Is it finally time to admit that portable 3D gaming just doesn’t work?
If you’ve been following the gaming business over the last year, you know that the Nintendo 3DS, which allows gamers to play titles in 3D without the need for special glasses, has faced a difficult market. In the second quarter of this year, Nintendo sold just 710,000 3DS units worldwide. Even worse, it could only get 110,000 units into homes in the U.S.
When I look around the gaming industry right now, it’s tough to find any single company that really “gets” it. Nintendo has the Wii, which was performing well for quite some time, but that device’s popularity has started to wane. And the 3DS has pretty much disappointed everyone from Nintendo’s CEO Satoru Iwata to his company’s most ardent supporters.
As many of you know, I’ve often been critical on these pages of Apple’s inability to fully capitalize on the living room. I’m a firm believer that the company has a real opportunity to be a dominant force in home entertainment, and yet, it hasn’t done anything to prove that. So far, the Apple TV is the best offering it has, and most would agree, that that device is still just a “hobby.”
There are times when I sit here and see the latest reports on the news and scratch my head. That has happened quite often as of late as the growing number of reports and rumors come in on all the companies looking to buy streaming-video provider Hulu.
In most markets it competes in, Apple easily defeats all others. In the mobile space, for example, the company’s iPhone 4 and iPad 2, are easily besting all others in total sales, due mainly to their strong features.
However, there is one space that Apple is lagging far behind: the living room. Currently, the company is trying to cement itself in the living room with the help of the Apple TV, a set-top box that, for years, has been called a hobby by Apple itself.
The last weekend was an adventure.
As I watched the news reports suggesting Hurricane Irene was on its way to my doorstep, I couldn’t help but think that it had little chance of affecting me. After all, I’ve never had to deal with a hurricane at any point in my life living here, and there was simply no reason to believe, I thought, that that would change.
Much of the talk surrounding Steve Jobs’ decision to resign as CEO of Apple and assume the role of chairman of the company’s board of directors has centered on the iPhone maker’s financial performance and future in the mobile market.
To some extent, that’s understandable. Shareholders care more about Apple’s financial performance than anything else. And the only way for the company to maintain its strong financial picture is to continue to deliver outstanding mobile products, like the iPhone and iPad, that people actually want to buy.
If you’ve followed my work here, you know that I’ve been a little tough on Nintendo as of late, saying that the game company is in deep trouble, and by the look of things, doesn’t have a strategy in place to turn things around so quickly.
Over the last several weeks, I’ve received some e-mails from folks about Nintendo and my comments on the company. Those folks say that Nintendo will always be a hardware-focused firm, and the very thought of playing its titles on other consoles is a joke.
When I use Netflix, Amazon’s streaming service, and all the others out there, I can’t help but think about film studios. I analyze their decision-making, I see where they place their content, I hear what they have to say about entertainment and its relation to technology today, and I can’t help but come to one simple conclusion: these companies are clueless.
Sony could very well have made its best decision in years by dropping the price of its PlayStation 3 console $50 earlier this week. Now, consumers can get their hands on the 160GB model for $249 or the 320GB option for $299. And in the process, the company, which also announced a Europe-only PSP, called the E-1000 for £99, has put the onus on Microsoft to respond with a price cut of its own to match its chief competitor.
Each month, the NPD’s report on game sales disappoints. Sales are plummeting in both hardware and software, and many are wondering if it’s a result of the economy or something else. As far as I’m concerned, it’s about time we all admit that it’s something else. The economy might not be helping matters, but the way I see it, the real problem is that gaming habits are changing, and the products that we once bought just aren’t as valuable to us as they once were.
If you’ve been following the stock market lately, you know that things haven’t been going so well for most companies. Well, that is, except for one: Apple. The iPhone maker has overtaken Exxon Mobil to become the biggest company, by market capitalization, in the world.
That news followed reports last week, claiming Apple had more cash on-hand than the U.S. Treasury did as lawmakers tried to come up with a deal on the debt limit.
