| kamil said: New Zealand 01 Wii Fit (Wii) 02 Star Wars: The Force Unleashed (PS2) 03 Star Wars: The Force Unleashed (360) 04 Star Wars: The Force Unleashed (PS3) 05 Wii Play (Wii) 06 Fifa 2009 (PS3) 07 Spore (PC/MAC) 08 Wall-E (PS2) 09 Rugby 2008 (PS2) 05 Warhammer Online: Age of Reckoning (PC) 10 The Sims 2 Aparment Life (PC/MAC) NZ no longer HD/PS2 bastion? |
This just goes to show how important marketing is. HD sales were always low compared to what PS2 did, but Nintendo's distributor did a terrible job, which made the HD consoles look like they were performing better than they were. Since NZ's Nintendo distributor went bust, and Nintendo's Australian subsiduary took over there has been a complete turn around in Nintendo's fortune. Both HD consoles have the benefit of a large installed base advantage though due to the incompetence of the previous Nintendo distributor. It's really quite amazing how a company distributing the hottest console ever managed to go bankrupt.
Different topic, but why haven't EA released Rugby XX on current gen consoles yet? Apparently they're not even releasing an 09 version on PS2. They pay for the exclusive license, and from what I've heard they treat the franchise like dirt. They don't even bother to update the form of the teams on each release so that teams which were good years ago but have since dropped in form are still good in the game. I realise that the Rugby game market doesn't compare to FIFA or Madden, but the HD console installed base in UK/AU/SA/NZ is over 5m, and that's not even including countries like France where it's a pretty big game too. It seems that EA just buy the license to stop others from releasing those games, rather than putting the effort in themselves. You have to wonder how FIFA or Madden would be if it wasn't for PES or NCAA. Codemaster's did a fantastic job with Jonah Lumu's Rugby, and it has to be said with Brian Lara's Cricket too, but EA's output just does not compare. Maybe because EA dish out their Rugby game to Canadian devs? They really should be using UK or AU devs for rugby games, but I guess with tax breaks Canadian devs are cheaper.
Well, as a big F1 fan I was disappointed that Codemasters got the F1 licence, worried that they will just use the GRID engine, but looking at what EA do when they have no competition then I guess it was the best option available.
Seeing all the effort Microsoft have put into Japan I'm really surprised that they haven't put the same effort into Europe picking up all the sports that SCEE and third parties have ignored. If they had exclusive F1, Rugby, and Cricket then I don't think PS3 would have caught up anywhere near as fast.
