Paco de Lucia
Youth Team
I'm only posting this because it may lend some context to discussions about our beloved WE and its future outside of Japan. It comes from Bloomberg in Asia and has been edited down:
Tokyo, May 22 (Bloomberg) -- Nintendo Co. and Konami Corp., two of Japan's largest makers of home video-game software, reported a decline in earnings last year, reflecting stiffer competition and a shrinking audience of game players...
...Konami's game sales aren't faring well. Sales at Konami's game software operations last fiscal year fell 2.9 percent to 87.5 billion yen even as the company's overall sales rose 12.4 percent to 253.6 billion yen...
...U.S.-based gamemakers such as Electronic Arts Inc., the maker of ``Medal of Honor'' and simulation game ``The Sims,'' are also attracting Japanese game players...
``Foreign game developers, especially Electronic Arts, are gaining more market share,'' Konami director Toshiro Tateno told reporters in Tokyo. ``Japanese game developers used to have a big market share; such good days can't be guaranteed any more.''
In Konami's case, the company blamed the decline in game sales to the performance of big budget games with higher prices such as ``Metal Gear Solid 2,'' which it said didn't sell as well as expected...
This year, Konami expects the decline in game sales to continue, eating into operating profit at the business. Konami expects game software sales to fall to 83 billion yen from 87.5 billion yen last fiscal year and operating profit is expected to decline to 12.8 billion yen from 13.9 billion yen...
...Konami's shares have plunged 37 percent since the beginning of the year, more than 10 times the decline by the Topix index of all companies listed on the first section of the Tokyo Stock Exchange...
...``Game software developers must pay more attention to the overseas market,'' said Takashi Oka, an analyst with UFJ Tsubasa Securities Co. ``In order to recoup increasingly high game development costs, they must do well outside Japan.''
Tokyo, May 22 (Bloomberg) -- Nintendo Co. and Konami Corp., two of Japan's largest makers of home video-game software, reported a decline in earnings last year, reflecting stiffer competition and a shrinking audience of game players...
...Konami's game sales aren't faring well. Sales at Konami's game software operations last fiscal year fell 2.9 percent to 87.5 billion yen even as the company's overall sales rose 12.4 percent to 253.6 billion yen...
...U.S.-based gamemakers such as Electronic Arts Inc., the maker of ``Medal of Honor'' and simulation game ``The Sims,'' are also attracting Japanese game players...
``Foreign game developers, especially Electronic Arts, are gaining more market share,'' Konami director Toshiro Tateno told reporters in Tokyo. ``Japanese game developers used to have a big market share; such good days can't be guaranteed any more.''
In Konami's case, the company blamed the decline in game sales to the performance of big budget games with higher prices such as ``Metal Gear Solid 2,'' which it said didn't sell as well as expected...
This year, Konami expects the decline in game sales to continue, eating into operating profit at the business. Konami expects game software sales to fall to 83 billion yen from 87.5 billion yen last fiscal year and operating profit is expected to decline to 12.8 billion yen from 13.9 billion yen...
...Konami's shares have plunged 37 percent since the beginning of the year, more than 10 times the decline by the Topix index of all companies listed on the first section of the Tokyo Stock Exchange...
...``Game software developers must pay more attention to the overseas market,'' said Takashi Oka, an analyst with UFJ Tsubasa Securities Co. ``In order to recoup increasingly high game development costs, they must do well outside Japan.''
