UMD price drop leads to sales jump in Japan
While the news probably doesn't come as any surprise to you, it has apparently taken the execs behind the UMD movie scene quite some time to pinpoint price as the primary culprit of the lagging sales. The higher-ups at Warner Home Video reported that its UMD films weren't selling well awhile back -- presumably to no one's surprise but their own -- and even Wal-Mart has been teetering on dropping the slow-selling discs from its precious shelf space. In a less-than-revolutionary announcement, it seems implementing a "permanent sale" on UMD movies in Japan has increased sales nearly tenfold; pricing 22 (and counting) titles at ¥980 (about $8.46) has prompted PSP owners to snatch these up in unprecedented quantities, which is somewhat telling of where these things should've been priced at from the start. While we aren't exactly sure if this indefinite sale will make the jump to US shores, this "discovery" is a rare step forward for the flailing format, and we can only hope this reduction becomes the norm on all UMD flicks.
[Via MobileMag]
