…Now spelled “wii”, thanks to Nintendo’s marketing team.
I’m just not sure what to think. The reasons for the name change sound good when they’re spelled out on paper. So why can’t I supress the urge to roll my eyes? Oh well, I fully admit that I’m no product-naming expert. I personally preferred “Revolution”, though.
Update: …and, the inevitable zinger from Penny Arcade.
Posted in Business (in general)
The Wall Street Journal reports that Microsoft may acquire Massive (in-game advertising company) for $200M – $400M. Programmers and EA reach a $14.9M overtime settlement, and the identity of the “EA Spouse” is finally revealed. Prediction: Report: China’s Video Game … Continue reading
Phil Gee, University Relations Manager for EA, was good enough to answer a few of my questions about the EA internship program — by far the largest (and probably oldest) program in the industry, excepting perhaps the console manufacturers. On to the interview:
How long has EA’s college internship program been active?
If my memory serves, almost 10 years to this day.
When the program first started, how many interns did you accept (and in roughly what proportion: engineers, artists, production, business, etc?) How many interns do you accept now?
I’ve only been here for 3.5 years, but from conversations with early alumni of the internship program, I can tell you it was rather small. We had roughly 20-30 interns during the summer, working predominantly at EA Redwood Shores. A little over half (let’s say 60%) worked in game development (art, engineering, production) and the other half were on the corporate side (marketing, finance, IT). Today, our program is a global one; we host approximately 274 interns (fiscal year 2006) with close to 70% of them being in game development.
Posted in Business (in general), Interviews
In the OMFG! category: some Korean mothers are helping to power-level their children’s online game characters, to free up time for school work. Falling behind in games can apparently result in real-life ostracism by peers. I’m thinking there are worse … Continue reading
The current console business model has been established for long enough that most of us take it for granted. Develop great hardware, sell it near or below cost, then generate profit by taking a cut of the revenue from all future game sales. If nothing else, this gets consoles into more homes, which benefits everyone in the long-term. But what would happen if the model were somehow disrupted?
I started thinking about this when I found out that the EU had voted to ban printer manufacturers from forcing consumers to buy their own-brand refills. The business model for printers is very similar to consoles: sell the printers cheaply, then profit from ink sales. (The major difference is that console makers don’t completely lock out third parties; they just exercise quality control and take a big cut of profits.)
Posted in Legal / Politics, Platforms
Prediction: India’s online games market to top $200M by 2010. IMO, it’ll be a billion not too many years thereafter. MMOGCharts has updated its subscriber census data for many of the MMOGs on the market (the data is a few … Continue reading
Gamasutra has reprinted an analysis by Jason Kraft and Chris Kwak that challenges the merits of an episodic model for AAA games. Jason and Chris ask some good questions, but I disagree with much of their analysis. Let me quote their key arguments and assumptions, tackle each as best I can, and see where that leads us:
Posted in Business (in general)
Nice article by Tony Walsh on using game-like systems to make boring jobs more interesting and make employees more effective. Example used: airport security screening. I agree with a comment on the post — Tony’s design is probably over-engineered, but … Continue reading
I’m currently under assault by four very cute, very intense little cousins, so my blog writing will probably cease for a few days. If they manage to snap any of my limbs (or my spine), the downtime may prove more extensive. :-)
Speaking of my cousins — Alexandra (age 7) has discovered Sonic the Hedgehog via a free flash-game website. She really enjoys it (and why shouldn’t she? Sonic rocked!)
Watching Alex play has further strengthened my belief that many more women would be “hardcore” gamers today, if only the industry hadn’t alienated them with utterly male-centric marketing in years past. That’s starting to change now, and I think the results are going to (positively) surprise everyone in the not-too-distant future. It’ll mean a lot more money for this industry!
Posted in Personal Stuff
Back in January, Henry and I gave a talk at the Economics of Open Content Symposium on “The New Economics of Gaming”, which is basically a vague, grandiose way of saying “a talk on user-generated content and the video game industry.” A video clip of the entire session was recently made publicly available here.
On a fast connection, the video quality is great. Otherwise, you’ll get nothing but chop, but at least the sound quality remains consistently adequate throughout.
Name: David Edery |
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