Harvest Moon: Grand Bazaar, The KING OF FIGHTERS XIII, DoDonPachi Resurrection, Rune Factory 3 and Cradle of Rome 2 all coming this year
Thursday 28thJuly 2011: Leading independent videogame publisher Rising Star Games today unveiled an all-star line-up of titles for the final six months of 2011.
The latter half of the year will cement the firm’s reputation as a publisher that delivers what its fans want. Catering for five different genres, Rising Star Games’ line-up includes some of the best loved franchises in their respective categories, all of which have been high on gamers’ wish lists.
This information comes from Mike Hickey at Janco…
“Retail is definitely a factor in this decision. 3DS has just not been moving in the channel, not moving at all. I think this price drop is appropriate. Normally you’d expect them to wait until the fall, but, frankly why wait? It has been overpriced and hasn’t been selling. It’s a cool device, and it’s under a lot of pressure from smartphones, but I think the new price might give it some traction.”
This information comes from Jesse Divnich at EEDAR…
“Retail pressure will have been part of this decision. But retailers are always pushing their vendors for price cuts, doesn’t matter if it’s in the games business or in laundry detergents. Nintendo has a loyal fan-base and they are doing the right thing. Gamers will still pay for great games and Nintendo has some big first party games coming.”
Divnich added that the industry should “give Nintendo a chance” as the holidays approach and that the system now has a stronger chance of holding its ground against Vita.
If you love sales and numbers, you’re going to greatly enjoy the points below. All of the details come from Nintendo’s Q1 2011 financial results.
– Nintendo expected net sales of 360,000 million yen for the half year spanning April 1 – September 30
– Expected operating income of 20,000 million yen
– Also expected net income of 18,000 million yen
– Now been respectively cut to 240,000 yen, 50,000 million yen, and 35,000 million yen
– Lowered sales forecast from 1,100,000 million yen to 900,000 million yen, operating income forecast from 175,000 million yen to 35,000 million yen, and net income forecast from 110,000 million yen to 20,000 million yen (full year ending March 31, 2012)
– Revisions due to stronger-than-expected yen appreciation, sales performance, 3DS price cut, sales outlook for the holidays
– Nintendo has to revise its exchange rate assumption from 83 yen to 80 yen per US dollar
– Lowered DS sales expectation to 9 million, 16 million for 3DS, 12 million for Wii
– DS and Wii figures are down from 11 million and 13 million, 3DS is the same
– Now expecting to sell 70 million units of software
– DS software projection cut from 67 million to 62 million
– Wii projection cut from 120 million to 110 million
– Current three month period ending June 2011: Sales fell to 93,928 million yen from the 188,646 million the same three month period in 2010
– Operating loss of 37,712 yen (23,342 million operating gain last year)
– Net loss remains at 25,516
– Reasons for losses: exchange rate, advertising costs for 3DS, costs for research/development for Wii U
– 3DS: .71 million units of hardware sold, 4.53 worldwide
– Total hardware sales for 3DS: 4.32 million
– Software sales for 3DS: 13.96 million
– Nintendo said Zelda: Ocarina of Time 3D was favorably received, but “3DS had few other hit titles”
Thanks to Thomas N for the tip!
3DS Downloadable Titles
Gin Boshi Shougi 3D (Silver Star Chess 3D) – 800 yen
Picross-e – 500 yen
Virtual Console
Dr. Mario – 400 yen
Pitman – 400 yen
Video Content
– Streaming 3D video of a recently released monster rhythm game called Ushimitsu Monstruo
– Super Pokémon Scramble delay announcement
– Commercial for Rhythm Heaven Wii
– Four minute Nazo Waku Yakata video
– Itsu no Ma ni Terebi and Nintendo Video additions
Nintendo has today announced a global change in the trade pricing policy of Nintendo 3DS. In Europe, this will be applicable from August 12th.
There have been times in the past when we, Nintendo, have marked down the trade prices for our video game machines a certain amount of time after launch to further accelerate adoption of the hardware, but never in Nintendo’s history have we dropped a system’s trade price so significantly less than 6 months after launch.
Obviously North America isn’t the only region receiving a 3DS price drop next month. Japan, Europe, and Australia will also be seeing reductions.
Here’s a listing of the new price for each territory…
North America (already reported) – $169.99 – Price drop on August 12
Japan – 15,000 yen – Price drop on August 11
Europe – ~£130/169 EUR – Price drop on August 12
Australia – 250 AUD – Price drop on August 12
If someone were to tell you a year ago that the 3DS would be getting a steep price cut less than six months into its lifecycle, you probably would have that that the person was crazy. But today, that’s exactly what happened. The system will be seeing a price reduction around the world next month in what is one of the quickest and steeping price changes for a Nintendo product.
And apparently Nintendo is concerned about how loyal, early 3DS owners will feel about the move. The company issued the following statement today:
“Never in Nintendo’s history have we dropped a system’s trade price so significantly. We are aware this may cause you, the loyal fans who supported Nintendo 3DS from the beginning, to lose trust in us, and this is not our intention in any way. …although we may not be able to completely prevent you from regretting purchasing Nintendo 3DS early, we would like to express our gratitude to our special customers like you….”
