Analysts Predict Tough Christmas For Game Publishers

Posted by simoniker on Thursday July 1, 2004 @08:09PM from the coal-in-stocking dept.

Thanks to Gamesindustry.biz for its article regarding predictions of a tough 2004 holiday season for all videogame publishers, as an analyst report from Banc of America Securities claims "competition in the games market will be much more intense than last year", and argues that "some games will just not receive any shelf space from retailers, and initial shipments of titles will be very low, even by historical standards." The report goes on to highlight some non-specific specifics: "We have very low expectations for games of other developers with less-known brands... including Acclaim, Midway (except Mortal Kombat), Atari, Eidos, Vivendi (apart from Half-Life 2, if it is released) and even Microsoft (apart from Halo 2)... Expect many disasters this holiday." Is there really a reason for game creators to worry about what sales Santa will bring them?

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Meaning of Christmas by LifesizeKenDoll · 2004-07-01 20:58 · Score: 5, Funny

I think we're forgetting the real meaning of Christmas - The birth of Santa
Re:Publish games during the summer season! by dammitallgoodnamesgo · 2004-07-01 21:01 · Score: 5, Funny

I had heard that the idea was that publishers thought no people would ever want to stay in playing games during the summer, they'd all be out in the sunshine. We know how wrong that is, but it's possible they've not learned yet.