Game industry business news

Ubisoft makes more money per Xbox One user than PS4 user

Global sales of the PS4 may well be far ahead of Xbox One, but today’s Ubisoft financial report reveals that Microsoft users are spending more. VentureBeat reports that for every $1 spent by the average PS4 owner on Ubisoft products in Q3, Xbox One owners spent $1.25. This higher average …

Read More »

Digital points cards hit £160m

Sales of digital points cards in stores rose slightly from 158m in 2014 to 160m last year. The main area of growth in this sector are cards bought for specific individual titles, which was valued at 27m in 2015. IHS estimates that over 1.224bn was spent on PC and console …

Read More »

Kojima launches ‘HideoTube’ YouTube channel

Free as a bird and without a care in the world, liberated developer Hideo Kojima has launched his own YouTube channel. It’s called HideoTube. The first episode, perhaps unsurprisingly, looks at the Metal Gear Solid creator’s favourite 10 films of 2015. Also present is Kenji Yano, who has worked with …

Read More »

PC games hardware market bucks wider technology trends

The sales of PC hardware may be suffering worldwide, but not in terms of games. Data specialists GfK revealed that sales of PC gaming components and peripherals rose by 13 per cent in 2015. Overall, the PC games hardware market – which also includes graphics cards and headsets – generated …

Read More »

Moshi Monsters collapse masks market growth for toy tie-ins

Toys based on game licences are actually in growth, despite what the numbers suggest, NPD has said. The toy tracker’s latest data – which does not include toys-to-life – shows that 62.3m was made from game-inspired toys, an eight per cent dip. But this is entirely down to Moshi Monsters. …

Read More »

Profit and revenue down at Candy Crush creator King

The record $5.9bnbuy-outby Activision was just about the only positive number for King last year. The Candy Crush studio has revealed its latest financials, which show that annual profit for 2015 dropped by a tenth to land at $517 million. Meanwhile, revenues were down 12 per cent to $2 billion. …

Read More »

Xbox boss talks down irate Quantum Break fans

Overall, platform exclusivity is not a good thing for gamers. It can be a good thing for platform holders, of course. In principle, it’s great for games to be as widely available to as many potential players as possible. Releasing across formats helps that. Of course, it comes with other …

Read More »

Need for Speed racing to PC, complete with improvements

EA has announced a PC version of the latest Need for Speed, and promised it will feature a range of enhancements. Among the perks include support for 4K visuals and an unlocked frame rate. Previous PC Need for Speed titles have suffered from a 30fps cap, much to the irritation …

Read More »

Is GameStop’s publishing move the future of the retailer, or just an interesting side-project?

On the surface, Song of the Deep doesn’t come across as anything particularly remarkable. The 2D underwater action adventure is pretty, and bound to delight a certain type of gamer. But ultimately it looks like most other 2D indie games that are on the market at the moment. Yet there …

Read More »