Scarface was a big mobile content seller in 2006, clocking up 2 million sales of ringtones, voicetones, graphics and games reports THR. The article claims that meant it accounted for “1 percent of all mobile consumption and 15 percent of those consumers purchasing an action game, according to research firm M:Metrics”. I’m assuming that’s a serious misquote, considering that (for example) there was $727 million worth of content sold in the US in the third quarter of 2006. “Disney and Universal Mobile Entertainment declined to break out revenue from “Scarface,” but the 2 million purchases range from the $5.99 fee necessary to pay to play the game “Scarface: The Rise of Tony Montana” to the $1.99 that will get you one of an assortment of wallpaper images that features Pacino’s menacing mug.” There were 186,000 voicetones based on Scarface sold, with 110,000 of those featuring the “Say hello to my little friend” line, which topped Nielsen RingScan’s rankings for 18 weeks.
As a comparison that illustrates how far mobile content has to go, Vivendi Universal’s console game Scarface: The World Is Yours sold more than one million copies.
Anyway, 2 million bits of content sold is still pretty good for a 24 year-old movie, and Walt Disney and NBC Universal plan a swath of new mobile content in a bid to keep the sales flowing. The new content includes “a new casual game (Scarface Casino), a separate console-style game (Scarface: MPR), made-for-mobile animated shorts based on the film and a total of 30 new voicetones and mobile images combined”. The video shorts will be created with elements designed to view specifically over mobile.
Rafat adds: The story goes into all kinds of spin on why it is popular on mobile, including some lameness about “the collaborative approach between Starwave and Universal and their mutual embracing of the brand’s irreverent nature when it comes to creating innovative mobile content.” The real reason: the power of gaming, not really anything else.
{"source":"https:\/\/gigaom.com\/2007\/05\/11\/419-scarface-content-a-win-for-disney-nbc\/wijax\/49e8740702c6da9341d50357217fb629","varname":"wijax_d9c15adca5a1eadf113799a06283562a","title_element":"header","title_class":"widget-title","title_before":"%3Cheader%20class%3D%22widget-title%22%3E","title_after":"%3C%2Fheader%3E"}