A lot of us keep pointing to the 10% industry growth this year as proof that things are just fine. Let me tell you where that 10% growth came from. It starts with an "N" and ends with "intendo." That's where your industry growth in these lean times is coming from. And as it has already been established, Nintendo has been…
EA was at 6% when you wrote that. They've now announced up to 10% layoffs, about 1000 people, and you can say goodbye to Black Box in Vancouver. This is clearly not just seasonal fat-trimming, this is a bad economy magnifying the problems of a bad business structure.
The problem is that they are selling the same amount as they did the last generation but they cost 10 times as much to make. See the problem? Outsourcing is not going to cure that. Only the biggest of the big hits can actually make that business work for them. Haze is a perfect example. Free Radical basically had to bet…
The industry is definitely not collapsing. Just changing, you could say evolving. I'm not sure if the team of 20 outsourcing to 100 ppl in China or elsewhere is a long term evolved strategy either. But for now I think it's something we'll see more. In the short term, if you take out the credit crap this is pretty much par…
On the one hand, that is an interesting idea. On the other hand, I find it hard to believe that all of the companies that are currently in trouble are shutting down their doors due to faulty management. Perhaps I just feel that management is a very obvious scapegoat. But then again, this argument may have merit. Most of…
http://www.cnn.com/2008/TECH/12/19/video.game.sales/index.html The market grew 10% this year. That is pretty massive. These big companies and publishers want to exploit that bigger market. They need people to do that. Obviously then the people they are cutting and the shops they are closing are ones they feel are were not…
I don't think there is anyone here saying its normal and no one has a right to worry. What I see people saying is that, because of a FEW FACTORS one of them being typical post crunch layoffs, bad management, economy in the toilet, things are a little bleaker then normal, but don't worry because as a whole the industry is…