Gamepark, their own worst enemy???

[RoboJoe32]

It seems gamepark is almost their own worst enemy to themselves.... (reasons why below)

1: Not recruiting or searching for many 3rd party developers... Basicly told capcom to screw off, etc...

2: No marketing whatsoever, If you're going to make something to sell it, make more than one tiny obscure ad.

3: Colored cases and shell variations, it's been said and said again, make more colors, and they will buy.

4: Lack of a real translation team, their english site is laughable at best, that and korean is a BITCH to translate compared to other asian languages like japanese and (maybe) even rivals kanji in difficulty I believe.

5: Their SDKs are poorly coded (especially the sound ones) It's like they are NEW to the entire concept of codeing...

6: They let the GP32 slide along too easily without much support, where are the new games?

7: European launch, will it EVER happen? They've promised TWICE in the past, both promises broken.

8: Lies in their promos, internal RF, etc.... (Sega support rumor)

Don't get me wrong, I love GP32 (perhaps more than any of my systems) but Gamepark needs to get their act together or the GP32 scene is gonna stay small, and finally die out (No new owners= no GP32s sold= no new games= no new GP32s= no more people coming to the community= no more gamepark= no more GP32 scene)

I think we should petition (It may or may not work) alot of the users in the English GP32 community to speak with them or PROPERLY interview them, and MAKE them answer questions instead of dance around the issues.

 

[Lord Namsu]

What did happen with Capcom?
I remember reading that Street fighter and Megaman were being made for the GP32 and other than that I have heard nothing about them. This is the first I've heard of gamepark telling capcom to "Screw Off".

 

[Calintz]

Did they really tell capcom to screw off? Where did you hear this from?
- perhaps capcom told gamepark : No theres not enough market or nintendo licenses were forcing them to stick to one handheld.
I doubt any ads outside of Korea wouldve had any real effect since they dont have any overseas distributors anyways and no english developers. THEYRE A KOREAN COMPANY.
I completly disagree with the Korean language being a 'bitch' to translate. Its the easiest language to read since it only has like 14 consonants and 10 vowels (thats 24 friggin LETTERS not 200+ SYMBOLS like chinese or the japanese mix of chinese which is read wrong coupled with native letters.) Its like the alphabet without all those exceptions that used in english.


4: Lack of a real translation team, their english site is laughable at best, that and korean is a BITCH to translate compared to other asian languages like japanese and (maybe) even rivals kanji in difficulty I believe.
- they have no real obligation to translate unless they have a real european target which wasnt gonna happen until they got overseas support and now Mitsui is there to do that. Read that little interview Lik-sang had with them in the german game show thing.

 

[synkro]

I phoned Mitsui Germany a couple of minutes ago, news will come within the next 10 days!

 

[khephren]

I think things might improve now a multinational distributor is involved, just leave Gamepark to develop hardware.

 

[Minipiki]

1: Not recruiting or searching for many 3rd party developers... Basicly told capcom to screw off, etc...

-> Theres is no business around with a third party, if there are just roundabout 20 000 sold GP32! And please can anyone qoute Capcom? That was just a fake.

2: No marketing whatsoever, If you're going to make something to sell it, make more than one tiny obscure ad.

-> Same as above!

3: Colored cases and shell variations, it's been said and said again, make more colors, and they will buy.

-> They are coming. You could see them at the Games Convention in Germany!

4: Lack of a real translation team, their english site is laughable at best, that and korean is a BITCH to translate compared to other asian languages like japanese and (maybe) even rivals kanji in difficulty I believe.

-> Why translate anything, if there are so many people NOT downloading. I mean, look at the counters ....! It's just money spend for a handfull of people ...

5: Their SDKs are poorly coded (especially the sound ones) It's like they are NEW to the entire concept of codeing...

-> I don't know. I'm no progger

6: They let the GP32 slide along too easily without much support, where are the new games?

-> As soon as the european launch will start, there will be more games.

7: European launch, will it EVER happen? They've promised TWICE in the past, both promises broken.

-> Yes, it's happening allready.

8: Lies in their promos, internal RF, etc.... (Sega support rumor)

-> Well, i think these are rumours. Remember: It's a phone-company. They are brand new on the market, even if they exist for more than two or three years. Theres is not same budget as Nintendo, Sony or MS ...

 

[synkro]

I think things might improve now a multinational distributor is involved, just leave Gamepark to develop hardware.

It still wonders me that a jap. Shogo Sasha (universl trading company) distributes a korean product. But Mitsui will do it right with hardware and games worth 20.000.000€, so I'm just waitng for marketing machine running up...

 

[Dolfhin]

1: Not recruiting or searching for many 3rd party developers... Basicly told capcom to screw off, etc...

Lookat the installed base of the GP32 and compare it to the GBA's

2: No marketing whatsoever, If you're going to make something to sell it, make more than one tiny obscure ad.

Please tell us more what sort of marketing where you thinking about? Web banners or big billboard adds?

3: Colored cases and shell variations, it's been said and said again, make more colors, and they will buy.

It must be profitably to set up a production line if it isn't a small company will never do that.

4: Lack of a real translation team, their english site is laughable at best, that and korean is a BITCH to translate compared to other asian languages like japanese and (maybe) even rivals kanji in difficulty I believe.

Wait until the europe launch before saying anything about this. I mean how many Gp32's are sold to englisch speaking people? and how many to korean speaking people?

5: Their SDKs are poorly coded (especially the sound ones) It's like they are NEW to the entire concept of codeing...

Argree and they need to update the sdk's with 3d functions

6: They let the GP32 slide along too easily without much support, where are the new games?

Google for them : www.google.com

7: European launch, will it EVER happen? They've promised TWICE in the past, both promises broken.

Can't say anything about it. The're a company if they can make some money in europe it will be done

8: Lies in their promos, internal RF, etc.... (Sega support rumor)

please talk about facts not rumors

I think we should petition (It may or may not work) alot of the users in the English GP32 community to speak with them or PROPERLY interview them, and MAKE them answer questions instead of dance around the issues.

Maybe you can send a letter or a e-mail?

edit // what's wrong with my quote tags???

 

[Vicious_Al]

Capcom is having financial trouble, they canned quite a few games and laid off some of its internal developers not so long ago. Why would they take a risk with the GP32?

 

[angrypants]

Game park is a small still relitivly new company. They are still operating like a small new company and I would say they are doing alright right now. The gp32 is much diffrent than the gba in many ways. Nintendo is a big company which is known every wear and has a huge amount of distribution. Game park dosn't have that name recognition and dosn't have a strong distribution as of now. The launch of this system has been very diffrent than the launch of the GBA. Due to nintendos past as soon as it was released it was in stores world wide with a decent amount of well known games and a didicated fan base. The game park is much much diffrent than that. Game park is the new kid on the block people don't know who they are so they are not going to get a lot of people to buy their product right away. I had heard about the gp32 about a year before I bought it but I bought a gba a few months after it was released. It took awhile for myself and many others to be sure that the system was really worth it. Because of this the game park is kind of snow balling and building up a fan base. The system is evolving as people relize its potential and is slowly becoming more popular. Word of the european release is great news as it shows that game park is doing well and is expanding its distribution. That is great news and it seems that there are many great things to come from it including new colored systems and possibly new firmware and pc-link software. As for the comment on game park about promising things and then not being able to deliver that sort of thing happens. They are a new company and have alot of fresh ideas so they are trying to promise the world. Things like the capcom licence are really expensive I'm not sure what the deal is with that but for a small new company to try to get games from big companys like capcom its not easy. That is why you only have a few games from relitivly unknown companys. I'm sure if the european release goes well and game park can get a little more name recognition then larger game makers will sign on. These thing take time and judging buy the write ups in magazines which are becoming more and more common I'm sure things will get better and better for game park. They have a solid product which they are continuing to improve and are slowly but surely getting their act together.

 

[woogal]

Not recruiting or searching for many 3rd party developers

They've actually been approaching people for several months
http://www.yakyak.org/viewtopic.php?t=6518

 

[Hazey]

Okay, the thing with Capcom, as explained in some interview by someone posted somewhere some time ago. (Gee, my memory really seems to fail me these days )

Capcom was approached by GamePark to support the GP32. They agreed and handed out a license to an unnamed third party developer to port some of their PlayStation games to the GP32. This was due to the fact GamePark had been promoting the GP32 as a machine to which PlayStation game were easily portable.
Software wise this may be true with some major hacking (I'm no dev, anyone can confirm this?) but hardware wise is a whole different story. The 3rd party devs soon found out and reported to Capcom that they couldn't do it, it was just too difficult. At that time Capcom couldn't spare anymore money and thus they dropped GP32 support.

That's basically it. Now, as to what the "problems" were, this mysterious 3rd party had run into, I'm still guessing. Graphics are less likely to be the problem. My best guess is that sound was the greatest problem.
You see, many PS Capcom games use CD audio. Initially the GP32 claims to support MP3, thus a decision to use that to replace CD audio would be quickly made. However the GP32's power is limited and thus MP3 wouldn't exactly work alongside a graphically intensive game.

And plus the same thing can be said about the previously announced Guilty Gear X port. Also licensed to a 3rd party dev to be ported from the PlayStation. And guess what? CD Audio. <_<

 

[Calintz]

this guys topic really pissed me off for some reason.

 

[RoboJoe32]

=/ sorry for the negative vibe but it seems gamepark seems a bit too naive and not putting the effort they should into things and it bothers me.

 

[animator75]

Just look back a couple of years, There was once two great companies called Atari and Commodore. They made great products but did not get that times changed, these day you can not sell a product no matter how good it is without marketing.. Atari And Commodore's computers were years ahead of the PC, still the pc and microsoft crushed them. Atari Jaguar is a good example, It didn't sell that good until Atari sold their factories and used the money for an ad campaign. The Jaguar became very popular but Atari had no longer any factories left and people got tired of waiting and bought a PS1 instead.. The rest you know, Atari died a twitching death.. The same thing happened with the VHS standard, there was another far better standard called BetaMax, but due to lack of advertising it failed in the home market. Hopefully Gamepark isn't to naive and believe their product will sell itself. I live in europe(sweden) so I don't know if there is any TV-spots, Magazine ads in Korea or the rest of the world. It would be great if someone could scan some Ads if there is any

 

[WhizzBang]

The same thing happened with the VHS standard, there was another far better standard called BetaMax, but due to lack of advertising it failed in the home market.

I don't think the VHS triumph over Beta Max was down to advertising. Price and recording length must have been big factors (VHS better at both) and VHS also had more support from the big Hollywood studios (particularly Universal and Disney which had long law suits with Sony, the creator of Beta Max). Sony made sure this wouldn't happen again by buying up/into some US film and record companies.

 

[animator75]

Yes you are right, that was a bad example. Still I wonder how VHS has managed to stick for so long.. Cheap to produce I guess..

 

[khephren]

Just look back a couple of years, There was once two great companies called Atari and Commodore. They made great products but did not get that times changed, these day you can not sell a product no matter how good it is without marketing.. Atari And Commodore's computers were years ahead of the PC, still the pc and microsoft crushed them. Atari Jaguar is a good example, It didn't sell that good until Atari sold their factories and used the money for an ad campaign. The Jaguar became very popular but Atari had no longer any factories left and people got tired of waiting and bought a PS1 instead.. The rest you know, Atari died a twitching death.. The same thing happened with the VHS standard, there was another far better standard called BetaMax, but due to lack of advertising it failed in the home market. Hopefully Gamepark isn't to naive and believe their product will sell itself. I live in europe(sweden) so I don't know if there is any TV-spots, Magazine ads in Korea or the rest of the world. It would be great if someone could scan some Ads if there is any

Bad management killed Atari and Commodore, they didn't get crushed by Microsoft. They crushed themselves. They were so busy kicking ten barrels of shit out of each other, that they didn't realise PC coming down in price, or consoles reaching 16bit specs. Or rather the managers were so busy raking cash in, they delayed releasing their next gen machines (imagine releasing the Amiga A1200 7years after the A1000 chipset..they were lucky the A500 sold for so long), hamstrung them with weedy processors and little ram. Commodore and Atari had quite a few ads (in Europe), as well as a lot of magazine shelf space. I can see your point with the GP, but it isn't similar to those too old timers. Give gamepark chance chance to release it here, I think they'll do ok. Especialy now they have a big corporation for backing.

 

[Calintz]

=/ sorry for the negative vibe but it seems gamepark seems a bit too naive and not putting the effort they should into things and it bothers me.

Havent you read ANYTHING we posted above? And youve never told us about the capcom thing.
Youre assumptions are exactly that -- assumptions. The thing that confused me the most was the fact that the mitsui distribution GP32 booth info was so plainly in the news like the day before you posted this topic.
Plz. Read

 

[animator75]

I did NOT mean to put Gamepark down, I'm just concerned that they don't have enough money to compete with Nintendo. If Gamepark will grow to fast Nintendo will just launch an MTV campaign and be right back in the top again. But then again, do Gamepark need to compete with Nintendo? I don't think (at least not at this time) that these different systems are aimed at the same buyers. Ofcourse there is more to Atari and Commodores downfall than bad marketing, but I wanted to cut the story short.