Which publisher could be next on the chopping block?

[Keoul]

Now what you have done there is mistaking a massive franchisee with a proportional upset fanbase for a massive upset fanbase.

ME3 did as well as you could hope for so to call it a fiasco is so out of touch with reality I dont even know where to start. SWTOR has cost EA a lot of money, but the thing about MMO's is that they are always an investment forward. Still I doubt they will see proper returns from that.

Sim City is in Beta so yeah.... there will be problems. They are supposed to be ironed out before launch. If you truely believe that this is DOA then you are living in an echo chamber. As of right now it can swing both ways.

Just saying that the way they've been acting they certainly won't be earning more, they're only heading downhill from here unless they make some major changes. I mean jeez have you seen the articles about EA? they had a stock price drop of 40%[footnote]http://www.escapistmagazine.com/news/view/121129-EA-No-Longer-Relevant-to-NASDAQ-Top-100 as of june 2012 a bit old but that's still a massive drop[/footnote]

I can´t believe that some people really think that EA is going to next, THQ and Midway had been on the brink for quite a while when they went bankrupt, EA is no way near that.

Heehee I may have started that, I just don't see EA surviving the next couple of years, it's stock has dropped dramatically. I mean come on it's only worth 14.77 dollars as of today, just 5 years ago it was at 48 ish, in just 5 years they've lost more than 50% in value.

Also Adept Mechanicus mentioned SEGA, 2nd page 2nd post.

 

[Terramax]

With THQ dissolved, it makes me wonder who could be the next publisher to fail. My lead contender is Sega since they don't seem to have any huge games in the works and they can only make so many sonic games.

What do you guys think?

I doubt it.

Sega are part of the Sammy Company, a HUGE gambling company in Japan. The most that would happen would be that they close several offices in places such as America and Europe, but I doubt there will be a demise anytime soon.

EDIT: I'm going to agree with the guy that mentioned Funcom. I think they've had financial problems several times due to bad predictions on game sales. It's only time before they make that one fatal mistake that finishes them off.

 

[Keoul]

No what you are saying is

Correlation = Causation

And that is false logic.

You are tieing your own personal grievances to a much bigger picture when you tie specific games to their stock drop. I did not deny their stocks going down. I denied that the reason for the stock going down was Sim City and ME3.

Obviously not Sim City, that was just an example of bad decisions that could possibly lead to their downfall. ME3 was just another example of how they've lost public trust and whatnot and the bad publicity they've got.

The fact of the matter being that they're sock has gone down dramatically and hasn't climbed back up yet, and with all these bad decisions they've made recently I just don't see their stock climbing back up.

Also I'm apathetic to the situation either way, I wouldn't say I'm tieing in my own personal grievances when I don't really care, EA just happened to be the first company to pop into my head when we're talking about gaming companies that aren't doing that well.

 

[Nero18]

Heehee I may have started that, I just don't see EA surviving the next couple of years, it's stock has dropped dramatically. I mean come on it's only worth 14.77 dollars as of today, just 5 years ago it was at 48 ish, in just 5 years they've lost more than 50% in value.

Also Adept Mechanicus mentioned SEGA, 2nd page 2nd post.

I dont know how Madden is doing in the states but there are still franchises that sell millions. They are far away from actually going bankrupt.

 

[Max_A_Buck]

I'm surprised no one's said Rockstar. Let's just see how GTA V goes.

 

[BrotherRool]

I'm not sure, Sony and MS possibly, if their companies are really as badly hit as people say. It won't be the fault of their gaming division, but I could believe that Sony's electronics division ends up taking everything else with it. But maybe Sony will live on but cutting it loose. They own most of the good small scale MMOs and have a good games library.

I think if Sega were to go they would have gone now. 2K is always a bit dodgy, they rely on big hits that are expensive and take a while to come out, but the ball has rolled with them so far. It couldn't survive a GTA not selling well, but all GTA's are going to sell well.

Ubisoft and/or Square-Enix are probably next. High development costs, recent risky investments. Their IPs are flagging somewhat, and don't have the same power they did before.

Ubisoft is doing great stock-wise right now, which is a solid (albeit not the only) indicator for their health. I'm pretty sure their last couple of years netted good profits.

Square's been losing consumer and investor confidence, has a declining stock, isn't making anywhere near the money it made even a couple years ago, and even its lead franchise doesn't seem to be saving it.

I think Ubisoft's going to do fine in the short run, but Squeeeenix is a far bigger question mark.

Though I still wouldn't be shocked to see EA go down.

Remember the Squeenix owns Eidos now. They aren't going down, they've got Tomb Raider, Hitman and Deus Ex to keep them strong.

On top of that Square Enix is a lot of companies Japanese publisher. I think even Modern Warfare got pushed out in Japan by Enix.

Really? EA may have a lot of failures but I think they have enough successful franchises to stay a float.

True but they've lost a LOT of money recently.
What with the SWTOR flop, Mass effect 3 fiasco, and now the Sim City Beta problems. A lot of people have lost faith in that company and that's gunna show in a the form of lost sales.

Which inevitably will lead to their downfall.

Mass Effect 3 sold 3.5 million copies and grossed $200 million, with several game of the year awards (boo) and extra income from DLC and an online-store. ME3 did well and made money.

The truth is, EA is probably making more money now they've gone back to evil. People hate the way the Sims is run yet game stores have entire sections dedicated to selling Sims expansions that everyone buys. FiFA can outsell CoD in any one country that likes football and Madden is similar in the US. They own all the sports games, the premier RPG manufacturer (and as much as everyone hates Bioware, I bet you the next Bioware RPG stills outsells the next Witcher game. Fan support keeps Double Fine alive, but thats the sort of scale it has an affect on. People don't need our love to make big money as a publisher. Mass Effect 3 proves that)

 

[The White Hunter]

With THQ dissolved, it makes me wonder who could be the next publisher to fail. My lead contender is Sega since they don't seem to have any huge games in the works and they can only make so many sonic games.

What do you guys think?

I don't really see Sega going down, they may not produce a vast quantity of triple-A games, but they do put out a fair few new IP's and are usually the one that publishes for Platinum, not to mention they have a healthy relationship with Nintendo and are advising on Bayonetta 2.

Sonic sells well if nothing else, but they do make a fair bit on RTS games like totalwar.

If they started making games with the goal of selling 5 million copies or the franchise wouldn't b worth investing, then Sega would be fucked.

I can't begin to imagine a publisher that would slate a game that they pretend is part of a rather niche genre (when it isn't at all, it's part of one of the most dominant of genres), and expect it to hit 5 million units...

Honestly EA is gonna end up in some trouble, the share prices are dropping and consumer and share-holder confidence is low indeed. But it's unlikely to happen soon, it'd take a couple more years and who knows, next gen could drag them back from the abyss.

I'd like to see Ubisoft go these days but it wont happen until AC10: FAFFING EDITION!

 

[The White Hunter]

Snip

I would like to affirm that Squeenix are indeed the Japanese publisher for Call of Duty.

Squeenix is doing well these days, sucesses like Sleeping Dogs kinda fuel them, just because shouty internet people don't like the latest FF iterations doesn't mean Squeenix is losing out.

 

[Lilani]

Really? EA may have a lot of failures but I think they have enough successful franchises to stay a float.

True but they've lost a LOT of money recently.
What with the SWTOR flop, Mass effect 3 fiasco, and now the Sim City Beta problems. A lot of people have lost faith in that company and that's gunna show in a the form of lost sales.

Which inevitably will lead to their downfall.

SWTOR did flop, but even though ME3 was met with a lot of criticism it still made them a very good pay day. And I'm not so sure we should count out Sim City just yet, they've still got time to pull it off and there are still people eagerly waiting for it.

 

[BrotherRool]

Snip

I would like to affirm that Squeenix are indeed the Japanese publisher for Call of Duty.

Squeenix is doing well these days, sucesses like Sleeping Dogs kinda fuel them, just because shouty internet people don't like the latest FF iterations doesn't mean Squeenix is losing out.

Heck, all else aside, FFXIII-2 had sold 3 million copies by last July. Even if they weren't doing very well as a publisher, their 'flagging' main franchise is a blockbuster success, despite not having much acclaim

 

[FFP2]

Square's been losing consumer and investor confidence, has a declining stock, isn't making anywhere near the money it made even a couple years ago, and even its lead franchise doesn't seem to be saving it.

I think Ubisoft's going to do fine in the short run, but Squeeeenix is a far bigger question mark.

As long as SE sells games in Japan they will never go down. They love the FNC games. Only Western people disliked FF13.

They also have the other studios (Eidos, Crystal Dynamics, IO Interactive, Rocksteady) that sell well enough in America to keep 'em going. And a lot of American games get published by them in Japan, most notably the COD franchise.

 

[Ironside]

Im quite surprised that so many people are saying EA will be the next one to go. Imo even though they seem to be run by lunatics who make constant terrible business decisions I think they will be able to survive as long as their monopoly on sports games exists since they make insane amounts of money from them (I believe fifa 12 was their biggest selling game last year).

I would say Sega would be the next to at least run into financial difficulties, but that is purely because the only games that i know of that they publish are the total war games and sonic. (There could be billions of games they publish that i dont know about though especially in Japan)

 

[The White Hunter]

Snip

I would like to affirm that Squeenix are indeed the Japanese publisher for Call of Duty.

Squeenix is doing well these days, sucesses like Sleeping Dogs kinda fuel them, just because shouty internet people don't like the latest FF iterations doesn't mean Squeenix is losing out.

Heck, all else aside, FFXIII-2 had sold 3 million copies by last July. Even if they weren't doing very well as a publisher, their 'flagging' main franchise is a blockbuster success, despite not having much acclaim

Most of the complaining about FFXIII and it's offshoots is done by an extremely vocal minority on the internet. I enjoyed 13 and 13-2, they weren't amazing butt hey were far from bad games, I'd like a more engaging and intelligent battle system next time though.

 

[BrotherRool]

Most of the complaining about FFXIII and it's offshoots is done by an extremely vocal minority on the internet. I enjoyed 13 and 13-2, they weren't amazing butt hey were far from bad games, I'd like a more engaging and intelligent battle system next time though.

I enjoyed 13, I thought the story was intelligent and the battle system in the last hourish became pretty fun. Apart from the insta death thing, the last boss fight was one of my more favourite gaming experiences.

I don't know if it was a good game though. There were lots of small problems with most things and the telling sort of distracted from the story. I heard that they had a really disrupted development process for FFXIII. I enjoyed it, but I think if I hadn't wanted to enjoy it I wouldn't have. But it didn't shake my faith at all that they can still make good games. There was just a lot going on for this one

 

[Strazdas]

Could or Should?
Could - Sega definatelly, Capcom
Should - Nintendo, EA

 

[ron1n]

Surprised no one has mentioned Warhammer Online amongst the financial woes of EA. They obviously didn't take as big a hit as they did with SWTOR but it was still a big budget MMO that failed in much the same way.

WAR>SWTOR>Warfighter. Doubt EA will go under, but I think they will significantly shrink in scope and be licking their wounds for some time.

Also people seem to be ignorant of the fact that a lot of these publishers don't solely rely on their big game releases.

SEGA for example has expanded into online gambling software and gambling machines which brings in significant revenue for them.

 

[Trull]

well since the wii U was a surprise fail (for Nintendo).. i think it will be the last console from them. there spot will be replaced by the steam box from valve. cuz there is always 3 competitors in this kind of race.

haahahahhahahahahaaha

Haven't you learned?

Haven't ANY OF YOU LEARNED?!

NINTENDO IS INVINCIBLE

(also, I'm pretty sure every household in Japan has like five snes', four n64's, 3 gamecubes, 2 wii's and a wii u in a pear tree.)

and if anyone thinks that nintendo SHOULD go, you're either a fool or have had 0% childhood. All they need is a slap in the face and to DO something with what they've got.

 

[D Moness]

Hmmm, I'm thinking ActiBlizz, especially the blizz side. They fucked up Diablo 3, noone even wants to hear about it, since they wasted so much money on it. Pandaria can hold on only for so long, and they seem to be not interested in fixing SC2 to make it an interesting buy. (Like some of the ladder maps are terrible)

I kinda hope they already release Titan and make WarCraft 4 and invest heavily in the progaming scene.

But then activision has skylanders.

As of December 2012, the Skylanders franchise sold more than $500 million in retail sales in the U.S., inclusive of accessory packs and figures. In 2012 alone, Skylanders Giants, the sequel to Skylanders Spyro's Adventure?the #1 best-selling kids' game of 2011?generated more than $195 million in U.S. sales.

As long as that Ip is going strong they do not have much to fear

 

[The White Hunter]

Most of the complaining about FFXIII and it's offshoots is done by an extremely vocal minority on the internet. I enjoyed 13 and 13-2, they weren't amazing butt hey were far from bad games, I'd like a more engaging and intelligent battle system next time though.

I enjoyed 13, I thought the story was intelligent and the battle system in the last hourish became pretty fun. Apart from the insta death thing, the last boss fight was one of my more favourite gaming experiences.

I don't know if it was a good game though. There were lots of small problems with most things and the telling sort of distracted from the story. I heard that they had a really disrupted development process for FFXIII. I enjoyed it, but I think if I hadn't wanted to enjoy it I wouldn't have. But it didn't shake my faith at all that they can still make good games. There was just a lot going on for this one

I think 12 was a better experience overall, it was much more expansive and the lore was amazing. Everybody seems to loathe it though...

 

[Something Amyss]

That reflects investor ignorance into the nature of the market more than anything. They hear epic scale fan whinging, and think that fans might actually do something proactive.They've realized that's not the case now, so I doubt a similar action will have a similar effect on their stock.

Except "investor ignorance" doesn't get cured overnight. This is evidenced by the fact EA's stock is yet to rebound. It's kind of crawling upward, but that doesn't scream that investors suddenly know better.

Remember the Squeenix owns Eidos now. They aren't going down, they've got Tomb Raider, Hitman and Deus Ex to keep them strong.

On top of that Square Enix is a lot of companies Japanese publisher. I think even Modern Warfare got pushed out in Japan by Enix.

Still not sure that'll save them.