All About Games: Business Matters

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Wednesday, April 22, 2009

Ignition Entertainment Brings Muramasa: The Demon Blade to U.S.

Muramasa: The Demon Blade, the stunningly animated sidescrolling action game from Odin Spheredeveloper Vanillaware, is coming to the U.S. thanks to a new publishing agreement just announced by Ignition Entertainment.

Scheduled for release exclusively on the Nintendo Wii in September of 2009, the game tells an almost cliché ninja story, but counterbalances that with the prettiest, most stylized graphics the Wii can produce.

"Ignition Entertainment is immensely proud for the opportunity to bring Muramasa: The Demon Blade to the legions of North American gamers yearning for top-quality, original action games on Wii,” said Ignition Entertainment's Shane Bettenhausen in the official announcement.

“The talented developers at Vanillaware have crafted an absolutely stunning adventure through feudal Japan that balances subtle, sophisticated artistry with razor-sharp, addictive gameplay.”

Image courtesy Ignition Entertainment

See Also:

Saturday, April 18, 2009

February NPD: Street Fighter IV Hits It Big

Street Fighter IV was the big draw in February, racking up sales of 849,000 copies across Xbox 360 and PlayStation 3, the NPD Group said Thursday.

No, Street Fighter IV was not the single biggest-selling game SKU for the U.S. in the month of February 2009. That honor again went to -- can you guess? -- Nintendo's Wii Fit, which continues to sell nearly as well as the Wii hardware itself. Sales of games and hardware totaled $147 billion, a 10% year-over-year jump.

Interestingly, NPD pointed out that the Xbox 360's sales of 391,000 units represented Microsoft's biggest non-holiday sales month with the exception of the launch of Halo 3. Looks like the price cut to $200 is delivering sustained sales increases for Microsoft. PlayStation 3 was no slouch at 276,000 units, no doubt buoyed by the release of Killzone 2.

Sales of Nintendo's catalog titles remain strong for Nintendo DS as well as Wii -- Mario Kart DS and New Super Mario Bros., released in 2005 and 2006 respectively, sold like gangbusters this month as another half million people picked up Nintendo's portable.

February 2009's Top 10 Game Sales By Platform

Warner's FEAR 2: Project Origin might have missed out on the top 10 list for January 2009, but only by a little bit.

In the NPD Group's release today of the top 20 games across all platforms and the top 10 for each piece of game hardware for February 2009, we see that the Xbox 360 version of Warner's horror-themed shooter came in at #11, and was the #3 best-selling Xbox game of the month.

Jillian Michaels Fitness Ultimatum for Wii barely fell off the top 20 charts, but My Fitness Coach held on -- Majesco and Ubisoft can thank Nintendo for creating the environment that allows fitness games to do such huge numbers, relatively speaking.

On the top 20 list, Wii had six games, PlayStation 3 had three, Xbox 360 nine, and Nintendo DS two.

The lists are below.

· January NPD: Lord of the Rings Squeaks One Out

· February NPD: Street Fighter IV Hits It Big

· NPD December: $18 Billion Year For Game Industry

· Top 10 Games of December 2008, By Platform

Xbox Live Community Games Dev Decries Poor Sales

Despite its pre-launch hype, developers who have opted to release games under Microsoft's Xbox Live Community Games banner are finding that their titles aren't attracting the vast audience they'd hoped for.

In a blog post detailing the newly released sales figures for caffeine monster software's DUOtrix (pictured above), creator Mobeen Fikree points out that while the demo for his game was downloaded 7,438 times, only 157 copies of the full version were paid for by consumers.

This amounts to a 2.07 percent conversion rate, a figure that Fikree describes as "not great, but I believe that’s around the average rate for downloadable games."

Continuing, Fikree believes that the poor exposure of XBLCG games is to blame for the poor sales ofDUOtrix:

"I think DUOtrix quickly got lost in the flood of games on XBCG," Fikree writes. "We were on the 'featured 5' list on the Community Games page at launch, which is where most of the traffic came from. When we were pulled off the list in December the downloads slowed down dramatically."

Echoing Fikree's concerns, Nathan Fouts of Weapon of Choice creator Mommy's Best Games describes his game's sales as "in one word, sobering."

His game received quite a bit more press than Fikree's, but still moved fewer than 10,000 units since its launch in November 2008.

"What all that means to our bottom-line, we do not yet know, but it does not feel great," Fouts adds. "Maybe rational people hang up their keyboard and call it quits. But if you played Weapon of Choice, you realize we’re far from rational."

Image courtesy caffeine monster software

DUOtrix sales numbers [caffeine monster software, via Joystiq]

· Xbox Community Games, As Low As 60 Cents?

· Xbox 'Community Games' Will Include Free Trial Mode

· Microsoft to Sell Home-Brewed Xbox Games, Share Revenue

· Microsoft: Don't Cut Off the Long Tail

March NPD: Resident Evil 5 Tops Charts

Capcom was the big winner again in March: Resident Evil 5 outsold every other videogame in the U.S. last month.

The Xbox 360 version alone came in at 938,000 copies sold, with the PlayStation 3 version at 585,000, according to the NPD Group's sales results for the U.S. videogame industry in March 2009. This suggests that Microsoft's efforts to co-market the 360 version were quite well received. Recall that last month, Capcom's top-selling Street Fighter IV sold roughly equal amounts on Xbox 360 and PlayStation 3.

(The Xbox 360 number does not include copies bundled with Xbox hardware, NPD says.)

Other big games for March included Nintendo's Pokemon Platinum and Microsoft's Halo Wars.

On the hardware side, it's the same old story. Everything's down from February, as usually happens in March.

1. Wii 601K

2. Nintendo DS 563K

3. Xbox 360 330K

4. PlayStation 3 218K

5. PSP 168K

6. PlayStation 2 112K

Software chart and broader industry analysis below.

Top 10 Software, March 2009

1. RESIDENT EVIL 5* CAPCOM USA 360 938K

2. POKEMON PLATINUM VERSION NINTENDO OF AMERICA NDS 805K

3. HALO WARS* MICROSOFT 360 639K

4. RESIDENT EVIL 5* CAPCOM USA PS3 585K

5. WII FIT W/BALANCE BOARD NINTENDO OF AMERICA WII 541K

6. MLB '09: THE SHOW SONY PS3 305K

7. KILLZONE 2 SONY PS3 296K

8. WII PLAY W/REMOTE NINTENDO OF AMERICA WII 281K

9. MARIO KART W/WHEEL NINTENDO OF AMERICA WII 278K

10. MAJOR LEAGUE BASEBALL 2K9 TAKE 2 INTERACTIVE 360 205K

*Includes limited edition versions

The entire game industry is down significantly over March 2008.

Dollar Sales March 2008 March 2009 Change

Video Games $1.72B $1.43B -17%
Video Games Hardware $552.04M $455.55M -18%
Video Games Software $952.14M $792.83M -17%
Video Game Accessories $217.55M $185.67 -15%

NPD analyst Anita Frazier, in a statement released with today's numbers, cautions against Chicken Little-type behavior, however:

While it might be tempting to jump to the conclusion that the sky is starting to fall on the video games industry given this month's results, it's important to remember that two very big things are different this year than last. First, Easter fell in March last year whereas it fell in April this year, and last March included the release of Super Smash Bros.: Brawl, which went on to become the fourth best-selling game in 2008.

We'll see next month whether that all pans out. Seems to make a lot of sense -- NPD says Easter accounted for $121 million in sales last year.

Sony Charges Publishers For Downloadable Content

Have you ever wondered who covers the bandwidth costs for all those demos and add-on content gamers download from the PlayStation Network? As of October 2008, Sony has been asking gaming publishers to pick up the tab.

Dubbed the "PlayStation Network Bandwidth" fee, the rate Sony charges publishers amounts to 16 cents per Gigabyte, according to MTV's Multiplayer blog. Free content, such as game demos, only rack up charges for the first 60 days they are available, but bandwidth costs for paid downloadable content are billed to the publisher essentially forever.

Publishers seem unhappy with the added cost -- an unnamed source who spoke to MTV said "It’s a new thing we have to budget. It’s not cool. It sucks." -- but this does seem like an inevitability given Sony's desire to offer the PlayStation Network for free to gamers.

Given this fee and Microsoft's attempts at making every high profile release exclusive to the Xbox 360, is it any surprise that gaming firms like Rockstar and Bethesda are content offering add-on content for their big releases only on Xbox Live?

Image: MiZ 007/Flickr

Sony Now Charging Publishers For PS3 Downloadable Content, An Unpopular Policy Shift [MTV Multiplayer]

· Sony Warns of Possible PlayStation Network Hack

· PopCap Games Coming to PlayStation Network

· Sony Promises Killer Content on PlayStation Network

Warhawk Developer Forms New Studio

Warhawk director Dylan Jobe has left Incognito Entertainment to head LightBox Interactive.

Alongside Jobe, it appears that the entirety of Incognito's staff has also been shifted to LightBox.

"This transition has been nearly a year in the making and we're very proud that no jobs have been lost in this transition -- every member of our team is critical and has a new home at LightBox Interactive," the studio's official site states.

LightBox is currently located in Salt Lake City, though the developer has plans to relocate to Austin, Texas "in the fall of 2009," in an effort to tap into that city's "creative culture and well established game development community."

No solid details on what projects LightBox might be working on have yet been revealed, but the official site claims the studio has signed a multi-year contract to create games exclusive to Sony's PlayStation platforms.

Image: LightBox Interactive

· Warhawk Operation: Fallen Star Detailed

· Update Brings Training Modes to Warhawk

Former Yahoo Head Tapped for Guitar Hero Division

Former Yahoo executive Dan Rosensweig has been named the new president and chief executive officer of Red Octane, the division of Activision Blizzard responsible for the company's Guitar Hero franchise, the company revealed Monday.

Rosensweig's credentials include four years as Yahoo's chief operating officer, as well as 18 years at publisher Ziff Davis.

"I am extremely excited for this opportunity to work with the talented Guitar Hero team, which has transformed the interactive entertainment landscape," said Mr. Rosensweig via press release. "With a platform and content that universally engages a wide range of audiences, Guitar Hero has incredible growth potential. I look forward to continuing to develop Guitar Hero into an even more successful enterprise."

Presumably Mr. Rosensweig has been brought in to ensure the future profitability of the Guitar Hero division, about which critics have long predicted sharply decreasing returns stemming from a series-wide lack of innovation and an over saturation of the rhythm game market.

Image courtesy Activision Blizzard

· Rumor: Transformers Tune Coming to Guitar Hero

· Scoop: The Guitar Hero Embeddable Widget

Lionhead Employee Sues Microsoft Over 'Homophobic Abuse'

Jamie Durrant, an employee at Fable creator Lionhead Studios, is suing parent company Microsoft for £45,000 over alleged homophobic discrimination he experienced while working for the developer, reports the U.K.'s Mail Online.

Key to Mr. Durrant's complaint are a series of e-mails he says were sent around his workplace "with headings such as 'I'm Jim and I'm Gay' and 'Me and My Favourite Men'." Additionally, Durrant alleges an overarching homophobic environment at the developer and that he was publicly branded "Fag Boy Jim."

Originally, Mr. Durrant attempted to resolve his grievance through Lionhead's human resources department, but says the company lacked any policies to handle his issue. Instead of filing a formal complaint against the company, he agreed to HR's idea of sending employees an e-mail reminding them "how to behave responsibly in a diverse office."

That e-mail was never issued, Durrant alleges.

Xbox designer sues Microsoft over 'Fag Boy' jibes at work [Mail Online]

· Microsoft: Don't Cut Off the Long Tail

· Sony: Microsoft Wants Blu-Ray Xbox

· Microsoft Ends Repair Service for Original Xbox

Ratchet & Clank Future: A Crack in Time Coming This Fall

Update: Sony has released a much better looking version of the game's logo, now pictured above.

The next Ratchet & Clank title has been officially revealed: Ratchet & Clank Future: A Crack in Time will appear on the PlayStation 3 in Fall 2009.

"Ratchet & Clank Future: A Crack in Time will conclude the story arc that started in Tools of Destructionand continued in Quest for Booty," writes James Stevenson, community manager for developer Insomniac Games, on Sony's PlayStation.Blog.

Unfortunately that sentence and the above, poorly cropped image of the game's logo is the extent of solid information Stevenson offers on the game, though he does urge fans to watch Spike TV's "Gametrailers TV" this week to catch the game's first official trailer.

Image courtesy Sony

Introducing Ratchet & Clank Future: A Crack in Time [PlayStation.Blog]

· Ratchet & Clank Save the Future on PS3

· Hands-On: Ratchet and Clank Future

Rock Band Series Tops $1 Billion In Sales

Since its launch in late 2007, the Rock Band series has pulled down more than $1 billion in sales -- and that's only including its success in North America.

That figure comes courtesy of a press release issued by Rock Band distribution partner Electronic Arts Thursday morning, that also includes word that fans of the series have paid for more than 40 million downloadable songs from the game's vast DLC selection since the series' debut.

Though Rock Band 3 has yet to be announced, the upcoming Beatles-themed Rock Band release, PSP port of the series and weekly downloadable song additions should continue the series' lucrative track record for quite some time.