2010-Jun-15

One of our technical artists whipped this up.

Graphics guys should get this…

Still not getting it? Here’s a hint…

Enjoy

2010-May-6

EA Games label president Frank Gibeau has said he and his teamed have aimed to make a “Halo killer” with Crysis 2.

Stealing the console shooter’s throne, he explained to IndustryGamers, was a focus of development for EA’s sci-fi sequel.

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2010-May-6

Epic Games design director Cliff Bleszinski has warned gamers not to trust Gears of War 3 info leaked via scans of a Russian games mag.

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2010-May-6

A Ubisoft rep has official confirmed Assassin's Creed: Brotherhood, after validating a leaked photo of the placeholder box art for GameStop's shelf displays, scooped by Kotaku.

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2010-May-5

The BBC has said that it has a responsibility to support the creative industries in the UK, including the videogames sector, but that it must act carefully when investing public money in projects.

Speaking in the first episode of a new series for EGTV, hosted today on GamesIndustry.biz, head of interactive for the BBC Children's, Marc Goodchild, said that audience research shows that videogames are the number one reason viewers use the internet, and games are central to the BBC's interactive services.

"Games is absolutely a core part of what we do. We do audience research about what children go online for and games is regularly top of the list and social normally comes second," he said. "So we couldn't operate in the interactive space without doing games, it's part of our remit.

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2010-May-5

EA Games president Frank Gibeau has said that the deal struck between Respawn, the new studio of sacked Infinity Ward heads Jason West and Vince Zampella, and EA was "spectacular" for the publisher.

"Infinity Ward - what they were was a spectacular development organisation," Gibeau told Gamasutra.

"Jason and Vince and their team there clearly created and did things in the entertainment business that have never been done before in gaming. So lots of respect to them. Those guys are big players."

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2010-May-5

Once of the biggest names in the videogames middleware space is Autodesk, with swathes of big titles being created using packages such as Max and Maya - but how does the company view the future of the industry, and the current trend towards handheld and social networking platforms? To find out, we spoke to the company's vice president of games - Marc Stevens. He explains here how business has been through the difficult economic situation, whether they're looking to work with more indie studios, and whether or not we're any closer to crossing the Uncanny Valley - or indeed if that actually matters when it comes to inspiring the more tender emotions.

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2010-May-5

Frank Gibeau, president of the EA Games label, has said the super publisher is "very excited" after its partnership with Respawn, formed by former Infinity Ward boss Jason West and Vince Zampella (and an increasing number of its dev staff).

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2010-May-5

Halo Reach is this year's most anticipated release, according to a survey taken in the US.

The Bungie shooter, which is currently in open beta form and can be played via a copy of Halo ODST, topped the list of 25 games released or being released this year that US gamers intend to buy.

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2010-May-4

Lisa and Tom are the type of people who can’t stay put, and this time they have decided that their new gig will take them flying around the whole world! Help them attend to the needs of iconic airport passengers and their luggage in this frenetic Time Management game! Fly to the most luxurious cities in the world as you help Lisa and Tom rake in the cash and purchase awesome upgrades in Lisa’s Fleet Flight.

2010-May-4

Australian ratings board OFLC has posted a rating for a mystery 'Project Red' title from EA.

As Joystiq notes, the Project Red title could be linked to EA and Starbreeze's yet-to-be-revealed game, codenamed Project Redlime, which is widely speculated to be a new Syndicate game.

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2010-May-4

Sony has launched a new PlayStation Protection Plan service, allowing PSP and PS3 owners to pay for extended warranthy coverage for their consoles.

Extensions of either one or two years are offered for both consoles, and for the PSP Sony's offering an additional accidental damage plan that covers things like users dropping their handhelds.

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2010-Apr-30

Apple CEO Steve Jobs has explained in detail his company's reasons for not supporting Adobe's Flash technology on any of its mobile platforms.

In a long open letter published on the Apple website Jobs began by emphasising that the decision not to support Flash on iPods, iPhones or iPads was not "primarily business driven".

He rejected suggestions that Apple was simply attempting to protect its App Store from competition and said that the decision was solely based on technology issues.

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2010-Apr-30

Remedy's Alan Wake is to become the latest title to be bundled with a DLC voucher that can only be redeemed once, encouraging consumers to buy new rather than pre-owned.

The move is a similar one to the much talked about 'Project Ten Dollar', announced by EA earlier this year and implemented into games Dragon Age: Origin and Mass Effect 2, which aims to add value to new copies of retail games.

Microsoft also employed the tactic with Gears of War 2, offering buyers a code for five enhanced multiplayer maps from the original game in order to encourage new sales.

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2010-Apr-30

The media furore over the crisis at Infinity Ward has been "overdone" according to Cowen and Company analysts Doug Creutz and Adam Nolly.

In an investor note the analysts acknowledged that the development team working on 2011's Call of Duty title (rumoured to be Modern Warfare 3) would be "significantly changed" from those that worked on the first two Modern Warfare games.

However, the analysts suggest that the proven track record of non-Infinity Ward entries in the series, such as Treyarch's World at War, gives little cause for concern - with Activision having 18 months to build a new team.

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2010-Apr-30

The recent class action against Sony and the removal of the Install Other OS feature from the PlayStation 3 highlights a "relatively untested" area of UK and European law, Jas Purewal, a lawyer at Olswang LLP and writer of GamerLaw, has told GamesIndustry.biz.

Purewal's comments were made following the revelation yesterday that Sony faces a class action lawsuit over the removal of the "Other OS" features commonly used to install the Linux operating system on the console.

Sony removed the feature in a firmware update after hackers exploited the option to gain read/write access to the PlayStation 3.

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2010-Apr-29

Bungie’s not the first core Microsoft developer to break away from the fold to go multiplatform with Activision. Bizarre Creations made the jump too, but Bungie has taken a step further, retaining its precious independence, its creative control and its ownership of the IP it’s going to spend the next ten years developing with the publisher.

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2010-Apr-29

Earlier today Halo developer Bungie dropped the bombshell that it had signed a ten year deal with Activision, giving the publisher exclusive publishing rights to games based on a new, unannounced IP. Many questions were raised by the deal - including how this would affect the developer's relationship with Microsoft, how much freedom Bungie would retain over its new creation and why such a lengthy signing. GamesIndustry.biz spoke to Bungie's community director Brian Jarrard who explained more about the deal.

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2010-Apr-29

Microsoft has said that further updates to its Xbox Live Game Room retro-arcade have been pushed back "until further notice".

The delay was announced via Twitter by Microsoft EMEA Xbox editor Daniel Maher who said: "The latest batch of Game Room content has also been delayed until further notice - I'll let you know once a new date is confirmed."

Since the service's initial unveiling at this year's CES when Microsoft said that it intended to offer over 1000 titles in its first three years, it has already faced one delay.

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2010-Apr-29

Retail giant HMV has outlined it's financial results for the year to April 24, 2010 as well as the fourth quarter (the 16 weeks to April 24) revealing a tough time since the start of this year - but overall slight growth in sales over the year as a whole.

The company posted an overall sales shrinkage of 5.8 per cent in Q4, with HMV UK & Ireland and HMV International struggling at shrinkage figures of 8.2 per cent and 9.5 per cent respectively. Its Waterstone's business offset that to a degree, with sales falling by 4.3 per cent, while the HMV Live business brought the overall figure down to 5.8 per cent.

But stronger results over the rest of the year, before calendar 2010, helped the company to an overall sales growth across all its brands of 1.8 per cent.

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2010-Apr-29

Best Buy's head of entertainment Marc Spence has said that pre-owned game sales will be an important part of the retailer's proposition from day one in the UK because it's what customers have asked for.

"The customers told us that they wanted to see second-hand games and, generally speaking, there's a cycle of buying a game then trading it in against the price of a new one. We did customer research and the customers said, 'absolutely, we want second-hand'," said Spence.

Speaking ahead of the flagship UK store's opening in Thurrock, Essex, Spence added that while pre-owned was a relatively new prospect for its US stores, it had decided it had to be offered from day one in the UK.

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2010-Apr-29

Sara is back in a new exotic adventure! Design and decorate your ranch and corral exotic animals in this Time Management game. This is a special Collector's Edition early release. The game is scheduled to be released in 2-3 weeks so, the Collector's Edition is for those who can’t wait to start their exotic ranch. As a bonus, Collector's Edition purchases counts toward three stamps on your Monthly Game Club Punch Card! Experience all the exclusive Collector’s Edition extras! The Collector’s Edition includes:

2010-Apr-29

After 12 months at the planning stage, the UK's first Best Buy store opens tomorrow in Thurrock, Essex, standing in the shadow of Lakeside shopping centre and amidst a sprawl of out-of-town retail competition. The chain had promised gaming would be a prominent category and its flagship store certainly doesn't disappoint. A dedicated games room - which lets staff give personalised demonstration of hardware and games - is housed separate to a vast games section, while console demo pods are replaced by TVs and consoles in spaces with more than enough room to swing several Wii controllers. Product space is equally expansive with a wide range of both new and pre-owned games on the shelves. Ahead of the doors opening on the new retail offering, GamesIndustry.biz spoke to the retailer's head of entertainment, Marc Spence - formerly MD of GAME Europe, and buying director for DSG - about competitors, digital plans and selling pre-owned product.

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2010-Apr-28

UFC franchise producer Neven Dravinski has told GamesIndustry.biz he doubts UFC Undisputed 2009 would have sold over 4 million units worldwide had it not been of a high enough quality to satisfy a "vocal" MMA community and UFC president Dana White himself.

Talking ahead of the release of a successor to the game this May, Dravinski added that it had been difficult to produce a sequel within a year, but that he was happy that it would "crush the memory" of last year's commercial and critical hit.

"The term sequel has this inherent stigma attached to it for whatever reason," he said. "As a developer it's somewhat difficult to create a whole brand new game within a year's time but we understand that people demand a lot and I think they'll be very satisfied with what we've been able to deliver within that short amount of time."

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2010-Apr-28

Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer thinks “controller-free gaming and entertainment experience" Project Natal is probably the most exciting product the company will bring to market this year.

Speaking to a group of executives in Bogota, Columbia this week, Ballmer was keen to stress the non-gaming applications of the motion sensing technology, much like Xbox Live general manager Marc Whitten did last week.

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2010-Apr-28

Vlad Ihora, the business development manager for Sweden's leading network operator TeliaSonera, has said that services such as OnLive won't work on a broad scale unless their makers can secure all of the points between their servers and the end-user.

"Obviously remote gaming is a very important part of the future," Ihora told GamesIndustry.biz. "Unfortunately it's not necessarily a strong part of the present as yet.

"It's not anything to do with OnLive or other such companies, in terms of their algorithms or service in itself - it has a lot to do with the rest of the components in the value chain."

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2010-Apr-28

As the games business turns increasingly to the online space, so the matter of the ever-changing connectivity landscape becomes more important. We caught up with Vlad Ihora, the head of games at TeliaSonera - the company that handles the networking for Blizzard in Europe, among others - to find out how the online environment had changed in the past year, plus what the chances of success were for OnLive.

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2010-Apr-28

Japanese games giant Square Enix has launched a new games label, 'Extreme Edges', to incorporate its western titles, according to reports.

The Japanese releases of Kane & Lynch 2: Dog Days, as wells as Activision's (who's games are occasionally published in Japan by Square) Singularity and Blur will be among the first games to come under the new label, according to Japanese games mags Dengeki and Famitsu (via The Lost Gamer).

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2010-Apr-28

A number of US retailers have told CVG that the black Wii SKU will be released Stateside in May.

More specifically, Wal-Mart told us the shiny black consoles should arrive on a Sunday in "mid to late May", although no exact day had been set.

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2010-Apr-27

Having co-founded two massively successful companies – mobile firm Macrospace and social gaming company Playfish, the latter of which was acquired by EA last year for an estimated $300 million – few are better placed to speak about entrepreneurship than Kristian Segerstrale, who will be doing just that in a Nordic Game keynote this week. Before he left for the conference, ash cloud permitting, Segerstrale spoke to GamesIndustry.biz about the setting up of Playfish and his thoughts on where social gaming is heading from here.

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2010-Apr-26

TimeGate CEO, Adel Chaveleh, has said that he believes digital distribution will continue to grow in the games industry, giving developers more freedom and control over their intellectual property.

Talking to Gamasutra , he said, “The barrier for large-scale releases boils down to bandwidth and marketing. As broadband speeds increase, the size of games will become less of an issue."

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2010-Apr-26

The BBCs plans to release four separate episodes for Doctor Who: The Adventure Games is a "leap of faith" according to developer Sumo Digital, as it prepares the first in the series for release on June 5.

Each episode is designed as a true extension of the hugely popular Saturday night TV show, with Sumo, BBC Wales Interactive and BBC Online collaborating with Broken Sword designer Charles Cecil to create what it calls "new forms of drama".

"The BBC has taken a big leap of faith here in trying to create a game alongside the TV series that integrates with it so closely, and is effectively broadcast while the series runs to compliment it," offered Paul Porter, studio head at Sumo Digital, in an interview published today.

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