Spirited News, Observations & Thoughts IV

[lazyboy97o]

Here's a side tangent....

Take Two Interactive.... parent company of Rockstar Games.... just grossed $1B in less than a week from Grand Theft Auto 5, a game that cost in the neighborhood of $200M to make.

$1B in less than a week for interactive entertainment that is a fictional land, an interpretation of Southern California (Sorry Kids, No Disney style theme parks) where you can do all sorts of adult nonsense... that appeals to a cross section of society that I didn't think possible. People spend hours and days inside this immersive world & the online component hasn't even launched yet. Serious amounts of time like 2 or 3 entire days in the week its been out.

My point? ONE BILLION DOLLARS grossed of entertainment that takes people to a mythical land and immerses them totally in story through their environment. (Tangent: My favorite part of the game has been the in-game stock market and the stock manipulation missions. Made a LOT of money)

I'm pretty sure that Iger is out of touch with entertainment as a whole to realize the threat that is.

Entertainment is changing and New Fantasyland - while the polar opposite of GTAV - just doesnt cut it.

Quality is what this is about. Rather than cutting corners, they should be doubling down on quality and entertainment. Rather than focusing on the quarterly profits, be the best real-life theme park entertainment company out there.

If you're losing your crowd to other sources of entertainment, go back to do what you do best. Do it right. Make your fictional entertainment better than anyones. People dont go for gimmicks. They go for quality. And they'll keep coming back for quality.

Disney has noticed video games and responded. It's a big part of NextGen with the interactive queues and smartphone apps. Disney no longer leads, they poorly imitate.

 

[KevinYee]

What? Do you need Kevin Yee to vouch for me too? Why would I pretend to be Ricky's wife. That's so dumb.

This actually is Ricky's wife posting as skippyrules.

 

[KevinYee]

Disney has noticed video games and responded. It's a big part of NextGen with the interactive queues and smartphone apps. Disney no longer leads, they poorly imitate.

Disney Interactive itself, the video game arm, never really seemed to "get it", I thought. They put out games featuring their IP but without much thought as to the fun quotient of the game (or the story, or the immersiveness). It's almost as though they felt the brand alone would carry things.

Hmmm, seems a bit familiar....

 

[SirLink]

Disney Interactive itself, the video game arm, never really seemed to "get it", I thought. They put out games featuring their IP but without much thought as to the fun quotient of the game (or the story, or the immersiveness). It's almost as though they felt the brand alone would carry things.

Hmmm, seems a bit familiar....

It was funny to see some of the Disney fans call less than 300k sales for their new strategy - that they are 'betting the farm on' good. Hint with less than 450k sales worldwide in the first month over 4 formats thats not good.

But your right hey had a really cool PoTC RPG in production for 360/PS3/PC then cancelled it, they cancelled it because development would of put it at around $100m and didn't feel that they could spend that. So yeah Disney and entertainment don't seem to mesh anymore.

 

[Astro Blaster]

Disney Interactive itself, the video game arm, never really seemed to "get it", I thought. They put out games featuring their IP but without much thought as to the fun quotient of the game (or the story, or the immersiveness). It's almost as though they felt the brand alone would carry things.

Hmmm, seems a bit familiar....

Reminds me of LucasArts, in a way. The best Star Wars game by far, IMO, is Knights of the Old Republic, which was developed by BioWare. Now that Disney has shuttered LucasArts and given the Star Wars franchise to EA (which now owns BioWare), I'm very interested to see what they do with it. I think it was a good move.

 

[Lee]

Do not get what the hype beyond it being MARVEL!!!!!!!!! For Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. It wasn't bad, but wasn't particularly good either.

I think what you meant to say is that Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D is the best thing on network TV since Lost. By a long shot, and after only one episode.

*Bows to Lord Whedon...*

 

[GLaDOS]

I think what you meant to say is that Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D is the best thing on network TV since Lost. By a long shot, and after only one episode.

*Bows to Lord Whedon...*

That's not really what I was saying, but okay.

Best pilot on network TV since Lost. Big difference.

 

[Goofyernmost]

This actually is Ricky's wife posting as skippyrules.

OMG! Do you realize that you just said that Spirit is wrong about something? And just when you and he started to bond again. Sad!

 

[Funmeister]

Disney Interactive itself, the video game arm, never really seemed to "get it", I thought. They put out games featuring their IP but without much thought as to the fun quotient of the game (or the story, or the immersiveness). It's almost as though they felt the brand alone would carry things.

Hmmm, seems a bit familiar....

Can I "like" this twice?

 

[KevinYee]

OMG! Do you realize that you just said that Spirit is wrong about something? And just when you and he started to bond again. Sad!

Spirit just said he wasn't convinced it was her. And really, how is he supposed to know? The internet makes anonymity easy (at least initially). Look at how many users here don't choose their own name as a username!

 

[Goofyernmost]

Spirit just said he wasn't convinced it was her. And really, how is he supposed to know? The internet makes anonymity easy (at least initially). Look at how many users here don't choose their own name as a username!

I hadn't noticed that...I use mine! OK, I guess the bonding can continue.

 

[PeterAlt]

You know you could have saved time and visited Google.com and typed "Universal Studios Japan."

That's been on my to do list never got around to it.

 

[TheTruthSpeaks]

Please, it's more interesting than the repeated arguments we've seen lately.

Besides 2012, I think 2010, 2007 (or maybe 2008, damn I'm old) and 2004 would be slam dunks. And if it holds up through the season, I think it could stand against any year.

Of the 8 houses, AWiL is universally (no pun intended) lauded as one of the best ever. CitW and ED are also getting high marks. LL and RE seem to be polarizing, but I see potential in each (especially the former). For me the only real clunker this year is Afterlife. Throw in a strong Bill & Teds and Kang & Kodos and I'm willing to overlook the repetitive, somewhat understaffed SZs.

AWiL has a compelling story, an OCD-like level of detail from the movie, and innovate new effects. Who knew that those things could come together to make a great theme park attraction?

I say bring back the Holiday house with the Thanksgiving dinner scene

 

[nor'easter]

Spirit just said he wasn't convinced it was her. And really, how is he supposed to know? The internet makes anonymity easy (at least initially). Look at how many users here don't choose their own name as a username!

To quote the Larson cartoon, "On the Internet, nobody knows that you are a dog."

 

[TheDisneyMagic]

Was that decision made for this year? I could have sworn I saw advertising for it somewhere.

Yup I phoned up the Shareholder Club line for tickets and they informed me it was not taking place this year.

The street atmosphere of this event was excellent and the rides had slight modifications (usually just the queue / preshow) but it worked really well and gave the park a completely different feel.

 

[Rodan75]

Disney Interactive itself, the video game arm, never really seemed to "get it", I thought. They put out games featuring their IP but without much thought as to the fun quotient of the game (or the story, or the immersiveness). It's almost as though they felt the brand alone would carry things.

Hmmm, seems a bit familiar....

I think their iOS games have picked up the pace in the last few months. My Muppet Show is a random addiction and their other new games seem interesting.

 

[PhotoDave219]

Trevor makes the game for me. The best character I've seen in a while.

I like that the cars don't blow up after you've wrecked them to bits, but now just stall and die.

Still not exactly sure how you've managed to compare gta to fle but congrats, it worked!

It comes down to a few things. Return on investment and creating a mythical world where the story envelops you. Granted there polar opposites but it's a worthwhile discussion to have about how Entertainment changes & Different sources of entertainment that Disney's theme parks have to compete with.

Any entertainment product that grosses $1 billion in less than a week, is something to take notice of.

Of course a sandbox style open world game set inside a Disney theme park sounds like an interesting endeavor that should've been looked into following the virtual Magic Kingdom's demise.

Plus when you look a return on investment for this particular game, even on $300 million investment and you've Got 30 to 40% return, that's pretty damn good.

So when are Beiger and Board of Directors ask "so what are they doing that we aren't?"… The putting out quality entertainment and doing their product better than anybody else's.

 

[SirLink]

It comes down to a few things. Return on investment and creating a mythical world where the story envelops you. Granted there polar opposites but it's a worthwhile discussion to have about how Entertainment changes & Different sources of entertainment that Disney's theme parks have to compete with.

Any entertainment product that grosses $1 billion in less than a week, is something to take notice of.

Of course a sandbox style open world game set inside a Disney theme park sounds like an interesting endeavor that should've been looked into following the virtual Magic Kingdom's demise.

Plus when you look a return on investment for this particular game, even on $300 million investment and you've Got 30 to 40% return, that's pretty damn good.

So when are Beiger and Board of Directors ask "so what are they doing that we aren't?"… The putting out quality entertainment and doing their product better than anybody else's.

If we look at Warner Bros Interactive(we'll call them WBIE or Universal(in theme park talk)) want to create games - they want to be in the market to produce acclaimed content not because they should, but because they want to!

Now let us look at Disney Interactive - they think they should be in that space. Not because they want to create games but look at the growing market and smack their lips at the thoughts of millions of dollars. They have had flourishes of success if they built on it like WBIE does - but they don't they close and retool. I.e. Junction Point was particularly bad on all levels.

Then look at WBIE which was set up later and owns arguably two of best studios in the industry - Traveler Tales and Rocksteady.

 

[Lucky]

Look at how many users here don't choose their own name as a username!

I just didn't want people here to confuse me with that other Justin Bieber.

 

[asianway]

Was that decision made for this year? I could have sworn I saw advertising for it somewhere.

I heard Burbank pulled the plug due to risk of melted snowflakes.