Mid america industrial park

Reggie Fils-Aime, the long-time president of Nintendo America, announced earlier today that he is retiring this April. The face of Nintendo in the western market at game events throughout the years, he will certainly be missed. It is time for someone to step up and fill his presidential shoes, and Bowser has been elected to the seat. We are talking about Doug Bowser, who is currently the Vice President of Sales in Nintendo America. The coincidence with Mario’s arch-nemesis, King Bowser, is now the talk of the town. Will Bowser set the company on fire and lead it to a new era? Also, will the Nintendo Switch Mini debut soon? … [Read more...] about – America subsidiary taken over by Bowser as new president

Back in December, film editor and author Jason Bailey wrote a piece on Flavorwire called How the Death of Mid-Budget Cinema Left a Generation of Iconic Filmmakers MIA. He spins a tale of the booming movie industry of the ’80s and ’90s, when mid-budget films were commercially feasible and commonplace. By the turn of the century, however, the movie industry had bisected itself; studios stopped committing resources to mid-budget films, “betting big on would-be blockbusters” instead and generating a hard-scrabble indie scene in their wake. As Bailey’s title suggests, that dramatic shift uprooted a generation of brilliant filmmakers and cheapened the art of films and filmmaking for everyone. It’s no stretch to say we’re witnessing the same phenomenon in the world of MMORPGs. Our Titanic; their WoW Prior to 2005, mid-budget MMOs were common. We had a dozen or two of them, all contentedly putting out patches and … [Read more...] about Working As Intended: ‘Multiplex monotony’ and the death of the mid-budget MMORPG

In all our many roundups at the turn of the year, we’ve never done one on the legal dramas that have affected the MMO genre. That changes today! Of note, there’s… the lockbox scuffle as various countries turn their watchful gaze on the industry and self-regulation collapses in a puddle of shrugs; the Crytek lawsuit against Star Citizen studio Cloud Imperium; the potential for dead online games to skirt DMCA laws; multiple Pokemon Go-inspired lawsuits and criminal trials; the end of the Warner Bros. and Tolkien estate lawsuit; the continuation of the Oculus/ZeniMax Media lawsuit; the cease-and-desist filed against Asheron’s Call emulators; and a whole ton of Blizzard lawsuits, including the capsizing of the Bossland cheaters following multiple Blizz victories. My favorite, however, is Andrew’s research into whether lockboxes legally constitute gambling – from last January. Enjoy! Call of Duty swatting incident leads to man’s death in Kansas … [Read more...] about A look back at the MMO industry’s law dramas of 2017

The recently released Quarterly Mobile Index (Q2) 2017 report from Pubmatic had some mixed news for publishers in Asia-Pacific region: Leading YoY growth in monetized mobile web, header bidding impression volume grew the most in APAC. Lowest mobile web (display) eCPMs of all regions despite 48% uplift YoY. Massive drop in the share of monetized mobile app impressions (down to 6% from 12% the year before). Only 3% of all (global) mobile video impressions came from APAC. Now, all of that may be true. But it’s one platform, and there’s a whole lot more to the state of ad tech in a region as diverse as APAC that’s worth a look. Zenith’s Advertising Expenditure Forecasts states that between 2016 and 2019, advertising expenditure in Asia Pacific will grow by USD 30B. Put that in context: APAC will be contributing nearly 50% more ad dollars than… North America, which will grow by USD 20B. Western Europe, which will grow by USD 11B, Central & Eastern … [Read more...] about The State of Ad Tech Industry: Asia-Pacific

Welcome back to another edition of the MMO Business Roundup, random bits of industry news that are interesting but probably not worth their own post, let’s be honest. So we’ll start with Britain’s Prince Harry, who is apparently on a tear to show how out-of-touch he is. At a mental health event where he was rightly “smashing the stigma that surrounds mental health,” he also lit into Fortnite and social media, singling out the game as bad for children and in need of a ban. Gamigo’s ambitions apparently don’t stop with its buy-up of Trion Worlds last year: Yesterday the company announced it has bought out WildTangent, a games publisher that is probably best known for that annoying games program stashed on your new Dell or HP computer. The exact amount isn’t disclosed; the press release puts it in the “mid-single-digit million US dollar range,” and the company says it’d “expected to contribute to revenues with a … [Read more...] about MMO Business Roundup: Prince Harry vs Fortnite, China’s big thaw, Gamigo’s new acquisition, and industry transparency