UEFA-Euro-2008
Latest
EA doubles Q1 revenues, troubled by $95 million loss
Monolithic publisher EA has reported the preliminary financial results for its first fiscal quarter, ended June 30, 2008, and noted a dramatic increase in net revenues. Despite sales rising $409 million to $804 million (more than double that of Q1 2007's $395 million), the publisher still suffered a net loss of $95 million, which according to our admittedly rudimentary mathematical abilities, is smaller than the previous year's $132 million. We want net loss to be smaller, right?EA's rise in sales can be attributed to the strong commercial performance of titles like UEFA Euro 2008, the "continued strength" of Rock Band and Battlefield: Bad Company, which managed to shift 1.6 million copies. "We are now seeing the early returns of the change agenda we started last year," stated CEO John Riccitiello. He went on to use words like "innovation" and "quality" to describe EA's forthcoming lineup, calling it "the best title portfolio in the company's history." We would totally agree, especially after experiencing the publisher's strong E3 showing ... but we're worried that doing so might just trigger Armageddon.
EA sorry over Irish anthem gaffe in UEFA Euro 2008
EA Sports has apologized for putting "The Soldier's Song," traditionally sung at United Ireland games, in place of Northern Ireland's national anthem, "God Save the Queen," in UEFA Euro 2008. Northern Ireland's Londonderry Sentinel reports fans were surprised to hear the anthem representing their country's victory in the game.What we're surprised to hear is that it took until now for this faux pas to come out. UEFA Euro 2008 released back in April. Was nobody playing as the Northern Irish team?[Via MCV]
Shipping this week: soccer spotlight edition
click to enlarge Another week beyond the Grand Theft Auto IV launch, another super slim lineup of new games. By super slim, we mean precisely one game. The game in question is UEFA Euro 2008 from Electronic Arts. After a quick wiki, we have discovered that UEFA stands for Union of European Football Associations, so ... it's a soccer game then. But what's this? According to Metacritic, it's actually a pretty good soccer game. For all the true football fans out there, this week is for you. The rest of you can wait for June 3.[Via Joystiq]%Gallery-18193%
ORF HD launches on SES Astra May 1
SES Astra doesn't seem to have trouble filling Sat.1 and ProSieben HD's transponder, its latest HD channel is German speaking broadcaster ORF HD. Scheduled to kick off May 1, it should offer all of ORF1's HD content including all 31 UEFA EURO 2008 matches.That's a good number, since SES Astra and SES Sirius now offer a total of 31 HD channels via satellite including BSkyB, BBC, Discovery, National Geographic, Canal+, M6 and others, with plans to reach 100 channels by 2010. Astra and ORF will team up on marketing the new channel and could possibly add more HD programming in the future, which should hopefully bring the end to any more HD contraction stories out of Europe.
