Filed under: Business, Rumors and speculation, Wii
According to recent reports, Brighter Minds Media, publisher of the successful World of Goo for Nintendo’s WiiWare, recently filed for chapter 11 bankruptcy protection. This is extremely bad news, especially since World of Goo was so well received.
Tags: Brighter Minds Media, Recession, Wii, WiiWare, World of Goo
Filed under: Business, General Nintendo, Nintendo DS, Wii
Following Nintendo’s revision to its profit forecast, a move which some analysts are calling “too cautious“, Nintendo’s shares have since dropped by 12 per cent — the largest fall Nintendo has seen in 18 years. Company president Satoru Iwata yesterday attempted to address many concerns that the business may have peaked:
“I think it is true that new information penetrates through the Japanese market very quickly and that Japanese people tend to get tired of something new very quickly,” Iwata stated. “It is also true that the population is smaller when compared with that of other major markets, so it is inevitable that the market starts to feel saturated earlier than others.”
Citing previous hardware generations, he noted that the U.S. has twice the sales potential of Japan. Europe, where Nintendo’s marketing has improved since the GameCube days, also presents growth opportunities.
Iwata also mentioned that the Nintendo DSi was one method Nintendo used to “reactivate the Japanese DS market”. Regarding the Wii, he stated that it’s “not impossible for the Wii’s total sales to exceed the final installed base of PS2“.
Tags: Nintendo DS, Nintendo DSi, Recession, Sales, Satoru Iwata, Wii
Filed under: Business, General Nintendo
Japanese analyst Hiroshi Kamide speculates that the Wii craze might be coming to an end, as Nintendo today cut its income forecasts by 33 per cent.
Although Nintendo still expects to finish the year in the black, “analysts described Nintendo’s guidance as a ‘baffling and potentially very worrying‘ sign for worldwide sales of the Wii as recession curtails household spending around the world”.
Part of the problem, according to games industry insiders in Japan and the UK, is that the pipeline of “must-have” Nintendo Wii software is less strong now than it was six months ago.
On the most widely read gaming websites, there are few forthcoming Wii titles generating the sort of excitement that preceded the release of Mario Galaxy or Smash Brothers.
One big source of margin destruction has been the soaring yen, which rose 24 per cent against the dollar and 30 per cent against the euro in 2008.
Filed under: Business, Rumors and speculation
A source talking to IGN claims that Sega laid off 30 employees earlier today.
Despite analysts’ beliefs early last year that the gaming industry would not be hit hard by the world’s economic strife, that has not been the case. Adding to the list of publishers cutting overhead is SEGA of America, which today laid off 30 employees. This according to a source inside SEGA.
It’s unknown if or how this might affect the releases of upcoming SEGA titles.
Update: This was later confirmed by Sega.
Filed under: General Nintendo, Wii
Nintendo had plenty of time to increase production of its increasingly popular Wii console but was sill unable fully to meet demand during the holidays. According to Game Daily, several analysts expected sales to be higher. Although the Wii sold exceptionally well — above 2 million units in December alone — it could have “doubled that figure if supply had been better”.
Deutsche Bank analyst Jeetil Patel agreed that supply was a problem in the final month of 2008. “While the data suggest the Wii lagged a bit in December, we think there is still strong consumer demand for the console, suggesting supply constraints in the channel for the console in December,” he said.
“We still believe that Nintendo, with its Wii and DS install base, were the main catalysts behind protecting our industry from seeing the full wrath of the recession in late 2008.”
Let’s hope 2009 will be an even bigger year for Nintendo!
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