This Week In The Business: Virtual Insanity

QUOTE | “You really need those experiences to help people understand – most people just can’t suspend disbelief.” – Oculus VP of product and co-founder Nate Mitchell, talking about the difficulties still ahead in bringing virtual reality to consumers

Elsewhere in the business of video games this past week …

QUOTE | “Now we’ve got gardens with small fences around them, or maybe a hedge.” – Microsoft VP Phil Harrison, talking about how they have made the “walled gardens” of the previous console generation much more accessible

QUOTE | “I want us as an industry to stop being so scared… Let’s not be scared to ruffle feathers.” – BioWare designer Manveer Heir, in his GDC talk on Misogyny, Racism and Homophobia and how the industry should take games beyond these things

STAT | $129 million – Amount of profit that Minecraft studio Mojang took in in 2013, more than double 2012 profits; that profit is after Mojang paid Minecraft creator Notch slightly more than $129 million in royalties

QUOTE | “Using the camera to broadcast yourself is much, much more fun than they thought and they didn’t quite get it.” – Shuhei Yoshida, president of Sony Worldwide Studios, talking about by marketing that’s led to shortages of the PS4 camera

QUOTE | “Never underestimate Nintendo. They’re probably one hardware release away from something that utterly convinces us that they know exactly what the future of games should be.” – Veteran designer Peter Molyneux, talking about why he’s not willing to discount Nintendo’s business in the future

STAT | 7.38 million – Number of copies sold so far of Animal Crossing: New Leaf on the 3DS worldwide; one million of those have been sold in the last six months

QUOTE | “From scratch, I don’t think we could do an Oddworld title for a couple million dollars.” – Lorne Lanning, Oddworld creator, talking aboutwhy he won’t do a Kickstarter to create a new Oddworld title.

STAT | 9th – Rank of the LEGO video game franchise among all video game franchises, according to Warner Bros Interactive Entertainment; WBIE has sold 1.6 million LEGO games since the beginning of 2013

STAT | 500,000 – Number of people who play Final Fantasy XIV: A Realm Reborn every day; the game has 1.8 million registered players so far

This Week in the Business courtesy of GamesIndustry International

Image by Nejron Photo | Shutterstock