Industry news articles

What does a company like Activision Blizzard do when sitting on $3 billion in cash with no debt while many gaming companies flounder in the face of an economic recession? They go shopping. Activision Blizzard's top publishing executive Mike Griffith told Bloomberg that the current economic climate is perfect for creating acquisition possibilities.
Comments (0) | Permalink

Two big first-party titles faced off last week in Britain: Killzone 2 and Halo Wars. Only one of them could come out victorious, and it wasn't going to be Halo Wars. Instead, it was Killzone 2 taking the #1 spot, in the process becoming Britain's second-fastest-selling PS3 game of all time (behind GT5 Prologue).
Comments (0) | Permalink

They've dabbled in used video games buy backs and sales before, but we're hearing that Best Buy is once more rolling out a test program to a number of their stories this month. Just a day after word of Toys R Us testing out used game sales, a source tells us that a used game trade program could be installed in some Best Buy stories within the month.
Comments (0) | Permalink

As Sony announced yesterday, Playstation Network has 20 million users. Xbox Live, by comparison, has 17 million But PSN is for the Playstation 3 and PSP (around 70 million devices), while XBL is only for the Xbox 360 (about 28 million). PSN has been around for 27 months. XBL? 67.
Comments (9) | Permalink

The Xbox 360 has only outsold the PlayStation 3 several times before, so we're reticent to bring the Four Horsemen out of their winter hibernation. However, if Japanese hardware sales tracker Media Create is to be believed, the 360 not only outsold the PS3 in Japan last week, it handily trounced all competition, with sales just over 25,000 units (compared to nearly 17,000 units for Wii and just over 16,000 for PS3).
Comments (1) | Permalink

Individual formats chart for week ending 21 Feb: 1. Street Fighter IV (PS3), 2. Street Fighter IV (360), 3. Wii Fit, 4. Warhammer 40,000: Dawn Of War II, 5. Mario Kart Wii, 6. Wii Play, 7. Professor Layton And The Curious Village, 8. Race Pro, 9. The House Of The Dead: Overkill, 10. Sega Mega Drive Ultimate Collection (PS3). Full chart at link.
Comments (0) | Permalink

Speaking at the DICE Summit in Las Vegas today, Anita Frazier of the NPD Group has revealed an interesting little piece of information regarding the PC market, saying retail sales are down by over 50%.
Comments (0) | Permalink

Over 300 industry professionals have voted in the first ever GamesIndustry.biz Network Survey, revealing which platforms and publishers they expect to be the most successful in 2009. The survey was open to all members of the GamesIndustry.biz Network, and included all sectors of the business, from retail to publishing, and all roles, from testers to senior executives.
Comments (0) | Permalink

The Entertainment Software Association is ready to welcome back the "glamour, sizzle and excitement" of former E3 events this year as the US trade body explains some of the changes coming in for 2009. But there are no plans to return to the "over-the-top excess" of years past, with exhibitors working under caps on booth space in order to prevent another "arms race" from taking hold and causing cost issues such as those that prompted the post-2006 changes.
Comments (0) | Permalink

'Wii Fit' tops the All Formats Chart for a fifth consecutive week. 'F.E.A.R 2: Project Origin' manage to reach No1 in the Xbox 360 and PS3 Full Price charts and No2 on PC. It becomes the fastest selling in the series with 50% of sales on Xbox 360, 31% on PS3 and 19% on PC. Nintendo still dominate the All Formats Top 10 with 5 games, including a strong second week for ‘Mystery Case Files: Millionheir’ up from No4 to No3 - sales up 25%.
Comments (0) | Permalink