As was foretold, we've added advertisements to the forums! If you have questions, or if you encounter any bugs, please visit this thread: https://forums.penny-arcade.com/discussion/240191/forum-advertisement-faq-and-reports-thread/
We're funding a new Acquisitions Incorporated series on Kickstarter right now! Check it out at https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/pennyarcade/acquisitions-incorporated-the-series-2

[Industry Thread] Impossible Games sets the speed record for studio closure

11516182021100

Posts

  • SyphonBlueSyphonBlue The studying beaver That beaver sure loves studying!Registered User regular
    If your electric bill is $50, then I want your electric company.

    My electric bill was $51 last month.

    LxX6eco.jpg
    PSN/Steam/NNID: SyphonBlue | BNet: SyphonBlue#1126
  • urahonkyurahonky Registered User regular
    Desktops are becoming really commoditized, though. Their value as a market is vanishing very fast. You can have your 3000 employees working on barebones machines, or even thin clients, these days. Hardware power outgrew the need for power by a big margin.

    I love desktops, I love making my own pc, but I can't see much of a life for that market other than cheap shitty machines or high end connoisseur stuff. Kinda like the music industry, you have your shitty ipod knock off masses, another big chunk of users of ipods, ipads and smartphones of all kinds, and then you have the crazy vinyl hi-fi DAC 1500 dollar cans dudes.

    But even after ignoring the big hysteria from the article author, the core of the facts is not really good for MS overall. Which saddens me indeed.

    Depends. A lot of developers need desktops because laptops cannot provide enough power.

  • Lindsay LohanLindsay Lohan Registered User regular
    edited January 2013
    Dirtyboy wrote: »
    Atari has filed for bankruptcy.

    Probably would've helped if they made good games...

    Does the version of Atari that is declaring bankruptcy own Roller Coaster Tycoon? I wouldn't mind someone picking up that license and going back to the glory of RCT2 - just a super nice high def top down game with tile based building/landscaping (it can be rendered in 3d, but it needs to play like RCT1 and 2 NOT 3). No asking friends on Facebook to help you build a roller coaster, just allow roller coaster design sharing online within the game, and with tons of park themes and decorations.

    In fact, I wish someone would start a niche company to do nothing but actually competent sims for things that have been botched up by the budget game makers. I would buy a good Theme Park/RCT, a solid Theme Hospital redo, a good Mall Tycoon, any sport done as well as Football Manager (sidenote: I'd LOVE a prowrestling league sim with all the over the top 80s gimicks), or a good Hotel Sim other than SimTower.

    I think Eurotruck and Farming Sims show the market is there for any sim game but it has to actually play well which is something all the current ones seem to miss.

    Lindsay Lohan on
  • EVOLEVOL Registered User regular
    edited January 2013
    Now with DmC news that's actually industry news

    UK PAL Charts - Week 3, 2013
    Capcom end FIFA 13’s run at the top as ‘DMC’ (Devil May Cry) debuts at No1.

    It may be a quiet time of year, but it still represents Capcom’s first All Formats No1 since ‘Resident Evil 5’ back in week 13 2009 (Resident Evil 6 could only manage No2). Released on Tuesday and developed by Cambridge indie developer Ninja Theory (the first time a Devil May Cry title has been developed outside of Capcom), DMC sells over a third of what ‘Devil May Cry 4’ did at launch when it also reached No1, back in week 6 2008.
    ‘FIFA 13’ (-40%) drops to No2 ahead of ‘Call of Duty: Black Ops II’ (-26%), while ‘Far Cry 3’ (-49%) falls 2 places to No4. There is no change at No5 and No6 with ‘Need for Speed Most Wanted’ (-35%) and ‘Just Dance 4’ (-18%) both non-movers. ‘Football Manager 2013’ (-16%) is up one place to No7, while sales of ‘Hitman Absolution’ (-50%) are cut in half, knocking it from No4 to No8. The Top 10 is rounded off by ‘Skyrim’ (-20%) at No9 and ‘Assassin’s Creed III’ (-21%) at No10. DMC is the only new release to chart this week.

    http://www.neogaf.com/forum/showthread.php?t=509253

    Speaks more about how terrible the PAL market seems to be these days than anything, but there you go. DmC isn't doing very well despite charting as number 1 this week.

    EVOL on
  • HenroidHenroid Mexican kicked from Immigration Thread Centrism is Racism :3Registered User regular
    I'm shocked that it beat out FIFA if we're talking about the UK market.

  • EVOLEVOL Registered User regular
    Seriously though, what the hell happened to the UK videogame market? Everything seems to sell terribly there these days.

  • HenroidHenroid Mexican kicked from Immigration Thread Centrism is Racism :3Registered User regular
    EVOL wrote: »
    Seriously though, what the hell happened to the UK videogame market? Everything seems to sell terribly there these days.

    Helloween and I were going back and forth about the Wii U's performance in the UK. He kept comparing it to the Vita and I'm not sure if that's a fair comparison at all. But I don't know the performance of each in the UK market specifically, I only know the big picture for each.

    The price of video games isn't helping, that's for damn sure.

  • AllforceAllforce Registered User regular
    We really need to ban Forbes as a source for video game news. It's just paid blogging and has nothing to do with the magazine.

    SpoitElvenshaeSmrtnik
  • CouscousCouscous Registered User regular
    Dirtyboy wrote: »
    Atari has filed for bankruptcy.

    Probably would've helped if they made good games...

    They tried becoming online focused. That didn't work.

    I wonder who will wear the goddamn name next.

  • SanderJKSanderJK Crocodylus Pontifex Sinterklasicus Madrid, 3000 ADRegistered User regular
    urahonky wrote: »
    Desktops are becoming really commoditized, though. Their value as a market is vanishing very fast. You can have your 3000 employees working on barebones machines, or even thin clients, these days. Hardware power outgrew the need for power by a big margin.

    I love desktops, I love making my own pc, but I can't see much of a life for that market other than cheap shitty machines or high end connoisseur stuff. Kinda like the music industry, you have your shitty ipod knock off masses, another big chunk of users of ipods, ipads and smartphones of all kinds, and then you have the crazy vinyl hi-fi DAC 1500 dollar cans dudes.

    But even after ignoring the big hysteria from the article author, the core of the facts is not really good for MS overall. Which saddens me indeed.

    Depends. A lot of developers need desktops because laptops cannot provide enough power.

    Yeah and graphic designers need their own PCs too, but the desktop market exists mostly as the worldwide office and home administration, and even 5 year old machines are more than adequate for 99% of what they do. MS Office, Internet, and maybe one or two specific software that usually also runs on toasters. Noone has a big incentive to upgrade.
    I've seen many offices upgrade to laptop docking stations, to facilitate work-at-home / on-the-road and also make flexible offices, but that's also pretty much a one time upgrade (Though laptops still breakdown more and take more service).

    In anecdotal value, my mom still uses her 2004 Athlon 3000+, while my dad is on some Pentium 4, and since probably the most taxing thing they do is photo administration, it doesn't even get into their head to upgrade, apart from the switch to a widescreen monitor. Both smartphones and tablets eat a ton of 'I wish my computer could do X' while at the same time lowering the amount of time the casual user spends behind a PC. (No longer have to turn it on for emails or do a quick check on something).

    Desktops will probably split between a large pool of very slowly upgraded bargain PCs (For Sub $300 you can build a PC that lasts a regular user 5 years), and 3 smaller pools of Gamer PCs, Industry specific PCs, and Prestige Models (High end Apples because 'they look nice' even though they spend less than 5h/week on, I have two friends who dropped a cool $2k each)

    Steam: SanderJK Origin: SanderJK
  • CouscousCouscous Registered User regular
    EVOL wrote: »
    Now with DmC news that's actually industry news

    UK PAL Charts - Week 3, 2013
    Capcom end FIFA 13’s run at the top as ‘DMC’ (Devil May Cry) debuts at No1.

    It may be a quiet time of year, but it still represents Capcom’s first All Formats No1 since ‘Resident Evil 5’ back in week 13 2009 (Resident Evil 6 could only manage No2). Released on Tuesday and developed by Cambridge indie developer Ninja Theory (the first time a Devil May Cry title has been developed outside of Capcom), DMC sells over a third of what ‘Devil May Cry 4’ did at launch when it also reached No1, back in week 6 2008.
    ‘FIFA 13’ (-40%) drops to No2 ahead of ‘Call of Duty: Black Ops II’ (-26%), while ‘Far Cry 3’ (-49%) falls 2 places to No4. There is no change at No5 and No6 with ‘Need for Speed Most Wanted’ (-35%) and ‘Just Dance 4’ (-18%) both non-movers. ‘Football Manager 2013’ (-16%) is up one place to No7, while sales of ‘Hitman Absolution’ (-50%) are cut in half, knocking it from No4 to No8. The Top 10 is rounded off by ‘Skyrim’ (-20%) at No9 and ‘Assassin’s Creed III’ (-21%) at No10. DMC is the only new release to chart this week.

    http://www.neogaf.com/forum/showthread.php?t=509253

    Speaks more about how terrible the PAL market seems to be these days than anything, but there you go. DmC isn't doing very well despite charting as number 1 this week.

    Ninja Theory keeps on producing games that don't sell well and companies keep on hiring them.

  • StormwatcherStormwatcher Blegh BlughRegistered User regular
    urahonky wrote: »
    Desktops are becoming really commoditized, though. Their value as a market is vanishing very fast. You can have your 3000 employees working on barebones machines, or even thin clients, these days. Hardware power outgrew the need for power by a big margin.

    I love desktops, I love making my own pc, but I can't see much of a life for that market other than cheap shitty machines or high end connoisseur stuff. Kinda like the music industry, you have your shitty ipod knock off masses, another big chunk of users of ipods, ipads and smartphones of all kinds, and then you have the crazy vinyl hi-fi DAC 1500 dollar cans dudes.

    But even after ignoring the big hysteria from the article author, the core of the facts is not really good for MS overall. Which saddens me indeed.

    Depends. A lot of developers need desktops because laptops cannot provide enough power.

    Oh, of course, there are lots of people needing the top beefy machines, like developers and media makers and so on. I meant the average "bought in thousands" office machines for email, browsing and word/excel/powerpoint. Nowadays any half-decent bargain bin laptop can do all those tasks without breaking a sweat, and with power to spare. They're all packing Core i3's and shit.

    Steam: Stormwatcher | PSN: Stormwatcher33 | Switch: 5961-4777-3491
    camo_sig2.png
  • StormwatcherStormwatcher Blegh BlughRegistered User regular
    SanderJK wrote: »
    urahonky wrote: »
    Desktops are becoming really commoditized, though. Their value as a market is vanishing very fast. You can have your 3000 employees working on barebones machines, or even thin clients, these days. Hardware power outgrew the need for power by a big margin.

    I love desktops, I love making my own pc, but I can't see much of a life for that market other than cheap shitty machines or high end connoisseur stuff. Kinda like the music industry, you have your shitty ipod knock off masses, another big chunk of users of ipods, ipads and smartphones of all kinds, and then you have the crazy vinyl hi-fi DAC 1500 dollar cans dudes.

    But even after ignoring the big hysteria from the article author, the core of the facts is not really good for MS overall. Which saddens me indeed.

    Depends. A lot of developers need desktops because laptops cannot provide enough power.

    Yeah and graphic designers need their own PCs too, but the desktop market exists mostly as the worldwide office and home administration, and even 5 year old machines are more than adequate for 99% of what they do. MS Office, Internet, and maybe one or two specific software that usually also runs on toasters. Noone has a big incentive to upgrade.
    I've seen many offices upgrade to laptop docking stations, to facilitate work-at-home / on-the-road and also make flexible offices, but that's also pretty much a one time upgrade (Though laptops still breakdown more and take more service).

    In anecdotal value, my mom still uses her 2004 Athlon 3000+, while my dad is on some Pentium 4, and since probably the most taxing thing they do is photo administration, it doesn't even get into their head to upgrade, apart from the switch to a widescreen monitor. Both smartphones and tablets eat a ton of 'I wish my computer could do X' while at the same time lowering the amount of time the casual user spends behind a PC. (No longer have to turn it on for emails or do a quick check on something).

    Desktops will probably split between a large pool of very slowly upgraded bargain PCs (For Sub $300 you can build a PC that lasts a regular user 5 years), and 3 smaller pools of Gamer PCs, Industry specific PCs, and Prestige Models (High end Apples because 'they look nice' even though they spend less than 5h/week on, I have two friends who dropped a cool $2k each)

    And laptops seem to be eating a huge piece of the "mom and pop" home machine market. When their Pentium 3 breaks, they just get a cheap samsung laptop, so they can pester their kids on facebook while watching tv.

    But iPads are, in turn, killing that market niche too. People just gitf their parents with ipads, so they can skype their grandsons inbetween games of fairway solitaire (love that game), and then you don't have to fix your mom'd laptop.

    Steam: Stormwatcher | PSN: Stormwatcher33 | Switch: 5961-4777-3491
    camo_sig2.png
  • CadeCade Eppur si muove.Registered User regular
    Rumors, Durango revealed?

    durango_arq1.jpg
    CPU:

    - x64 Architecture

    - 8 CPU cores running at 1.6 gigahertz (GHz)

    - each CPU thread has its own 32 KB L1 instruction cache and 32 KB L1 data cache

    - each module of four CPU cores has a 2 MB L2 cache resulting in a total of 4 MB of L2 cache

    - each core has one fully independent hardware thread with no shared execution resources

    - each hardware thread can issue two instructions per clock

    GPU:

    - custom D3D11.1 class 800-MHz graphics processor

    - 12 shader cores providing a total of 768 threads

    - each thread can perform one scalar multiplication and addition operation (MADD) per clock cycle

    - at peak performance, the GPU can effectively issue 1.2 trillion floating-point operations per second

    High-fidelity Natural User Interface (NUI) sensor is always present

    Storage and Memory:

    - 8 gigabyte (GB) of RAM DDR3 (68 GB/s)

    - 32 MB of fast embedded SRAM (ESRAM) (102 GB/s)

    - from the GPU’s perspective the bandwidths of system memory and ESRAM are parallel providing combined peak bandwidth of 170 GB/sec.

    - Hard drive is always present

    - 50 GB 6x Blu-ray Disc drive

    Networking:

    - Gigabit Ethernet

    - Wi-Fi and Wi-Fi Direct

    Hardware Accelerators:

    - Move engines

    - Image, video, and audio codecs

    - Kinect multichannel echo cancellation (MEC) hardware

    - Cryptography engines for encryption and decryption, and hashing

  • vagrant_windsvagrant_winds Overworked Mysterious Eldritch Horror Hunter XX Registered User regular
    edited January 2013
    Those are the rumors, yes. By all rumors, the next Playstation (Orbis) has a very similar CPU, but instead of 8bg drr3 ram it has 4gb gddr3 ram - less overall, but way faster bandwidth. I'm going to assume some of the XBox ram will be tied to Kinnect 2.0.

    vagrant_winds on
    // Steam: VWinds // PSN: vagrant_winds //
    // Switch: SW-5306-0651-6424 //
  • LilnoobsLilnoobs Alpha Queue Registered User regular
    Why is there an HDMI in and out port?

  • mere_immortalmere_immortal So tasty!Registered User regular
    edited January 2013
    Cade slapped!

    High-fidelity Natural User Interface (NUI) sensor sounds like a potential Kinect 2.

    mere_immortal on
    Steam: mere_immortal - PSN: mere_immortal - XBL: lego pencil - Wii U: mimmortal - 3DS: 1521-7234-1642 - Bordgamegeek: mere_immortal
  • HenroidHenroid Mexican kicked from Immigration Thread Centrism is Racism :3Registered User regular
    Lilnoobs wrote: »
    Why is there an HDMI in and out port?

    Good catch. Video input on consoles is goofy.

  • CptHamiltonCptHamilton Registered User regular
    Desktops are becoming really commoditized, though. Their value as a market is vanishing very fast. You can have your 3000 employees working on barebones machines, or even thin clients, these days. Hardware power outgrew the need for power by a big margin.

    I love desktops, I love making my own pc, but I can't see much of a life for that market other than cheap shitty machines or high end connoisseur stuff. Kinda like the music industry, you have your shitty ipod knock off masses, another big chunk of users of ipods, ipads and smartphones of all kinds, and then you have the crazy vinyl hi-fi DAC 1500 dollar cans dudes.

    But even after ignoring the big hysteria from the article author, the core of the facts is not really good for MS overall. Which saddens me indeed.

    Microsoft doesn't sell processors. If your 3000 employees are working on barebones machines, that's still 3000 licenses of Windows and Office. Depending on how you set up your enterprise licensing, even 3000 employees on thin clients may be 3000 licenses of Windows and Office. The article is correct that MS makes their money on Windows and Office, but their breadwinners are enterprise sales. Look at Visual Studio: it makes the company a fair bit of money but you can get it for free as an individual. The money all comes from enterprise customers buying hundreds or thousands of licenses.

    Every individual in the world could be using their iphone or android tablet exclusively for home computing but until, and unless, enterprises start going Apple or Android, MS isn't going away. And considering the amount of inertia that enterprises have that's not super likely in the next decade.

    But to bring it around to the actual point of the thread: I thought the Xbox started making money a year or two ago?

    PSN,Steam,Live | CptHamiltonian
    RandomHajileshrykeElvenshaeTurkey
  • Mego ThorMego Thor "I say thee...NAY!" Registered User regular
    Henroid wrote: »
    Lilnoobs wrote: »
    Why is there an HDMI in and out port?

    Good catch. Video input on consoles is goofy.

    Cable input, perhaps?

    kyrcl.png
  • HenroidHenroid Mexican kicked from Immigration Thread Centrism is Racism :3Registered User regular
    Mego Thor wrote: »
    Henroid wrote: »
    Lilnoobs wrote: »
    Why is there an HDMI in and out port?

    Good catch. Video input on consoles is goofy.

    Cable input, perhaps?

    Coaxial cables aren't HDMI cables though. Unless I'm massively ignorant about TV tech these days and providers have changed to that somehow.

  • CptHamiltonCptHamilton Registered User regular
    edited January 2013
    Henroid wrote: »
    Mego Thor wrote: »
    Henroid wrote: »
    Lilnoobs wrote: »
    Why is there an HDMI in and out port?

    Good catch. Video input on consoles is goofy.

    Cable input, perhaps?

    Coaxial cables aren't HDMI cables though. Unless I'm massively ignorant about TV tech these days and providers have changed to that somehow.

    Probably cable input from the cable box's HDMI out.

    Edit:
    Or just input from whatever you currently have plugged into your TV. Given the apparent desire to make the xbox your home media hub it would make sense to try to get customers to treat the thing as a sort of video receiver. All your other devices go into the xbox and you tell it what you want to watch via kinect.

    CptHamilton on
    PSN,Steam,Live | CptHamiltonian
  • LilnoobsLilnoobs Alpha Queue Registered User regular
    Acts as a DVR? Will that also allow the console to record game sessions too? Ala "Let's Play" tripe on youtube?

  • HenroidHenroid Mexican kicked from Immigration Thread Centrism is Racism :3Registered User regular
    That's what I was thinking but I mean, why would it go wall -> provider box -> NextBox when it could be wall -> NextBox?

    I mean okay, that works and makes the HDMI in port make sense in theory. And yeah it fits the media hub thing MS has been pushing toward.

  • Mego ThorMego Thor "I say thee...NAY!" Registered User regular
    Cable companies really, really like renting that box to you every month.

    kyrcl.png
    Dhalphir
  • HenroidHenroid Mexican kicked from Immigration Thread Centrism is Racism :3Registered User regular
    Mego Thor wrote: »
    Cable companies really, really like renting that box to you every month.

    Yeah... I guess MS would have to parlay with them for that and... Okay. Fine. I submit about the possible reality of this HDMI-in port.

    If MS announces a partnership with satellite radio with their NextBox I will be on board.

  • OneAngryPossumOneAngryPossum Registered User regular
    Those are the rumors, yes. By all rumors, the next Playstation (Orbis) has a very similar CPU, but instead of 8bg drr3 ram it has 4gb gddr3 ram - less overall, but way faster bandwidth. I'm going to assume some of the XBox ram will be tied to Kinnect 2.0.

    Wasn't this part of the situation that made the PS2 such an annoyance to develop for? I mean, 4 GB of RAM is significantly more modern than what the PS2 was using relative to the norm in those days, but I remember reading about devs being frustrated about having to code more complex constant streaming of resources since they couldn't just tuck the necessary resources into memory and leave them there.

  • LanrutconLanrutcon The LabyrinthRegistered User regular
    Cade wrote: »
    Rumors, Durango revealed?

    durango_arq1.jpg
    CPU:

    - x64 Architecture

    - 8 CPU cores running at 1.6 gigahertz (GHz)

    - each CPU thread has its own 32 KB L1 instruction cache and 32 KB L1 data cache

    - each module of four CPU cores has a 2 MB L2 cache resulting in a total of 4 MB of L2 cache

    - each core has one fully independent hardware thread with no shared execution resources

    - each hardware thread can issue two instructions per clock

    GPU:

    - custom D3D11.1 class 800-MHz graphics processor

    - 12 shader cores providing a total of 768 threads

    - each thread can perform one scalar multiplication and addition operation (MADD) per clock cycle

    - at peak performance, the GPU can effectively issue 1.2 trillion floating-point operations per second

    High-fidelity Natural User Interface (NUI) sensor is always present

    Storage and Memory:

    - 8 gigabyte (GB) of RAM DDR3 (68 GB/s)

    - 32 MB of fast embedded SRAM (ESRAM) (102 GB/s)

    - from the GPU’s perspective the bandwidths of system memory and ESRAM are parallel providing combined peak bandwidth of 170 GB/sec.

    - Hard drive is always present

    - 50 GB 6x Blu-ray Disc drive

    Networking:

    - Gigabit Ethernet

    - Wi-Fi and Wi-Fi Direct

    Hardware Accelerators:

    - Move engines

    - Image, video, and audio codecs

    - Kinect multichannel echo cancellation (MEC) hardware

    - Cryptography engines for encryption and decryption, and hashing

    So, are folks still hoping for that $399 price point?

    Capture.jpg~original
    Currently playing: GW2 and TSW
  • LilnoobsLilnoobs Alpha Queue Registered User regular
    But the 720 has a Windows Kernel, so I assume most of that RAM will be eaten up by Windows overhead.

  • SatsumomoSatsumomo Rated PG! Registered User regular

    That was pretty fantastic, specially for the Windows Phone. I know a lot of people do not want to even try using a Windows Phone because of the Windows association. Surface Phone would definitely get a lot more attention.

  • CadeCade Eppur si muove.Registered User regular
    edited January 2013
    Lanrutcon wrote: »
    Cade wrote: »
    Rumors, Durango revealed?
    Vast quoted stuff here

    So, are folks still hoping for that $399 price point?

    The question is.....how many jobs do we got to work for one?

    and then how many for Sony's?

    Cade on
  • GlalGlal AiredaleRegistered User regular
    I imagine the sale of games PCs/components at least will pick up again once the new console generation hits and you need something more recent than a 2008 machine to play AAA games maxed out.

  • vagrant_windsvagrant_winds Overworked Mysterious Eldritch Horror Hunter XX Registered User regular
    Those are the rumors, yes. By all rumors, the next Playstation (Orbis) has a very similar CPU, but instead of 8bg drr3 ram it has 4gb gddr3 ram - less overall, but way faster bandwidth. I'm going to assume some of the XBox ram will be tied to Kinnect 2.0.

    Wasn't this part of the situation that made the PS2 such an annoyance to develop for? I mean, 4 GB of RAM is significantly more modern than what the PS2 was using relative to the norm in those days, but I remember reading about devs being frustrated about having to code more complex constant streaming of resources since they couldn't just tuck the necessary resources into memory and leave them there.

    Faster ram still has it's advantages. And it's hard to say until we get actual values.

    For example, the WiiU might have 2gb of ram, but that ram is around 40% slower than the ram in the PS360s which significantly hurts in porting in any action based game where data is streamed constantly.

    // Steam: VWinds // PSN: vagrant_winds //
    // Switch: SW-5306-0651-6424 //
  • ZephiranZephiran Registered User regular
    Lilnoobs wrote: »
    But the 720 has a Windows Kernel, so I assume most of that RAM will be eaten up by Windows overhead.

    Now, it's been a while since I've taken part in any 720 speculation, but the last time I heard anything about the OS overhead it was supposed to be right around 4 Gigabyte, square half of what's available. It'd be an even and neat number for sure, but I wonder if they'll make some of that available for devs after nailing the OS functions down, or even give themselves the possibility of doing this?

    Alright and in this next scene all the animals have AIDS.

    I got a little excited when I saw your ship.
    Snake Gandhi
  • RainbowDespairRainbowDespair Registered User regular
    Nintendo has a US TV commercial for Fire Emblem.

    http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mg7qQnxFQ-g

    Nintendo also paid for a 4 page advertisement for Fire Emblem in the latest Game Informer magazine.

    This is a LOT of marketing muscle to be putting behind a hardcore anime-style Strategy/RPG. Guess they have really high hopes for it doing well in the US.

  • vagrant_windsvagrant_winds Overworked Mysterious Eldritch Horror Hunter XX Registered User regular
    Well, isn't it supposed to be the best Fire Emblem game yet?

    // Steam: VWinds // PSN: vagrant_winds //
    // Switch: SW-5306-0651-6424 //
  • cloudeaglecloudeagle Registered User regular
    Hyperbolic and doom-filled as it is, the Forbes article isn't wrong in that Windows 8, so far, has been a near-disaster. Surveys showing internet traffic indicate it's being slow to be adopted by existing users, and the fact that the PC market actually declined in the fourth quarter when it was released is just mind-boggling. Not to mention it seems that developers are still pissed/wary about developing for it.

    You guys think I should put a "be wary of Forbes blogs" note in the OP? This comes up a lot. Anyone have a handy link explaining Forbes' new content strategy?

    Switch: 3947-4890-9293
  • SwashbucklerXXSwashbucklerXX Swashbucklin' Canuck Registered User regular
    It's really nice to see Nintendo properly marketing this one instead of just assuming that nobody will buy it. It's a good Fire Emblem game to market--it looks fantastic on the 3DS and it has options that novice players can set to make the game welcoming/accessible to them.

    Want to find me on a gaming service? I'm SwashbucklerXX everywhere.
  • StormwatcherStormwatcher Blegh BlughRegistered User regular
    Desktops are becoming really commoditized, though. Their value as a market is vanishing very fast. You can have your 3000 employees working on barebones machines, or even thin clients, these days. Hardware power outgrew the need for power by a big margin.

    I love desktops, I love making my own pc, but I can't see much of a life for that market other than cheap shitty machines or high end connoisseur stuff. Kinda like the music industry, you have your shitty ipod knock off masses, another big chunk of users of ipods, ipads and smartphones of all kinds, and then you have the crazy vinyl hi-fi DAC 1500 dollar cans dudes.

    But even after ignoring the big hysteria from the article author, the core of the facts is not really good for MS overall. Which saddens me indeed.

    Microsoft doesn't sell processors. If your 3000 employees are working on barebones machines, that's still 3000 licenses of Windows and Office. Depending on how you set up your enterprise licensing, even 3000 employees on thin clients may be 3000 licenses of Windows and Office. The article is correct that MS makes their money on Windows and Office, but their breadwinners are enterprise sales. Look at Visual Studio: it makes the company a fair bit of money but you can get it for free as an individual. The money all comes from enterprise customers buying hundreds or thousands of licenses.

    Every individual in the world could be using their iphone or android tablet exclusively for home computing but until, and unless, enterprises start going Apple or Android, MS isn't going away. And considering the amount of inertia that enterprises have that's not super likely in the next decade.

    But to bring it around to the actual point of the thread: I thought the Xbox started making money a year or two ago?

    The point is that those shitboxes now take a really long time to become obsolete and require a replacement. And big corporations and goverment agencies sometimes hang on to older versions of Windows for an even long time.

    So, long lived commoditized hardware + slow upgrade of OS = Bad business for MS. Also, the shitboxes are being slowly replaced by Shitlaptops and even tablets.

    Being number one in a dying commodity market isn't the healthiest recipe for success.

    Take Google, for instance, their revenue streams are quite hum, portable, they're making money no matter what kind of machinery we're employing. And they're also establishing a healthy participation in several different types of market, thus insuring their long term survival.

    We're already going through a very painful paradigm shift in the entire global entertainment industry... I have no idea what companies we will find still standing 10 years from now.
    Jesus christ, even SONY is on its last lags, and that's pretty sad.

    Steam: Stormwatcher | PSN: Stormwatcher33 | Switch: 5961-4777-3491
    camo_sig2.png
  • LilnoobsLilnoobs Alpha Queue Registered User regular
    Nintendo has a US TV commercial for Fire Emblem.

    http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mg7qQnxFQ-g

    Nintendo also paid for a 4 page advertisement for Fire Emblem in the latest Game Informer magazine.

    This is a LOT of marketing muscle to be putting behind a hardcore anime-style Strategy/RPG. Guess they have really high hopes for it doing well in the US.

    Wow. That's on the 3DS? Guess I found my next gen.

This discussion has been closed.