Game industry business news

EA PopCap has dropped ZipZapPlay’s Facebook game Baking Life, despite the title having almost three quarters of a million players. The free-to-play game will close at the end of the month. Users who have bought in-game currency using real money will not be able to use this in other PopCap-owned …

Microsoft revenues pass $4 billion for the holiday quarter

Up-and-coming MMO specialist Trion Worlds has received a massive financial boost towards the company’s ongoing expansion. The publisher secured $85 million from Ontario Teachers’ Pension Plan and current investor Bertelsmann Digital Media Investments. "We are thrilled about entering this exciting period of growth and scale with our investors," said Trion …

Microsoft has launched the Dance Central 2 Dance Cam app which lets users appear in customisable music videos. The free download for iPhone, Android and Windows Phone 7 smartphones lets users record themselves or their friends dancing. Videos can be edited and shared, with smartphone owners able to challenge each …

Last week GAME revealed its poor Christmas financials, with UK and Ireland retail sales down 17.6 per cent over the festive period. We speak to CEO Ian Shepherd about the state of the market and how the Group can turn its fortunes around. So what went wrong? The video games …

Three of Ubisoft’s biggest downloadable releases of 2011 are coming to retail. A Play.com listing reveals the Ubisoft Triple Pack will contain Beyond Good & Evil HD, From Dust and Outland, according to Gamerzines. It will be available for Xbox 360 and PS3 from March 23rd and will retail at …

It wasn’t a great week for UK games retail, with the market shrinking by a third. 14m was generated from game sales overall which is almost 7m less than last week’s 20.9m With no new big releases hitting shelves for the week ending January 14th, the number of units sold …

A successful Christmas for Xbox 360 hardware and software saw Microsoft’s Entertainment and Devices division post record sales of $4.24bn for the Christmas quarter. That’s a 15 per cent year-on-year increase over 2010. The division registered a profit of $530m, which represents an annual decline of 28 per cent. 8.2m …

The digital world may be riding high following the high-profile global protests against SOPA and PIPA, but in the real world authorities have just claimed one of the largest piracy scalps. Late last night the US government shut down Megaupload, a site that allows users to host large files and …

The rumours were true – Capcom last night lifted the lid on Resident Evil 6. And consumers only have a short wait to get their hands on it, with a release date of November 20th on Xbox 360 and PS3 and a release on PC slightly later down the line. …