Have you been diligently buying and registering your games via Square Enix Members? The 2009 prizes finally shipped, and we snapped some pics of the Ultimate level gifts. Included in the box is a Square Enix branded iPod Touch, and a medal-enclosed box that includes a soundtrack CD, postcards and a desktop calendar. This is some of the highest-quality swag we’ve seen given to fans. It certainly makes Club Nintendo pale in comparison. Check it all out in our gallery below.
The 2010 program is currently ongoing. To register, visit the official Members website.
Square Enix Members 2009 prizes unboxed originally appeared on Joystiq on Sat, 21 Aug 2010 23:30:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.
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E3 2010 officially kicks off today, though we’d understand if yesterday’s gaggle of press conferences led you to believe differently. We’ve already seen what Microsoft has to bring to the table — in just a few hours, Nintendo and Sony will reveal their plans for world domination over the next year.
Tuesday, June 15, 2009 (times presented in EDT)
- 12:00PM — Nintendo press conference
- 3:00PM — Sony press conference
- 5:30PM — Shigeru Miyamoto interview
- 6:00PM — Shinji Mikami interview
- Booth tours — Disney Interactive, EA, LucasArts, Nintendo, Sega, Sony, SOE, Square Enix, Tecmo Koei, THQ, Ubisoft
PrE3view: Tuesday, June 15, 2009 (Day 1) originally appeared on Joystiq on Tue, 15 Jun 2010 11:14:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.
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US consumers of those newfangled video games apparently spent $25.3 billion on them in 2009, according to the Today’s Gamers Survey by Newzoo and TNS. If this study seems vaguely familiar, it’s likely because there was a similar report released on massively multiplayer games a couple months ago, which found that Americans spent $3.8 billion on MMOs during 2009. Typically, data we see comes from retailers, but this survey was conducted using 13,000 respondents, aged 8 and up, who were “carefully selected to represent each individual country’s demographic profile.”
As VentureBeat notes, the numbers in the Newzoo report are quite different than NPD’s report on 2009 sales — by about $5 billion. Unlike NPD, the Newzoo study also reports data on several European nations. A free summary [PDF link] of the report is available on GamesIndustry.com, while the full report will cost you €299 ($384). We wonder how much US consumers spent on research reports in 2009 …
[Via VentureBeat]
Study: Americans spent $25.3 billion on games in 2009 originally appeared on Joystiq on Mon, 10 May 2010 22:30:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.
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As
predicted by analysts late last year, Nintendo is forecasting a drop in annual profits for the first time since the Nintendo DS’s 2004 introduction. It’s not a
loss, just a
reduction in profits — Nintendo is still forecasting profits of ¥230 billion ($2.43 billion), compared to fiscal 2009’s ¥279.1 billion ($2.95 billion). The AP’s Yuri Kageyama notes that the
Wii price drop, as well as
slower sales early in the fiscal year (reflected in the
first half earnings report), negatively impacted Nintendo’s profits.
Analyst Yuta Sakurai thinks Nintendo is being too pessimistic (or just not optimistic enough, considering that the subject is enormous profit). “We are expecting the results to be better than the company forecasts for the Wii,” the Nomura Securities analyst said. “Christmas shopping was strong.” Nintendo did have an extraordinary December, with both the Wii and the DS breaking three million units each just in the US. It then went on to break sales records in the first two months of 2010. Perhaps Sakurai is correct, and Nintendo is just being modest about its profits. We’ll find out on Thursday when Nintendo releases its annual earnings.
[Via 1UP]
Nintendo expects falling profits for fiscal 2009 originally appeared on Joystiq on Tue, 04 May 2010 15:30:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.
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Of the many, many games that GameStop sold in 2009 (not to mention the millions of dollars it made), we were left wondering where the lion’s share of the game retail juggernaut’s capital went in terms of product that the company was actually buying for its stores. And in a recent SEC filing for the last financial year, the company an unsurprising leader: Nintendo took the top spot, with 23 percent of GameStop’s “new product purchases” in fiscal year 2009. Sony trailed in second place by only five less points at 17 percent, while MIcrosoft, EA, and Activision picked up 12, 12, and 11 percent (respectively).
The remaining 25 percent presumably belongs to various third party peripherals and game-related items available for sale in the retail chain’s stores. That said, while over 41 percent of GameStop’s sales come from new products (read: from the vendors listed above) over the 26 percent coming from used game sales, the vast majority of revenue is still very much coming from used game sales, and thusly, the company’s number one vendor: you.
Nintendo accounts for nearly 25% of GameStop’s new product purchased in fiscal 2009 originally appeared on Joystiq on Wed, 31 Mar 2010 14:00:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.
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The way we see it, unless you’re old enough to have taped a world premiere Smiths video off of 120 Minutes (probably “Stop Me If You Think You’ve Heard This One Before”) you have no business hoarding
VHS tapes. But maybe you are enamored with their many charms: actual
tape that gets taut, stretches, or simply loses signal over time, resulting in color bleeds and ghastly images; bulky physical media; cardboard cases that stain and tear quickly and easily. Well, you probably live in the United Kingdom, then! According to a report by that nation’s Entertainment Retailers’ Association (ERA), while music sales dropped by 0.8 percent in 2009 (the lowest decrease in five years) and all other video fell by by 10.6 percent, VHS sales more than
doubled, from 44,377 in 2008 to 95,201 last year. Of course, everything is relative — while PC games, for instance, declined nearly 25% last year, some 6.4 million titles were sold. Even so, this is no small potatoes when you realize that almost all the sales were attributed to Bill Cosby’s Razzie Award-winning classic. What do you think, guys? Time for a
Leonard Part 7?
UK VHS sales more than double in 2009, Bill Cosby enjoys the attention originally appeared on Engadget on Wed, 24 Mar 2010 09:53:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.
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Massively multiplayer online game players in the States allegedly spent $3.8 billion last year, according to the Today’s Gamers MMO Focus Report by Gamesindustry.com and TNS. The report claims that the MMO market in the US has reached 46 million users, with 21 million paying for online games. The rest play without spending a dime (think “freemium”).
In a shocking upset victory dripping in sarcasm, World of Warcraft was the most popular MMO with the US, besting NeoPets, Club Penguin, Disney ToonTown and Runescape. Ah freemium, where even the traditional MMO companies can make money.
[Via Massively, Gamasutra]
Study: America spent $3.8 billion on MMOs in 2009 originally appeared on Joystiq on Thu, 11 Mar 2010 05:00:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.
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Despite fears about the languishing PC game industry, revenue seems to have grown a bit in 2009. According to PC Gaming Alliance’s Horizons Report, revenue hit $13.1 billion in 2009, versus $11 billion in 2008.
Don’t expect that growth to translate to increased shelf space for PC games, however. The report notes that digital distribution sales are way up, as are the sales of virtual items. “In 2009 we saw North America and Europe experience a rapid uptake in purchasing virtual items,” PCGA president Randy Stude said. “This model is what drove growth in Asia and we think it is just starting to come to Western markets.”
As expected, given the rise in digital distribution, packaged game sales have dropped for a second year, now accounting for just 20 percent of PC game revenue. It appears that PC games are going to go all digital unless we start seeing some really awesome cloth maps.
PC gaming revenue grew in 2009 as retail PC game sales shrank originally appeared on Joystiq on Wed, 10 Mar 2010 23:00:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.
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Infosecurity Professionals Receive Salary Increase in 2009, Hiring Outlook Most Promising in Asia-Pacific, (ISC)2 …
Survey of 3,000 Reveals Top Skills in Demand and Recruitment Challenges Defying expectations amid a global recession, the (ISC)2(R) 2010 Career Impact Survey found that half of information security pr
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Up against the likes of the … um … Popcorn Hour C200 and the … erm … Asus O!Play (we’d better leave the gadget stuff to the folks who know what they’re talking about), Sony’s PlayStation 3 Slim has triumphed as the 2009 Engadget Awards winner in both “Game Console of the Year” and “Home Entertainment Device of the Year” categories. In fairness to the other game consoles, the Home Entertainment Device category didn’t exactly feature Microsoft and Nintendo devices (the awards are for devices specifically released in 2009, as you might imagine), so the closest competitor (at 9.6 percent) was the HP MediaSmart Home Server — the PS3 Slim took a commanding 54.3 percent of the vote.
In terms of the Game Console of the Year award, the margins were significantly … slimmer, with the PS3 taking 43.3 percent of the vote, followed close behind by the Xbox 360 Modern Warfare 2 Edition at 31.2 percent. The Slim also made the Editor’s Choice top pick for Console of the Year, rounding out the love fest. Also of note, Wii’s MotionPlus landed on both lists as well for “Game Accessory of the Year,” beating out the Modern Warfare 2 night vision goggles by just 4.7 percent. Your giant golden USB hubs will be mailed out shortly, winners! Congrats!
PlayStation 3 Slim sweeps the 2009 Engadget Awards originally appeared on Joystiq on Mon, 22 Feb 2010 20:30:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.
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