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

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 …

After two months of lobbying from the UK games industry, the finalists for this year’s MCV Awards have been selected. The shortlist, listed in full below, has 71 different companies in the running for the various accolades. Warner, Ubisoft and Sony each have ten nominations, EA has nine, Nintendo scores …

Tekken X Street Fighter game director Katsuhiro Harada has confirmed crossover fighting game Tekken X Street Fighter is still actively being developed. In an interview with Polygon, Harada admits that the team had planned to launch the game in a more timely manner than the delay-riddled schedule that has evolved. …

CD Projekt RED and Fuero Games’ mobile MOBA collaboration The Witcher Battle Arena is now available on iOS and Android devices. Both Apple App and Google Play stores currently carry the free-to-play title. The game features two teams of three competing over conquest points to capture and hold. As far …