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Nintendo Quarterly Profits Down 80%
mybrainonfire writes "1UP is reporting that Nintendo had a 78.5% reduction in operating profits for the quarter. 'Speculation from the news service on the reason for the drop makes perfect sense - the GameCube doesn't have enough exclusives, first-party and third-party, and sales of GBA SP and GameCube have been declining.' Time to release more Pokemon games, stat!"
..but how did the other guys do?
If this is comparable or better to the other guys' performance...
Gamasutra points out that while Nintendo is suffering from reduced profits, neither Sony nor Microsoft's Xbox division are currently making any profit.
That's not really the point.
Sony has multiple divisions, just because the company as a whole isn't making a profit doesn't mean the PS division isn't. In previous years, the PS division of Sony made more profit than all of their other divisions combined.
As for the Xbox, the intent was never to make a profit, so it's really an unfair comparison. Entering the game console industry is extremely difficult and expensive. Xbox 2 will most likely turn a profit, and the losses on Xbox 1 were really just necessary to break the barriers to entry in the market.
However, the game console market can be very profitable with 2 major players, but with three major players, profits will fall. Nintendo's lackluster earnings can mostly be blamed on the Xbox and PSP, for bringing new competition to Nintendo's old turfs.
Thank you Mario! But our princess is in another castle!
actually since day one MS has made massive losses on the console hardware. They were more expensive to make than Playstation 2 Yet they had to undercut Sony on price to make it in the door. Their only profits are from game and LIVE royalties.