There weren't THAT many new titles being liquidated. And it still isn't happening in my areas in SE Detroit area. 90% of the clearance titles were dust collectors in the first place: Blowout, hotwheels, hulk,. power puff girls, TMB, XRGA, whiplash, harry potter? Most of these have been in the clearance bin at Target for many moons now. Theres only limited shalf space for the number of new releases and I think retailers are going to be more selective in the titles they decide to stock. This could be a very good thing for the industry.
I'm really sorry to hear about your trouble Defender, but that's the nature of the business with inventories that have a steep depreciation curve. The same thing happened to all the Indy PC shops throughout the evolution of the PC. When inventory is so volitle in the first place, only the big boys can afford to absorb the potential losses.
Doesn't the VG industry always lag in the summer? Kids play outside in the summer, go to movies, spend their money on other stuff like bikes, cars, and other nefarious activities. Then during the fall and winter season that money gets pointed toward indoor activities like gaming.
Then Christmas is just around the corner to get your majority of profit for the year.
I think theories about an outright crash are premature, though. There is a userbase of 150 million console users. That market isn't just going to disappear. There are companies that will be there to meet the demand, unless the economy takes a shit and people don't have as much disposable income anymore. With gas prices rising things don't look promising, but they seem to be stable for now and I'd expect the economy to get stronger through the summer before the election (It usually does in an election year). I think it's just going to be a dip in the industry, which has the potential to get worse if they keep announcing new hardware in 2005. People will stop buying as much so they can wait for a new console, i.e. the Dreamcast phenomenon.