Provinciano's determination to port Grand Theft Auto 3 to NES hardware escalated into a love letter to video games and pop culture. While Provinciano hasn't announced his next project yet, he says we should expect more humorous open-world games.
Provinciano's determination to port Grand Theft Auto 3 to NES hardware escalated into a love letter to video games and pop culture. While Provinciano hasn't announced his next project yet, he says we should expect more humorous open-world games.
Eric Hirshberg, CEO of Activision Publishing, says the company isn't changing its sales projections on the Skylanders franchise, or this fall's Skylanders: Swap Force, in the face of Disney Infinity.
"We're still bullish on our projections. We feel like it was only a matter of time, given the scale of the success of Skylanders, that other competitors entered the genre. That's to be expected," said Hirshberg.
"I get this question a lot on Call of Duty. We have tough competition every year. We have tough competition in every category we play in, it's a part of the business. We try not to focus on it. We try to focus on making the best games we can and exceeding the expectations of our fans and bottling magic."
Skylanders has surpassed $1 billion in lifetime sales since launching in 2011. Disney Infinity will launch this August.
"We're still bullish on our projections. We feel like it was only a matter of time, given the scale of the success of Skylanders, that other competitors entered the genre. That's to be expected," said Hirshberg.
"I get this question a lot on Call of Duty. We have tough competition every year. We have tough competition in every category we play in, it's a part of the business. We try not to focus on it. We try to focus on making the best games we can and exceeding the expectations of our fans and bottling magic."
Skylanders has surpassed $1 billion in lifetime sales since launching in 2011. Disney Infinity will launch this August.
As part of today's announcement, the company also added PlayStation 4 and Xbox One versions of Swap Force to its multiplatform lineup, joining previously announced ports for the PlayStation 3, Xbox 360, Wii U, Wii, and Nintendo 3DS.
The Skylanders series allows players to summon playable characters via collectible toy figures. Skylanders Swap Force introduces a new series of toys that can be split in half and reassembled for unique mix-and-match ability combinations. Figures released for previous Skylanders games are also compatible with Swap Force.
Series creator Toys for Bob is taking a break for this year's Skylanders release. The console versions of Swap Force are helmed by Vicarious Visions, who previously tackled the 3DS port of 2011's Skylanders: Spyro's Adventure. The Nintendo 3DS version of Swap Force is being developed by Heroes of Ruin creator n-Space, while developer Beenox is working on the Nintendo Wii version.
Skylanders Swap Force will launch in North America on October 13, Australia on October 16, and Europe on October 18.
Trine 2: Directors Cut for Wii U is on sale for $9.99 until 9am Pacific on June 27. Finally, Marvel Avengers: Battle for Earth has received a permanent price drop to $29.99.
Pachter says the Xbox One pricing "makes sense given that the Xbox 360 Pro debuted at that price point in November 2005," though he stresses that this is without any type of subscription or subsidies program - like a cable television provider. As for PS4, Pachter asserts it'll make its debut at a lower price point than the PS3 as that $599 debut "negatively impacted its long-term popularity."
"We also expect the hardware manufacturers to announce price cuts," Pachter writes in the report (pdf link). He predicts both the PS3 and Xbox 360 will be reduced by at least $50 in the run-up to the holidays, while he says the Wii will be knocked down to $99 - maybe we'll get our own Wii Mini? Pachter also says Nintendo may try to increase Wii U sales through a price cut or "a bundle that includes some of its more popular software." Finally, he anticipates a PS Vita price drop, too.
Japanese artist Ippei Gyoubu's female personification of the event (full-size here) is as fantastic as ever, though: "In this year's main visual," the announcement reads, "character 'She' who is the core of games wears a wide variety of devices and tools as parts and she is now going to transform herself into 'something' beyond the reach of imagination to dynamically represent 'GAMES: Limitless Evolution' which is the main theme of Tokyo Game Show 2013."
The conference will take place between September 19 and 22 at the Makuhari Messe convention center in Chiba, where officials expect an estimated 200,000 visitors. Last year, the Tokyo Game Show broke its previous attendance records by drawing a total of 223,753 folks over the course of four days.
Zumba Fitness World party goes cross-gen, available later this year
by Alexander Sliwinski
(21 days ago)
Zumba Fitness World Party will bring the generations together with sweaty support for current and upcoming platforms. The fitness franchise, which has sold over nine million copies, will launch its latest installment this October on Wii U, Wii and Kinect for Xbox 360. An Xbox One edition will launch after the new console comes out later this year.
If you or someone you care for is likely to pick up Zumba Fitness World Party (or could stand to), registering at zumbafitnessgame.com will net you a $10 coupon for the game at GameStop.
The bullet-point features for the latest game are over 40 new tracks, a new visual presentation with 14 celebrity Zumba instructors and 30 cultural dance styles. Our Zumba dance style regularly devolves into a crawling motion toward the nearest water spigot after any five-minute routine.
In non-allegorical terms, gross revenue (overall sales) and net income (post-tax profit) were both down year-over-year, at $1.865 billion and $54.6 million, respectively. As far as net income, that's a 24.69 percent decrease from the $72.5 million Gamestop reported at the end of Q1 2012.
Meanwhile, mobile device sales were up 290 percent, though this massive increase was largely due to the fact that Gamestop's mobile trade-in/sales program was just getting started during Q1 of 2012. Digital sales also increased, to the tune of 47.3 percent year-over-year, while new software sales, both physical and digital, fell 3.8 percent.
As was the case during Q1 2012, used hardware and software sales accounted for the majority of Gamestop's pre-tax profit, with new hardware and software sales making up just 29.5 percent of the quarter's overall gross.
In March, Square Enix President Yoichi Wada stepped down and the company announced widespread restructuring that it expected to cost $106 million. Square Enix posted a net loss of $134 million for fiscal year 2013, citing "weak" sales of major console games, including Sleeping Dogs, Hitman: Absolution and Tomb Raider, the last of which sold 3.4 million in its first month.
Hardware sales brought in $109.5 million, a 42 percent decrease from the $187.8 million seen last year, with the Xbox 360 once again enjoying the highest sales with 130,000 units moved. Meanwhile, the brief reprieve from year-over-year decline seen by the Accessories segment last month was short lived, as in April it by dropped 19 percent to a total of $131.4 million.
Software sales (including PC games) topped out at $267.8 million, with NetherRealm Studios' Injustice: Gods Among Us taking top honors as the best-selling game for the period, the first time a fighting game has finished in first since 2011's Mortal Kombat. Dead Island: Riptide and BioShock Infinite rounded out the podium in spots two and three respectively – meanwhile MMO/Syfy series Defiance debuted in fifth. As always, scope the full list after the break.
Reseburg added that "many players didn't respond to the format," despite EA going on record months after instituting Online Passes, reporting it had not seen a "significant" backlash. "We've listened to the feedback and decided to do away with it moving forward."
The Online Pass, a one-time use code required for online play, was first introduced in 2010 with the intent of being exclusive to EA Sports games, though it quickly escalated from there. Online Pass revenue generated between $10-$15 million for EA in its first year alone.
Nintendo hit 185,000 sales of its 3DS last month, a 46 percent jump in sales from the previous year, Pachter says. Sony's Vita is down 57 percent from 2012, selling just 30,000 units this April. These are of course the standard Pachter estimates, which can only mean one thing – the official numbers are on their way, via the NPD. Those figures are expected on Thursday.
As of March 31, the Wii U has sold 3.45 million units since its launch, below Nintendo's initial forecast of 5.5 million, and even January's adjustment to 4 million. Nintendo expects to have sold 9 million Wii U consoles by next fiscal year, ending March 2014, with sales spurred by the release of "key Nintendo titles."
"Motiva's litigation was targeted at financial gains, not at encouraging adoption of Motiva's patented technology," Circuit Judge Sharon Prost wrote, as reported by Reuters. "There is simply no reasonable likelihood that, after successful litigation against Nintendo, Motiva's patented technology would have been licensed by partners who would have incorporated it."
"We are very pleased with this result. The court confirmed that Motiva's sole activity, litigation against Nintendo, did not satisfy the ITC's domestic industry requirement," said Richard Medway, Nintendo of America's deputy general counsel. "We vigorously defend patent lawsuits when we firmly believe that we have not infringed another party's patent."
The lawyer for Motiva said the company will now take the case to the district court. The judge and Medway then went under the nearest bridge and laid out some nice bedding made of the finest straw to show there were no hard feelings toward Motiva.
Mad Genius break-apart motion controller is for the serious Skyrim sniper
by Richard Mitchell
(1 month ago)
Split controller designs are nothing new. We've seen them implemented by third parties such as SplitFish and, of course, major players – Nintendo's Wii Remote and Nunchuk, and Sony's PS Move and Navigation Controller. Now, Mad Genius is looking to up the ante with its new break-apart motion controller.
Mad Genius says the controller is capable of tracking movements as minute as 1/100 of an inch. A video demonstrates the controller being used in an unmodified version of Skyrim on Xbox 360, tracking the player's body movement to make the character move in the game world. A more practical application is splitting the controller apart to aim and fire a bow in-game.
Holding the two halves like a bow and arrow, the game automatically equips and begins aiming the bow. The control is so fine, according to Mad Genius, that players will actually have to hold their breath to steady their shots, lest a tiny movement knock them off target.
The motion-tracking system will work with any game on any platform, including even outmoded platforms such as the original PlayStation (though it's not clear how you would actually connect the two together). Mad Genius is planning to launch a Kickstarter to fund the final version of the controller, which will be wireless and, presumably, a bit sleeker.