News

Week of April 10-April 16, 2000

[Friday, April 14, 2000]

Interplay Credit
Interplay has secured $20 million in much needed development cash in a transaction that could lead to an increase in Titus' involvement with the company. Interplay will receive the cash infusion in exchange for nearly 720,000 shares of preferred stock. The preferred shares can be purchased back from Titus at any time for the purchase price plus accrued dividends of six percent annually. Titus, for its part, can convert each preferred share into ten common shares any time after May 2001. Titus also receives warrants for an additional 400,000 shares for future purchase. In addition, Interplay extended its $25 million working capital line of credit with its bank through April 2001 when Titus extended a corporate guarantee to Interplay's lender.

Gilbert Leaves Humongous
Creative Director Ron Gilbert and CEO Shelley Day are leaving their management positions at children's game maker Humongous Entertainment as part of an organizational change that will see Humongous folded into GT Interactive. GT hopes to improve the profitability of Humongous through the adoption of a more unified sales and marketing approach with the rest of GT. Gilbert and Day will stick together, with details about their new Internet venture coming soon. Day will continue to run Humongous until the management change is completed in June.

3dfx Moves South
3dfx has moved a step closer to realizing its goal of product globalization by signing a series of deals to move into Latin American markets. The company has penned distribution agreements with Tech Data, Intcomex, Tech Media, Dasmico and Dual Comp that will bring localized Spanish and Portuguese versions of the Voodoo 3 product line to Mexico, Chile, Argentina, Brazil, Uruguay, Peru, Panama, Guatemala and the Caribbean. 3dfx's Latin American move will also include the establishment of dedicated technical support and localized sales representation. "We believe there is a significant opportunity for us in Latin America as sales of retail add-in boards continue to grow in the region," said 3dfx Vice President of World Wide Sales Richard Burns.

[Thursday, April 13, 2000]

Acclaim Slips
Acclaims is reporting a $19 million operating loss for the second quarter, compared with earnings of $14.5 million in the same period one year ago. While the company places the blame on a industry wide sales slump in anticipation of next-generation hardware, Acclaim is not to shy to admit that it's historic focus on the fast fading N64 has accelerated the slide. "We continue to feel the impact of the declining Nintendo 64 market," said Acclaim CEO Greg Fischbach, "we are diversifying our product mix and positioning ourselves for the launch of the next generation."

Rage Buys Online
Publisher and developer Rage Software is buying its way into the mobile and interactive television games business with two recent purchases. The company is spending close to five million dollars to pick up internet game makers Caffeine Studios and The Internet Football Club. Rage will put the two companies together to create a browser based soccer management game that will be accessible over the Internet as well as on interactive television platforms and WAP based mobile systems. "The explosive growth in Internet gaming through fixed and wireless devices provides us with a huge number of opportunities on which we intend to capitalize," said Rage CEO Paul Finnegan.

[Wednesday, April 12, 2000]

PC Data's Top Ten
After what seems like an eternity, Regis has finally been dethroned on the latest Top Ten, for the week of March 26 - April 1. The new sales leader, The Sims, has already sold one million copies worldwide.

1. The Sims, Electronic Arts
2. Who Wants To Be A Millionaire, Disney
3. Soldier Of Fortune, Activision
4. Star Wars: Force Commander, LucasArts
5. Star Trek: Armada, Activision
6. MP Roller Coaster Tycoon, Hasbro Interactive
7. Microsoft Age of Empires II: Age Of Kings, Microsoft
8. Thief 2: The Metal Age, Eidos
9. Unreal Tournament, GT Interactive
10. Command & Conquer: Tiberian Sun Firestorm, Electronic Arts

IGF Grand Prize Renamed in Honor of Late Seumas McNally
The CMP Game Media Group announced today that it is renaming the Independent Game Festival's Grand Prize in honor of Seumas McNally. McNally, who succumbed to Hodgkin's Disease on March 21 at the age of 21, was President and Lead Programmer for Longbow Digital Arts, the team that won this year's IGF Grand Prize. The award will henceforth be called the Seumas McNally Grand Prize.

The McNally family plans to reorganize Longbow Digital Arts. Current plans for the company include looking for a publisher for Tread Marks, and building more games with Seumas' Tread Marks game engine as the foundation. A trust has been set up to provide an annual award to recognize programming excellence in the game development community. For more information on giving a donation in Seumas' memory please visit http://www.indiegames.com.

Corel Buys MetaCreations Graphics Products
Corel Corporation has acquired several professional graphics products from MetaCreations, Inc. These include Kai's Power Tools (KPT), KPT Vector Effects, Bryce, and Painter. Given Corel's involvement with the Linux operating system, it's a good bet that these products will eventually find their way onto the desktops of Linux users.

[Tuesday, April 11, 2000]

S3 Reborn
After unloading it's PC graphics chip business into a joint venture with VIA, S3 is recasting itself as an internet company. VIA is picking up S3's chip activities for a total of $323 million in cash and securities, with additional payments in the works if the division meets it's financial marks, while S3 maintains ownership of it's cross licensing agreements with Intel. S3, for it's part, is now looking to position itself as in Internet company. The company will focus it's growing digital consumer device business, building on successful brands like it's Rio product line. S3 is seeking out more partnerships and joint ventures to take on parts of it's ongoing multimedia board operations as it looks to move away from that area.

Console Bestsellers
PC Data's list of the best selling console games for the month of March had Pokemon written all over its. The little beasts held on to four the ten best slots, with Pokemon Stadium making its debut at number one.

1. Pokemon Stadium, Nintendo Nintendo 64
2. WWF Smackdown, THQ Inc. Playstation
3. Pokemon Yellow: Pikachu Edition, Nintendo Game Boy
4. Syphon Filter 2, 989 Studios Playstation
5. Resident Evil: Code Veronica,Capcom Dreamcast
6. Dead or Alive 2, Tecmo Dreamcast
7. Pokemon Blue , Nintendo Game Boy
8. Pokemon Red, Nintendo Game Boy
9. Mario Party 2, Nintendo Nintendo 64
10. Tony Hawk's Pro Skater, Activision Nintendo 64

[Monday, April 10, 2000]

3D Labs Buys Intense 3D
3D Labs is set to issue up to 3.69 million common shares to acquire Intergraph's Intense 3D accelerator division. 3D Labs will pay up to $25 million in additional stock or cash if Intense 3D meets certain performance marks, and the company will continue to provide graphics accelerators for Intergraph's product range. 3D Labs considers the two product lines to be complimentary, and has no plans to discontinue product to reduce its workforce. Intense 3D will remain in it's Huntsville, Alabama, headquarters. "3Dlabs will now have multiple proven development teams, each with its own critical mass," said 3D Labs CEO Osman Kent, "This should enable the combined company to increase our frequency of product introductions into the professional graphics market and to liberate engineering resources for developing products for additional growth markets, both on the traditional PC and the emerging appliance platforms."

PS 2 Awarded
Nikkei Business Publications has awarded the 10th annual Nikkei BP Technology Award to the creators of the LSI chip for Sony's Playstation 2. Sony Computer Entertainment, Sony Corporation, and Toshiba Semiconductor share the award for the year 2000 for their contribuions to development of the Playstation 2's LSI architecture and technology. The prize was created to encourage domestic technology development in Japan, and honors excellent technology in the fields of electronics, telecommunications, personal computer, mechanical system, civil engineering, medicine and biotechnology, and ecological technology.

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