Nasdaq traders exchanged 6.9 million shares of THQ stock -- more than four times the daily average -- in a day that saw the stock's price drop nearly 26 percent to $4.40 per share, though a small portion of that decrease has been reversed in after hour trading as of this writing.
The volatility follows a 7 percent rise on Monday to a close a $5.94 per share, a trend that seems to have been stopped by a several lukewarm reviews for alternate history first-person shooter Homefront, which hits stores today.
The game currently has an average score of 72 on popular review aggregator MetaCritic. All the reviews below this average were posted online today, while the eight highest reviews for the title -- all of which earned the game an adjusted score of 85 or higher -- were posted in the four days prior to release.
But sales for some other THQ releases have not been as strong recently. An analyst note from Wedbush Morgan's Michael Pachter shows the company's Wii-based uDraw tablet, which was a major hit over the holidays, sold just 26,000 units in February, according to NPD. In addition, colorful platformer De Blob 2 sold "well below" an expected 75,000 units for the month, Pachter said.
Today's drop puts THQ stock at its lowest level since November 2010, when it briefly saw a surge to a recent high of $6.41 per share. The stock remains well off from a 52-week high of $8.27, reached in April 2010, and a historic high of $36.16 achieved in 2007.
I wonder what Danny Bilson has to say about this one? Can his arrogance keep him employed? I like the way they mentioned that the game was at its highest in scores 4 days prior to shipping. Did THQ spend their way to get those scores as well? They did dump incredible amounts of cash advertising this product.
HomeFront hot dog stands?!!!?? Live concerts for the resistance?!!!!?? Lots of bus stops and cab ride billboards? That's a good chunk of cash for propaganda. Not to mention the amount of resources it took to even develop the title. It would be interesting to know how much revenues THQ need to make just to break even on this spoiled egg.
Bilson has a long history of mediocre releases in film, tv, comics and games. Even the ones that decent scores also got a lot of not so good score. Homefront is no different that other past roll outs. They get a lot of buzz during production, tons of advertising before release and then there is the big "whiff!" sound of the bat missing the ball once we finally get a look at what has actually been done.
Sad that they couldn't have done better marketing this, I think it would have helped. I did see the commercial with the live action at the beginning (on the web), and that part looked pretty good. But the gameplay just did not look that enticing, and I never did see a big vid on what the whole story of the game was.
It's a bit ironic, considering that they kept mentioning that they wanted to be like COD, that they never showed a big gameplay reveal on tv and the like - which it seems is what the COD games have done in the past. And maybe they couldn't because it simply wasn't there.
For hardcore console gamers, they do matter. No individual reviews, but gamers absolutely look at the metacritic, and few these days will bite on a 72-rating game.
Here's is where the real joke is, the scores used before the game ships (in most cases) are predicated on some crappy game trailer or mocked up game experience; not the actual true game experience in itself.
A lot of studios pull this nonsense.
I don't care about scores of titles before ship.
Only ones after to see if they're credible!!!!!!
Gamers are tired of being burnt. They will definitely be eyeing that metacritic!
Not so woot.
I wonder what Danny Bilson has to say about this one? Can his arrogance keep him employed? I like the way they mentioned that the game was at its highest in scores 4 days prior to shipping. Did THQ spend their way to get those scores as well? They did dump incredible amounts of cash advertising this product.
HomeFront hot dog stands?!!!?? Live concerts for the resistance?!!!!?? Lots of bus stops and cab ride billboards? That's a good chunk of cash for propaganda. Not to mention the amount of resources it took to even develop the title. It would be interesting to know how much revenues THQ need to make just to break even on this spoiled egg.
It's a bit ironic, considering that they kept mentioning that they wanted to be like COD, that they never showed a big gameplay reveal on tv and the like - which it seems is what the COD games have done in the past. And maybe they couldn't because it simply wasn't there.
Here's is where the real joke is, the scores used before the game ships (in most cases) are predicated on some crappy game trailer or mocked up game experience; not the actual true game experience in itself.
A lot of studios pull this nonsense.
I don't care about scores of titles before ship.
Only ones after to see if they're credible!!!!!!
Gamers are tired of being burnt. They will definitely be eyeing that metacritic!
I don't see this as being anything but mediocre.