Leading by example?

THQ recently showed its support for Nintendo's upcoming 3DS but it's not forgetting about the Wii or the DS in doing so. Jon Rooke, THQ's UK Managing Director has told GamesIndustry.biz that the company is confident that the Wii and DS market will bounce back from slumps in sales with a strong Christmas season this year.

This optimism is backed by the launch of THQ's Kids, Family and Casual marketing campaign, with its slogan of 'Great Games, Great Value':

The whole campaign is focused with retail in mind, so all the TV will be tagged with a retailer. A 30-second ad might have two or three titles in it, and the end message will be something like: 'Great games, such as Megamind, available now from ASDA' - at whatever the pricing is.

Rooke notes that the Wii software market seems to follow a trend: a decline in sales throughout Summer and Autumn, then an increase from the tail-end of October through November and December, with particularly strong performances in the Christmas periods:

It's one of those challenges that everyone forgets - what's happened before. The Wii is behaving a bit more like a toy - people get it out at Christmas, start playing with it again. It's not depressed in that people aren't engaging with the Wii - there are a lot of active users out there, they haven't put it away and it's still set up next to the TV in the living room. But they probably just haven't had a really compelling piece of software to get hold of to really engage with.

With a statement like that, it's interesting to see THQ's October-December line-up consists of titles like WWE Smackdown Vs. Raw 2011, Dreamworks' Megamind: Mega Team Unite, Dreamworks' Megamind: The Blue Defender and Truth Or Lies. Which of those makes you want to dust off your consoles and engage in some compelling gaming?

[source gamesindustry.biz]