Posts tagged Super Mario Bros
Wii Fit, Sims 3 top console, PC games of ‘09?so far
Jul 23rd
ChartSpot: NPD’s rankings of US game sales from January to June show EA’s sim sequel edging out WOW expansion on PC charts; Nintendo takes half of non-PC top 10.
Just under a week after it published a worse-than-expected US monthly game sales report, the NPD Group has released its top 10 best-seller charts for the year so far. The rankings were based on unit sales figures, which were themselves not made public.
The leading industry-research group found that, in the first six months of 2006, Nintendo dominated the domestic non-PC games market, occupying six of the top 10 slots. Wii Fit came in first, followed by Pokemon Platinum (DS), the Wii Remote pack-in Wii Play, and Wii Mario Kart, which is bundled with the Wii wheel. The last two positions on the top 10 were taken by some venerable DS holdovers–New Super Mario Bros., released in May 2006, and Mario Kart DS, first released in November 2005.
Sandwiched between the Mii yoginis and pocket-sized plumbers were three Xbox 360 games–Capcom’s Resident Evil 5 (fifth), THQ’s UFC 2009 Undisputed (sixth), and Activision’s 2008 hit Call of Duty: World at War (seventh). The sole PlayStation 3 title to crack the top 20 was the long-awaited–and critically praised–first-party shooter Killzone 2, which fought its way into eighth place.
On the PC charts–much like in the real world–Electronic Arts and Activision Blizzard fought it out for supremacy. From January to July, the former’s Sims 3 was a double threat, with the regular edition being the top game and the $70 collector’s edition coming in eighth. Despite competing against its own sequel, The Sims 2: Double Deluxe was the six-month period’s bronze-medal winner, with The Sims 2: Apartment Life expansion taking 10th place. EA also scored with Spore, the half-year’s seventh-place PC title.
Activision Blizzard’s showing wasn’t too shabby, with the World of Warcraft: Wrath of the Lich King expansion coming in second, and the $40 World of Warcraft: Battle Chest Bundle–which consists of the original game and the Burning Crusade expansion–coming in fourth. The original World of Warcraft, which was released over four and a half years ago, remained a best seller in sixth place. Rounding out the top 10 US PC games from January to June were fifth-place finisher Empire: Total War from Sega and ninth-place game Warhammer 40,000: Dawn of War II from THQ.
TOP NON-PC US GAMES: JAN.-JUNE 2009
1) Wii Fit w/ Balance Board (Wii) – Nintendo
2) Pokemon Platinum (DS) – Nintendo
3) Wii Play w/ Remote (Wii) – Nintendo
4) Wii Mario Kart w/ Wheel (Wii) – Nintendo
5) Resident Evil 5 (Xbox 360) – Capcom
6) UFC 2009 Undisputed (Xbox 360) – THQ
7) Call of Duty: World at War (Xbox 360) – Activision Blizzard
Killzone 2 (PlayStation 3) – SCEA
9) Mario Kart DS (DS) – Nintendo
10) New Super Mario Bros. (DS) – Nintendo
TOP PC US GAMES: JAN.-JUNE 2009
1) The Sims 3 – Electronic Arts
2) World of Warcraft: Wrath of the Lich King – Activision Blizzard
3) The Sims 2: Double Deluxe – Electronic Arts
4) World of Warcraft: Battle Chest – Activision Blizzard
5) Empire: Total War – Sega
6) World of Warcraft – Activision Blizzard
7) Spore – Electronic Arts
The Sims 3: Collector’s Edition – Electronic Arts
9) Warhammer 40,000: Dawn of War II – THQ
10) The Sims 2: Apartment Life – Electronic Arts
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GTA creator opens up on APB
Jul 16th
DEVELOP ‘09: Realtime Worlds’ Dave Jones uses keynote to discuss origins of forthcoming cops-vs.-criminals MMOG, suggests sci-fi settings limit audience size.
BRIGHTON, UK–As the creator of Lemmings, Grand Theft Auto, and Crackdown, Dave Jones is well positioned to talk about innovation and shaping the future of the industry. Nevertheless, this is the first time that the Dundee native has ever attended the Brighton Develop conference, let alone spoke at it. To mark the occasion of his first keynote at the show, Jones focused on the development of a 100 percent online game, with his upcoming action title All Points Bulletin at the centre.
The highlight of the talk was a 10-minute expose of APB, which launches in early 2010. The game is designed around the concept of “creativity, celebrity, and conflict.” In terms of creativity, the game will offer an in-depth avatar creator, which also stretches to vehicles.
Some of the most interesting customisation in APB looks to come from the audio side. Jones confirmed the integration of music-streaming service Last.fm (which is owned by GameSpot’s parent company CBS) for the game, so when players link their APB accounts to the service, they will be able to enjoy their favourite music in the game. There’s also a simple music composition tool included in the game, and Jones showed how users will be able to compose “Another One Bites the Dust” or the theme from Super Mario Bros. These customs sound clips can then be cued up to in-game events, for example, playing whenever the gamer kills someone. “You could become the Mario assassin,” joked Jones.
On the technical side, Jones said that his new favourite piece of technology was the server that APB will run from. “There will be no lobbies in our game,” said Jones. “There will be asymmetrical matchmaking, looking at your skill level and bringing in lots of players or just two depending on the situation. APB will also be a truly persistent world–GTA and Crackdown were not.” He then showed how the game world is alive even when players aren’t on the server, with AI cars and people going about their business in the city.
Jones also found time to talk about his previous game, Crackdown on the Xbox 360. “Crackdown sold 1.5 million copies, which was just enough to break even,” he said. “You have to be top 10 these days,” he claimed, talking about retail charts. He specifically bemoaned used game sales–often a favourite complaint from speakers at Brighton–as well as the difficulty in selling a new IP.
Jones also had plenty of advice to give from the lessons he’s learned over his 20-year career. When he set up DMA Design, which would go on to make Lemmings and GTA, Jones was a student and received £0.75 ($1.20 at today’s exchange rates) per game he sold. “I plagiarised and that’s fine–it’s OK to learn from the masters,” he said. “Actually, a lot of people said GTA1 was a lot like Pac Man, and it was.” Jones added he was amazed at how similar game development is now, with the advent of the iPhone, in terms of production and royalties for development teams.
Jones also talked about his design principles, listed in order of importance: attention to detail; simple building blocks, compound effects; great training; keep it contemporary; humour; innovate, forge a genre. Attention to detail is the most important facet of design according to Jones, but his most interesting, and potentially controversial, advice was on keeping games contemporary. “If you want to break down barriers, reach the biggest audience, [then] keep it contemporary,” he said. While he acknowledged their place in the industry, he railed against sci-fi games in particular, which he feels have too many barriers to entry.
He also talked about looking at developing for other platforms. “We looked at Wii, and it’s great for Nintendo, but I like to make games that I play and so does our team,” said Jones. “iPhone is also interesting, but I think it’s for the up-and-coming guys–a great one for students to cut their teeth in.”
Eventually, the team settled on an online game. “Online has huge scope for innovation,” he elaborated. “If you look at Gears of War and Halo, then you see [online] is truly where players spend their time.” There are also selfish reasons, he admits. “Client piracy is not an issue, and the economics are more favourable to developers.”
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Halo 3: ODST, God of War III top E3 favorites – Survey
Jun 19th
Nielsen study released yesterday reveals the top 12 games presented at the expo that are most likely to be purchased by gamers.
According to a June 8 report by research group Nielsen, New Super Mario Bros. Wii garnered the most online “buzz” at this month’s Electronic Entertainment Expo. However, a report released this week indicates that such ephemeral attention might not translate into hard sales.
The survey asked gamers which games presented at E3 they were definitely or probably interested in purchasing. Some 53 percent of respondents were likely to purchase Halo 3: ODST, with 49 percent for God of War III. On the other end of the list, The Beatles: Rock Band ranked last at 12th with 30 percent.
One interesting factoid by Nielsen is that there were no massive changes in interest in the 12 titles from pre-E3 to post-E3. As the research group puts it, “In other words, games that already tugged at gamers’ hearts held on.”
The results of Nielsen’s June 7 to 14 survey are listed below, along with a video of GameSpot’s Halo 3: ODST demo.
TITLE – RELEASE DATE – PERCENTAGE INTERESTED
1) Halo 3:ODST – September 22, 2009 – 53%
2) God of War III – March 2010 – 49%
3) Wii Sports Resort – WII – July 26, 2009 – 45%
4) Guitar Hero 5 – September 1, 2009 – 42%
5) Final Fantasy XIII – Q2 2010 – 37%
6) Madden NFL 10 – August 14, 2009 – 35%
7) Guitar Hero: Van Halen – Q3 2009 – 34%
Assassins Creed 2 – November 17, 2009 – 32%
9) Need for Speed: Shift – September 22, 2009 – 32%
10) Need for Speed: Nitro – Q3 2009 – 32%
11) NCAA Football 10 – July 14, 2009 – 32%
12) Beatles Rock Band – September 9, 2009 – 30%
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E3 09: Why wait? E3’s hottest games reviewed NOW (PC)
Jun 6th
New Super Mario Bros Wii
Getting one of the best platformers of all time with four player support should be a godsend, right? Sorta. And even though the game retains the DS’s impeccable tight and intuitive, the characters goofily occupy a physical space in a relatively small field. “Up To Four Friends!” can now halt your movement, ruin timed jumps, and even swallow you while riding on Yoshi. Furthermore, one player …
Blizzard conquers Develop 100
May 11th
Annual list of world’s most bankable development houses topped by the WOW machine; Nintendo bumped into second place.
UK trade magazine Develop has published its annual list of the most bankable game studios. The chart is based on UK, US, and Japanese sales figures, as well as more nebulous benchmarks such as their impact on nonretail channels, critical acclaim, and general industry standing.
Last year’s chart–the last to be based purely on retail sales–saw Nintendo oust EA Canada from the top of the chart as the overwhelming success of Nintendo’s first-party games pushed EA’s sports franchises out of the limelight. This year, it’s the resurgent Japanese giant’s turn to be pushed aside by American behemoth Blizzard Entertainment.
The Californian studio–estimated to employ 2,700 people across the globe, primarily in customer service–was called out for generating $100 million (£66.1million) every single month from World of Warcraft. The company also released the fastest-selling PC game of all time in the form of the MMOG’s second expansion pack, Wrath of the Lich King. Blizzard delivered $1.34 billion to the coffers of its megalithic parent, Activision Blizzard, during the course of 2008.
Nintendo came in second, in no small part thanks to the success of evergreen games Mario Kart DS, Brain Training, Nintendogs, and New Super Mario Bros, which all sold in excess of four million copies in 2008, despite all but one of them having been originally released in early 2005. Also called out were the successes of Mario Kart Wii (13 million copies sold in 2008), Wii Fit (10 million copies sold), and Wii Play (8 million copies in the US alone, topping the annual Wii software chart in the process).
Rockstar North, whose third-place position bumped 2007 winner EA Canada into fourth place, was the UK’s standard-bearer thanks to the massive success of GTAIV. Traveller’s Tales, maker of the Lego-based games, and Little Big Planet developer Media Molecule also made it into the top 20. Lionhead snuck into the chart at number 22 thanks to the success of Fable 2.
There are other interesting rivalries reflected in the Develop chart positions. Tomb Raider developer Crystal Dynamics is ranked above Square Enix–despite Square’s recent buyout of Eidos, which publishes the Tomb Raider franchise. Then there’s the placing of Neversoft 10 places above Harmonix; the two rival Guitar Hero/Rock Band studios were placed at 15 and 26, respectively.
Treyarch’s place one slot above Infinity Ward may cause some ripples of dissent among Call of Duty fans, but it makes sense financially due to the success of Call of Duty: World at War during 2008, and the moderate success of movie tie-in Quantum of Solace.
American studios led the way overall, with 29 entries in the top 100; 25 of the top 100 were British, 23 were Japanese, 14 Canadian, two South Korean (Nexon and NCsoft), two French (Ubisoft Paris and Gameloft), and for the first time, two Australian studios (Krome and Blue Tongue) made the list. The list was rounded off by single entries for Sweden (EA DICE), Germany (Crytek), Iceland (CCP), and Norway (Funcom).
The full chart can be seen on the Develop 100 site.
Check out our video review of Wrath of the Lich King.
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Guitar Hero TV show, Call of Duty movie under consideration – Report
May 8th
Activision looking to translate its rhythm game, war action series into small- and big-screen properties, claims the Hollywood Reporter; concert tour also a possibility.
When Brett Ratner pronounced he wanted to make a Guitar Hero movie last year, the floodgates of derision swung wide open. Now, though, Activision appears to be seriously considering a television show centered on the game. (Apparently the lingerie-model TV ads and rampant product placement in Californication weren’t enough.)
Shortly before parent company Activision Blizzard reported the Guitar Hero series has generated $2 billion in sales–a feat only matched by the Madden and Super Mario Bros. franchises–CEO Bobby Kotick spoke with the The Hollywood Reporter. Though he declined to comment on Legendary Pictures’ in-limbo World of Warcraft movie, he did say that that the rhythm game series “might make for a good TV show or a good concert tour.”
Though a throwaway comment on its own, Kotick’s statement was backed up by an unnamed source who told the Reporter that discussions to turn Guitar Hero into a reality show are underway. Adding to the Activision cross-media synergy stew, the trade reported the same source said that another marquee Activision series, Call of Duty, is “being talked about for the big screen.”
Kotick also wouldn’t address the prospect of a Call of Duty movie, but was unapologetic about Activision Blizzard’s attempt to generate revenue wherever it can. “We have growth and we’re making money. That’s better than others can say,” he said, in an apparent dig at archrival Electronic Arts, which reported $1 billion in annual losses this week .
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