- Sony launch Home to much criticism, it has been hacked and features sexual harassment. Overall it is a disaster for Sony and needs much work before it begins to become a credible product. This debacle shows Sony’s weakness, they are a consumer electronics manufacturer. Microsoft, by comparison, are a software company, which is why Live is still the best gaming portal, with no competition in sight.
- Midway get rid of 25% of global workforce. This is the result of bad management in the past, as at so many game companies. I hope they are flattening their management structure and not just getting rid of developers, as seems to be the industry solution when cutting costs. Midway are far too small to prosper as a global publisher and need to do a bit of M&A quickly, merging with another, similar sized publisher would be a good start, but needs one half of the combined management to be sacked.
- Employers don’t want World of Warcraft players. And they do have a point. I have written about game addiction in the past and can see why you wouldn’t want to employ someone who puts a big chunk of their emotional commitment into an online existence. This applies not just to WoW, but to any MMORPG.
- Warner increases stake in EIDOS to 20%, we can all see where this is going. And it isn’t costing them much, at 17p per share each 10% of the company costs them less than £4.5 million. I can see why Warners are being so cautious, because of historic awful management EIDOS is a mess that is being sorted out. So it is best just to establish a position and a relationship at the moment without taking on the risk and problems that would come from a full takeover.
- Little big planet has terrible sales. And this was the platform exclusive that was going to put Sony back on top. It is a disaster, the Playstation 3 is losing position by the day. It is more expensive than an Xbox 360 and offers a far inferior ownership proposition. There is very little in the way of reasons for buying one. It is very sad that Sony have screwed up this generation so comprehensively and in so many ways. But they have.
- Scrabulous is coming back to Facebook. This is brilliant news, Hasbro seeing sense at last. Obviously they read the article on here about their actions.
- Rockstar to stick with Take Two and not go independent. Seems to make eminent sense, Take Two have done a brilliant job with the GTA franchise. To the point where it would be difficult to see anyone doing it better.
- Microsoft say that much less than 1% of Xbox 360s suffered from scratched disks. But in litigation crazy America they suffer another class action as a lawyer tries to get even richer and a bunch of people look for a windfall. People who lose actions like this should pay the person they sued an equivalent amount to what they were seeking to win.
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you’ve forgot to write at the and of the article 9th story: xbox360 is the best console of the world and will sell like hot pancakes forever and Microsoft is the only recession proof.And then wii bubble is next to burst, it’s inevitable and then Sony is already dead psn is broken and exclusive games on ps3 have terrible sales and are epic fail.
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ChesterP, I am just reporting facts. And you ought to read my blog more deeply. For I have written before that the hottest and fastest growing platforms are phones and netbooks. The latter of which will be bigger than any console.
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@ChesterP
If you click the links they take you through to gaming industry FACTS. Just because you don’t like them , there is no need to be a sarky git.
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bruce max respect for you.You are an insider and veteran of gaming industry.but I disagree with you only on the fact that you consider Microsoft and Xbox360 as the salvation of gaming industry.So I think in this recession AAA multiplatform titles are the only salvation for developers and exclusive titles for sony and microsoft and Nintendo (in fact Nintendo core business is exclusive and cheap titles).And first and the most important thing is: gaming web sites and journalists must help and defend gaming industy for what is now.I don’t understand why there are so many ps3 hating articles over the web. today with high costs to develop games there must be a place for Sony Microsoft and Nintendo.however yes maybe phone and expecially netbooks will be the hottest and fastest growing platforms as you said before.
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addicted to Warcraft?..I am addicted to this blog….avid reader since 2007 – first heard about it from i think the Metro/some paper/magazine that mentioned it as an interesting blog.
I do however disagree with some of your thoughts on adult entertainment but alas, intellectual debate is the way forward!.
Keep it up.
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“Scrabulous is coming back to Facebook.” – Nope, completely misreported by the Edge website.
According to the AP story, part of the agreement is that the Agarwallas make changes to Wordscraper (the game they put out to try to dodge the litigation) to make it even *less* like Scrabble. They’re hardly likely to be allowed to rip off Scrabble directly again.
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I know exactly what you mean about PlayStation HOME.
I was in the plaza area testing out the feature when I saw a guy ask a girl:
“Hey girl, how old r u?”
she replied, “13, how old r u?”
he replied, “31, want to have sex?”
and then starts dancing up against her with his character.
So, now the world of Sony’s HOME has been invaded by the pedophile much like MySpace before it.
HOME is no doubt a disaster waiting to happen.