Image credit: Nintendo
“Throughout April, NOA territories will receive the last shipments of Nintendo Entertainment System: NES Classic Edition systems for this year.” That’s a Nintendo representative confirming the discontinuation of the NES Classic, just two months after Nintendo president Tatsumi Kimishima apologised for shortages and pledged to ramp up production.
QUOTE | “In terms of where the console space goes, there’s some things about how the console business runs, in terms of you don’t make any money on the hardware, it’s making money on the games, making money on the service. So if you’re in a situation where you’re subsidizing the hardware, a faster refresh of the hardware really hurts you.” – Xbox head Phil Spencer on why console generations may slow down.
QUOTE | “The idea is to give Minecraft creators another way to make a living from the game, allowing them to support themselves in the creation of ever-greater projects, while giving Pocket and Windows 10 players access to a growing catalogue of fun stuff – curated and supplied by us, safely and simply.” – Microsoft, in announcing a Minecraft virtual currency and user-created content marketplace where mod makers will see at least 35% of the money they bring in.
QUOTE | “If you want a more authentic way of doing [advertising], you can’t find it. It doesn’t exist. We can talk directly to an audience that listens to us, that cares about what we say, and that trusts us.” – Felix “PewDiePie” Kjellberg makes the case for advertisers to keep selling through YouTube, even though he just launched his first Twitch show.
QUOTE | “There are many charities that don’t want anything to do with us, and by us I mean video games as a whole. Some charities who you call up think you’re the prince of Nigeria trying to take money off of them. They really don’t trust us.” – Sega digital distribution director James Schall says one of the hardest parts of the company’s Humble Bundle promotions (10 and counting) has been convincing charities to agree to participate.
QUOTE | “I have sold my soul to the devils a few times, but we’re completely independent now. If I had kids I would probably have sold their souls, too, but my horse would never be part of any deal.” – Julie Heyde of VRUnicorns conveys the lengths to which she’ll go to keep making quirky VR games.
QUOTE | “IDATE DigiWorld considers that the first generation of VR headsets will not be as successful as the hype would suggest. Overall, sales are likely to be lower than most observer estimates.” – IDATE DigiWorld’s head of gaming Laurent Michaud, prefacing a report that still says the VR headset installed base will reach 60 million by 2020.
QUOTE | “As an industry, we’re going through a period of increasingly irrational exuberance: mostly without a clear path, a growing number of companies are sinking money into Esports.” – Superdata’s Joost van Dreunen throws a bit of cold water on the hype surrounding eSports.
STAT | $US7 ($9) million – The amount of money raised by UK-based eSports outfit Fnatic in its most recent investment round. The round was led by The Raptor Group, the investment firm of Boston Celtics co-owner Jim Pallotta.
QUOTE | “We respect our critics and believe that they have the good of the industry at heart. Unfortunately, sometimes they do not understand how G2A.com works and as such this misunderstanding causes them to mislead the public about our company.” – Maciej Kuc, head of PR for near-constantly-criticised key reseller G2A, responds to an ultimatum from oft-criticised developer Gearbox, who partnered with G2A before being criticised for doing so by various people, including sometimes-criticised YouTube personality John “TotalBiscuit” Bain. The partnership was on a physical limited edition of the actually quite liked first-person shooter Bulletstorm.
QUOTE | “You increasingly find a number of the larger tech companies have business models that are directly at odds with their customers. Instead of selling them software that they value, they’re giving them software and extracting value through intrusions into their privacy or advertising that just detracts from their product’s user experience.” – Epic Games CEO Tim Sweeney contrasts the Unreal Engine business model with current trends.
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