Game industry business news

Up-and-coming social and casual games studio Zattikka has announced the launch of Mr Bean: Out of Control. The iPhone and iPad game is the first in a series of downloadable distractions based on the classic slapstick character portrayed by Rowan Atkinson. It is available now on the App Store. In …

Sony’s lack of first party software releases for PSP in the last year has mean the handheld has been 2010’s most disappointing performer, according to retailer GameStop. I think Sony did a great job two years ago in terms of coming out with a pretty good line-up of PSP offerings …

The Hut Group has announced it has acquired online health and beauty specialist, the Lookfantastic Group. The acquisition cost 19.4m and will see Lookfantastic’s online stores such as lookfantastic.com, lookmantastic.com and beautysleuth.co.uk integrated into The Hut’s extensive portfolio. As such, the 1m+ predominantly female customer base that Lookfantastic has established …

Movie rental service LoveFilm has arrived on PS3 today with users able to stream TV episodes and movies from their console. The firm has also partnered with Push Button who will bring the service to other digital platforms across the world. The developer previously brought LoveFilm on-demand to Sony Bravia …

EEDAR analyst Jesse Divnich has predicted that the global install base of the PS3 will overtake Xbox 360 by the end of 2012. Using a similar method to that used by MCV at the end of October when we made the exact same prediction, Divnich points out that since May …

Turbulenz Limited game creation and publishing platform receives investor support

With this year’s Call of Duty now out in the wild, reports are once again predicting that the next iteration of the franchise will be set in the future. Industry sources say Sledgehammer’s Call of Duty will be set in the future and feature, for lack of a better term, …

After all the talk and all the hype, Microsoft’s Xbox 360 Kinect is finally on sale in the UK. Following the arrival of Sony’s Move in the UK in September, the launch of Kinect today means that the motion control revolution started by Nintendo last decade has now finally spread …

We are yet to receive any firm sales numbers for Call of Duty: Black Ops from publisher Activision, but stats from Xbox Live suggests the game is well on track to rival the records set by its predecessor Modern Warfare 2. As noted by Treyarch’s community manager Josh Olin, last …

MIGS 2010: Age of Conan MMO company boss argues the case for sticking to platform conventions