
Not even Nintendo was immune from Activision Blizzard’s criticisms. Chief Executive Bobby Kotick, who runs the massive videogame publisher, had strong words for all three console manufacturers, citing the economic downturn as a significant problem that should have been attacked immediately.
The company, who’s titles include Call of Duty, Guitar Hero, and World of Warcraft, recently posted $981 million in net revenue last quarter, and was one of the few game companies to benefit from a profitable fiscal year. But based off Kotick’s words, this isn’t enough.
“I was disappointed not to see any sort of aggressive price cutting. Of all the things that the hardware companies need to be doing right now, it’s recognizing the difficulties of the economy and pricing their hardware appropriately.”
But considering companies like Sony Computer Entertainment posted a $605 million loss for the year ending March 31st, the hardware manufacturers may not have enough breathing room to appease the demands of Kotick and his fellow software publishers. A more economic strategy for Sony, Microsoft, and Nintendo would be to simply make their hardware more desirable through compelling software releases, which made a grand showing at E3, and keep the innovative firmware updates coming.
[Source]
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June 8th, 2009 at 11:06 AM
Is it just me, or do Activision seem to do nothing but moan lately?
Anyway, while we’re on the subject of price cuts, and seeing as Activision have made so much profit in just the last quarter, maybe they can start selling their games for £24.99.
No, thought not.
June 8th, 2009 at 11:13 AM
what a twerp
June 8th, 2009 at 11:24 AM
boring!!!! although a ps3 price cut might sell more consoles.
June 8th, 2009 at 11:39 AM
how about he cuts the price on his video games?
June 8th, 2009 at 12:13 PM
I can’t say that I disagree with the guy. Great read. I meant to give it a 5/5 but I hit 4 first by mistake.
June 8th, 2009 at 12:56 PM
@ TheHater
lol very true
June 8th, 2009 at 1:02 PM
lower the game prices Kotick
June 8th, 2009 at 1:42 PM
I think I remember when Activision used to build their own console with Coleco. If he is so disappointed about the current economy then maybe he needs to go through the company archives to find out how much money they lost when producing that console. Then maybe he would be believable so he could face the economic losses by making top rated hardware.
June 8th, 2009 at 2:57 PM
@ SPD55 – Nicely said.
June 8th, 2009 at 3:49 PM
I don’t blame him.
June 8th, 2009 at 4:52 PM
This is dissappointing to hear a represenative of Activision speaking like this. I prefer to hear information from Activision about what they can and will do with their products to help boost the economy.
June 8th, 2009 at 8:08 PM
LOOK WHO’S TALKING !
YOU SHOULD STOP MAKING GUITAR HERO GAMES EVERY MONTH , GREEDY PEOPLE !
June 9th, 2009 at 4:21 AM
HELL YA HAMMODY! WHO THE FRICK MAKES A BUNDLE OVER 150 DOLLARS WITH BRAND NEW INSTRUMENTS THAT ARE INCOMPATIBLE WITH THE STUFF PEOPLE ALREADY HAVE IN THEIR FREAKING HOUSES!
Blizzard better not have been saying that crap either. 40 dollars for WoW and expansion pack, 40 for the new expansion pack, and then like 150 dollars a year to play WoW…
They just need to stop making it overly difficult, stop trying to sell their own instruments by trying to make them incompatible iwth the RB instruments…
Let’s not freaking forget the DJ turntable coming out. Take your own damn advice activision.
July 15th, 2009 at 4:32 AM
[...] threatened to stop supporting the PlayStation 3 platform, a great bit of attention was garnered by an assortment of gaming blogs [...]