Wedbush Morgan analyst Michael Pachter recently shared with us his insight on yesterday's pricing and release date announcement for the Nintendo 3DS. He predicts that the 25,000 yen ($299) price point for the Japanese launch of the handheld will depreciate somewhat as it travels to Western markets, arriving in the U.S. for $250, Europe for €250 and the U.K. for £200. And although Nintendo of America CEO Reggie Fils-Aime stated the 3DS would "launch in all of our major markets by March 31, 2011," Pachter foresees an even later arrival in the West.
"Looking at how Nintendo does things," Pachter said, "if you're launching February 26 in Japan, and their earnings reports say before the end of the fiscal year in U.S. and Europe -- is there any prayer, even a 1 percent chance that they'll launch a week later in the U.S., March 5? No freaking way. It's not even remotely possible they're launching first half of March. I'm betting it gets delayed until April in Europe and U.S.."
Some analysts have balked at the fairly high Japanese launch price of the 3DS. Though Pachter admits the launch price is "higher than what's customary" for the handheld market, he said the market will bear the toll -- a lesson hard learned by Nintendo when it launched its latest home console.
"They screwed up on the Wii. It was sold out for two full years! You just couldn't get one," Pachter said. "What was the point? They should have sold it for $300 at launch, and made another $50 for every Wii sold during that period. It sold so competitively in the first few weeks that it was going for $1,000 on eBay -- and they absolutely don't want to see the 3DS on eBay."
#3ds
The one big surprise from yesterday's 3DS reveals from Nintendo was the fact that, even in Japan, the handheld would be missing the 2010 holiday season. Turns out it wasn't supposed to be that way. More »
Here's more proof that Ubisoft hasn't forgotten the Beyond Good & Evil franchise: The company is in the process of remastering the Michel Ancel-directed adventure classic for release in 2011 on PlayStation Network and Xbox Live Arcade. According to IGN, Beyond Good & Evil HD will run at 1080p resolution and feature updated character models, higher-resolution textures and a remastered soundtrack, along with Trophies and Achievements.
Beyond Good & Evil was first released on Gamecube, Xbox, PS2 and PC in 2003. Like Okami, it is considered by fans to be one of the best Zelda games ... that, you know, isn't actually a Legend of Zelda game. Beyond Good & Evil HD coming to PSN, XBLA in 2011
#ubisoft Beyond Good & Evil, one of the best (and yet under-appreciated) games of the previous hardware generation, is to receive a well-deserved re-release in high definition, Ubisoft has revealed. More »
#kinect
The Xbox 360's Fall Update will be with us soon, but for some, a preview went live earlier today, bringing with it a whole range of new additions and features. More »
Parisian gallery Arludik will feature concept art created for the Assassin's Creed series during the month of October. "Assassin's Creed L'Exposition" will run from October 5-30 and features 35 pieces of original concept art. Ubisoft claims the canvases have been appraised between €600 ($820) and €2,000 ($2,725).
If you'd like to own a piece of the exhibit, two pieces were selected to have a limited run of 149 lithograph prints. Those will go on sale, likely in the limited edition section of the gallery's website, for €80 ($110). Those pieces will come with a certificate of authenticity and will be hand-signed by Ubi's graphic art director. Proceeds from the sales will be donated to MO5, an organization seeking to preserve the history of video games.
#art
Halloween is right around the corner, and while for some it means costumes and candy, for us, it means a few weeks of pumpkins with video game characters carved into them. More »
Sure, lots of players are building memories and geek tributes in the incredibly popular indie sandbox game Minecraft, but here's something actually functional: a working 16-bit ALU (arithmetic logic unit) designed entirely in the game. The "wires" are made from Redstone, a unit in the game that can carry a fiery charge. So to calculate numbers, creator "theinternetftw" just lights torches representing binary numbers on one end, and then waits to see which torches (representing binary digits) light up on the other; giving him the mathematical answer he's looking for. Crazy? Yes. Nerdy? Very. Awesome? Indeed.
All the hard work must have been worth it -- theinternetftw has been posting about the project on Reddit and reportedly got a job offer out of it. But he's not done yet: He wants to add some memory to the computer and even make it "Hack" compatible, which means it would compile and run actual code (albeit very, very slowly). Said Minecraft creator Markus Persson via Twitter last night, "I saw the ALU, and I wet myself! Seriously, I got a hose and wet myself. With pee."
#politics
Jens Stober thought making a game about the Berlin Wall would be a good way to help teach kids about one of the less pleasant aspects of modern German history. Other Germans disagree. More »
"Dance Fortress 2" may only be 40 seconds long, but it's something you'll probably watch over and over again. Created by animator James Benson over four months, the scene features several elaborate dances by the Team Fortress 2 cast.
If you're interested in viewing each dancer separately, you can find all those clips on Benson's YouTube channel. And, before anyone asks, the song over the credits comes from You Have to Burn the Rope, which you should totally play!
#thehorror
The Nintendo 3DS has a cute little party trick, where it can take pictures of two people's faces and combine them into a single image. A hybrid. Which would be cute were the first example not two Nintendo big-wigs. More »
As fervent opponents of books and all they stand for, we're delighted to report the biggest thing on Amazon's Kindle e-book reader isn't a book at all, but rather EA's port of Scrabble, which is topping the paid charts. Hey, books? Just give it up already, OK? You're embarrassing yourselves.
#nintendo
Last night, Nintendo of Japan assaulted us with details on the Nintendo 3DS, which we won't get our hands on until early next year. Amidst the new games and new features were buried some lower-key but still impressive details. More »
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