Borders Teases New Video Games Lineup

As in Borders the international bookseller, and they're reportedly testing a handful of PC titles in their Oxford Street, London store with potential plans to expand to Wii and DS games.

David Kohn, Borders UK and Ireland commercial director, recognizes the fact that computer games (i.e. console and PC) are booming and either comparable or superior sales-wise to DVDs and music. "We believe there is a significant opportunity for computer games in our stores following much positive feedback from our customers and our store staff," he told MCV today, adding the Borders sees games from Nintendo in particular complementing the company's "market-leading" children's lineup.

The United Kingdom is the largest games market in Europe and the third largest in the world after the U.S. and Japan.

At the same time, major publishers are beginning to shift business toward online distribution. (Not online-only, mind you, but if sales do well, that's not so far off, even for major releases.)

You can currently buy game books from Borders online, but you have to shift to their partner, Amazon, to buy actual games and/or hardware, and Amazon's behind the curve when it comes to downloadable video games, i.e. they don't offer the latter feature at all.

So the question as I see it is: Is Borders selling games even news? Sure, the company deserves credit for finally waking up and smelling the superior moneymaker, but with games moving swiftly toward a predominantly download-driven model, are they too little, too late?

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