Our New Casual Games Store

Every now and again we mention casual games on our Gaming Podcast and we’ve taken the opportunity to open a little store to sell some casual game titles. Our store is located at BuyCasualGames.com and carries titles publishes and distributed by Big Fish Games.

Lot’s of folks have found the games Big Fish publishers are great quality titles for a low cost (as casual games should be). We’ve been working with Big Fish Games for a few years on CasualGamerChick so we’re extending that to its own little website. If you’re looking to pickup a few casual games, this is a great way to get familiar with some titles.

A new game arrives each day and we have free downloadable trials that gamers can test drive before they commit on a purchase. If you’re into the casual gaming scene and want to help support us, use buycasualgames.com for all your casual gaming needs!

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EA and Take-Two Stock Falls FastEA and Take-Two Stock Falls Fast

It’s official, EA has given up their talks with Take-Two and, as a result, the stock of both companies is falling like a stone. While gamers may cheer knowing the Grand Theft Auto and 2K Sports product lines will continue to compete with EA products, share holders are doing a WTF?

Take-Two has had its share of financial difficulties, but nothing shakes up a stock more than a break in discussions when the words acquisition have been spoken. It causes uncertainty and lack of understanding on the part of the game industry and share holders. EA’s stock dropped 2.7% upon opening this morning but has begun to stablize as it’s clear EA isn’t in any financial peril from this breakup in discussion.

Take-Two’s stock, however, is in epic free fall with a 25% decline since the discussions ended. One theory is that, “is taking a huge beating as everyone and their mother tries desperately to sell the shares the figured EA was going to to buy.” (kotaku)

As the game industry gets more competitive, builds bigger bank-roll and becomes a staple entertainment icon there is always more business savvy people getting into the game trying to make a fast buck. In this case, the shareholders obviously aren’t pushing for Take-Two’s future decisions or product launches — this is the reaction of business folks trying to make money.

There is huge risk with block buster 100-million dollar titles and all the crazy hype involved with some of the biggest games in history. They break sales records, smoke box-office numbers and bring new gamers into the industry but it’s all at risk when money gets involved. One bad move and a company making a title like GTA can find themselves in financial peril.

With risk comes reward, but failure is always sneaking up around the corner so watch out!

End of 100 Million Dollar Games?End of 100 Million Dollar Games?

Gigaom had a great writeup about how Grand Theft Auto IV marks the end of “next generation” as we know it, stating, in more words or less, the game is a failure. GTA: San Andreas sold 21.5 million copies during its time on the shelf while GTA IV has sold roughly 9 million copies as of June 7th.

Granted, the game is still on the shelves and will still get sales, but the mass of “hardcore gamers” have had their fill and either purchased it or will not. The end result? A huge tapering of sales numbers for the graphically impressive game. Take-Two spent USD $100 million to develop the game which had great opening sales records but has gone down drastically since.

Imagine the title gains them USD $30.00 per sale in profit (considering distributors get the game for roughly USD $45 to $48.00 USD), taking into account shipping of the product, marketing and all the materials that go into producing a copy, they’d have to sell a large quanity of game titles to break even, which I think they have done.

Nobody is in this industry to break even. A block buster title should make block buster profits, right? Else, why bother to spend the 100-million when a Wii title can double or triple the profits with six months of development?

(more…)

Nintendo Wants More Wii and DS SalesNintendo Wants More Wii and DS Sales

At E3 Reggie Fils-Aime let the world know he wasn’t satisfied with the sales progress of the Wii or DS in 2007 and hopes Nintendo can do better this year. Perhaps Nintendo is playing the humble card? No doubt they bragged about their 10 million sales of the Wii and 20 million sales of the DS but quickly followed it by saying they’re not satisfied.

Or, is this a threat?

Nintendo has built some steep competition while both Sony and Microsoft scoff at their product and tell everyone its a novelty and it doesn’t really “count” in this next-generation console battle. It doesn’t count… really?

Perhaps Microsoft and Sony are right; maybe every Wii owner that wanted a PlayStation 3 and/or an Xbox 360 purchased their console too. There may be some truth to that as hardcore gamers may purchase a Wii for many reasons:

  • They want every console so they have the widest array of game purchases
  • They’re hardcore nature forces them to spend money on all products
  • They want to get their kids in on gaming early, to grow them up in their image
  • Mob mentality, if everyone has a Wii you must as well!
  • The technology is cool and you want to be there for its inception

It seems they don’t feel a threat because Wii is a non-gamer console and thus attracts a different crowd… yet they’re both mimicking some of the motion sensing in their own controllers and playing nice towards “casual games” and non-gamers of late. Maybe their not threatened, but impressed?

Fils-Aime isn’t impressed with their sales figures, perhaps because he expected a higher degree of Wii sales by now, but the fact that people cannot purchase them two years into production has hurt sales figures. Although 10 million units sold is an impressive figure, knowing you had such higher potential if the product was actually on the shelves has to hurt a bit of your pride.

The DS sales were impressive considering the product has been in the market for awhile and is easier to find (minus the holiday rush). We’re not sure why he’s not satisfied with the figures, but inspiring a higher degree of DS sales will require some work. Perhaps this is why they’ve gone with the GTA Chinatown approach; using the GTA name to grow their DS sales figures?

It will be interesting to see how Wii does through the next few quarters and if sales slow down now that we’re a few years into the product. What was the last home console Nintendo owned to get this high of a demand?

Perhaps none.