A Tree Falling in the Forest

When asked, I told people I started this blog as a cathartic outlet.  I didn't really care if any one read it, and I wrote when I had something to say.  People started to read.  I mean, who doesn't like to watch a good train wreck. There was a period of time I had a lot to say, and after a while the compulsion was gone.  I guess it worked.  I  catharted .   Or so I thought. This morning I saw this quote from Mike - boy do I miss Doug Lowenstien - Gallagher:  "The video game industry's explosive growth and technological innovation were front and centre at E3 2014," said owner and manager of E3 Michael D. Gallagher. "Video games are the most innovative and engaging force driving our culture and entertainment experiences the world over. Congratulations to our incredibly creative members, partners, exhibitors, and the hundreds of millions of gamers who engaged with the show online and through social media." He was trying to say this E3 ...

Our business is growing more like Hollywood every day. Budgets go up and publishers, like studio executives before them, rely more and more on established franchises to hedge their bets. We are just as used to seeing things like Transformers 2 and 3 or Hangover 2 as we are to the ensuing debate over whether the sequel is as good as the original. But this time Microsoft has gone just too far. In fact, so far, there is no need for a debate. For those of you who do not remember, just before the launch of the 360, Microsoft invented J Allard and he was good. I can't help watching the interview and wanting to buy a 360 all over again. But J left and Microsoft decided to make the sequel. C'mon guys . . . J worked, but can't you come up with something new?

There are far to many "role models" in the world and too few people to really admire. Every sports figure or actor is inevitably held up as a role model and they never fail to disappoint. While their effort to get to their position is admirable, the likelihood of emulating their role is slightly smaller than winning the supper lotto - twice. In the bright glow of these superstars we miss the ordinary guy who makes an ordinary gesture extraordinary. The guy you can really be if you just try hard enough. You have to be born Superman, but anyone can be Batman. Anyone who has spent time with J Allard knows he is not an ordinary guy, but the act of leaving employment is pretty ordinary these days and exit emails are not often inspiring love letters worthy of publication next to Steve Jobs' famous commencement speech. Actually, I've never seen one. Many compare J to Jobs and in an alternate world where he sat a couple seats high in the organization he may have been h...

In 2001, at the launch of the first Xbox, Steve Ballmer said: We know we have to succeed [with a game strategy] but there is a broader concept there that we will pursue at some point. You can say, is it the end of the road or is there a bigger play? And the answer is yeah, there's a bigger play we hope to get over time." I guess we got to that point. In yesterday's New York Times Bits section, Shane Kim, newly appointed head of strategy and business development for Xbox was quoted as saying: “We have been very focused on making sure we win in the gaming space,” Mr. Kim said. “Now that we expand and our aspirations broaden, we need to think about which assets of Microsoft fit in.” Which closes the loop on what I wrote in December 2001: Microsoft is following a strategy that worked for it before: Get a foothold, and iterate. They want to get a position in your home and continue to expand and improve until they consume more and more of the applications and operability for...

I am about to establish a relationship with a new 360. It's not by choice. I was jilted by the last one. I can't say it was completely unexpected. I learned how fickle their breed can be. They are so slick and shiny when you first meet them. They invite you to dress them in faceplates. They learn your name, and respond to your every whim. They promise to keep track of your gaming life for you, managing your social life, finding friends, and even talking on your behalf. They engage you with the the opportunity to earn their affection, granted in the form of achievement points which carry no value other than to display your commitment to them. Then, one day, without warning, the leave you. They check out. Their physical form remains as a monument to the relationship you once shared. Their spirit, their essence, their functionality, their soul leaves the hardware. I believe it skips out through the broadband connection and heads to a dormitory in Redmond, waiting f...

David Reeves, head of SCEE announced Sony's VE Day over Microsoft at the PlayStation Day event in London: "I am delighted to be able announce today that we have sold more PlayStation 3s throughout Europe than Xbox 360 - even though they launched sixteen months before PS3," The much anticipated announcement came a few months earlier than expected. Publishers have been eyeing the increased European sales for a few months and using words like "still born," "moribund" and "hit the wall" to describe 360's European performance. Apparently, David Reeves and the publishers didn't read Microsoft's announcement from one month earlier: Xbox 360 is the number one next-gen console in EMEA, owning 42% of the market in terms of life-to-date revenue. Xbox 360 continues to enjoy the highest software attach rate of any game console in Europe with more than 7.0 games sold per console (PS3: 3.8; Wii 3.5) after 27 months on the market. Microsoft...

Last month I reposted an article I wrote about the Xbox really being a no apologies, cable system. Yesterday, the New York Times wrote a story about Microsoft's commissioning of original, linear content for the 360. Another cable system building looking kind of a move. If Comcast and Time Warner Cable are not awake yet I don't know what other alarm bells they need. The move speaks strongly to the console wars as well as the cable world. Microsoft v. Sony When looking at a comparison of Microsoft to Sony, this story gives us a well enough defined view of corporate genomes to win the genomics Xprize. I said this before, but just a brief recap. . . Sony's corporate DNA dictates selling boxes. I will sell you a Playstation 2 and then in five years I will tell you it is obsolete and you have to buy a new one. Conveniently, in the last two console cycles, obsolescence coincided with the launch of a new media format (even the first one provided audiophile approved metho...

The console war continues after three Christmases for Xbox and 2 for Wii and PS3. While Microsoft feigned a a claim of victory as first to 10 million units worldwide, their press conference is starting to look more and more like George Bush in front of a Mission Accomplished poster. Microsoft has a lot to be proud of, if we focus on the US. In the month of December, Xbox sold 1.26 million units to PS3's 798,000 in the US. They don't like to talk about Wii which sold 1.35 million. For the year, Xbox almost doubled PS3's sale with 4.62 to 2.56 million units. Wii beat them both with 6.29 million. You can see more in real time at the bottom of this blog. Unfortunately, and it may sound un-American, but we have to consider the rest of the world. Xbox never made it out of the gate in Japan and still fails to sell. In Europe, sales have been trailing PS3 since last summer. According to Sony, the PS3 installed base is already larger in France, Spain, Germany and Italy th...

I wish I could say I hate to say I told you so, but I really don't. I kind of love it. On December 10, 2001 I published the article posted after the jump in the Gaming Industry News suggesting the Xbox was really a cable box. This was about two weeks after the launch of the Xbox. I thought it was kind of odd that while seriously defending itself against the Department of Justice, Microsoft was well beyond the central issue of that case. Publicly they were arguing over placement of the browser in the OS, in reality, the company was moving its focus to the living room. Much like cancer, Microsoft grows by metastasizing. If they get a foothold in your life, even if it is vaporware or buggy product, it is enough to iterate and grow. Anyone out like Windows 1x very much? My first Xbox - not so great. But my 360 is my friend. It will take media off my other computers and servers and deliver it to the TV, it will let me talk to others, it will even let me order HD movies at th...