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146 exhibitors sign on for post-earthquake TGS 2011, up from 138 in 2010
CESA revealed today that 146 companies (including 34 from outside of Japan) have agreed to exhibit at the 2011 edition of the Tokyo Game Show "despite the Great East Japan Earthquake," a show of force that proves "that games are loved by people all over the world." That's more than the 138 companies that came to the Makuhari Messe venue last year, pre-earthquake. They'll all be operating their booths with reduced power usage, as the show seeks to drop electricity consumption by 25% versus 2010. The list of exhibitors includes perennial attendees like Capcom, Square Enix, and Sega -- but, startlingly, TGS show floor superstars Level-5 are listed only in the "Business Meeting Area." No Level-5 booth? What line are we going to stand in for the entire first day?
TGS hosting charity auctions and other fundraisers this year
The earthquake and tsunami in northern Japan won't stop the cosplay, commerce, and inevitable, infinite Monster Hunter lines that represent the Tokyo Game Show. Organizer CESA announced today that the 2011 edition of the Japanese trade show will be held on schedule, from September 15-18. The Makuhari Messe convention center suffered some damage, but repairs are already underway. The show won't ignore the current situation in Japan, however -- it'll use its ability to gather massive numbers of people (with disposable income) for good. Charity auctions and "other fund raising initiatives" will take place, in order to gather some money for relief. That'll be our excuse for spending way too much money at TGS this year, as opposed to our usual excuse, which is ... oh, we never bothered to come up with one.
Tokyo Game Show 2011 makes hearts dance Sept. 15-18
Tokyo Game Show organizer CESA has announced the final dates for this year's event: September 15 through 18, at the usual Makuhari Messe venue in Chiba. After announcing last year that it was considering axing one of the business-only days for TGS 2011, CESA has decided to keep the two-business-day and two-public-day structure in tact. For which we business-only types, and everyone who has ever tried to play any Capcom, Square Enix or Level 5 game at TGS, say thank you. Following up on amusingly upbeat slogans like "GAME, it's so energetic" and "GAME goes to a new chapter," the tag line for this year's event is (according to Andriasang's translation) "If your heart dances, it's a game."
Marvelous caps 3DS game development at $1.8M per title
During a recent investor call, Marvelous Entertainment, the publisher best known for its Harvest Moon games, revealed its budget range for 3DS game development. According to the transcription of the call's Q&A session (as translated by 1UP), a Marvelous representative said that, "while costs vary based on game content," the company would spend an estimated ¥50 million to ¥150 million ($600K to $1.8M) on the development of a single 3DS game. Currently, Marvelous has two 3DS projects in the works, a Harvest Moon game and a zoo sim called Animal Resort. Not surprisingly, Marvelous' 3DS spending money is significantly higher than the ¥4.4 million to ¥43.9 million per title (roughly $50K–525K) Japanese companies spent on developing (regular) DS games last year, according to data gathered by TGS sponsor and promotional organization CESA. More interestingly, Marvelous' ¥150-million cap for a 3DS game represents a figure more than double the cost of the last year's most expensive Japanese PSP title, which, while unnamed, cost ¥59.2 million to develop by CESA's account. (The cheapest PSP game cost its maker just ¥3 million.) If Marvelous' budget is indicative of other companies' 3DS game costs -- and, certainly, some of these guys are likely to splurge -- then developing for the platform could prove more expensive than for Wii, where last year's most expensive Japanese project topped out at ¥116 million. In an era when budget gaming is dominating the handheld market, and following the disastrous combination of costly PSP game development and rampant piracy, the 3DS could be as ill-fated as the 3D technology that requires you to wear glasses. Well, that, or it'll just "print money" ... in 3D.
TGS 2011 provisionally dated, TGS 2010 audience breaks record
Tokyo Game Show organizer CESA announced the dates for next year's event: either September 15 through 18 or September 16 through 18. The reason for the uncertain date range: CESA has yet to decide whether to cut one of the two business days from the schedule -- otherwise known as the "we actually get to see and play things" days. In addition, CESA also announced record-breaking TGS 2010 attendance. 207,647 people in total showed up over the four days of the event, the first time it's broken the 200,000 mark. This is despite slightly smaller numbers during the business days, and the smaller size of the show overall. Basically, it means that more people were crammed into the Monster Hunter line at one time than ever before. [Pictured: Monster Hunter Portable 3rd line -- on a business day]
CESA: 5.2 million illegal downloads of Dissidia: Final Fantasy in Japan
Siliconera has some more insight on those Consumer Entertainment Software Association piracy figures, and while the "money lost" totals are still a little inflated (it's very hard to agree with the sentiment that all pirated software would otherwise have been purchased legitimately at full price if not for piracy), the actual downloads are pretty surprising. Dissidia: Final Fantasy is the big winner (loser?), with over 5.2 million illegal downloads onto Japanese PSPs. Phantasy Star Portable 2 and Dynasty Warriors Strikeforce were also heavily pirated, with 4.6 and 2 million illegal copies downloaded, respectively. Fortunately, outside of a few major titles, downloads drop off pretty sharply -- by the end of the top 20 in sales, they're at a few thousand or 10 thousand downloads each, rather than millions. Piracy is definitely still an issue (and a growing one -- the first Phantasy Star Portable only saw just over half a million illegal downloads a few years ago), but in Japan it appears confined to a small group of extremely popular titles.
CESA calculates gaming industry losses due to portable piracy
Japan's Computer Entertainment Suppliers Association recently conducted a study of the the world's 114 most popular sites for illegal game downloads in order to get a rough estimate on how much the industry has lost due to software piracy. The results aren't pretty: According to Andriasang's report on the group's calculations, piracy on the DS and PSP alone between 2004 and 2009 cost the worldwide games industry roughly 3.816 trillion yen, or around $41.7 billion. Join us in a "holy crap," won't you? Holy crap. CESA noted that peer-to-peer downloads couldn't be tracked under their study, so the actual results could end up being much higher than this initial figure. We guess the industry's learned a pricey lesson about ... umm, DRM restrictions, or day-one paid downloadable content, or dedicated servers, or selling things at a negotiable price for charity.
TGS organizers announce plan to expand for 2010
Attendees of Tokyo Game Show 2010 will have more to see and do -- or, perhaps, more to wish they could see and do while they're in line for a Final Fantasy demo. CESA announced several new additions to the show, which takes place September 16-19. New segments of the show floor will be devoted to PC hardware, gadgets, and mobile. An International Career Pavilion will help companies recruit foreign talent, and a PC Online Game Business area will "provide opportunities to present and discuss licensing, sales, and partnership regarding PC online games." Also toward the goal of boosting business, TGS will host an Asian Game Business Summit. Publishers will now be able to sell games in the Merchandise Sales Area, in addition to swag. The Kids' Area will be expanded into a Family Area, with no restrictions on the number of games on display. Some of the additions seem to be focused on promoting Japan in general: tours will now be available for foreign visitors, along with an Asian Culture Hub.
Monster Hunter 3, two Sega games honored by TGS organizers
CESA announced their list of the best games of TGS 2008, known as the "Future" category of their Japan Game Awards. Of the twelve games given the award (in no specific order), three are on Wii. Of course Capcom's Monster Hunter 3 got a nod; nothing short of not calling it Monster Hunter 3 will keep this from being a ridiculous hit in Japan, and that held true at TGS as well, with the game commanding ridiculous lines. But the two other Wii winners may be more of a surprise: Chunsoft's Sega-published visual novel 428: The World Doesn't Change Even So, and Prope's experimental Let's Tap. Sega must be very happy right about now!For the sake of Nintendo fandom, we'll include the DS winners here as well: the Phoenix Wright spinoff Gyakuten Kenji and Dragon Quest IX, which wasn't even playable.%Gallery-27138%[Via Kotaku]
TGS 2008 dated Oct. 9-12
Tokyo Game Show organizer CESA has announced that the annual trade show will be held October 9-12 this year, several weeks later than its typical September arrival. TGS 2008 will be hosted in the show's usual spot, the Makuhari Messe convention center, and, like last year, the first two days will be closed to the public. With E3 retaining an invite-only policy, expect TGS to continue to be the world's largest games event, with Leipzig Game Convention a close second.[Via Gamasutra]
Metal Gear wins the future
The people of CESA sure love Metal Gear Solid: Portable Ops. They gave it a "Best of Show" award at Tokyo Game Show a few weeks ago, and now they're willing to give it the prestigious "Future Award," which is given to games which are sure to be hits in the future. It joins other games such as Blue Dragon for the Xbox 360, Elebits for the Wii, and Heavenly Sword for the PS3.Monster Hunter Portable also won a "Special Award." The game gets to wear a special hat and sit in the corner because of it. Check out the rest of the winners at Siliconera.
Picture It: scoring an invite to the new E3 [update 1]
In the wake of just-released information about the new mini-E3, we present to you this guide to getting an invite to the new, downsized show. An invite-only event in which publishers decide which outlets get to cover them creates conflicts of interest. Given limited space, publishers will naturally want to invite only those outlets that give them favorable coverage (and positive reviews). Some sites will take the cue and will obligingly pull punches. It could get ugly. Browse previous Picture It posts here. [Update 1: Fixed queue / cue error. Oops.]
TGS 06: Best in Show, according to CESA
The mighty Computer Entertainment Software Association of Japan revealed the eleven titles they thought were the "best in show." Of those titles, two were exclusives for the PSP. Here are the winners, in no particular order: Elebits (Konami) for the Wii Gyakuten Saiban 4 [Phoenix Wright] (Capcom) for the DS Gran Turismo HD (Sony) for the PS3 The Eye of Judgment (Sony) for the PS3 Seiken Densetsu 4 [Dawn of Mana] (Square Enix) for the PS2 Tales of Destiny (Namco Bandai) for the PS2 Blue Dragon (Microsoft) for the Xbox 360 Heavenly Sword (Sony) for the PS3 Metal Gear Solid Portable Ops (Konami) for the PSP Monster Hunter Portable 2nd (Capcom) for the PSP Lost Planet (Capcom) for the Xbox 360 This should come as no surprise. There are so many excellent games at TGS this year, that it must've been nigh impossible to even narrow the list down. But, for those of you that are battling a fanboy war, you might want to note that PSP got two titles, and the DS only got one.[Via Joystiq]
