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

Rovio has denied the report that its popular mobile franchise Angry Birds was utilized as a tool by government spy agencies, including the US National Security Agency and UK’s Government Communications Headquarters. Responding to allegations found in a leaked Snowden document, the Finland-based company claimed it doesn’t share data from …

The upcoming expansion of Crusader Kings 2 – its sixth and one of its biggest – will see the game head east to India. The expansion, due for release in March, brings jungle terrain to the game, and lets players align themselves to one of three religions – Buddhism, Jainism …

Get a job at the CSR Racing developer

Mario and friends will not be appearing on smartphones in the foreseeable future, despite recent reports to the contrary. That’s the message coming from Nintendo this afternoon after it reached out in response to claims overnight from Japanese outlet Nikkei that the company is preparing to release smartphone minigames based …

How Marmalade helped a pair of mobile developers develop two distinct titles

Sucker Punch’s iconic PlayStation IP Sly Cooper is getting the big-screen treatment. Sony has teamed up with Rainmaker Entertainment and Blockade Entertainment for the project, which is due for release in 2016. The film’s Facebook page describes it as a kinetic and comedic heist film”. Don’t forget that before Sly’s …

Bethesda has confirmed that PS4 owners will not need to subscribe to PlayStation Plus to play The Elder Scrolls Online. PS4 is the first Sony console to require that users sign up to the subscription arm of PlayStation network to access multiplayer. However, it appears from CVG‘s report that this …

Mo-cap and motion tracking firms team up to offer studios flexibility in facial and full-performance capture productions

A Japanese news channel is claiming that Sony is lining up a 7bn acquisition of a Renesas Electronics semiconductor plant. This is of note because the site currently produces the DRAM chips found in Nintendo’s Wii U. DualShockers reports that Sony is prepared to invest a further 20bn into the …

51m iPhones and 26m iPads were sold by Apple in Q4 2013. Both numbers are record-breaking for the firm, which in the same period a year before sold 47.8m iPhones and 22.9m iPads. The sales led to revenue of $57.6bn and net profit of $13.1bn – which was flat –for …