Nickelodeon plans to develop 600 games in the next few years. Most of the titles, it sounds like, will be web-based games, with nearly a third popping up on Nick.com alone, Yahoo reports.
The games are part of a $100 million investment by MTV Networks. MTV plans to spend $500 million on creating games for its websites through 2009 as well.
The whole thing is tied to the advertising packed into sites like MTV, Nick and Nick Jr. according to the article. Other games will allow player to try before they buy or include micro-transactions to make money.
Nickelodeon's Game Plan: 600 Casual Games Being Developed; 185 Games Planned For Nick.com Alone [Yahoo]










Comments
I'm all for, you know, games being developed, but wouldn't you think that $500 mil could be better spent creating 100 games that are 6x better?
Unless, of course, the "iCarly Webisode Wardrobe" storyline is a 22-parter. I know those things can get pretty in-depth to stay true to the original novels.
Gaming going mainstream has its good and bad sides. We're seeing bigger more high quality titles but you also get things like this. Marketing campaigns disguised and gussied up as games. Hopefully we'll see alot this crap disappear over the next couple of years, but that only will happen if stupid stop using the internet. That will happen roughly around the same time Unicorn Giggles can be put in cans. Now lets all laugh and laugh at the idea of stupid not using the internet...
They don't have Achievement points. fission mailed.
Prepare the toilet paper of our respective lands. A new range of NickBullshit is squeezing our way.
$500 million. On some shitty licensed crap? And its MTV too so were gonna get about 50 Pimp my Ride games. That is the biggest waste of money I've seen in a long ass time.
When did Nickelodeon go from Mediocre to compete Suckage? Was it the same time as MTV, early-mid 90s?
Maybe, just maybe, one of the guys who works on these games doesn't starve to death as a result of being employed on this and then goes onto create something worthwhile years later. Thats the best possible scenario for anything good coming of this that I can think of.
God, does Nick ever give up.
They've been going downhill LONG time ago and they should stay that way
my girlfriends little sister used to LIVE on nick.com's games. It's like childrens own little console.
Nick.com has always had a lot of games. I don't see this as being any different.
@MoarFightos: Yeah, that's what I thought. I haven't actually been on Nick.com since I was like 10, but the ads seem to suggest they have lots of games (hey, I watch Rocko on Nicktoons Network, OK?)
Some math here: $100 million on 600 Web games = over $160,000 per game, a large chunk of change in the online gaming world.
@sethmad: I disagree. In total, yes, $100 million is a lot, but $160,000 individually -- even for web games -- isn't necessarily a lot of money.
@sethmad:
It doesn't state that the $100 million is specifically funding online games.
Young 'uns love this stuff regardless of its quality. And who are we to judge?!
Didn't they get the memo about Video games provoking violence upon kids?
In light of the previous story, you should totally have photoshopped that game menu to include Doki Doki Majo Shinpan.
@Torgen thinks AAA means "Costs $60": Well, 'a' previous story, not 'the' previous story.
600 games?!! how in god's name are they going to play them all!?
i reckon i could save them a lot of money, make 'generic tv based games A through Z' that's 26 games! and then reskin them according to the program they're based on. in fact you could probably get away with 4 basic games reskinned.
@animemecha: Same with all of Viacom's properties.
It's over.... wait.. ok.. it's not over yet.
But come on Nick. Little casual web games are fine, but its not quantity, it is quality. If just one of those games is your 'bejeweled", your set. Any developer would take one smash hit verses 600 web based crap fests.
Who knows, make 400 of those titles will be amazing, but I doubt it.
Which one's the game where you get knocked up at 16?
@A Pimp Named Daver4470: That's Disney, not Nickelodeon!
I still have difficulty believing that Nick puts games on their website. It's one of the worst coded sites I've ever seen. Both my top end desktop and laptop PCs slow to a crawl on the rare occasions I have been directed there. I cannot believe that low and midrange PCs are able to access that site, much less play games on it.
@MoarFightos: He's referring to Jamie Lynn Spears who is on that show on Nickelodeon.
I miss the oldschool nick...
@Vecha: *sniff* Pete and Pete, that ally mack who could turn it ooze, Kenan and Kel, Kablam....sniff....
@Vecha: Agreed. I remember back in the day, Nick actually had some really good Flash (or was it Shockwave?) games. Not as good as Cartoon Network's, of course. Heck, they STILL make some good flash games.
@excel_excel: If you for a second think Kenan and Kel is a show worth missing, I just feel bad for you. Now Salute Your Shorts... that's a different story. It's too bad that some of those 600 games will probably damn fantastic, but we've already written them off as crap... oh who am I kidding. Even that old Ren and Stimpy game for genesis was crap. Nick games are forever doomed to suck.
@monkeysaresilly: Yeah, those are the younger kids. I bring up old school Nickelodeon and they want to talk about Angry Beavers. I'm all 0_o and say that was long after the good old days.
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