Posting some new Wii details (hehe..."Wee details") here instead of the other thread: http://revolution.ign.com/articles/703/703727p1.html (more about Madden Wii) http://revolution.ign.com/articles/703/703834p1.html (Super Monkey Ball Wii) http://www.gamespot.com/pages/news/show_blog_entry.php?topic_id=24568676&sid=6148621 (Kojima and Wii at E3?) Those are pretty long, so no quotes from them. I actually haven't even had a chance to read them yet; if no one picks the juicy parts, I'll try to post some of the more interesting parts later. BTW, does anyone have any article(s) about Nintendo being the most profitable of the 3 (by far)? That spurred my curiosity, yet the numbers I found had Sony ahead of Nintendo in profitability, although not by that much. I've yet to see anything that shows Nintendo being MUCH more profitable than the other two companies...well um...better make that just one actually. Edit: From the Madden interview: From the Super Monkey Ball interview: From the report about a Wii game by Kojima (went ahead and quoted it all):
Here's an article on nintendo's profits when compared to the other two. Keep in mind it is slightly old and doesn't assume the release of xbox360. http://nintendoinsider.com/site/EEEZuAypVuTuOJPzyb.php
The Xbox 360 probably wouldn't have any effect on that article. If anything, it would just make MS look worse than they are. Now, maybe the ~10M PS2s, the ~15M PSPs shipped/sold, and the 15M-20M DS handhelds sold since then would have an effect though. That's the one problem I have with using that article to conclude that Nintendo is the most profitable (by far) of the 3. If I understood the article right, it was looking at the early-2004 to early-2005 time period. This wasn't a normal time period for both companies AFAIK. Sony was using their razor/blade strategy by trying to get the PSP launched WW (which didn't actually finish until long after the FY IIRC); Nintendo, on the other hand, was going the opposite route, launching the DS and making a profit off it immediately. I guess another way of putting it is that if you wanted to, you could compare the FY that just recently started and will go until next year for the two companies (early 2006 to early 2007). Sony will probably lose ~$1B or so thanks to the PS3 (although it could have been worse), while Nintendo will certainly make a profit. But that won't be the case every year. For example, the two fiscal years prior to the ones mentioned in the article, I believe Sony made ~$650M and ~$939M on the PS business, while Nintendo made ~$316M and ~$560M. I could probably make an article stating how Sony is the most profitable (by far) by using those time periods to support the argument. The numbers usually go back in forth depending on the situation IIRC; in the end, the numbers I saw had the two sitting at about ~$5B a piece since the last few years of last-gen (like 98-99) to the last year or so. Now Nintendo is obviously more "stable" with their profits, and they're definitely more efficient (I guess that's what you'd call it), but Sony makes just about as much profit off the PS business as Nintendo from what I can tell. In fact, I think I should note that the Nintendo numbers include more than just video games; IIRC, they also include Nintendo toys and merchandise, which would include...you guessed it...Pokemon. It isn't as bad as the MS/XBX numbers (which include MS games for the PC, M&KB sales, and other highly profitable businesses), but Nintendo has some other sources of income in their numbers besides just the sales of their games and systems (console and handheld).
The article combines Sony's entire operations while limiting MS to its games division. Also, it combines Nintendo's entire operations to cover up the Gamecube's failures. I think that article was too optimistic and downplayed the importance of the console market. Nintendo has been consistently profitable. It's a company half the size of Sony without all the other electronics, so it really isn't that small...
No, I think those numbers were from SCEI (Sony's game division). They matched up with what I saw in the financial reports anyway (well, the numbers I bothered checking for anyway). Not sure about the MS numbers, although I assume they're from the Microsoft's H&E division. edit: I'm talking about where the author compares the profits between the 3 BTW ($400M for Sony). Not sure about all the numbers the author used.
The timing of the numbers. It's based on one year which is a year at the end of a consoles life. IIRC, the year before, Nintendo posted a rare quarterly loss. The article is totally framed towards the strength of Nintendo's handheld department.
Oh, I thought you meant some numbers were inaccurate or something like that. FWIW, I pretty much agree with what you said about the article.
