Sams, his wife and three kids are listed as the part-owners, though since Mrs. Sams works for free for a law firm and the kids are, well, kids, we’ll guess the money came from the one member in the family that’s COO for the world’s largest and most profitable third-party video game publisher.

Steelers ownership transition moves forward [Steelers, thanks Jim!]

During his hour-long—and highly quotable—presentation on Monday to the Deutsche Bank Securities Technology Conference in California, Kotick was asked by attendee whether he considered the gaming industry to be a hit-driven business.

“It is hit-driven business, but it’s not as volatile as you would think,” he said. “If you look at the top 10 products this year, eight of the top 10 products are based on franchises that were out last year and the year before that and the year before that.

“There’s always been a confusion about the value of new intellectual property and also the difficulty of introducing new intellectual property. You still have the great challenge every year of innovating in your franchise, but one of the great benefits of having franchises is that you have a road map for innovation. When you are developing a new intellectual property from the ground up, you have to invent the story, the characters, the gameplay dynamics, and you’re doing it without the benefit of audience knowledge.

“If you’re really disciplined, as we are, about spending time surveying your audiences, you can take a lot of that knowledge — and the audience can give you a lot of guidance about what they want in their innovative new products. The pathway to innovation on a franchise is easier and better defined than it would be in something new.

“The companies that have proven franchises and have the discipline to leverage them are always going to do better and have a greater level of success. The single hardest thing to do in the video game business is to introduce new, original intellectual property and that’s why it doesn’t happen very often.”

Who among us can deny that some highly innovative games were also sequels? Most games must be born without a number at the end of them, but Kotick makes a strong argument that when they get that numerical appendage, they get…better.

You can listen to the full Kotick presentation at the conference’s official site. The quoted excerpt above begins close to the 42:00 mark.

Koelnmesse, home to Gamescom, is a mammoth, sprawling complex of buildings, streets and boulevards, so it’s not surprising that Mike and I got lost on the way to the press room.

Our wanderings had us walking through GDC Europe and all four of the show’s halls, where we couldn’t help but notice what we’d be seeing when the show opens to press tomorrow.

The biggest presenters at the show seem to be Activision Blizzard, Sony, Microsoft and Nintendo. Many of the booths were elaborate constructs featuring cars, plenty of screens and consoles, life-sized cutouts and at least one giant snowball.

Watch this vid for a taste of one of the booths, which included DJ Rapstar and Sony’s booth.

Kotick made the comment during a conference call between Activision Blizzard executives and financial analysts yesterday to discuss the company’s performance from April through June.

Kotick was quoted as telling an analyst that “I would raise the prices even further,” a line that was interpreted to mean that he’s ready to jack up game prices. (Destructoid provided Kotick a forked tongue for this one.)

What hasn’t been as clear is what Kotick was replying to and the tone in which he offered his comment.

The question Kotick fielded involved the price of peripheral-bundled games like Guitar Hero and Tony Hawk Ride. It came from analyst Tony Gikas, according to a transcript of the call: “… if you don’t mind, just your comfort level regarding pricing of some of your new games that have some expensive controllers and any feedback that you had from retail as we move through the holidays.”

Company CEO Mike Griffith first fielded the price question, saying: “We’ve had for all of our launch titles in the back half of this year, some of which contain peripherals, as you point out, very strong retailer acceptance and support for all parts of our plan, including our merchandising plans, our marketing programs, and our price points.”

Kotick responded, prompting laughter, with: “And Tony, you know if it was left to me, I would raise the prices even further.”

I’ve asked Activision representatives to clarify Kotick’s statement, to specify what price the company feels is ideal for games and what price Kotick would like to raise peripheral-based games to. I’ve not heard back yet, but if I do, I’ll update the post.

The company reported $US1.04 billion in revenue for the company’s second quarter of 2009, ended June 20, 2009. Executives credited sales of franchises World of Warcraft, Guitar Hero and Call of Duty as well as new games Prototype, Transformers and Wolverine.

Testifying to the continued strength of World of Warcraft, company executives said that more than a third of Activision Blizzard’s revenue from the past three months came from MMOs.

But the mega-publisher lowered its revenue expectations for the year, from $US4.3 billion for 2009 to $US4.05 billion. The movement of StarCraft II and the first-person shooter Singularity were blamed, along with lower retailer orders for upcoming games, a byproduct of a weak economy.

Activision chairman Bobby Kotick said he expects game sales to be “flat to down slightly in America and Europe” for the year. “We are very concerned,” he said about the forthcoming holiday market. “There’s a lot of reason to be concerned and cautious.” Activision’s line-up is strong, he said, but the market overall is facing a tough period with shoppers not as eager to buy new games.

Activision’s big hopes for the end of the year are Guitar Hero 5, Modern Warfare 2, DJ Hero, Blur, Band Hero, Tony Hawk Ride and Marvel Ultimate Alliance 2.

The company’s CEO, Mike Griffith said that, in addition to the delayed Singularity, now expected between January and the end of March, the company will publish new games in the James Bond, Tony Hawk and Spider-Man franchises. Griffith also promised tie-ins to Dreamworks movies Shrek 4 and How To Train Your Dragon. More mysterious was his reference to an unnamed “innovative property in the $US4 billion action genre.”

Later in the call, a financial analyst tried to get top Blizzard exec, Mike Morhaime, to clarify whether the delay of StarCraft II to 2010 would push back an anticipated 2010 release for the studio’s Diablo III. The analyst recalled an earlier comment by a Blizzard representative that the studio would release a single major game per year.

“The move of StarCraft into next year does not impact the schedule,” Morhaime said. “And so it would be correct to conclude that you could expect two releases of Blizzard for next year. But I would not make any conclusions on what those titles would be.”

Activision also announced plans to offer “new releases” in the Call of Duty series next year, though how those releases will mix downloadable map packs for existing games and brand-new games was not specified.

The biggest change? Blaming the economy, the company lowered expectations for console sales in 2009 by one million units.

The day after Activision pushed back sci-fi first person shooter Singularity, Sterne Agee analyst Arvind Bhatia believes that the signs that StarCraft II will be ultimately be a 2010 title, according to a report from the Wall Street Journal.

We’ve already braced ourselves for the bad news, considering Dustin Browder, the game’s lead designer, told us the developer needs four to six months of public beta exposure to get the game in tip-top shape. Still a possibility, as Blizzard released StarCraft: Brood War at the end of November 1998, but looking less and less likely as the days progress.

Blizzard has never officially dated the game, only saying the highly anticipated StarCraft sequel would be released when the game “meets our standards and the expectations of our players.” And those expectations are, well, kinda high.

Activision Seen Delaying Two Big Games [WSJ]

Activision Blizzard pulled in $US981 million in revenue in the first quarter of this year ending March 31. That’s up from the company’s projected $US860 million (which happens to be the revenue rival EA earned in its last quarter).

“Our better-than-expected first quarter results were driven by strong global consumer response to the Call of Duty and Guitar Hero franchises and Blizzard Entertainment’s World of Warcraft, despite challenging economic times,” the company’s CEO, Bobby Kotick, said in a statement.

Kotick claims Activision is the #1 third-party console and handheld third-party publisher in North America and as the top third-party for the Wii worldwide.

Among the highlights for Activision Blizzard’s quarter were Wrath of the Lich King maintaining the top spot on the PC charts according to NPD and Guitar Hero’s sales rising by 84% year over year in Europe according to Charttrack and Gfk.

Activision is bullish on its next quarter, which will see the release of Transformers and Ice Age games along with Prototype, the already-released Wolverine game and new Guitar Hero titles (Smash Hits and Modern Hits, for consoles and DS, respectively.)