Game industry business news

It’s been another eventful day for Woolworths, as the Financial Times labels the company trying to buy the retailer for 1 a ‘scavenger’ – and Woolies’ biggest shareholder spits feathers over the potential deal. Shares in the company plunged to an all-time low yesterday on news of Hilco’s takeover attempt. …

Cheesy Canadian rockers Nickelback have blamed games such as Guitar Hero for reducing the number of new bands emerging in America. The band’s frontman Chad Kroeger says young people are more interested in playing music simulation games than learning real instruments. He told MTV: "I feel like there’s not enough …

Codemasters has confirmed Colin McRae: DiRT 2 for release next year on PlayStation 3, Xbox 360, Wii, DS and PSP. The sequel follows the tragic death of the rally legend in 2007, and the decision to continue to use Colin McRae’s name in the series was taken jointly by both …

Google has announced that it will be closing Google Lively at the end of the year, four and a half months after the service launched. The social networking space, set up in July this year, gave users the chance to interact while expressing themselves online in new ways”. Google confessed …

Ubisoft’s Jon Rosenblatt is to make a shock return to Electronic Arts, as senior European marketing director for the publisher’s Sports label. MCV understands that Rosenblatt, Ubisoft’s UK marketing director, will begin his new role in the New Year. He will report to Todd Sitrin, VP of marketing for EA …

Fallout 3 has been an great success for you. Can you walk us through the topline numbers, revenue figures, etc?As a private company we don’t generally give out financial information, I’m afraid. Our target unit ship-out was 750,000 for the UK/Eire and we came very close to that. If Paul …

Rockstar has revealed that the exclusive Xbox 360 downloadable content for GTA IV is set to arrive on February 17th, USA Today reports that the content will be entitled The Lost and the Damned and star Johnny Klebitz, a member of Liberty City gang The Lost. Rockstar has yet to …

Microsoft has told MCV that Xbox 360 has cruised past seven million sales in Europe. The firm told MCV this week that the combination of Xbox 360’s September price cut and blanket Q4 marketing had seen the console’s unit sales accelerate across EMEA. The company last released a European sales …

A host of names have stepped up to back next year’s Gamescom event. The city of Cologne and its Mayor plus the G.A.M.E. trade association have joined the likes of Nintendo, EA, Sega, Microsoft, Sony and the other members of German trade group BIU to support to support the new …

The attendance at Arsenal’s top of the table Premiership clash with Manchester Utd last weekend was 60,106 – but that number was dwarfed by another major London event taking place a little further south. Electronic Arts’ Be The One event once again proved a real jewel in the crown of …