CEO Strauss Zelnick says Western has potential to be "permanent" franchise, like James Bond.

During a recent earnings call, Take-Two CEO Strauss Zelnick teased a sequel to 2010's critically acclaimed Red Dead Redemption, saying he believes the game has the potential to be a "permanent" franchise, similar to the James Bond series.

"It's been our goal not just to preserve and grow the Grand Theft Auto franchise, but also to build other franchises that we think can be permanent, whether that's the Red Dead franchise or the Borderlands franchise or the BioShock franchise or others, Civilization, for example," Zelnick said.

The executive also claimed that Take-Two has a unique approach to building franchises compared to its competitors. In his view, it is smarter to make "permanent" franchises that consumers will continually spend time and money on over the years instead of "making hay while the sun shines."

"Our goal is to try to create permanent franchises, that's the unique goal in the industry. Our competitors do not see it that way. Our competitors' view is that our franchise will have a certain life, and at the end of that life, you move onto the next thing, so you better make hay while the sun shines," Zelnick said. "Our view is to the contrary. The best franchises are permanent franchises. Outside of our business you can look at James Bond, for example."

Red Dead Redemption was released in May 2010 to nearly universal praise. The game was developed primarily by Rockstar San Diego and is a spiritual successor to 2004's Red Dead Revolver, which Rockstar Games purchased from Capcom in 2002 after its cancellation.

If the Red Dead Redemption franchise is to return, it could be one of the multiple next-generation games Take-Two currently has in development. In May, CEO Strauss Zelnick said, "We also have a extraordinary pipeline of titles in development for next-generation platforms, including groundbreaking new intellectual property and releases from our proven franchises."

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Milestone for aging console achieved during April-June quarter where system sold 500,000 more units than successor the Wii U.

Nintendo's Wii console, released in November 2006, has crossed 100 million units in global life-to-date sales. The milestone was achieved during Nintendo's April-June quarter.

To date, lifetime sales for the system stand at 100.04 million units. The Wii is now Nintendo's third gaming machine to have sold over 100 million units, joining the DS (153.93 million) and the Game Boy (118.69 million).

More than 872 million games for the console have been sold to date, with Mario Kart Wii the top non-bundled game at 34.26 million copies sold since launch.

By comparison, Microsoft's Xbox 360 has sold 78.2 million systems to date, while the PlayStation 3 is believed to have sold around 77 million units worldwide since launch.

Nintendo's latest console, the Wii U, has not yet been the runaway success that the original Wii was. As revealed today in an earnings report, the system sold only 160,000 units during the April-June quarter, boosting lifetime sales to 3.61 million consoles. The original Wii outsold the Wii U in the quarter by 500,000 units.

14.44 million Wii U games have been sold thus far. New Super Mario Bros. U is the system's top non-bundled game, moving 2.15 million units to date.

Nintendo plans to sell 9 million Wii U units before March 2014. The company is hoping to spur console sales by releasing numerous first-party titles in the coming months, including The Legend of Zelda: The Wind Waker HD, Wii Party U, Donkey Kong Country: Tropical Freeze, Super Mario 3D World, and Wii Fit U.

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Sega's new real-time strategy game helps boost company's gaming business for April-June quarter.

Company of Heroes 2 sold 380,000 units in five days, according to sales information released by publisher Sega today. The game launched June 25 to a positive critical reception.

The sales news for Company of Heroes 2 came as part of Sega's latest financial report for the April-June quarter ended June 30.

Sega's consumer business, which handles the company's gaming efforts, posted net sales of ¥18.9 billion ($192 million), up 25.2 percent year-over-year. Operating income was ¥39 million ($400,000), compared to a loss of ¥1.6 billion ($16.2 million) last year.

Sega achieved these results despite a year-on-year decline in total volume of packaged software sales of 1.21 million copies, including 370,000 in the United States, 570,000 in Europe, and 250,000 in Japan.

The company's digital business was a bright spot for the quarter, with performance remaining "favorable" on games for smartphones and PC. Sega called out free-to-play role-playing game Phantasy Star Online 2 as a top performer, exceeding 500,000 for downloads and packaged versions since launch.

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Publisher reports net income for the latest quarter decreases to ’828 million; Resident Evil: Revelations "basically achieved" projected sales.

Capcom today announced financial results for the quarter ended June 30, revealing net income decreased to ¥828 million ($8.4 million), down 37.3 percent year-over-year. Net sales also fell for the quarter, sliding 6.2 percent to ¥17.5 billion yen ($177.8 million)

During the April-June quarter, Capcom said Resident Evil: Revelations "basically achieved" projected unit sales at 900,000 copies, while Dragon's Dogma: Dark Arisen achieved "solid sales" of 550,000 copies in the company's digital content business.

Lifetime Resident Evil franchise sales now stand at over 57 million units, across 86 released titles to date.

"Consolidated financial results for ended June 30, 2013 was decreased in sales and all profits from the same term last year, because of the lower ASP for the package software and the lack of major titles for the mobile contents in the Digital Content business," Capcom said.

Online game Monster Hunter Frontier G performed "strongly," Capcom said, while the Taiwanese browser game Onimusha Soul "enjoyed a successful launch," according to the company.

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