RETAIL INTELLIGENCE Head to www.mcvuk.com for daily market data and news. This week our Recommended section starts on p27
Sony casts a Spell over UK retail Amazon hails Wonderbook, could it come to Waterstones? ‘It’s our big Christmas focus,’ says Sony’s Fergal Gara
by Christopher Dring SONY UK has been overwhelmed by the retail feedback to Wonderbook. Amazon told MCVthat the interactive book service – which will launch with Harry Potterspin-off Book of Spells – is ‘terrific’.
SCE UK’s boss Fergal Gara said that Wonderbook is the big PS3 launch of Christmas, and will arrive with multiple SKUs designed for current PS Move owners, those who have yet to buy Move, plus those who don’t own a PS3. “[Wonderbook] is the biggest one we’re going after this Christmas,” Gara said. “There’s still a lot to do and a lot of communicating to consumers still to do. We will need to work with retail where appropriate.
“If consumers understand what we are offering them, then it should fly. It is unlike anything I have ever seen before. The feedback we have had this week is that this is special, this is unique, this is pushing boundaries. That is what you want to be doing in a sector like this.” Amazon’s head of buying for games, Graham Chambers said: “I thought [Wonderbook] was terrific, very innovative and good to see the PS3 offering something new this far into the lifecycle. I’m sure the Wonderbook will have huge appeal to parents and young children.” Gara added that
Wonderbook could work in a wide range of retailers – perhaps even the likes of Waterstones and WH Smith. He said: “Specialists see a
key role for them in it, especially with their power to demonstrate, but also it is going to appeal to parents, so you would expect the likes of
2 June 15th 2012
Wonderbook is terrific, very
innovative and it’s good to see PS3 offering something new this far into the lifecycle.
“ Graham Chambers, Amazon
Argos and the supermarkets to do well with it. And the hybrid between books and games means that it fits with Amazon’s strengths. Maybe it would be appropriate to take into traditional book retailers.” Wonderbook will launch this Christmas along with Book of Spells, and has been supported by Harry Potter author J.K Rowling.
You can read more about J.K Rowling’s involvement in Wonderbook, plus how the idea came to be, in our interview with SCE president Andrew House on page 18.
BBC EYES WONDERBOOK SUPPORT
Sony is preparing various bundles for the launch of Wonderbook
BBC’s Walking with Dinosaurs could come to Wonderbook
BBC Worldwide believes PS3’s Wonderbook could be the perfect fit for its IP. The firm’s EVP of digital entertainment and games Robert Nashak says the company is thinking about which of its products – such as Doctor Whoand Walking with Dinosaurs– it could bring to Sony’s newly- announced interactive book platform.
Amazon’s Chambers (above left) and Sony’s Gara (above middle) see the J.K. Rowling-backed Wonderbook as a major Q4 release
“It was really exciting for us to see the Wonderbook at the Sony conference,” Nashak told MCV.
“We are a big believer in Augmented Reality, we are a big believer in story. “We like to call ourselves the storytellers to the world, and if you talk to people around the world, they associate the BBC with news and they associate the BBC with great stories. “You can imagine our properties coming to life in a book that is like a virtual pop-up book.
“It is very exciting for us to contemplate and think about.”