Ubi Soft and Midway pledge massive Wii support

Ubi Soft and Midway have pledged massive Wii support, announcing a total of seven and six Wii titles in development, respectively. 1UP has the story:

While speaking on a panel at the Ziff Davis Electronic Games Summit in Napa earlier today, Ubisoft North America President Laurent Detoc revealed that his company currently has seven titles in development for Nintendo's upcoming Wii platform. This show of support came as a surprise to many, as the company had previously only demonstrated two of those seven titles: Rayman Raving Rabbids and Red Steel.

Detoc praised the Wii several times during the panel, stating that he expects it to have "a large audience and market." He also stated that he personally felt that in a time when fewer and fewer games appeal to him, the Wii offers plenty of enjoyment. "The first time I picked up that sucker I couldn't stop playing it."

On the same panel, Midway President David Zucker stated that his company has six titles in development for the Wii.

This is truly great news for Wii. We had grown accustomed to the fact that Nintendo is rekindling a lot of the third party relations of old. But such strong support from both Ubi Soft and Midway can only mean one thing: plenty of action games and plenty of big licences.

Think Splinter Cell, Rainbow Six or Ghost Recon. Think America´s Army or Far Cry Instincts. Midway has already confirmed Mortal Kombat for Wii. SpyHunter will now surely come to Nintendo´s new console too. We might even be able to hope for some Unreal title. Who knows?

This is phenomenal news. I would actually be surprised to see those two publishers supporting the PS3 and Xbox360 with so many titles.

EDIT There are news from EA, too. As reported by Gamasutra, they revealed a total of seven titles in development for Wii, two of which will make the launch:

EA executives particularly noted that "...we have ramped up [game] production for the Wii and DS Lite", following significant excitement over the Nintendo-created consoles at E3. The company revealed that it would probably ship 2 titles for the Wii launch period (Madden and Need For Speed), and 5 titles over the fiscal year ending March 2007.

Regarding Wii pricing, EA execs simply commented that publishers would have to decide on pricing themselves, but that Nintendo had indicated that first-party Wii titles would not be priced at more than $49.99 - suggesting that Electronic Arts games may debut for Wii at $49.99 at launch, though they did not state this specifically.

$50 for a Wii game sounds a great deal better than an expected $60 or even a possible $70 tag for PS3 games. In fact, EA pledged strong PS3 support, but had a number of critical comments, too.

In addition, execs revealed that there would be 4 or 5 launch titles on the PS3, including Madden, Need For Speed, and Tiger Woods - the 'launch period' being the 2006 calendar year.

EA execs also expressed skepticism that Sony would actually make it to 6 million units PlayStation 3 units manufactured in the 2006-7 fiscal year, commenting both that "hardware companies come up a little short", and that "we expect that they will be challenged" to make that number - not necessarily good news for consumer confidence in Sony's launch.

Further asked about PS3 vs. Xbox 360 graphical and technical performance for this holiday season, it was suggested that PlayStation 3 and Xbox 360 games will look "more alike than different", with additional commentary: "There's a lot of horsepower in the PS3 that we're going to be able to unlock in years two, three, and four."

Interesting stuff from the world´s leading software publisher.

Sources: 1UP, IGN, Gamasutra
Thanks to: TheReturnofSaveon21, Infendo

Wii will outsell PS3, says Merrill Lynch analyst

An analyst with Merrill Lynch, one of the world's leading financial management and advisory companies, believes the Wii will outsell the PS3. Bloomberg has spoken to a number of analysts in the wake of Sony´s recent financial statement.

"The PS3 is key to the medium-term success of this company since so much has been invested in it. [Success may be] harder because of the pricing and the delays of the product so far."
Yoji Takeda
RBC Investment (Asia) Ltd., Hong Kong.

"PlayStation 3 will be a huge money loser in the beginning. I think Wii will sell better than the PS3."
Masafumi Oshiden
Merrill Lynch Investment Managers Co., Tokyo.

"If the PS3 doesn't sell well, Sony won't be able to recoup the investment in five years. That will hurt profitability for much of the group."
Kazuharu Miura
Daiwa Institute of Research Ltd., Tokyo

To give us some idea of how important these analysts are within their companies, Bloomberg notes that Yoji Takeda manages $600 million in stocks and Masafumi Oshiden helps looking after more than $1 billion. These are big guys, no doubt.


Now, I don´t think this is just a case of another analyst writing off the PS3 - although I find that interesting enough. This is a big analyst speaking on behalf of Merrill Lynch and that is one of the most reputable companies in the business. There are a lot of people who pay lip service to these analysts and will follow whatever buy or sell rating they churn out. Undoubtedly, this is good news for Nintendo.

Source: Bloomberg,
Thanks to: Codename Revolution

New ´E3 Media Festival´ to take place in two hotels

Next Gen have the first details of the new event to replace the E3, courtesy of the Wall Street Journal.

Here are the shocking details:

Lowenstein said that next year’s event is tentatively titled the “E3 Media Festival,” and will have a target attendance of 5,000. To put that into perspective, E3 2006 drew 60,000 attendees--and that number was down from 70,000 in 2005.

In addition, the event will move from its traditional May dates to sometime in July next year, and take place in suites and conference rooms in two L.A. hotels. E3 has normally been held in the enormous Los Angeles Convention Center.

"Some companies were frustrated because E3 was such a huge, sweeping event it became increasingly difficult to get their messages out," Lowenstein told the WSJ.

5.000 visitors are less than a tenth of the previous attendance numbers. Holding the event in the meeting rooms of two hotels shows how irrelevant the event will become to most people who previously attended. It seems to me the new event is supposed to do away with media attendance in general and exclusively focus on the trade and retail people. At any rate, this piece of news really drives home the message that E3 has died.

EDIT Yahoo News carried the story already some hours ago and they have further details on the event:

_The usual date in May will be pushed to early July, closer to the holiday season. In recent years, an increasing number of exhibitors were compelled to show off their upcoming products but were unable to present demonstrations that could be played.

_Attendance will be by invitation only. Although the event had always been closed to the general public, almost anyone involved in the industry could previously attend. Attendance is expected in the "thousands" instead of "tens of thousands," Lowenstein said.

_The number of exhibit booths will also be decreased.

The trade show will aim to provide a setting for "high-quality" meetings with media, developers, retailers and other key industry audiences, Lowenstein said.

So, apparently, media will be able to attend. We will have to wait and see what is meant by the ´by invitation only´ admission rules. Certainly, the bulk of internet sites will be barred (with the possible exception of sites like IGN or Joystiq). It´s my guess that the event will also cater to US and Canadian professionals only. I mean, why would I travel to LA for a limited number of booths in two hotels anyway?

EDIT There is a lengthy interview with ESA president Lowenstein on this blog, courtesy of game editor Brian D. Crecente, who often writes for Kotaku. Here are some excerpts:

"We are talking about no show floor in the sense you go to the convention center and there are big booths and the other accoutrements associated with that." (...)

The new system will rely on invite lists created by developers, though Lowenstein said they haven't figured out exactly how it would work.

The ESA is still in the process of planning the new event, but he said that it will still likely feature demo areas, though most of the event will take place in private meetings with individual publishers and developers. (...) "We found that what works best at E3 was what was behind closed doors. That means the show floor pretty much ends." (...)

"There will be some people who are part of the E3 family right now who will not fit into the new model, that's inevitable," Lowenstein said, adding that the show is still trying to figure out a way to give smaller game publishers a chance to showcase their products at the new event.

"It might be something set up in a hotel ballroom," he said. "We might create opportunities for them to do small displays." (...)

"You are not going to have the sensory overload and on the other hand we are still going to have a set-up where you are going to have an opportunity to see everyone you want to see and eliminate the overload of E3," he said. (...) "We will still have some of the enjoyment and fun and glitz of E3."

Lowenstein said that while developers' rising costs for putting together booths for the show was a factor in the decision to overhaul E3, it wasn't the deciding factor.

"The question wasn’t are people willing to spend money, it's how do you get the highest return for your money," he said. "Many felt the investment was no longer as compelling as it was."

It was to be expected that there will be no more showfloor. The most astounding piece of news from this article is the explanation of the ´invite only´ policy. If the attendance list really will only be drawn up by the publishers, this new event will become as spectacular as the EB / Gamestop managers conference - and there will be probably not much more media coverage either.

Source: Next Gen, Wall Street Journal
Thanks to: Game|Life, FEU, Kotaku