Via Newyorker

Fifteen years ago, the video-game industry was ruled by one player, Nintendo. The company had machines in a third of American homes, and it was Japan’s most profitable electronics company. The title of a 1993 book summed up the situation: “Game Over: How Nintendo Conquered the World.” Then the Sony PlayStation arrived, and everything changed. Today, Sony is the dominant force, and its chief rival is not Nintendo but Microsoft, which makes the Xbox. Two weeks ago, the début of Sony’s PlayStation 3 was greeted by crowds of hysterical consumers anxious to get their hands on the new console, billed as the most powerful gaming machine ever. When Nintendo’s new console, the oddly named Wii, appeared, a few days later, there were excellent reviews and expectations of good sales, but no more talk about world conquest. If Sony and Microsoft are the major-party nominees, Nintendo is more like a cool third-party candidate.

You might expect, then, that Nintendo would be struggling to stay afloat. After all, the prevailing wisdom is that companies need to be market leaders, or face disaster. This approach was famously institutionalized by Jack Welch, who, when he took over as C.E.O. of G.E., laid down a rule that he described as a “central idea” of his tenure: the company would quit any business in which it was not No. 1 or No. 2. The lesson that people took away from this was clear—third place is for losers. “First prize is a Cadillac Eldorado,” Alec Baldwin’s character says in the film “Glengarry Glen Ross.” “Second prize is a set of steak knives. Third prize is you’re fired.” Nintendo, though, has not just survived out of the spotlight; it has thrived. It has five billion dollars in the bank from years of solid profits, and this past year, though it spent heavily on the launch of the Wii, it made close to a billion dollars in profit and saw its stock price rise by sixty-five per cent. Sony’s game division, by contrast, barely eked out a profit and Microsoft’s reportedly lost money. Who knew bringing up the rear could be so lucrative?

Sony and Microsoft are desperate to be the biggest players in a market that, in their vision, will encompass not just video games but “interactive entertainment” generally. That’s why the PlayStation 3 and the Xbox 360 are all-in-one machines, which allow users not just to play video games but also to do things like watch high-definition DVDs and stream digital music. Sony and Microsoft’s quest to “control the living room” has locked them in a classic arms race; they have invested billions of dollars in an attempt to surpass each other technologically, building ever-bigger, ever-better, and ever-more-expensive machines.

Nintendo has dropped out of this race. The Wii has few bells and whistles and much less processing power than its “competitors,” and it features less impressive graphics. It’s really well suited for just one thing: playing games. But this turns out to be an asset. The Wii’s simplicity means that Nintendo can make money selling consoles, while Sony is reportedly losing more than two hundred and forty dollars on each PlayStation 3 it sells—even though they are selling for almost six hundred dollars. Similarly, because Nintendo is not trying to rule the entire industry, it’s been able to focus on its core competence, which is making entertaining, innovative games. For instance, the Wii features a motion sensor that allows you to, say, hit a tennis ball onscreen by swinging the controller like a tennis racquet. Nintendo’s handheld device, the DS, became astoundingly popular because of simple but brilliant games like Nintendogs, in which users raise virtual puppies. And because Nintendo sells many more of its own games than Sony and Microsoft do, its profit margins are higher, too. Arguably, Nintendo has thrived not despite its fall from the top but because of it.

Nintendo’s success is not an anomaly, either. The business landscape of the past couple of decades is replete with companies that have flourished as third wheels, and with companies that have struggled to make money despite being No. 1 in their industries. (Today, would you rather be Honda or G.M.?) And while it’s true that in many industries there is a correlation between market share and profitability, one doesn’t necessarily lead to the other. A recent survey of the evidence on market share by J. Scott Armstrong and Kesten C. Green found that companies that adopt what they call “competitor-oriented objectives” actually end up hurting their own profitability. In other words, the more a company focusses on beating its competitors, rather than on the bottom line, the worse it is likely to do. And a study of the performance of twenty major American companies over four decades found that the ones putting more emphasis on market share than on profit ended up with lower returns on investment; of the six companies that defined their ...

When people line for Wii pre-orders, chances are it will be a success. And when stores start putting up signs offering to purchase those consoles at prices slightly higher than retail, you know in your heart of hearts that the new console is going to flatten and destroy Japan. The Nintendo-centric Super Potato in Den-Den Town has put up notice that it will purchase "used" Wiis for 1,000 yen above the 25,000 fixed sticker price. Not expecting Yahoo! Auction craziness, but rather, consoles snapped up fast and sequestered away to people's homes for the upcoming New Year's holidays. ...

New research by Nokia has highlighted the growing importance of community and connected features to mobile gaming consumers.

Forty five per cent of players make use of multiplayer features at least once a month, with 62 per cent of the 1800 participants sampled wanting to share demos with friends, and 79 per cent stating they would sample a trial game sent by someone they know.

"These research results further validate that consumers are looking to the next-generation of mobile gaming to meet their gaming needs," said Jaakko Kaidesoja, director of games and multimedia at Nokia.

"Consumers are demanding great graphics, great content and great gameplay and we have listened. Next year, we intend to deliver superior mobile gaming experiences which will include great looking, involved and connected games that are easy to find, manage and play."

"Web 2.0 saw the birth of a new, more empowered use of the internet and with the next-generation of mobile gaming we are on the brink of the same evolution," added Kaidesoja.

"Nokia has recognised consumers' desire for communities and connected social gaming. We are evolving our online community strategies to bring truly connected, easy-to-use mobile gaming experiences to millions of mobile device owners worldwide."

Other highlights of the research by Nokia revealed that 80 per cent of users play mobile games once a week, with an average session lasting 28 minutes.

Despite being mobile by name, 62 per cent of mobile games are played at home, just pipping 61 per cent of titles played while on the move.

When considering a purchase, 83 per cent of users cite gameplay as the key motivator, followed by replayability (79 per cent) and game genre (78 per cent).

In terms of distribution, 34 per cent of respondents prefer over-the-internet (OFI) methods, with over-the-air (OTA) proving more popular with 45 per cent of those sampled. ...

Via eurogamer

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Via eurogamer

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Via eurogamer

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AnythingButiPod took a look at the Zune's AV Cable and surprise, surprise... found it to use yet another unique pinout configuration for pumping audio and video out to the TeeVee. However, this time you don't have to get locked into the vendor-specific accessory game since the Zune AV cable shares the same ground location of both the iPod (video) AV Cable and better yet, those off-the-shelf camcorder cables you probably have sitting around the house. As a result, you can use the other cables as long as you route the cable colors correctly for AV-hookup to your TV: iPod AV cable, swap left and right audio; el cheapo camcorder cable, swap video and right-audio. Unfortunately, in yet another drubbing for PlaysForSure devices, the AV cable which works interchangeably between Archos devices, the Zen Vision Series, Cowon iAudio, and even Toshiba's other DAP -- the Gigabeat -- won't work with the Zune. Not without the help of a Xacto knife, anyway.

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via engadget

While we initially felt Wal-Mart was being a bit old fashioned by not allowing Wii demo kiosks to be setup in stores due to "safety concerns," Walton and friends apparently had a good bit of foresight that we weren't aware of. After numerous reports of television sets getting the axe, and an innocently bystanding HP iPAQ getting all cracked up, we're wondering if folks aren't just staging their own Wiincidents at this point. Apparently warning everyone of how jeopardous these free-flying Wiimotes can be wasn't really taken to heart, as now a butterfingered gamer has quite an interesting tale to tell to the presumably skeptical insurance adjuster. While busting a few moves in Wii Sports, the nonsensical user let the controller fly, but instead of landing softly (and harmlessly) on the couch, it rocketed straight through his window, leaving a fairly dangerous scene as proof of gaming negligence. C'mon folks, we've warned you all enough by now, either strap on that thoughtfully included wrist strap, grab some sticky gloves, or tape up the windows -- your property, your call.

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Xbox 360 advertised for £199.99 on UK TV ads

It's the season to be ten whole English pounds jollier. Microsoft has knocked ten quid off the price of the Xbox 360 Core System in the UK.

During ITV's I'm A Celebrity Get Me Out Of Here*, Microsoft unleashed an Xbox 360 ad-break frenzy; three ads in less than four minutes.

Ghost Recon: Advanced Warfighter and Gears of War aren't a surprise and have been shown many times already over the past few weeks, but the first ad showcased the platform's swelling portfolio of games, stating the price of the console as "from £199.99 RRP". ...