I just watched a 1 hour 27 mintue round table discussion regarding the video game industry at gamespot. You'll need a subscription to view it. The conference had:
MS
Sony
Sega
EA
...and Nintendo declined to show.
Very interesting to hear what these guys had to say, and I must say that guy form EA had a pretty funny sense of humor. Althought he could appear a little arrogant at times...
They compared the movie industry to the game industry mostly, and talked about the changes in tastes people have had as they get older. All of these guys said the same thing. Before, the only games we could make looked like cartoons, and now we have the power to make games that appear more relaistic and still appeal to the older gamers. The appeal of characters and games like mario, has been replaced with games like GTA 3 & vice city. This part made sense to me since I've been saying the same thing for a long time. That people are getting older and thier tastes changed. I know that my tastes have also changed when I have Mario sunshine sitting here and I haven't started playing it yet. It's been two months... I can remember a day where that game would have sat there for more that two seconds without me playing it.
They also mentioned some interesting facts.
The average age of a PS2 owner is in thier early 20's
The average age of a Xbox owner is in thier mid to late 20's
...and then they followed up with the comment that nintendo would say there's 5 million new 6 year olds every year. I really wish Nintendo had a respresentitive there to to participate. Since there were a few shots at nintendo, and the shots at each other were pretty funny.
MS
Sony
Sega
EA
...and Nintendo declined to show.
Very interesting to hear what these guys had to say, and I must say that guy form EA had a pretty funny sense of humor. Althought he could appear a little arrogant at times...
They compared the movie industry to the game industry mostly, and talked about the changes in tastes people have had as they get older. All of these guys said the same thing. Before, the only games we could make looked like cartoons, and now we have the power to make games that appear more relaistic and still appeal to the older gamers. The appeal of characters and games like mario, has been replaced with games like GTA 3 & vice city. This part made sense to me since I've been saying the same thing for a long time. That people are getting older and thier tastes changed. I know that my tastes have also changed when I have Mario sunshine sitting here and I haven't started playing it yet. It's been two months... I can remember a day where that game would have sat there for more that two seconds without me playing it.
They also mentioned some interesting facts.
The average age of a PS2 owner is in thier early 20's
The average age of a Xbox owner is in thier mid to late 20's
...and then they followed up with the comment that nintendo would say there's 5 million new 6 year olds every year. I really wish Nintendo had a respresentitive there to to participate. Since there were a few shots at nintendo, and the shots at each other were pretty funny.