The beginning of the end: id, Bigpoint, THQ close mobile divisions

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Disney's mobile, social push improves its bottom line

by Jessica Conditt on Nov 11th 2012 9:00PM

Disney Interactive, the arm of Walt's empire that handles video games, saw an operating loss of $216 million for the fiscal year 2012, which ended on September 29. Loss for the quarter came to $76 million, an improvement of $18 million from Q4 2011.

Revenue for the year decreased 14 percent from 2011's $982 million, bringing 2012 to $845 million – the $216 million loss, however, improved from 2011's $308 million. Disney attributed the loss improvement to a focus on social games and decreased production of console games:

"Improved segment operating results for the year reflected an increase at our social games business.... The reduction in console games product development reflected an ongoing shift from console game releases to mobile and social game releases."

In 2011, Disney Interactive shut down all core studios except for Junction Point, the house responsible for the Epic Mickey series. Disney acquired Lucasfilm for $4.05 billion on October 30, and the deal included LucasArts, Industrial Light & Magic and Skywalker Sound, the Star Wars games and effects studios. During the acquisition, Disney said it was likely to develop social and mobile games in the Star Wars universe, leaving console games to licensed third parties.

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NPD: Number of US mobile gamers surpasses core, totals down

THE U.S. EXPERIENCES DECLINE IN TOTAL NUMBER OF GAMERS

Mobile Gamers Now Represent the Largest Gamer Segment

Port Washington, NY, September 5, 2012 – According to Gamer Segmentation 2012: The New Faces of Gamers, the latest report from leading market research company, The NPD Group, there are an estimated 211.5 million gamers in the U.S. that play video games, a 5 percent decline, or loss of close to 12 million gamers, when compared to 2011.

Of the six gamer segments in the report, only Mobile Gamers and Digital Gamers saw increases in the number of gamers when compared to 2011, with Mobile Gamers up 9 percentage points to 22 percent and Digital Gamers up 4 percentage points to 16 percent. All other gamer segments, which include Core Gamers, Family+Kid Gamers, Light PC Gamers, and Avid PC Gamers, experienced declines, with Family+Kid gamers experiencing the most significant decline of an estimated 17.4 million gamers.

"Given the long lifecycles of the current consoles and the increasing installed base of smartphones and tablets, it's not surprising to see a slight decline in the Core Gamer segment," said Anita Frazier, industry analyst, The NPD Group. "It's the revenue contribution of the Core Gamer segment that continues to outpace all other segments, and remains vital to the future of the industry."

The size of key gamer segments are shifting, with Mobile Gamers now representing the largest gamer segment, edging out Core Gamers, which was the largest segment in 2011.

"While this study segments the gaming audience based on a number of key variables and attributes, looking across the total gaming audience we see a tremendous impact from mobile gaming, particularly on smartphones and tablets," said Frazier. "Because of this, our next study, which will be released later this month, takes a deeper look into the area of mobile gaming."

Money Spent
Game purchasers reported spending an average of $48 on physical games and $16 on digital games-PC/console/portable in the past three months. Core Gamers spent $65 on physical games over the same time period; this is more than any other gamer segment.

Close to 14 percent of total gamers report that they purchased microtransactions/additional game content in the past three months versus 11 percent during the same time period in 2011, with Core Gamers and Digital Gamers being the largest consumers of these types of purchases at 27 percent and 23 percent, respectively.

Methodology
An online survey was fielded in March 2012 to members of NPD's online panel. Responses for kids under age 13, as well as some kids in the 13-15 age range, were captured through surrogate reporting (where the parent answers on behalf of the child). The data is weighted and representative of the US population ages 2 and older. The study is based on 8,488 completed surveys.

About The NPD Group, Inc.

The NPD Group is the leading provider of reliable and comprehensive consumer and retail information for a wide range of industries. Today, more than 2,000 manufacturers, retailers, and service companies rely on NPD to help them drive critical business decisions at the global, national, and local market levels. NPD helps our clients to identify new business opportunities and guide product development, marketing, sales, merchandising, and other functions. Information is available for the following industry sectors: automotive, beauty, entertainment, fashion, food, home and office, sports, technology, toys, video games, and wireless. For more information, contact us, visit http://www.npd.com/, or follow us Twitter at https://twitter.com/npdgroup.

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Rovio's Vesterbacka defends mobile games, calls out Nintendo's '$49 pieces of plastic'

by Ben Gilbert on Mar 30th 2011 1:55PM

"A lot of people in the games industry, they think the 'real' games are on consoles. You're only a 'real' games company if you do a big budget game. But we don't have that inferiority complex," Rovio head Peter Vesterbacka told MCV in a recent interview. Vesterbacka was defending against Nintendo's latest criticisms of the mobile market -- both Nintendo of Japan head Satoru Iwata and Nintendo of America head Reggie Fils-Aime have argued that low-priced smartphone apps are degrading the value of games.

"If I was trying to sell a $49 piece of plastic to people then yes, I'd be worried too," Vesterbacka added, with a tinge of vitriol, alluding to the standard retail price of a Wii game disc. "But I think it's a good sign that people are concerned -- because from my point of view we're doing something right." Rovio's Angry Birds and its spin-offs are just a $1 each for iPhone and are offered as free, ad-supported apps on the Android Market.

Still, the company has plans for more console development, having already released Angry Birds as a PlayStation Mini, with additional console ports in the pipeline -- even Nintendo's 3DS is getting an Angry Birds port. "Games consoles for us are just like launching on a new smartphone platform," Vesterbacka said nonchalantly. After all, he's probably more concerned with the movie tie-in, the planned US IPO, and, uh, having an Angry Bird etched into the Moon.

Okay, that last one probably isn't happening. Yet.

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