Gameboy Advance: Not Just Playing With Content

摘要

Nintendo's Gameboy has been strengthening kids' thumb muscles since its introduction over a decade ago. But those countless hours of button smashing were invariably spent doing one thing: playing games. Thanks to the initiatives of three companies, this year should see that focus expand to transform the Gameboy Advance and Gameboy Advance SP (which folds) into full-fledged, multimedia digital content delivery platforms with an already-established infrastructure of nearly 20 million units in the U.S. alone. Making a big splash in this nascent market with three major announcements at the quarter-year turn is video game publisher Majesco, the sole operating subsidiary of ConnectivCorp. First came its agreement struck with Nickelodeon to release titles like SpongeBob SquarePants, Jimmy Neutron, and Fairly Odd Parents in the first half of 2004. A week and a half later, the company announced a three-year agreement with 4Kids Entertainment to publish a total of 12 episodes from 4Kids' popular Saturday morning FOX BOX cartoon lineup, while 4Kids has agreed to promote those titles during its programming block. Third, Majesco secured approval to develop and market their video technology in Europe in addition to North and South America, adding 10 million users to the potential market for these videos. Majesco's new video compression technology allows for up to 45 minutes of full-color video to be housed in a standard Nintendo-manufactured game cartridge (90 minute capacities are currently under development).