Archive for December, 2006
Best Buy: Sit on PS3s, Sell Wiis
A friendly Best Buy mole shot us a copy of the retailer’s latest employee newsletter, The Retail Inside. In it, Best Buy reminds their blue and yellow worker bees to hold Playstation 3 consoles for the Dec. 31 Ad.
All stores will receive PlayStation 3 (60 GB, $599) for the Dec. 31 ad (ad minimum 25). Product will be labeled with orange stickers that say “Hold for ad.” If your store received 70 or more units, hold 40 units for the ad and release the rest. Some stores have sold many units and may be at risk of not having the minimums. If your store received less than 70 units, hold 32 units for the ad and release the rest. Additional PS3 software and accessories will arrive throughout the week to support the ad.
The insider goes on to say that stores will also be receiving shipments of Wii this week and that blues are to get them to the floor and sell them ASAP.
Employee purchases of either console, by the way, remain a no no at the chain.
The Best Keyboards of 2006
You can tell a lot about a person from the input device they use, and the people at ExtremeTech can tell you a lot about keyboards. They’ve posted Keyboard Kraziness, which means they compare keyboards they’ve reviewed over the year, picking the best and worst models in general, gaming, and gamepad. categories.
I only have two keyboard purchasing criteria myself. Coolness factor, and clickiness. Give me a sleek machine under my fingertips with far too many buttons clicking so loud that cicadas get hot and bothered. Strangely enough, I happen to own winners in all three of ET’s main categories, so I’m doing something right. The MERC gaming keyboard from Ideazon tied with the Wolf Claw Type II for best gaming keyboard, the Saitek Eclipse II with stylin purple backlit keys takes home the general crown, and the WolfKing Warrior runs circles around the other gaming keypads.
Don’t worry, I didn’t spoil all the fun! Head over to ExtremeTech to see the winners for weirdest, most innovative, most ergonomic, and most over-hyped keyboards of 2006.
Keyboard Kraziness: Best and Worst [ExtremeTech]
Or maybe you’re a mouse man?
Wired trains its brain
Filed under: Culture, Nintendo DS
The January issue of Wired magazine includes a few short columns about writers trying to improve their abilities; Joshua Green’s story about improving his brain functions relies on Nintendo’s Brain Age game, a better diet, and more sleep. His non-scientific study left him with a brain age improvement from 44 to 34 after four weeks of work.
Now that Brain Age has been out for a while, do you think it has sharpened your mind? Anecdotally, we like the game, but we think it just makes us better at Brain Age.
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Clips: PS3 Steak Cooking Action
A while back we linked the finished PS3 grill, and now, a working clip. You know, sometimes I like the idea of things better than the actual thing. This is a classic example. A PS3 grill sounds funny. But an actual PS3 grill? Dull. Blame this boring clip, whose sole highlight is the inability to pick up raw meat!
Japanese hardware sales, 18 Dec - 24 Dec: shameless recap edition
Filed under: Nintendo DS, Nintendo GameCube, Sony PlayStation 2, Sony PlayStation 3, Sony PSP, Nintendo Wii, Microsoft Xbox, Microsoft Xbox 360, Business
Like a stage hook dramatically coercing us out of the spotlight or a kind psychiatrist pulling us back from the brink of madness, the end of the year is putting the kibosh on Japanese sales charts for 2006. With all the ups, downs and insufferable numbers you’ve been exposed to, it’s quite likely that your nightmares have become filled with imposing calculator-men riding rollercoasters and vomiting out percentages as soon as the ride stops.
We’re very sorry for that. Have some numbers.
- DS Lite: 485,584 (yes, really) 
165,876 (51.88%)
- Wii: 279,277 171,040 (158.02%)
- PSP: 138,588 89,626 (183.05%)
- PS3: 76,882 5,940 (8.37%)
- PS2: 46,209 8,479 (22.47%)
- Xbox 360: 17,213 45 (0.26%)
- Game Boy Micro: 2,394 903 (60.56%)
- GBA SP: 1,858
9 (0.48%)
- Gamecube: 1,250 98 (8.51%)
- DS Phat: 380 222 (140.51%)
- GBA: 57 15 (35.71%)
- Xbox: 11 8 (266.67%)
[Source: Media Create]
In addition, we’ve compiled a list of our least terrible sales charts from the last year (though they only started appearing on Joystiq in July) in a last-ditch effort to inflict their unimaginable pain upon you once more. Thank you for reading!
Continue reading Japanese hardware sales, 18 Dec - 24 Dec: shameless recap edition
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Happy ducks on the NES music day
Filed under: Retro
After putting together 15 game music Fridays over the past 5 months or so, you might think that we’re beginning to run out of ideas for mostly regular feature. Well, you’d be wrong. Our imagination for this kind of thing knows no limits. You give us three random video game music videos from YouTube and we will manage to connect them in some semi-coherent way to make a passable music day theme because that’s what we get paid for, dammit!
With that in mind, please enjoy some YouTube videos featuring music from NES games that featured ducks. Including:
- A suitably digital-sounding version of the Duck Tales theme
- A surprisingly competent, jazzy tune from Darkwing Duck
- A death metal anthem based around Duck Hunt. Yes, Duck Hunt.
Continue reading Happy ducks on the NES music day
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Contest: Use Ice, Snow, Sand, Win Lost Planet
Want Lost Planet? We’ve got ten, count ‘em, ten copies of the Xbox 360 game to put in your greedy hands. Just handing them out ain’t no contest though, but a giveaway. So here’s our newest contest:
Using ice, snow or sand (for you warm weather folks) sculpt something game-related, snap a pic and send it our way to kotakucontest@gmail.com. Be sure to include your name and address as well as some info about your creation. We’ll post the entries and from that select the winners. Contest ends January 5th, and the winners will be announced the following day. Like any contest, this one’s got rules. Good luck and happy sculpting!
Chess player banned 10 years for cheating
Filed under: Hacks
An Indian chess player caught using a bluetooth headset to receive tips in a chess match has been banned for 10 years. The earpieces were sewn into a cloth cap he always wore and pulled over his ears; on the other end were accomplices who used a computer to relay good moves. While the player, Umakant Sharma, can still play chess in a non-professional sense, this will stay with him as a black mark.
Now imagine that scenario in online gaming. In most cases, widespread cheating is caught and IP addresses or game keys are blocked / suspended. However, one is still able to play by altering his or her IP addresses, using a different email, or repurchasing the game. Certainly one’s image is not tarnished outside of the realm of gaming, a fate we suspect Sharma might succumb to. You would never have to explain why you were caught with an Aimbot while applying for a job.
Then again, we could be wrong. Has there ever been a time you have experienced (or heard from a friend) where in-game cheating affected your out-of-game life?
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Feature: The Decline of the PS3 Grey Market
By: Michael Fahey
The rise and fall of the PlayStation 3 on eBay is one of the most talked about gaming stories of the year. In order to paint a broader picture, I’ve tracked pricing trends from preorders to Christmas Eve and surveyed retailers to determine just how hard the PS3 grey market has crashed.
In the days leading up to the PlayStation 3 launch in mid-November, people all over the country lined up with dollar signs in their eyes, hoping to cash in on what was sure to be the most sought after gift this holiday season. I talked to many people planning on financing college, cars, vacations, and countless other dream items with the fruits of their labor. A week later those hopes and dreams were crushed, as reports of plummeting eBay prices poured in. Just how fast did the PS3 grey market crash? Take a look for yourself, and feel free to click the graph for a larger version.
Within two days of the system’s launch the going price dropped by over $1000. eBay prospectors across the country were stunned at the rapid depreciation of their investment. While they were still looking at $600 profit on average, it was a far cry from the windfall everyone had been expecting.
The smart thing to do in that situation would be to wait, right? Several enterprising folks I talked to during the launch festivities predicted a glut early on, and planned on holding their systems until Christmas, when demand would be at its highest. As the graph indicates, that wasn’t the wisest move. Four days before Christmas PS3 auctions hit the lowest point ever, bottoming out at just $724. Figuring in sales tax, that’s less than $100 profit on a 60GB system.
Clearly the way to go for the PS3 prospector was preorders. On November 16th, as the reality of the system shortages began to sink in, buyers spent an average of $2,367 to secure themselves on of the 600 or so preorders sold that day, and from the point eBay started allowing receipt-verified presales prices maintained a steady average of around $1500.
How are retail stores being affected?
With the prices dropping so low, many eBay hopefuls have been returning their purchases to the stores they procured them from. Between packing, shipping, and taxes, it’s much less of a hassle just to get a refund and forget the whole thing ever happened. I decided to survey several popular retail ’superstores’ to get a feel for just how big a trend grey market returns were.
Here’s how this worked. I called a random selection of stores across the country from each of the four retailers listed below. I asked to speak to their electronics department first, and then called back to speak with customer service. I made sure to specify intact, boxed returns to avoid clouding data with random defective units. Interestingly enough, not one store I spoke to mentioned any defective returns. If anything the PS3 is a solid machine. Bear in mind that these are not hard numbers. I spoke to whoever was staffing the departments at the time I called, and only counted the answers applying directly to those people. While I’d like to say you could safely double the returned system numbers below, there are far too many factors involved to make it an accurate estimate.
I picked the four below for various reasons. Fry’s because of its unique bundling policy, Best Buy because of its huge initial allotments, Target as a major retailer that isn’t focused on electronics, and Wal-Mart because I am apparently a glutton for punishment. All four stores had people wait in line for the consoles…one of the reasons you don’t see GameStop represented, another reason being that many GameStop systems went to either employees or regulars to the store tipped off by employees. “But GameStop wasn’t allowed to sell to employees!” Where do you think I got mine?
Store Findings:
Fry’s Electronics
Number Called: 10 - Called double what I had planned for Fry’s because the first five all reported having systems in stock.
Average Returns: two per store
Systems Available? Yes
Fry’s stands out from the other retailers I’ve surveyed in that they still insist on selling their PS3 systems in ridiculous bundle packs with eight or so games. Every single store I called reported having plenty of bundles available for purchase. On average each store had received two returns, with the Alpharetta Georgia location, a favorite of mine, reporting four. Systems at Fry’s can only be returned with the full bundle intact, and are resold the same way.
Conclusion: Nothing too surprising here. When I was working at GameStop on Christmas Eve I had countless customers tell me that Fry’s had PlayStation 3s just sitting there, with no one buying. The only thing harder than trying to turn a profit off of a PS3 on eBay is trying to turn a profit off an $1100 bundle filled with games no one wants to play.
Target
Number Called: five - they’re a major retailer, but they weren’t exactly a big launch location.
Average Returns: two
Systems Available? No, though two out of five stores did tell me I had “just missed one.”
Conclusion: Target doesn’t get many systems in, and when they do they generally last a day tops. One electronics rep I spoke to in Colorado told me they had gotten two returns earlier in the week, which didn’t last more that 24 hours on the shelf. Low volume, relatively quick turnaround.
Best Buy
Number Called: 15 - Best Buy had the greatest launch allocations, so I gave them a bit more attention while conducting the survey.
Average Returns: Four - One customer service rep said she had seen as many as eight returned, though she worked at a midnight launch store with a much larger console allocation than the rest.
Systems Available? Not a one, at any store. Most likely a corporate sponsored lie, however, as we’ve been getting several reports on Best Buy holding systems until New Year’s Eve.
Conclusion: A much larger allocation equals a slightly higher number of returns. This whole sitting on items for big holiday sales severely screws up survey data. As well as forcing their employees to lie, they also forced me to lie. When I mentioned I was writing a story, I was told they couldn’t comment to the press. I had to tell them I was a father looking in to buying one for his son, trying to figure out if the system was reliable. If anyone asks, my son’s name is Rufus, and he has a glandular disorder.
Wal-Mart
Number called: Five before I gave up out of sheer frustration
Average Returns: Inconclusive. While I did have one store tell me they’d seen a couple come back, most of them couldn’t figure out how to transfer me to customer service.
Systems Available? Possibly. They might not even know what it is.
Conclusion: While I’ve known some very helpful and intelligent Wal-Mart employees in my time, all of them must have been off over the past two days. I got through to one customer service rep and one electronics department out of five stores, the rest of the time spent either waiting endlessly on hold or being accidentally hung up on.
While return numbers seem to be relatively low, when you figure in the transactions the employees I spoke to weren’t privy to, and then multiply the number by even a fraction of the stores these retailers have scattered across the country, and things start adding up. In an ironic twist to the whole story, it seems as though your best bet for securing a PlayStation 3 console, unless you want to shell out $1100 for a bundle at Fry’s, is eBay. As of this writing there are over 7,000 up for auction, looking for a good home.
The Grand Conclusion, with a Personal Note
To be completely honest, when I first secured my PS3 preorder with GameStop the first thought in my head was the massive amount of money I could make from selling it. That’s how I got approval from my girlfriend to put down the $100. The TMX Elmo had just been released and was selling for ten times retail price. I figured I could triple my money, pick myself up a nice flat panel HDTV…hell, I might even have enough left over for another PS3 once the dust cleared.
What changed? Well the more I thought about the PS3, the more articles I read, and the more videos I watched, until the gamer in me basically slapped the profiteer silly. The PlayStation 3 has real potential. Lair. Motorstorm. Resistance. Soon dreams of a giant TV faded away, replaced by the gnawing anticipation I’m prone to get whenever something big is going to happen in the gaming industry. That, and I got this gig at Kotaku. If you guys ever got wind of me eBaying a PS3 I’d never hear the end of it.
As it turns out my gamer instincts and the threat of hordes of angry readers steered me clear of potential disaster. Aside from a couple brief spikes, there is no way I’d have been able to pull off the television, and I know damn well I would have waited for Christmas like so many others did, only to lose even more.
The moral of this story? There’s no such creature as a sure thing. The majority of eBay prospectors walked away from this experience with that lesson burned into the back of their brains. My suggestion for the future? If you want to gamble, go to Vegas. If you want to invest, try mutual funds. Leave the video game system buying to the gamers. We’ll all be happier for it.
How I collected the graph data:
To track eBay sales I used a website called Terapeak, which is of of the most trusted eBay market research tools available. I looked at data for the US eBay site each day utilizing the keyword “PlayStation 3″ in the Video Games/Systems category. I set the price range for $200 through $10,000 to weed out any artificially inflated auctions as well as any bogus “PS3 Buying Guide” type offerings. Keep in mind that the statistics provided are for both the 60GB and 20GB models combined. Many sellers neglected to specify which version they were auctioning, so weeding out one from the other was nigh impossible. Counterbalancing that slightly are auctions including games and extra controllers, which are also figured into the statistics.
While certainly not a completely infallible system, I believe it led to a more accurate overview of the eBay PlayStation 3 market than simply searching for PlayStation 3 and leaving it at that.
Using the same guidelines outlined above, I poked about for a few more interesting tidbits regarding system demand. For instance, auctions ending on or before November 16th, meaning preorders, had a 96.5% success rate. In the period after the system was released the figure dropped to 73%. Hazarding a guess I would say those figures are due largely in part to unrealistic reserve price auctions.
Clips: Wario Ware Preview
Gametrailers have a fairly lengthy preview up of Wario Ware: Smooth Moves. I did not think it was possible to get any more excited about this game. I have now been shown to be mistaken.
Analyst: PS3 dragging down Sony
Filed under: Sony PlayStation 3, Business
Add one more name to the media dog pile that has developed around Sony since the company’s launch of the PS3. RealMoney’s Michael Comeau recently told readers that the slow start for the system was “only one of many reasons to avoid shares of the consumer-electronics conglomerate, but it’s certainly the most important.”
Comeau cited Sony’s unflagging support for Blu-ray as the PS3’s Achilles heel, causing higher costs and production delays “with no discernible improvement in game quality.” Ouch! A harsh assessment, and one Kaz Hirai would no doubt disagree with. Comeau also felt that the loss of previous Sony exclusives like Grand Theft Auto and Virtua Fighter and the early hype surrounding the Nintendo Wii will hurt Sony’s gaming market share.
Why is that important to the investors that Comeau writes for? Well, while gaming only provides 10 percent of Sony’s revenue, it accounts for over 60 percent of their profits, leading Comeau to predict a declining video game market share for Sony will dramatically drag down profits for the entire company. What’s more, increased competition in other consumer electronics like high-definition TVs lead Comeau to say “it is nearly impossible for me to come up with a bullish case for Sony.” Double ouch!
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Rumor: Clover Studios v2.0
When Capcom shuttered Clover, the arm behind Okami and Godhand, grown men cried. Producer Atsushi Inaba fled the company, while his partner-in-crime Shinji Mikami (Resident Evil) kept contractual ties with Capcom.
So, what came of Inaba? What is he doing now? Word from a handful of insiders is that he has set up his own studio in Osaka and is hard at work on new titles. This shouldn’t come as a surprise in the least (file under “no duh”), but it is good to hear this chatter. No word what this outfit is called, and we’ve gotten conflicting reports that Mikami has joined Inaba’s boutique studio. Stay tuned until there’s something official.
Artistic NES up for sale
The NES, billed as the savior of the video game industry after the 1980s crash, has a special place in the hearts of many long-time gamers. Now, an artist is offering up a piece of that with an NES. Not just any original NES, but one lovingly painted. Depicting The Legend of Zelda, one of the NES’s landmark titles, the NES is not only a functioning piece of gaming history, but an incredibly well done piece of art. The NES looks like a screen shot were taped to the top of it and is protected by 3 or 4 layers of acrylic coating. The seller also has other custom painted systems featuring Kid Icarus and Mega Man 2. Worth taking a look at if you’re under the mindset that games are art, as these systems are quite artistic.
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Clips: The Gears of War Toilet Man
Today’s pointless video clip of the day, and I can’t promise it will be the only one, is this little gem of an easter egg from Gears of War. Apparently there is a “secret” dead toilet man on the Rooftops map.
You can see him by looking into the windows outside the map next to the building where the Hammer of Dawn is located or you can use the “Control the Camera when Dead” glitch or you could just raise your eyeballs slightly and click on the sideways triangle in that box up there.
[Hattip Joystiq]
HD DVD decrypted using 360 drive
Filed under: Hacks, Microsoft Xbox 360
The hack is useless, however, unless you have the encryption key for the disc; however, as he was able to find certain keys, that task is not impossible. In the FAQ for the program, muslix64 provides an explanation as to how the keys are encrypted. As Team Xbox points out, the AACS encryption is identical to what is found on a Blu-ray disc, so a way to rip those other next-gen discs is inevitable.
The security on HD DVD and Blu-ray has long been touted as one of the reasons for movie studios to start looking past that antiquated DVD format, and something that the studios thought would be unbreakable. Never underestimate the ingenuity of someone told “no.”
Of course, there is another, more involved way to backup HD DVD discs, if you’re a masochist. Video of the hacker’s achievement, decrypting Full Metal Jacket, can be found embedded after the break.
[Via Xbox 360 Fanboy]
Continue reading HD DVD decrypted using 360 drive
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PS2 Will Beat PS3 In 2007, Says Business Week
Maybe Sony weren’t kidding around when they predicted the PS2 would have a ten-year lifespan. Business Week have been crunching numbers (and speaking to Michael Pachter!), and have come away with the conclusion that in 2007, the PS2 will outsell the PS3.
The PS2 already owns the industry’s all-time sales record. As of last March, Sony had shipped more than 103 million units worldwide. In the year ending in March, 2007, Sony expects to sell an additional 11 million–and just 6 million PS3s. In the following year, Sony will likely ship another 11 million PS2s vs. 7 million PS3s, according to research by rating agency Standard & Poor’s (MHP).
It’s cheap, it’s trusted, it’s in over 100,000,000 homes, has an enormous library of classic titles and has a few AAA games left in it yet. You won’t find four of those five with a PS3, so those guesstimates might just hold some water.
The Golden Oldie Of Gaming [Business Week]
Using games as specialized learning
Filed under: Culture
The Chicago Tribune recently published an expose on the efforts of David Williamson Shaffer, an Assistant Professor at the University of Wisconsin-Madison with a long and accredited background in education. Shaffer is pushing to use video games as a means of teaching kids new specializations, as opposed to enhancing currently-covered curriculum (e.g., Math Blasters).
Shaffer, who just released a book How Computer Games Help Children Learn, argues that we should utilize interactive entertainment to better prepare children for the real world. “We already choose to have our kids think like historians [in history class],” he said, “or like cartoon scientists … In thinking like a journalist or an urban planner or a lawyer in society, you prepare kids to enter the workforce as more prepared citizens.”
We await the day where our descendants enjoy a round of Mario Teaches Electrical Engineering.
See Also:
Our coverage of the Serious Game Summit 2006
[Update 1: It's Shaffer, not Shaffen -- I used both. Sorry for the confusion.]
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Let’s Makes Those Pervy Japanese Games Less Pervy!
Erotic games too erotic? Yup. The telephone card illustration featuring Rena from doujin softcore PS2 game Higurashi no Naku Koro ni Matsuri has apparently been deemed too spicy for use in Japan and has been toned down. The cartoon character’s apron is now less revealing and a stray nipple bulge is gone. Odd. I mean, who cares? Really.
The original image up close and personal after the jump.
The Great Apron Change [Akiba Blog]
Capcom’s makin’ movies
Filed under: Culture, Business
Video games and movies frequently don’t mix. Sometimes, movies pump out a Resident Evil, which goes on to produce financially successful sequels. Mostly, though, Uwe Boll ends up with them. Capcom is making sure none of that happens to their titles.
Capcom is currently cozying up with Hollywood to turn more of its licenses into hit movies; and the other way around. Germaine Gioia, Capcom’s new Senior VP of Licensing, is working to get Capcom more exposure in Hollywood. This way, Capcom games like Lost Planet could get decent showings on the silver screen and Capcom can work closely with studios to create games on Hollywood IPs … which could allow them to work nicely together.
Microsoft should take a page from Capcom’s book in dealing with Hollywood (possibly getting together with arch-nemesis Sony to make it). By working closely with Hollywood, Capcom is taking a step toward making gaming a more socially acceptable past time. If the movies about games are frequently decent (not directed by Uwe Boll), we could see a loosening of political intolerance of the medium as Hollywood and politicians frequently are in lock-step. Plus, Capcom gets to make more money, which they aren’t about to argue with.
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SEC filing reveals 3mil Take Two shares unloaded
Filed under: Business
You might be quick to think something rather shifty is going on behind the scenes with such a large quantity of sales, but remember that GCM is a hedge fund with a fiduciary responsibility to its investors, and Take Two’s stock has been on a steady rise since the FTC concluded its investigation of the Hot Coffee incident in June.
[Via Seeking Alpha and Dubious Quality]
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