EA to Invade Australia. Clearly upset by Infogrames’s recent spate of acquisitions and war-like utterances, EA has decided to reassert itself as the world’s dominant gaming superpower. The method? Invading Australia. It appears that EA has green lighted plans to construct a multi-million dollar studio in Australia. 100 developers are expected to be based at the new studios, which will be built just south of Brisbane on Queensland’s sub-tropical Gold Coast. The reasons for all this activity (apart from free holidays for EA execs) is the continuation of EA’s master plan. As explained by Euro MD David Gardner, the plan is for "products to be targeted to global markets first, and secondly on a regional basis." As a result, the new Australian HQ will produce up to 30 sports and entertainment titles a year for both world-wide audiences and the Australasian demographic. This sounds like a ominous threat from EA to release a dozen different Cricket and Australian Rules Football games a year.

Infogrames Retaliates. Not to be outdone, and just to prove that it is indeed Infogrames vs. the World, Bruno Bonnell’s stromtroopers have counterattacked against EA’s Australian offensive by buying up the only world-famous Aussie developer. Australia’s Beam International has now approved the deal to sell Melbourne House, the company’s games division. Although more recently famous for C&C clone KKND, Melbourne House is perhaps best remembered (in Europe at least) for the seminal beat ‘em-up Way Of The Exploding Fist on various 8-bit computer formats. Infogrames forces will immediately occupy its new acquisition’s offices and take control of the 100 member staff.

Titus as Contender? Infogrames has, more or less, managed to convince the world that it is serious about becoming the world’s biggest multimedia publisher. However, it’s not the only French company with such lofty ideas. Titus — a company famous only for the fact that it has never released a triple A product in its decade long existence — is the rather more unlikely world-beater. Before you start poking fun though, consider that the company has just bought out a significant chunk of Interplay. What’s more, Titus hopes to turn its $10 million stake into full control of the company within the next six months. This move will also nab them Interplay’s 49 percent stake in Virgin. Believe it or not, Titus stock actually outperformed all other shares on the Paris Bourse (Stock Exchange) last year, and the current market capitalization of the firm is $100 million, with an annual turnover of $50 million. You can bet that hardly any of that money came from games sales, though.

Tough Times Coming for Nintendo. All Sega’s troubles aside, Nintendo’s own patch of white water is fast approaching. Its hardware sales predictions for the N64 in Europe are down from last year to a mere 2 million, adding to a current user base of just 4.5 million. With no triple A products released yet this year and only vague assurances for the coming months, many Euro-retailers are already proclaiming the N64 a dead duck. Nintendo isn’t going to go bankrupt anytime soon — 5 million Game Boy sales in Europe this year will see to that — but the influence of the big N is slowly shrinking everywhere in the world. At least they’ve manage to answer the age old question: Which is more important in a game, graphics or game play? By common consent the, best N64 games win out on both, so the answer must be marketing (and sex and gore).

Fallout from the Virgin Suit. For those of you left on the edge of your seats wondering just what will happen in Virgin’s rather odd attempts to sue its German chief for plotting against them (see the previous issue of EuroSpeak) the whole business has come to a head sooner than was expected. The Los Angeles Federal Court has dismissed Virgin’s case against Crave Entertainment. Virgin alleges Gloe was conspiring with Crave to sabotage Virgin’s business and set up a new competing company. Gloe himself has not yet been cleared of the same charges, but the whole affair seems to have amounted to nothing more than a storm in a beer stein.