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

Spring 2013 is indeed the release date of Grand Theft Auto V, Rockstar has at last confirmed. The announcement follows on from two separate leaks confirming that date. Xbox 360 and PS3 have also been confirmed as the launch formats. Pre-orders for the game will go live on November 5th. …

Skyrim is receiving a premium edition retail release, at least for select countries. A listing on Amazon Germany points to a December 7th launch for the re-release on PC, PS3, and Xbox 360. Along with the game, extra goodies such as a map, t-shirt, postcards, an Elder Scrolls novel, and …

Activision Blizzard has unveiled Activate, a new social gaming platform for mobile devices. Inside Mobile Apps reports the platform will offer cloud storage allowing customers access to their games from multiple devices, and supports multiplayer titles as well. Users can log into mobile games using a Facebook ID or set-up …

There’s certainly no accusing Rovio of creating a shameless cash-in. The first gameplay trailer for Angry Birds Star Wars is here, and it suggests a huge amount of work has gone into integrating George Lucas’ intergalactic licence into the gameplay. In the video we see a Luke Skywalker bird attack …

Deep Silver has announced an April 26th 2013 release date for Dead Island Riptide in the UK. It will be released a few days earlier on April 23rd in the US and Canada. Launch formats will be Xbox 360, PS3 and PC. The publisher has also announced two SKUs that …

Develop takes a look at a new range of high-end motion capture cameras

It can be startling how quickly the music video game genre changes. One moment Just Dance is nothing but a Rayman Rabbids mini-game, and Rock Band and Guitar Hero are amongst the biggest selling titles in the world. The next, Rock Band has lots its publisher, Guitar Hero has been …

Publisher Ubisoft believes it can still become the world’s biggest publisher, despite the changing marketplace. The firm told MCV?in 2011 that it wanted to topple EA as the No.1 games firm. But admitted this year that its mission has been complicated by the emergence of mobile, browser and social gaming. …

Free-to-play mech combat title Hawken has received an additional $18m in funding ahead of its December launch. VentureBeat reports publisher Meteor Entertainment has brought in the sizable amount as part of its second round of fundraising, bringing the total to $28.5m raised thus far for the game. Despite being an …

Tools provider also adds cross-platform support for Microsoft's latest mobile OS