Factor 5 Moves Away From GameCube Development

Thanks to IGN Cube for its article discussing Star Wars: Rebel Strike developer Factor 5's official confirmation that they won't develop any more GameCube titles - apparently, "The studio is currently creating software for other platforms", and, although formerly having very close ties to Nintendo, "at the Game Developers Conference 2004 [Factor 5 president Julian] Eggebrecht was spotlighted as one of the studio heads very keen on Sony PSP development."

Comments

Guessing..

[NanoGator]

... Rogue Squadron 3 didn't do so well for Factor 5. Losing money perhaps?

Re:Sony and Microsoft only?

[Anonymous Coward]

Well... Nintendo aren't dead yet, and I don't think they'll actually "go bust" any time in the immediate future. However, I think Nintendo pulling out of the non-handheld hardware market if their next gen console doesn't do substantially better than the GC did isn't totally implausible.

It's a little unfair to suggest that only invested money matters. Sure, Sony and Microsoft have been able to throw a lot of money behind their consoles and this has helped, but I don't think it's the only, or even the main reason. Sony and (to a lesser degree) Microsoft have been more successful at making use of the benefits of modern technology, taking the console market in new directions and branding themselves to fit a rapidly aging gaming audience. Nintendo, quite frankly, give me the impression that they'd much rather we'd never moved on from the SNES generation of consoles. They're still making essentially the same games, pitched at essentially the same audience (an audience which is perhaps beginning to move on to other things). They've failed to keep many of their second and third party developers interested, so the only big exclusive titles we can look forward to on the GC are basically remakes of 10 year old games.

Of course, competition is a good thing and it'd be sad if the number of major console hardware players was reduced from 3 to 2. However, I wouldn't be surprised to see a 3rd contender appear. I suspect that when Sony are eventually dethroned, it might come from an unexpected direction (who, at the height of the SNES generation, would have believed that Sony would be the company to smash Nintendo's dominance?). Microsoft will probably establish their console family as moderately strong competitors to the Playstation series (the X-Box's first couple of years haven't been great, but MS are learning... and FAST), but I don't see them unseating the PS brand.

Astroturfing....

[zulux]

Microsoft is known for paying people to try to sway public opionion: info here .

It this why, in the last 6-months, Slashdot has had a rash of "Nintendo is Dying" stories?

I'll really know we've been astroturfed if I see a "poor beleagured Nintendo" story.