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

Microsoft’s PC games guy Jason Holtman has apparently moved on, a move that comes after less than six months on the job with the firm. VG247 points to an update on Holtman’s LinkedIn profile, indicating the industry veteran left Microsoft at some point last month. Holtman was hired on by …

NPD has revealed new US sales figures for games in 2013 – and this time around, the research group has included digital revenue and second-hand sales in their findings. Following its 2013 US retail report – which showed a 2 per cent year-over-year decline in industry sales – NPD has …

Microsoft has invested in location-based social networkFourSquare to reportedly help develop the firm’s rumoured voice-activated assistant app, Cortana. The investment was confirmed by FourSquare CEO Dennis Crowley, but no details were disclosed at the time. However, Bloomberg cities an anonymous source who claims the deal is worth $15m and was …

Warner has told fans not to expect any further patches for Batman: Arkham Origins. Instead, Warner Bros Montreal is focusing its development resources on DLC. The team is currently working hard on the upcoming story DLC and there currently are no plans for releasing another patch to address the issues …

Developer explains decision to take mobile hit off app stores

UK studio working on strategy title based on Games Workshop IP

Ubisoft shipped 10m copies of Assassin’s Creed IV: Black Flag by the end of 2013, the company has confirmed. However, as CVG notes, by the same stage in its life predecessor Assassin’s Creed 3 had seen over 12m units shipped. However, the company added that sales of ACIV have been …

The gap between and console and PC releases of Dark Souls 2 should me measured in weeks and not months. That’s according to the game’s producer Takeshi Miyazoe who told Digital Spy that the PC SKU should hit shelves shortly after” the game’s arrival on Xbox 360 and PS3 on …

This week sees the arrival of Xbox One’s first software update but Microsoft has already detailed what will be included in the March update. Here’s what it will include, as detailed by Microsoft chief product officer Marc Whitten: Get to your friends list faster. The friends list will be front …

PS4 and Xbox One are the lead platforms for this year’s as-of-yet unannounced Call of Duty. Sledgehammer is approaching this as a next-gen-first development,” Activision Publishing CEO Eric Hirshberg told IGN. Obviously in the console-transition year, anyone who developed a cross-generational game last year had to deal with the fact …