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Pachter: EA could delay GTA IV's April 29 release
Mr. Michael Pachter – everyone's favorite clairvoyant video game analyst – has a knack for making headlines. Whether it's "Pachter snubs pal Lohan in Viper Club debacle" or "EA could delay GTA IV's April 29 release" we tend to take notice. On the latest episode of Bonus Round, Pachter told host Geoff Keighley, "I think if EA takes over Take-Two, they have an economic incentive to delay [Grand Theft Auto IV]." What economic incentive might that be? Why, to hold the release until the far more lucrative fourth quarter. As for why Take-Two isn't simply doing that itself, the Pach explains, "Take-Two, financially, has to get that game out ... they need the money. They need to get it out." That's all well and good but, you see, it's just that we've had April 29th circled on our Strauss Zelnick pinup calendar (in permanent marker no less) for over two months and, since Peter Moore really dropped the ball, we also went ahead and got that date tattooed on our far less impressive biceps. So, to recap, if EA manages to merge their giant family with Take-Two's impressive roster, your plans for May are shot and we're going to have a funny tattoo story to tell the grandkids.
Pachter says 3-4 million for Wii Fit in 2008
Apparently, there's a lot of folks out there looking to tone up their life with Wii Fit. That's what Michael Pachter thinks, as he predicts a whopping 3-4 million copies of Wii Fit being sold in this year alone. That's a $90 package that he expects between 3 and 4 million folks to buy. Wow."Wii Fit will sell 3 million to 4 million in the US if they market aggressively," Pachter said. Well, if Pachter read Wii Fanboy, he'd know that they are putting a lot into their marketing of the game. And, if Pachter's lack of reading game blogs are any indication, the man is woefully under-prepared to make any kind of prediction.%Gallery-4745%[Via Gamespot]
Pachter: Shortages coming to an end later this year
Michael Pachter is at it again. This time, of all people, he spoke with a writer for the Dallas Morning News. Now, we're not experts in this institution that reports real world news, but we do know that video game news tends to usually fall below their radar. But they care about the Wii because, well, everyone and their grandmother bought one.Regardless, Pachter did, and he is saying that those of us in the U.S. need to blame it on the rain the Brits. You see, his estimation is that due to the weak U.S. dollar and high demand for the console in the UK, Nintendo has been shipping more consoles over there because they profit more from sales in that country. This has supposedly been the reason that store shelves in the U.S. still don't have the console stocked. His belief is that the console will be more readily available in the U.S. later on this year, when the dollar is expected to bounce back some. Based on the fact that the console released over a year ago, though, we're not going to hold our breath.[Thanks, Matt!]
Pachter: Take-Two's rejection of EA offer a mistake
Wedbush Morgan Securities analyst Michael Pachter jumped right on Take-Two's dismissal of EA's buyout offer and says it was "ill advised." GameDaily reprints Pachter's analysis in which he goes point by point over how, in his opinion, Take-Two's board screwed up. He believes the company was positioned to get even more money out of EA if it had offered a "friendly transaction" instead of continuing its "adversarial posture."Pachter believes that if Take-Two is holding out for more money following the release of Grand Theft Auto IV, the tactic is "naive at best, and disingenuous at worst." He states that GTA IV's sales will not ultimately impact the value of the company and that EA's $26 per share offer was done even with GTA IV sales in mind. Pachter goes on to say that if EA doesn't get controlling interesting of Take-Two with its tender offer, it will withdraw the offer and Take-Two's stock will take a 20% hit. He surmises the drop will be even worse if the market doesn't presume EA to be taking a walk around the block before picking up Take-Two later.
Nintendo plans largest-ever marketing campaign for Wii Fit
If anyone's going to get a workout from Wii Fit, it's going to be Nintendo's marketing department. According to Michael Pachter, Nintendo is preparing the "biggest marketing campaign in its history" for the North American release of Wii Fit on May 19th. He deduces that all of these marketing dollars won't be wasted on GameStop alone, but will be aimed instead at promoting in (and with) more mainstream retailers Target and Best Buy.Besides causing you to see Wii Fit freaking everywhere, this push will have a positive effect on the gaming world in general: according to Pachter, Nintendo will start increasing American Wii shipments by about 150,000 units a week. If you don't have a Wii yet, you can get some early exercise traipsing back and forth to Target for the next few weekends!%Gallery-4745%
Analyst: EA being Rockstar's 'white knight' is 'bullsh*t'
Amidst EA's hostile takeover of Take-Two, EA Chief Exec. John Riccitiello told the New York Times last week that his company would "represent a white knight" to a developer like Rockstar (GTA, Bully) and bring its games to a wider audience than Take-Two could. GameDaily spoke with a couple of the industry's leading analysts, like Janco Partners' analyst Mike Hickey, who called the "white knight" statement -- wait for it -- "total bullsh*t, and disrespectful" to Take-Two's new management team.DFC Intelligence's David Cole says that Rockstar doesn't need EA's help to bring its games to a wide audience. Wedbush Morgan's Michael Pachter thinks Riccitiello doesn't really understand the definition of a "white knight." He points out that Rockstar is no "damsel in distress" and could become independent, even though it wouldn't own GTA -- Take-Two owns the GTA IP and that belongs to whichever company owns it.Read -- Analyst: EA's Riccitiello 'Disrespectful' Towards Rockstar, Take-TwoRead -- New Shareholders to Weigh Take-Two Bid
Pachter: GTA IV could sell 9 million units by Halloween
Wedbush Morgan analyst Michael Pachter believes Grand Theft Auto IV could become the best-selling game of 2008, with $450 million in revenue and over 9 million units sold by the end of Take-Two's fiscal year (Oct. 31). He believes that GTA IV will ship 6 million units in its first week and sell 75% of that in a brief amount of time -- that means the game should not be difficult to find at any big box retailer. GTA IV is expected to mask the "underperformance" of other Take-Two games and make up "100% of Take-Two's earnings for the year."It's not all sunshine and lollipops, though, as Pachter questions the profitability of GTA IV's Xbox 360 exclusive downloadable content. The conclusion of some fancy math is that 50% of Xbox 360 GTA IV owners will have to purchase the DLC for Take-Two to generate cash from the deal, which Pachter believes is "not highly likely." Taking GTA IV out of the equation, Pachter continues to make his case for the EA buyout of Take-Two by saying the company continues to lose market share and revenues. GTA IV unleashes panic on Liberty City beginning April 29.
Pachter: EA will acquire Take-Two
Wedbush Morgan Securities' right-more-often-than-not analyst Michael Pachter believes that in the end EA will acquire Take-Two. Pachter prognosticates that EA will continue working angles for a takeover and is doing so to stop Take-Two's sports franchises, which he estimates will cost EA $150 million in operating profit this year. On Sunday it became public that EA was looking to gobble up Take-Two for $2 billion dollars, Take-Two quickly responded saying it wasn't interested. If EA does not acquire Take-Two then Pachter believes EA will attempt to purchase hire key personnel on teams like Rockstar and make its own version of Grand Theft Auto.Even if EA were to gain the rights to the GTA franchise and key people like the Housers were to quit, Pachter imagines the GTA series would still make around $150 million every year even without Rockstar North as developer; although he admits if Rockstar North were still in charge of the franchise it would make about $600 million every other year. There's still much more info to pop out of this rabbit hole of acquisition soon -- time to work on our Ferengi post images.Read: EA could make GTA games without Rockstar - analystRead: Pachter: Why EA Will Prevail and Acquire Take-Two
How accurate are your favorite video game analysts?
Man, being a video game analyst must be a sweet job. You can put out all sorts of crazy predictions and no one will ever call you on it if you end up being wrong, right? Well, yes, right, until today, because today Kotaku has completed a massive project to rank the truthiness of predictions from some of the most prominent video game industry analysts out there.The results show that even the best prognosticators out there aren't all that infallible -- Michael Pachter, Jeetil Patel and Mitshuhiro Osawa all top out the scale at 60% correct. That might not sound so good, but it looks absolutely glowing when compared to Billy Pidgeon's dismal 10% truthfulness rating (with 20% still to be determined). Want to avoid his ignominious fate? Just be like Piers Harding-Rolls and predict stuff so far into the future no one can tell how accurate your calls are until you've moved on to used car sales or something.The full piece takes an interesting look behind the scenes in analyst-land and provides some good reasons to be cautious of all those stories with headlines that start with "Analyst predicts ..." Do yourself a favor, take a few minutes and give it a read.
EA: Wii will continue to dominate
EA has decided to put on the Michael Pachter Hat apparently, as the company is betting that the Wii is going to continue its trend of crushing all of its competitors in the games space throughout this year. How do we know this? Well, let's just put it this way: many Bothans gave their life to get us this information.Actually, IGN published EA's projected numbers, which show the Wii selling between 5.5 - 6.5 million units in North America and 6.5 - 7.5 million units in Europe throughout the 2008 calendar year. This fantasy world in which EA has built for itself also has a nice gumdrop waterfall, we hear.We're not saying the Wii can't do those figures (we don't really have much experience in predicting the future), and EA's backing of Nintendo seems to be a sound enough strategy, but we're not sure we'd put the farm on Europe pushing more Wii units than North America this year.
Pachter: EA needs to produce investor guidance
Video game analyst to the stars, Wedbush Morgan's Michael Pachter, wonders why EA decided not to provide any guidance (forecast) for its upcoming 2009 fiscal year, which starts in April. He claims that EA is making a mistake by deferring the guidance until May, thinking investors have become tired of watching EA's stock hover around the $45 mark for the last four years. He goes on to say that shareholders want assurances of EA getting back to form, much like it was in fiscal year 2004 -- before it got stuck in a stock rut.Pachter's expectation for a guidance from EA stems from the belief that relatively new EA CEO John Riccitiello was planning on giving more visibility to investors. In addition, he cites EA's continued flirtation with a $60 stock price, which frequently falls back to $45. Pachter should get his guidance wish at EA's first-ever analyst day scheduled for Feb. 12, where the company intends to discuss future growth. Pachter maintains a "strong buy" rating for EA stock, but considering Activision Blizzard is now in the same ring as EA, it seems reasonable for EA to give an idea of future financial expectations.
Pachter: Take out Wii Sports, sell Wii for $199
Michael Pachter, the man who makes a living predicting sales trends and corporate decisions in the gaming industry, is saying that Nintendo should cut Wii Sports out of the package and sell the Wii for a cool $199. "I think that if Nintendo were to do so and cut the price to $199, it would still sell a piece of Nintendo software to 80% of new Wii purchasers, and would end up effectively lowering revenues per console by only around $10," he explained in an interview with Gamasutra. You see, Pachter thinks this is not going to be that great of a year for the Wii.Pachter further explains that the high-definition features of the other consoles make them "more likely to end up in the living room, which could relegate the Wii to the playroom." He says this could be bad for the Wii, as if it "is not at the center of the home entertainment system, software sales could suffer as a result."We can't say we particularly agree with Pachter. We're not sure we'd see Nintendo cut the price on the Wii anytime soon, and if they did, we would hope it didn't involve losing one of the best experiences one can have on the console, let alone the best Wiimote trainer we've ever had time with. What do you folks think?
Pachter foresees Wii coup in 2008
2007 was the year of the Wii. So, which console's cuisine will reign supreme in 2008? According to super-analyst Michael Pachter, that would be the PS3.In the latest issue of EGM, Pachter predicts that the Wii will fall to the PS3 this year. The thing that will bring about this fall is not software (well, that too), but price. That's right, Pachter predicts that the price will soon be right for the PS3. The Wedbush Morgan analyst stated, "I think the Wii momentum will last until the Playstation 3 is under $300, so another year."Perhaps Pachter is making too many assumptions: Will the PS3 drop to under $300? And if so, does that necessarily mean that Nintendo won't cut the price of the Wii to compete? If Nintendo doesn't price drop, will people even care (check eBay, for example)? Of course, it's his job to make assumptions, so we suppose we can't fault him for that.[Via NeoGAF]
Analysts sound off: What does Blu-ray winning mean to the PS3 and gamers?
The big boys of game industry analysis are back to tell GameDaily what they think this new Blu-ray tide of exclusivity will mean to gamers. Sure, the big talk is that Blu-ray winning could mean a PS3 price cut, but that'll only benefit those who don't already have the latest console Kutaragi built. For consumers with a PS3 snug at home, they should breathe a little easier knowing they won't have to buy another HD movie player in the near future. But what do the boys with the crystal balls think? Mike Hickey, Janco Partners: The PS3 will eventually receive an awakening as Blu-ray becomes the winning format, this will lead to larger install base and motivate third-party developers to the PS3. Michael Pachter, Wedbush Morgan Securities: Says Sony once said 70 - 80% of PS2 owners treated it as their first DVD player, he believes the same will hold true for HD movies -- except that there is currently only a 10% penetration with 1080p televisions. He also says there will be a sales spike later this year coinciding with another price cut. Colin Sebastian, Lazard Capital Markets: He says when consumers decide they "need" a Blu-ray player it certainly can't hurt the PS3, especially if its games improve and hardware prices decline. David Cole, DFC Intelligence: Doesn't believe Blu-ray is a determining factor in the console wars, but it is a nice bonus. He believes if a consumer were stuck choosing between two gaming platforms that were equal, then the Blu-ray might tip them over to the PS3. But he says the list for consumers goes: Price, good exclusive games, and, finally, Blu-ray. The boys of analysis have spoken, what do the ladies and gentlemen of these here internets believe?
Hickey and Pachter talk Blu-ray and PS3
Analysts. They say the funniest things. Two analysts have made their thoughts on Warner's choice to abandon the HD DVD camp very clear indeed. Both see this development as only being a good thing for, not only Blu-Ray but, as a result, the PS3. Mike Hickey of Janco Partners writes that "if Blu-ray can win the current format war, the true value of the PS3 can be unlocked, and will likely lead to an acceleration of PS3 sales". The ever-lovable Michael Pachter agrees, but indicates that sales of the PS3 will be intrinsically locked with penetration of HDTVs. Pachter further expects HDTVs to go from sub-10% penetration to over 50% later this year, which is when we're likely to see a spike in PS3 sales. Of course, all of this relies on Blu-Ray winning the format war. Though, with companies jumping off of HD DVD like rats from a sinking ship, we shouldn't have too much to worry about.
Pachter: 2008 should maintain 2007's sale momentum
Wedbush Morgan analyst and financial guru Michael Pachter believes that 2008 is going to start strong by using 2007's already vigorous sales momentum. Pachter postulates that the NPD numbers for December will break records and that the "first several months" of '08 having a strong release schedule should continue "double-digit sales growth." Pachter expects to see US publisher stocks continue appreciating as the year gets started and we're guessing he also meant to mention Atari as the big exception in that statement. Gamers could probably keep the industry flying high just trying to get through '07's year-end glut of titles at this point.
Midway looks to Hollywood tie-ins in 2008
2007 was not exactly a banner year for Midway, with the company still doing its best Atari impression with its pocketbook alongside lowered financial forecasts, f*cked up development, and a string of delays. Like a good little soldier, however, the publisher has kept its eyes on the horizon, though we're inclined to chalk up its newly revealed plans to achieve financial security by investing in Hollywood tie-ins to too much holiday eggnog. Something tells us this was not what Pachter had in mind when he said Midway could be just one franchise away from financial freedom. The company has already announced new NBA Ballers and Blitz games for the new year, and also plans to helm the video game prequel to the Vin Diesel flick Wheelman, though Midway CEO David Zucker describes the firm's 2008 strategy as one of "fewer, bigger, better" releases. Honestly, if we were Midway we'd take just one of those three and count ourselves lucky.
Pachter thinks Mass Effect is coming to PS3
Michael Pachter has certainly had his hits and misses, but if his latest hunch turns out to be true, we'll be pretty damn happy. While filming an episode of Bonus Round on Gamespot, Pachter suggested that EA will port Mass Effect to the PS3. Since EA expects $300 million in revenue a year from Bioware and Pandemic, it wasn't looking to only publish games on the 360, he said."I wouldn't be surprised if Mass Effect 1 came to PS3, the Wedbush Morgan analyst said. "It has to."After already selling a million copies in three weeks, Mass Effect is a certifiable hit, and we all know much EA likes to spread its library across as many platforms as possible to maximize revenue. We just hope that if it does happen, it will be as soon as possible, or if we do have to wait awhile, we can get some exclusive bonus content. We just can't get enough of that lesbian alien sex![Via Joystiq]
Pachter: GTA IV is not a Take-Two panacea
Take-Two might be seeing improved financials, but Wedbush Morgan analyst Michael Pachter is tapping the brakes if the company thinks Grand Theft Auto IV is going to drive profits and be a "panacea" for all its ills. Giving GameDaily some fancy financial math, Pachter lays out that Take-Two management is operating in a fantasy world if they think their profit forecasts are credible. Pachter goes on to say that Take-Two still receives a "Sell" rating and questions if management is even capable of turning the company around.He then plunges the dagger deep into Take-Two management not only over fiscal issues, but basic management. He believes they are sincerely trying to turn the company around, which continues to operate at a loss, but that they have "not managed a business like this one in an environment like this." He doesn't understand why there weren't staff reductions after the "abysmal performance" of All-Pro Football -- especially with EA having the NFL in its pocket. Pachter believes investor confidence in Take-Two is unfounded and reminds the company had a cumulative operating loss of $450 million between Feb. '05 and Jan. '08. He concludes that investors and management have "overconfidence in the performance of GTA IV."%Gallery-3442%
Pachter insists Mass Effect coming to PS3
Wedbush Morgan analyst Michael Pachter is all but certain the Mass Effect trilogy is going multiplatform. In the latest episode of GameTrailers' Bonus Round (start about three-fourths of the way into the video), Pachter notes that, given the financial expectations Electronic Arts has with its recently-acquired developer, Mass Effect 2 "has to, has to" come to the PlayStation 3 in addition to the Xbox 360.More interesting is what Pachter says after his ME2 assertion. "I wouldn't be shocked if Mass Effect One came to the PS3," he said. We aren't sure the exact details of EA's acquisition, but we do know the original Mass Effect was published by Microsoft Games Studio, leading us to assume it was a safely exclusive title. Could EA port and publish the game on Sony's console? We doubt Microsoft would be willing to let that platinum-selling title go without a fight.
