Yet another industy has caught on to the idea that anything negative can be blamed on gaming.
Apparently, the gaming world is now sucking the wind out of big-box office openings. The coveted 18-34 male market is sitting at home playing Halo instead of watching “The HeartBreak Kid.”
The Punk Marketing Blog explains why this theory is full of it:
Poor box office on opening weekend for new Ben Stiller movie, ‘The Heartbreak Kid,’ is being blamed on the huge success of Halo 3, the third in the series of Halo video games by Microsoft Corp’s video game division.
Halo 3 sold $170 million in its first 24 hours of sales when it was launched on September 26, beating out previous record-holder movie Spiderman 3 for the title as biggest entertainment launch ever (of course Spidey 3 was a piece of crap, so it was just a matter of time). This shows how so NOT niche video games now are - they are going head to head with more traditional (read ‘dull’) forms of entertainment competing for the attention and pocket money of the fickle youths. And winning.
‘The Heartbreak Kid’ made $14million in its opening weekend, versus an expected $20-25million. And overall, box office receipts in October is down down down - it’s lowest level since 1999. Studio execs have been wondering aloud whether the success of Halo 3 can be blamed for the lackluster performance.
But we think there might be another explanation. Crap movies.
I second them on the crap movies. Halo launched September 26th, so the mad new-game-must-conquer high has pretty much worn off. Even the most hardcore gamers can peel themselves away from the TV to go out for a few hours.
That is, if they are properly motivated.
And I doubt that The Heartbreak Kid qualifies as proper motivation. It actually looks more like a Netflix to me…
