Games Publishers

Gurdeep Singh Sheri

The role of a Video Games
Publisher
• A video games publisher manufactures copies of the original
game to distribute to retail stores that will then sell them such
as GAME
• They also pay for all the marketing materials to promote the
new game to the public.
• Often produce all the box art and manuals of the new game
• Will also pay for licenses which may be required as well as
paying for localization which is the regions in which the game
is going to be released in.
• Will often pay for the development of a game before it has
even been started
• Are usually major international companies
• May have a developer within the company – called an ‘in
house’ developer which is not unusual
• These days, games are becoming incredibly expensive to
produce mainly because of the advanced graphics and
gameplay that is demanded on the Xbox and PS3 format
• A game usually requires around $15-$20 million dollars to
develop and publish on these consoles. Activision’s
‘Spiderman’ cost $35 million dollars just to develop and this is
not including marketing and sales. This shows the extreme
attention to detail required for these high demanded games.
• Can also be a console manufacturer such as Nintendo
 NINTENDO
• Nintendo is multinational company, founded in Kyoto,
Japan in September 23rd 1889 by Fusajiro Yamauchi
• By the end of 1969, Nintendo had tried many businesses
such as making hanafuda cards, a cab company and a
hotel business.
• They then tried the video games industry and now are one
of the most successful console manufacturers in the world.
• They also publish games as well as develop, so we can say
24.01 million sold 22.61 million sold 3.07 million sold
they are also a in-house developer. Most of the games
produce are only compatible with the Nintendo consoles
• Nintendo do not have a specific games genre they choose
to publish and develop. As you can see from examples of
their games, they all have a different genre.
• For Nintendo, the target audience changes for the
different games. For example ‘Mario’ games would appeal
more to children than adults whereas a game like ‘Wii Fit’,
would appeal mostly to adults as a fun way to stay fit.
• Nintendo also own the biggest share in the American
baseball team ‘Seattle Mariners’
• Nintendo when translated to English means ‘Leave luck to
heaven’

The playing cards that Nintendo

Wii advert promotes games that produced and started of with.
Nintendo have published and developed.
 Electronic Arts (EA)
• EA is a international developer, marketer, publisher and distributor
of video games
• Founded on May 28th 1982 by a guy called Trip Hawkins in the USA
• EA started of as a home computing games publisher. However in
the late 1980’s the company began developing games in-house
• Currently EA has its most popular games are it’s sports genre
labelled under the EA sports label, However EA publishes and
2.6 million approx
2.106 million approx 31,000 copies sold
develops games in other genres also such as the examples given,
So far … racing and shooting
• Although the games are of a different genre, most of EA’s games
are targeted at the same target market. This market consists of
males between the ages 12-25. This is because the content mostly
appeals to males as they are more associated with cars and football
and the army.
• EA games are compatible with the main consoles in the industry
which make them more accessible to play for their target market.
• EA had received criticism for developing games that lack
innovation. They have also been under the light for the way they
treat their employees. Apparently some employees were working
up to 100 hours a week and it was not even crunch time.

EA sports poster helps promote the FIFA game

through the publisher.
The classic Electronic Arts logo,
‘ It’s in the game! ’
1982–1999
 UBISOFT
• The five Guillemot brothers founded Ubisoft as a games publishing
company in 1986 in Brittany, France
• Ubisoft also began developing some of their games in-house after the
early 1990’s
• Now it is a global company with studios in 17 companies and some
additional studios in 28 other countries
• As of 2008, it is the third largest video games publisher in Europe and
The whole Assassins
1.2 million 2.19 million fourth largest in America
Creed series has sold over
20 million Copies. • As of 2009, it is the fourth largest in the world
• Their games are compatible with most of the major consoles making
them more accessible to their audience as they are not tied to a single
platform
• Ubisoft specialise in the game genre of action adventure games as
shown by two of my examples. They even share similar box art,
however they also publish and develop games with different genres
also.
• For their speciality genre of action adventure games, ubisoft have a
older target market of over 16-18 years of age. This is also relevant to
some of their shooting games such as the ‘Brothers in Arms’ series.
The content of these games actually appeals mainly to males. For
their other games, the target audience is much younger and is usually
aimed at children.

Ubisoft promoting their

published series of the Tom
Television advert which presents a Ubisoft game Clancy games
being marketed.