Strong & Weak Among the Video Game Market Players

MARCH 6, 2013 • Technology is an inherently disruptive undertaking. At the very least that disruption is relentlessly incremental, and at most, seriously transformative. The iPhone, for example, made its debut back in 2007, elevated smartphones up to a must-have status with consumers, and as a result, permitted Apple to muscle itself into the games business. Looking forward, DFC thought it would be useful to take a hard look .....

Battling for Entertainment Dollars: 7 Major Companies in the Video Game Market

MARCH 5, 2013 • As we discussed recently in Can Sony & Nintendo Recover? one of the great ironies of 2012 was that Sony and Nintendo were not able to take advantage of strong consumer excitement over digital devices.  Hardware is clearly not a commodity and this should be good news for game hardware manufacturers that specialize in providing unique, proprietary systems.  Unfortunately, w.....

Electronic Arts Loves Microtransactions

FEB. 27, 2013 • During a guest presentation at the Morgan Stanley Technology, Media & Telecom Conference, Electronic Arts chief financial officer Blake J. Jorgensen said the publisher is now building microtransactions capability into all of its games. “The ability to pay for things along the way, either to get to a higher level to buy a new character, to buy a truck, a gun, whatever it might be, and consumers are enjoying and embracing that way of the .....

LG Acquires WebOS

FEB. 25, 2013 • Major South Korean consumer electronics manufacturer LG Electronics Inc. is buying the WebOS operating system source code from the Hewlett-Packard Co. The latter acquired the mobile phone system when it purchased Palm, Inc. in 2010 for $1.2 billion. Financial terms of the LG deal were n.....

Can Sony And Nintendo Recover?

FEB. 21, 2013 • The year 2012 clearly showed that even in the age of easy digital distribution consumers love their physical products.  Among other things, this has included expensive hardware designed mainly to play digital content.  Having the coolest hardware device to access the Internet has suddenly become an important status symbol in society.  Unfortunately for the game industry, traditional game hardware manufacturers were not able to ride that trend.....

Sony Confirms PlayStation 4 release

FEB. 20, 2013 • As expected, Sony Computer Entertainment used its press event at the Hammerstein Ballroom within New York City’s Manhattan Center to provide the first official details on the PlayStation 4 release. The new system is slated for a holiday release this year, but no pricing details were announced. SCE chief executive Andrew House framed the new console as, “a significant shift from thinking of PlayStation as a box or console to thinking .....

Vita Price Slashed In Japan

FEB. 19, 2013 • In its first broad move since announcing that PlayStation Vita first-year targets had been reduced down to 7 million units sold by March 31, Sony Computer Entertainment said street Vita prices in Japan would be reduced significantly on Feb 28.  On that date, both the ¥29,980 ($320) 3G and the ¥24,980 ($266) WiFi models would now retail at ¥19,980 ($213). No price changes were an.....

Wargaming Buys Gas Powered Games

FEB. 15, 2013 • Financially ailing Gas Powered Games, which had pegged its future on its new Wildman action RPG property and a $1 million Kickstarter campaign to fund the project, agreed to be acquired by F2P World of Tanks publisher Wargaming. In the three weeks since starting the funding drive, Gas Powered Games had just over $500,000 in pledges and had been forced to lay off most of its staff. Following the acquisition by Wargaming, the indie developer cance.....

End of content

End of content