LAFFERS DANCE - Kidscreen

up front
“4Kids TCG” continued from page 15
of the physical cards were uploaded for
Coast out of Renton, Washington currently
online gameplay, and the website had more
dominate the landscape, and it remains to
than two million users at its peak—which
be seen what impact 4Kids’ entry will have
is huge, considering the population of
on these category veterans. “Obviously,
Scandinavia is just 24 million.
when you put something new on the shelf,
4Kids has spent the past two years
unless you add more pegs, you’re going to
retooling the art to skew a little older and
have to reduce something else,” says Kahn.
testing the gameplay with boys nine to
“That will be the retailer’s decision.”
14. The rollout plan for Chaotic gets into
One advantage 4Kids may have in nego-
full swing this month with the 4Kids.TV
tiations with buyers is that Chaotic allows
launch of a same-name animated series
retailers to profit from online gaming, albeit
whose purpose is to teach kids how to
indirectly. “Most retailers, if they’re honest,
play the game. A co-pro with Vancouver,
are very upset about online games because
Canada’s Bardel Entertainment, the show
they don’t make any money from them,”
stars two boys who discover a secret
says Kahn. But with Chaotic (whose cards
portal in the trading card game they’ve
are embedded with codes that drive online
been playing. They use it to enter the
gameplay), they’ll get the margins associated
world of Perim, a parallel universe where
with the sale of starter kits, booster packs and
the unique codes on their cards are scans
coded ancillary products like toys, and they’ll Chaotic breaks new TCG ground with of real creatures and battle gear that they
generate goodwill from having provided con- embedded codes that drive a vast online game use to collect more codes and advance in
sumers with added value. Once kids buy the
the game.
Chaotic cards, the cost of online gaming is free, which is a big deal The cards themselves will hit card retailers in the spring,
for this less-than-flush demo, considering that some subscription- building into a summer mass-market entry with some major
based online games cost as much as US$20 a month.
promotions scheduled for back-to-school. The plan is to license
Chaotic was originally launched in 2001 by a toyco Chaotic in other product categories, and 4Kids is in talks with
called Dracco Company, which operates out of Copenhagen, many potential partners. But the company wants to make sure
Denmark. The pan-Scandinavian program ran for two and a the TV series, TCG and website gain traction before expanding
half years and racked up sales of US$54 million. More than 67% the property.
New Euro TV ad edict spells more of the same for kidnets
The European Parliament is supporting a controversial overhaul designed to relax TV advertising standards, but
they won’t stray far from the rules that kids broadcasters in EU countries already adhere to. The revisions move to increase the
frequency of commercial breaks to every half hour. That’s a step up for dramas, which can only broadcast ad breaks every 45
minutes now, but the standard for kids and news programming is already 30 minutes. The Parliament also amended the ban on
junk food advertising, much to the dismay of consumer groups, recommending that service providers develop a voluntary code
of conduct in kids programming to keep watch on foods high in fat, sugar and salt.
EU favors filters and .kid domain for web safety
The EU’s Culture Committee is pushing new guidelines for protecting European kids from violent, pornographic and racist content
on the internet. Its report recommends automatic fi lters or blocks that restrict access to harmful sites, and calls on providers to
submit regularly updated lists of harmful sites with common abbreviations. Another suggestion is to create a generic domain
name such as .kid to continuously screen sites and whistle-blow on those that may be considered inappropriate for children.
China to censor music and game imports
In the very same month it pledged to reform its tight policy on foreign TV and fi lm content, China is ordering online music and
game distributors to submit all imported products for approval by offi cial government censors. The new rules apply to websites
and mobile phone companies that distribute music, and they also ban the establishment of foreign-fi nanced music distributors.
Besides upholding government morals, the Chinese Ministry of Culture’s website says the new controls protect Chinese companies
that have lost market share to foreign rivals.
JANUARY 2007
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