I don't agree with Ubisoft if only because of Ubisoft Montreal which has been touching gold lately.

I'm more worried about SE because they tend to support the PS3 too much for their own good.

 ditto.

Even if Square suddenly supported the Wii heavilly, the Japanese market isn't doing that well and they are the only big developer not to publish their game worldwide ( Ubisoft distributes their stuff in Europe I think) and the one that relies the most on domestic sales...

Square-Enix.

They've just made another, firmer commitment not just to more RPGs, but to more Final Fantasy RPGs, remakes, and all that dreck.

I don't see how limiting yourself to the tiniest of niches can result in anything other than stagnation and atrophy. I used to love Square in the PS1 days.

@ disolitude re: OS market

Lousy analysis countered with lousy analysis. Windows is far from dead, but Vista is cannibalizing XP installs. Not a big deal, except Linux and Mac OS are also eating XP installs. Microsoft's goose has stopped laying golden eggs, and you can bet Ballmer is sweating over it.

http://cybernetnews.com/2008/03/18/apple-computer-market-share-progress-report/

US numbers:
Looking at the numbers for February of 2007 compared to February 2008, Apple has every reason to be optimistic about current and future growth. In February 2007, their market share in the United States was 9% and this year in February it was 14%. This translates out to an overall PC growth of 60% and a 67% increase in revenue. More specifically, there was a 55% increase in desktop computers and a 64% increase in notebook computers.

So if that trend continues (60%), in 5 years, Apple will have most of the market. I am sure there will not be a 60% growth year over year (there can't be, because that would be 146% of the market in 5 years), but if the trend continues, Apple will have a huge portion of it.

Another thing is virtually all Apple sales are because people wanted the product. Most Vista sales are because it was a requirement (meaning the IT department required it, or software requirements).

As IT departments learn to accept UNIX OS’s, and more and more applications become web based, more and more people will go with what they want, and not what is required. Bad for MS.

MS has other strong area’s (the 360, applications, development tools, server tools and OS’s), but if they lose the desktop OS market, I don’t know what it will do to them as a company.

I think Ubisoft and Square Enix are the two best choices.

Ubisoft seems to be churning out disappointing games. Haze is just the latest. They'll probably continue to do fine, sure, thanks to the shovelware on the DS, but their reputation might very well take a massive hit, making them just a shovelware company. Maybe not though, they do still have a few top notch games. I'm undecided.

Square Enix is a good, if obvious, choice. Everyone knows how much they rely on Final Fantasy. A two year delay on XIII is not good for business. If the game is disappointing, it could be disastrous for them. Their moves following that might be Dragon Quest delayed, Kingdom Hearts delayed and then bankruptcy.

I could see Take 2 kind of becoming Rare-like if EA ever successfully completes their takeover bid.

Ballmer may be sweating a lot (he's a sweaty guy), but MS isn't really in danger of losing their golden goose anytime soon.  Windows will continue to hold 90% of the market for a long time -- Linux may become more accessible to the power user and very advanced users, but it's not making real inroads to regular home users.   Arguably, it's doing worse than ever.

Apple is in no danger of succeeding in the low end and even mid range market because they simply do not compete with Dell on price.  You can compare system specs until you're blue in the face (you can't buy non-xeon branded Apple towers, AFAIK), but $1000+ on a dell system is high end for Dell with a decent display and you can get systems with displays at the low end for only a few hundred.

As computers sell, so do Windows licenses.  That's just how it goes.  This comes from a long time linux user and unix admin. 

Does Ubisoft own Free Radical or did they just distribute their game ?
If it's the later they shoudn't take big of a hit from Haze, besides following the mega success that AC was I really would not worry ( best-selling new IP this gen...)

Konami. The only big game on the horizon is MGS 4. Their support for current gen consoles is lacking. The Wii gets all the shovelware, PS3 get a lot of praise and promises and the 360 some multi platform rhythm games. Their new Pro Evo did not do that well considering the rising production costs. There are dozens of games on the DS, but it is not enough to fund all the other projects.

 That's because Castlevania Wii hasn't been announced yet