Uh, oops. Over the weekend, Forbes ran an article citing data obtained from Electronic Entertainment Design and Research (EEDAR). Forbes' article said that, according to EEDAR, only 4% of games ever make a profit. Wha? 4%? Sounded silly. Seems it was silly. Forbes mis-quoted EEDAR's data, which actually says that only 4% of all games that ever enter into production make a profit. Sounds like a case of semantics, but it's a key difference. Just like movies, most games that enter into production never actually see the light of day. Of those that do make it onto store shelves, it turns out 20% of them return a "significant profit". That sounds more like it. EEDAR's full correction follows.

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Chris Morris of Forbes magazine thinks that Google should try its luck at publishing video games. The search engine behemoth has put some serious research time into advertising within games and certainly has the resources to acquire a developer or three.

As well as the rather ill-received virtual world Lively, the article points out that Google already has some technologies that could mix well with gaming. Google Earth could make a for an excellent flight sim (in fact, it already has) while streetview might be useful in a GTA-like game.

I'd love to see the Google brain trust attack a problem like enemy AI or random terrain generation. It's just a shame we will have to wade through adverts to get there.

Will Google Play Games? [Forbes]

And if American football, unabashedly violent, is also a combat simulation, then really one genre dominates the top 10 list that Forbes asked NPD to put together: the best selling home video games of all time, in units sold, in the United States. NPD's data goes back to 1989, so this does not include units sold before them.

Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas is the winner at 9.4 million. Guitar Hero III: Legends Of Rock clocks in at 8.2 million, but after that, it's nothing but football and shooters: Three versions of Madden (06, 07 and 08), Vice City, Halo 2 and Call of Duty 4.

This list is almost immediately out of date, of course. Grand Theft Auto IV has shipped 11 million copies and sold 8.5 million, with an analyst saying it'll move 15 million by the end of the month. That's a global figure, but really, who wouldn't expect it to park at No. 1 and bump Madden '05 off the list at No. 10.

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The appeal of casual games is a no-brainer at this point. Everyone can enjoy a quick game of Solitare, or while away some workplace boredom with Diner Dash. But as someone who's never really paid for any of my casual gaming fun, I was impressed by statistic from the Casual Gaming Association that consumers paid $US 2.25 billion for casual gaming last year. 75% of those who bought casual games were women, and 72% were over the age of 35. With Fahey's mom a future Wii Bowling champion, and my mother a devout Scrabolous addict, I'm not surprised that women over 35 make up the biggest part of the paid casual-market pie, I was just impressed by how high the number was.
All this leaves me with just one thought: there's actually a Casual Gaming Association?

Games Girls Play [Forbes]

Money has already asked if games were a recession-proof commodity, but now Forbes is fine-tuning the idea, proposing that GameStop's (nyse: GME) used game business has the real super-awesome-recession-proof-armor-with-turbo-boosters. They explain:

...no rival can touch GME's used-game business.

They continue:

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The financial minds at Forbes have taken off their big business hats for a moment to focus on a more pressing topic: classic video games. Which of today's titles will become immortalised in our hearts, marble statue-ised into our next Super Mario Bros 3s that we can't put down a decade later? Well, they've compiled a list of their top ten and it's...actually not that bad. And of course, Mario has made an appearance.

Portal Brain Age 2 Legend of Zelda: Phantom Hourglass BioShock Puzzle Quest Rock Band Super Mario Galaxy Wii Sports The Witcher WoW: Burning Crusade

Needless to say, a fiery debate will rage in the comments and give this list a good sorting. I'm actually not so sure about BioShock, of all choices, as single player FPS experiences don't seem to stand the test of time (meanwhile, multiplayer is a whole different story).

And now that the industry has become so successful at creating high quality, more polished sequels, will any of these titles really be in play a decade from now?

The Future Of Videogames [Forbes via WiiWii]

Forbes, who for the record are normally very sensible when it comes to things like this, have in their January 2008 issue gone and named a gaming-related business as their "company of the year, 2007". Thing is, it's not, as you'd be forgiven for believing, Nintendo. It's not Sony, either. Not even Mad Catz. No, it's...Nvidia. Forbes point to their dominance of the graphics card market and company growth as the main factors in the decision. We point to some financial types who might just be total graphics card fanboys.
Nvidia Named Forbes' Company of the Year [Shacknews]