Tag Archives: Screen Digest

Although analysts warn Nintendo not to rest on its laurels, the 3DS is now tipped to go from strength to strength.

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Screen Digest has predicted big numbers for Nintendo’s latest handheld, but warns it won’t outsell the other members of the DS family.

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Screen Digest has issued a report showing the MMO market was up for 2009, but average revenue was down.

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Screen Digest, a media analyst firm, has concluded that the online games market will grow 6 percent this year, with motion control being a “much-needed” console feature in order for the boxes to compete.

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Screen Digest has issued a report stating that despite the popularity of the online games market, publishers are gingerly adopting the trend due to retail relationships.

Not wanting to subvert these relationships, publishers are instead releasing titles that either cost little to digital distribute, or are undermarketed titles. Because of this cautious attitude, Screen Digest believes that consoles currently on the market are nothing more than transition devices that will become obsolete before their capabilities are realized.

Therefore, online downloads will not become viable until the next hardware generation is released.

“While the online console market is growing strongly and will provide welcome revenue in later years, today’s consoles have been consigned to the important, but ultimately limited, online market role of ‘transitional’ devices as the industry only slowly makes its way to a more online-console orientated framework.

“There will be a substantial addressable online market to exploit towards the end of the cycle, but it is likely that this opportunity will remain significantly untapped and it won’t be long before the industry will be forced once again to prepare itself for the next generation of hardware.”

The report indicates that ‘active online TV consoles’ will reach 79 million by 2010 but at the same time, users will only spend $1.2 billion annually on online downloads by 2013 which will be just 11 percent of the current-gen console market.

Full thing past the break.

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Screen Digest’s predicted that in-game advertising will be a $1 billion business within five years, according to this Media Week story.

A combination of audience media habits and the “unique advantages of dynamic in-game advertising” is forecast to drive spending to about one and a half percent of all digital advertising, says the report.

At that size, Screen Digest has predicted, the format will be impossible to ignore.

Full thing through there.

Analyst firm Screen Digest has estimated that MMO subscriptions grew 22 percent in 2008 and accumulated over $1.4 billion in Europe and North America.

World of Warcraft dominated the sector.

In a report titled “Subscription MMOGs: Life beyond World of Warcraft,” it is estimated that 58 percent of the share of western spending on subscription-based MMOs has amounted to $2.2 billion since 2005.

Free-to-play, micro-transaction-based games were not included in these findings.

By 2013, Screen Digest expects the subscription market to top $2 billion.

Press release after the break.

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Ed Barton, UK analyst for Screen Digest, has said that the British Wii price hike is “perfectly justified” and it should come as no surprise if Wii Fit goes up in price as well.

“‬If you look at the yen exchange rate over the pound in the previous year ‬it has changed by thirty to forty percent”, he said. “We looked closely at Nintendo’s figures in the last quarter and this exchange rate has absolutely murdered their operating profit.

“When you look at all the data and financials it wouldn’t surprise me if Nintendo raised the price of Wii Fit.‭ ‬The margin on games hardware and peripherals is a serious problem right now”.

Over on Edge, Barton goes on at length about how retailers should deal with the raised price. He also says that the hike may hurt smaller speciality stores.

Thanks, GoNintendo.

As if there were any real doubt about just how severely Activision Blizzard and EA now dominate videogames publishing in general, Screen Digest’s put out a report saying that games from the two firms now account for more than 75 percent of all console releases in the third quarter.

While it is unclear whether these numbers apply only to the European market or worldwide – Screen Digest is a European company – the publishers’ clout will carry into the fourth quarter, where their line-ups still account for 40 percent of all releases.

Ready for the September rush?

Thanks, Shacknews.

A panel of analysts at the Nordic Game 2008 pulled no punches and labelled Microsoft’s attempts to break into the casual market as “disastrous”, Eurogamer reports.

David Cole from DFC Intelligence together with Nick Parker, who runs Parker Consulting, and an analyst from Screen Digest were all united in their condemnation of Microsoft predicting that 2008 will be a struggle for the Redmond firm.

“The trouble with Xbox 360 is it hasn’t managed to shake off this urban, irreverent adult male feel; so it hasn’t gained traction in the more casual gaming markets of mainland Europe such as France, Spain and Italy, where it’s stalled,” said Parker who rather tellingly used to work for Sony.

“And there are already rumours of Xbox 360 being delisted from certain retailers.”

Loads more diatribe from the experts through the link.

By Mike Bowden