Metue.com

Cell phones are getting more and more sophisticated and along with the changing technologies, mobile usage patterns are starting to shift.  According to a just released report from Pew Internet about 75% of American adults own a cell phone.  58% have used their device for non-voice applications (email, texting, and Internet) and 41% have logged into a mobile Internet connection.

Apple and Research in Motion are among the phone makers leading the push to the future but like giant ships passing in the night, they have so far approached the markets from opposite shores; one focused on consumers, the other the needs of corporate business users.  Now that is changing.  In an increasingly spirited competition both companies are expanding their ambition.  Instead of targeting just a segment (corporate/consumer) now they’re both aiming for the entire smart phone market. It’s shaping up to be an interesting battle.

Click to Read More

About a week ago, Electronic Arts CEO John Riccitiello acknowledged many of EA’s past merger efforts proved disappointments.  The post merger integration process, and EA’s style at the time, simply didn’t accommodate the needs of incoming creative talent.  Effectively, the company ended up buying existing game titles but doing a poor job of leveraging the human capital behind them to build for the future.  Now, about 7 months after restructuring the company and creating an organizational hierarchy designed to better balance creative development and fiscal accountability, EA is setting out to prove they can acquire assets without stiffling (and losing) their creative game development talent.

The first test of the new approach began several months ago with the acquisition of Bioware and Pandemic.  The second test began to take shape today.

In a press release, EA made public a proposal to buy struggling game developer Take Two Interactive for approximately $2b in cash. Click to Read More

On July 11, 2007 famed video game designer Shigeru Miyamoto took the stage at a Santa Monica gaming convention to reveal a peripheral and game designed to bring exercise and fitness to the Nintendo Wii gaming platform.  Wednesday, Nintendo took advantage of another trade show, this time in San Francisco, to announce the Wii Fit launch schedule for the U.S. and Europe.

Part of Nintendo’s ongoing strategy to expand the gaming market by appealing to mainstream audiences, the Wii fit package uses a specially designed balance board controller to turn exercise into games (or games into exercise).  Like the Wii’s other innovative controllers, the board (which is primarily designed to be stood on) senses motion and movement.  The device is also sensitive to shifts in weight.   Reportedly its scale-like design was inspired by Sumo wrestlers who often need to weigh themselves with two scales.

Click to Read More

Post holiday sales notwithstanding January is typically a soft period for the retail industry when compared to the results November and December holiday rush.  The monthly NPD numbers released last week, showed the skyrocketing returns for the gaming industry weren’t immune.  Hardware sales, in particular, were off but overall, there was plenty of value to be mined from the latest monthly results report from NPD.

Total U.S gaming sales were $1.18b in January, a 6% drop versus the same period a year ago (though that has largely been attributed to an extra week of reporting included in last year’s tally).  Taking into account the calendar adjustments, NPD notes that sales were up about 18% on a week by week accounting.

Click to Read More

New years seem to start with a tempered excitement.  As a symbolic beginning, we’re prone to look ahead anxious of the unknown.  As a symbolic end, we’re drawn  to look back and take inventory of what has passed.  Where have we been? What have we done? And, most of all,  where are we going?

In the mix, the glass is neither half full nor half empty.  In the beginning of a new year, it is just there with some liquid in it open to all voices to call it what they will.   Looking back is a means of measuring where momentum is taking us. Corporate earnings, personal achievements (or faults), annualized statistics: all numbers and quantities to set benchmarks and goals.

Click to Read More

Everyone knew the numbers were going to be good; it was just a matter of how good.  That and how long it would take to see them.   Usually, it takes a few weeks to tabulate year end results.  In that time, expectations were building.  Today, NPD Group released their December and Year-End Sales results for the U.S. video game industry.   The results took November’s stellar returns and raised them by one more. More records were broken.

Total U.S. hardware and software sales for 2007 rose 43% over 2006 to set a new record at $17.94b.  December contributed $4.82b to that tally (a 28% annual increase).

Click to Read More

A good story is timeless, crossing between different medium, living and breathing it runs in an often unending circle.  Books and comic books become TV shows and movies.  Movies and TV programs spin off and beget novels and video games. Games too, sometimes start their own traditions or evolve from other tales already known.   It’s a natural co-existence; a cycle that’s evolving with each change in communication mediums.

Among the different medium, video games and movies in particular share a common ground.  They are often similar in storyline and visual style.  That makes for a natural companionship where, on one level, they co-exist by sharing franchises as appropriate to the different technologies and methods of storytelling; watch Star Wars, the movie; play Star Wars, the video game.  On another level, however, the mediums themselves almost converge. There, games become a dynamic, interactive, choose-your-own-adventure equivalent to the static, but rich, three act Hollywood movie experience.

From Spiderman, to the Matrix, from Lord of the Rings to Star Wars, from James Bond, to The Simpsons and CSI: games built around existing TV and movie franchises increasingly dot the lists of popular games for current generation consoles.  And in reverse, Click to Read More