of mentality. I think it dampens creativity if you only have a couple of publishers out there," he said. "The likelihood of a studio coming up out of nowhere and coming up with a blockbuster, I think, is less possible."
CNET News.com's Tom Krazit contributed to this report.
