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

More than two million players take up premium membership

Just weeks after telling MCV it will cut the store space dedicated to games, HMV has changed its mind. Instead it will actually now grow the amount of space for games as it looks to take advantage of market gaps left by the shrunken GAME. Earlier this year the High …

Japanese electronics giant Sony has reported a 456.7bn (3.5bn) loss for the year ended March 31st 2012. That’s significantly down on the 259.6bn loss reported the year before. The company’s Consumer Products and Services Division, which houses its PlayStation operations, posted a 229.8bn loss, down from last year’s 10.8bn profit. …

Nintendo has caved to the online revolution, and will soon offer simultaneous digital/physical releases. But its download plan could also change the way video games are sold, says Michael French Too little, too late? It’s very easy to consider Nintendo’s sudden declaration to ‘significantly expand its digital business’ during its …

Warner Bros will release a widely-expected LEGO Lord of the Rings game. Packaging for LEGO’s new line of LOTR toys, inspired by the three Peter Jackson movies based on the books, reveals the title is on the way. Earlier in the year we predicted that the new line of toys …

Sony has announced the Limited Edition PS3 Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 3 Bundle. The US PS Blog reports the bundle is set to hit shelves on May 25th. The package will cost $299 and includes a 320GB PS3 system, along with a copy of Modern Warfare 3. For reference, …

The Angry Birds franchise has reached 1bn downloads, Rovio has announced. The announcement was made via the Finnish developer’s YouTube account, with the figure accounting for downloads across all titles in the series (Angry Birds, Seasons, Rio, and the recently released Space). The original Angry Birds launched in late 2009 …

The management team at Version2Games, including its president Rajat Ojha, has left the company to form The Awesome Game Studio. V2G was responsible for Smash n Survive, the first Indian PS3 game to be released to a worldwide audience, and had recently announced its next PS3/Vita game, T.U.M. The Awesome …

Activision Blizzard has reported its financial results for the first quarter of its fiscal 2012. The company’s total net revenue was $1.17bn for the period ending on March 31, 2012; a 23 per cent drop over the same period in 2011 ($1.44bn). Net income was down year over year as …

MMO subscriptions 'give studio the edge' in moving to next-gen