Slashdot Mirror
Square Enix To Buy Eidos, Midway Files For Bankruptcy
arcticstoat writes to tell us that Square Enix has been revealed as the potential buyer to Eidos, developer of the Tomb Raider franchise. Eidos had been shedding workers and studios in an attempt for financial stability. This comes alongside news that Midway Games is filing for Chapter 11 bankruptcy in order to stave off creditors while they sort out what's left of their resources. World of Goo publisher Brighter Minds Media also filed for bankruptcy last month. Free Radical, a UK studio recently put in a similar position was snapped up by Crytek, and we discussed news of Sega's financial turmoil as well. It seems that claims from late last year suggesting the games industry may be "recession proof" are quickly being proven wrong, though Kotaku suggests that most of the blame falls on the developers.
Chrono Cross is an average PS1-era JRPG which is hardly similar to Chrono Trigger. It's a "spiritual sequel" in name only.
Midway files for bankruptcy? I think that's a...
FATALITY
SJW n. One who posts facts.
"I think all of the smart publishers are looking at ways to add-on to existing games," Kramer said. "It stems the flood of used game sales and every used game sale is money out of the pockets of the developer and publisher."
What fucktards. Either they believe the rhetoric that they spew or they expect us to believe it, and either way it makes them look like assholes.
The last thing I want is a level 5 dwarf (haha) providing me my OS.
If Gimli tells you to install Linux you better DAMN well install Linux.
It seems that claims from late last year suggesting the games industry may be "recession proof" are quickly being proven wrong
Labelling an entire industry "recession proof" seems a bit excessive. Any games company with a solid fanbase, probably through years of making good quality games and having good customer support, are unlikely to be affected too badly by the global economy problems. Sure, things are a bit tighter for me money-wise now, but I'm sure as hell not going to stop buying games. A good business model and high quality products, for a receptive market sounds like a winner to me. But a bad games company, making bad games and treating their customers like idiots, criminals, or flat out ignoring them, is going to go under no matter what. Recession just speeds things up, and being in an industry considered "safe" from economic problems isn't going to save you one little bit.
Another approach to riding out a recession is to create games that are mind-bendingly addictive, and provide income month-after-month. Anyone for WoW?
You can advertise in this sig from as little as £99.99 a month!
It's not even a "spiritual" sequel -- it's a sequel, period.
That's what you call a game like Chrono Cross that uses many of the same game mechanics, is explicitly set in the same world, and is packed with references to the previous game, including appearances by several of the main characters. (Did you miss that Kid was brought up by Lucca, or that the end boss was Schala merged with Lavos?)
Does this mean we can look forward to more abandonware of classic videogames?
It doesn't matter if it is a factor in declining game sales or not. You have a damn right to resell whatever you bought - it's YOURS, not theirs. Car sales have declined much more and no one thinks of forbidding people to sell used cars in order to fix that.
People have less money, they will buy cheaper games - and less games altogether, since they are somewhat frivolous items. That is expected, and the game industry should learn to deal with it without finding a scape goat. Cut your development costs, your marketing budget, make better games. And stop whining.
Where is that guy who'd die defending what I had to say when I need him?
The only reason why people are willing to pay as much as they are for new games is because they know that they can sell them later. The used game market props up the new game market.
LK
"Hi. This is my friend, Jack Shit, and you don't know him." - Lord Kano
Chrono Cross was good it just couldn't match CT.
Can't wait to get grind and magic spells in Hitman V: Shadow Crystal
And by "a lot of people", you mean you.
Chrono Cross is an excellent game in its own right and was received really well when it came out.
My twitter
It will be revealed that Lara is actually a man...
They'll only take away half of her cup-size, though.
As we all know, SE only makes male leads (except in the craptastic FFX-2), but they all look like girls
Some of this is due to big developer "ego". Ignoring the Wii/DS because it isn't as sexy as the big consoles - trying to dictate to the market then listening to it and changing your strategy accordingly.
I'm not sure about that. The Wii gets plenty of 3rd party love, but those games don't sell as well. The attach rate for the Wii is friendly to existing Nintendo franchises, not 3rd parties. On the PS3 and 360, the 3rd parties get more attention from consumers. If anything, I think the Wii deserves less attention.
http://www.gamasutra.com/php-bin/news_index.php?story=20988
I kinda liked Chrono Cross as its own game, but as a sequel to Chrono Trigger? No. I have to agree with the posters above.
Dual and Triple techs were so sparse you could play the entire game and never use one. They threw in FOURTY characters, which means you had a lot of characters that were worthless to the plot, and a lot of characters with trivial backstories that diluted the plot. To deal with the over-abundance of playable characters, they watered down the magic system so that everyone shared the same spells, bar 3 unique abilities per character. This is in stark contrast to Trigger.
For the most part, Chrono Trigger doesn't come into play, until the end of the game where they throw in "oh, and the bosses you're fighting are related to Trigger!" The plot was needlessly convoluted. The whole dragon thing was just... meh; it was trying too hard.
Overall, it felt like they took an average jRPG, tacked on some Chrono Trigger backstory, and then called it a sequel. Most Chrono Trigger fans that I've talked to agree on this point.
That's because all of the developers only put their C and D teams on Wii/DS, and save their AAA teams for the 360/PS3. Then everyone's surprised, or angry at Nintendo when those games aren't good and don't sell very well. NO SHIT! If they were smart and spread their investments, giving equal time and creative resources to the Wii as they do for the 360/PS3, they'd be raking in the doah. If investment bankers used the same formula that these companies do, they'd be out of a job. Look where the money is. The Wii has about 1.5x as many users as both the 360 and PS3 COMBINED. When programming for 360/PS3, you have to hire extra programmers to port, and the PS3 is not very friendly to program on, especially when a game is already programmed for the 360. There are literally dozens of titles that do not use all the latest graphics that the 360 or PS3 offer, that would work perfectly fine on the Wii, but devs choose to release on the more troublesome duel-platform 360/PS3 option.
This is simple arrogance mixed with a Bush-esque "stay the course" type attitude. There's no good excuse for leaving the Wii in the dust
Multiplayer Gaming (defined): Sitting around, discussing single-player games with my friends, at the bar.