http://www.1up.com/do/newsStory?cId=3157148 "A Kameo or a Viva Pinata on a DS makes a lot of sense in a lot of ways from a franchise perspective," Shane Kim told 1UP last week at the DICE Summit in Las Vegas. Kim, a Corporate Vice President for Microsoft Game Studios and Phil Spencer, head of Studio Development for Microsoft Game Studios, reinforced Microsoft's commitment to Rare's Pinata-stuffing IP, despite lukewarm performance at retail. "[Viva Pinata] is the beginning of an IP that will be a pillar for Microsoft Game Studios for a long time," Spencer said.
Remember last year when Kim called Viva Pinata the most important franchise in the portfolio? Microsoft is still committed to the franchise, "I think it's fair to say that we're going to continue to invest in that property [Viva Pinata]," Kim said. "Whether that is in the form of a sequel, a product line extension or through merchandising, whatever the case may be, that's something that we're going to stick with." Or, as Kim pointed out as a DS title.
But the sales figures for Pinata have been so slow. Wasn't this the title that was supposed to broaden the 360 owner beyond the "core" gamer? Is Microsoft happy with how Rare's game did? "You won't hear us inside Microsoft talking about Viva Pinata as anything other than a success," Spencer said. "For us, it was a successful game, it happened to come at the same time Gears came out, so obviously people put the yardstick out and say 'Hey, which one's bigger?' -- I'm not sure that's how you want to evaluate at this point in the console's life cycle which game is more important."
We already know Rare is working on Banjo, and after having shipped 3 full-length titles in the 360's first year at retail, presumably the team is working on other projects for Microsoft beyond 2008's Banjo title. "Right now the number of things that Rare is looking at on 360 includes a number of 360 prototype projects," Spencer said. "Some of them involve games that we've shipped before; some of them involve new ideas." Is the team working on a new Kameo or going back to the drawing board for another iteration of Perfect Dark? What about the EGM rumor that the next Viva Pinata game would be a Kart Racer? That could translate to either home or portable consoles, couldn't it?
Do Kim's comments mean that Nintendo and Microsoft are entering some partnership to publish portable games for the DS? Absolutely not. However, Kim didn't leave the door open for titles to appear on Sony's handheld like he did with Nintendo's. " Whether you're talking about [publishing games on] mobile or the DS -- you probably won't see it on the PSP, though.""
They should've included a proper online service if it the franchise was that important to them. I mean you spend hours making your garden and you can't share it with any1? wth? Viva pinata on the DS would be a good seller i think. but why is microsoft releasing a product for the ds? Possibly to try and hurt the sales of the psp? That would make sense as sony is M$'s main competitor. Or maybe they've just realised what a goldmine the DS is and they want to get their grubby little paws in on the action.
If they did release viva piñata on the DS I would take tha as a sign that they won't be getting into the handheld market anytime soon ;) I still wanna try the game though hehe
i think MS is just in denial, the game sold horrible so now they are thinking about milking it on DS ? it makes sense for this type of game to be on DS but i doubt nintendo would license it, if anything they are content with how nintendogs is doing and dont want this competing with it on their own console.
I think nintendo would be more then happy to license microsoft games on their handhelds,. cause it means they wont have anything to fear from M$ in that area for many years. Plus it prints $$$!! Viva makes alot more sense on the ds then the 360 anyway.
Sides its no different then sony pushing Resistence & Killzone has huge titles when they have proven to be equally huge failures at retail. Illumination77
uh as far as i know both those titles sold pretty decent, viva pinata sold like 40k that is usually the death of a franchise when its their first outing, but of course MS has pockets as deep as the grand canyon so they can shove whatever they want down our throats. i highly doubt nintendo would go for this as it would directly conflict with nintendogs and nintendo hates big american corporations like MS trying to buy their way into everything, but if they do go for it then that means they sold out big time just chasing the money.
that be really cool if Microsoft let Rare do that. Screw Microsoft making their own games, just put out games on the most successful hand held and both them and Nintendo benefit.
but nintendo is doing great now so they have no need to chase the dollar anytime soon, so the chances of this happening is about the same chances that viva pinata 2 goes platinum in japan.
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