MCV/DEVELOP News, events, research and jobs from the games industry

Florida-based toy firm Jazwares has expanded its offering in the UK. The company, which produces Minecraft, Plants vs Zombies and Terraria toys, has opened a UK warehouse so that it can supply smaller outlets. The firm opened a UK office in 2013, but had to buy products in bulk from …

The most collectible individual 20th Anniversary PS4 is up for auction in Japan. Each of the 12,300 consoles, which have been selling for sky-high prices in the UK, has a serial number – and this one carries the coveted 00001/12300 badge. The bidding currently stands at nearly 12,000 on Yahoo …

With zombie-filled games continuing to sell in droves, it’s clear that players’ love of the undead never dies.MCV checks out what’s alive and kicking in the merchandise sector Since seminal horror flick Night of the Living Dead kickstarted their cultural domination in 1968, zombies have remained a widely-loved topic – …

Funding platform Kickstarter has hit back against critics that claim crowdfunded video games are on the decline. The firm announced on January 6th that $89.1m was pledged towards successful ‘games’ projects, a drop of 15 per cent year-on-year. In fact, this number also includes board games and other such products …

Bungie temporarily put a highly sought after weapon up for sale in Destiny last week, and the resulting stampede of interests demonstrates the ongoing interest in Activision’s title. The Ice Breaker sniper rifle was for one weekend offered for sale by in-game vendor Xur. The result? 1,143,320 were purchased by …

Over 6m units of a game you’ve never heard of was sold in Japan last year. And now it’s coming to the rest of the world. What is it? Should we be excited? Christopher Dring investigates Towards the back end of 2012, Japan’s massively popular CoroCoro Comic magazine published a …

It’s official. The UK games industry is full of workaholics. According to MCV’s annual Salary Survey, the majority of British games professionals work over 41 hours a week (56 per cent of those we surveyed). That’s above the national average of 39.2 hours a week – a figure that is …

Newcastle studio releasing procedurally generated vertical exploration title next month

Game of Thrones: Episode 2 – The Lost Lords has a release date. The second episode in the series will hit PS4, PS3, PC and Mac on February 3rd and then Xbox One and Xbox 360 on February 4th. The iOS release will follow on February 5th. The game will …

Ubisoft’s Grow Home is a quirky PC title starring a plant-loving robot, set to launch in less than two weeks. The ‘experiential vertical adventure’ (ie. Involving climbing) game is being developed by Ubisoft Reflections, the studio behind recently-released open-world racing IP The Crew and upcoming open-world multiplayer shooter Tom Clancy’s …