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

Research from Flurry confirmed that Christmas 2011 was dominated by smartphones and tablets, with the result that 242m apps were downloaded on the big day and 1.2bn across the holiday week of December 25th-31st. It’s the first time app downloads have passed 1bn in a week, said Flurry. By comparison …

A trio of developers at Stockholm studio EA DICE have quit to join nearby outfit Ngmoco Sweden. Wille Wintertidh, Malte Hildingsson and Torbjorn Ldre, the latter two having worked on Battlefield 3, were named as new hires by Ngmoco Sweden manager Ben Cousins. Cousins himselfleft EA in March last year, …

Anonymous courtroom source says agreement has been reached regarding the Fallout MMO

The Wii U’s semi-portable tablet controller could become the central focus of a new content service offering from Nintendo, according to online reports. As well as being linked with – surprise surprise – a push to get iOS games ported onto the device, Forget The Box has been lead to …

DICE devs become latest recruits for growing Sweden studio

'Peak concurrent users at 350,000 players', says analyst

It appears that Disney Interactive has accidentally announced Epic Mickey 2 in a newsletter – which, incidentally, has subsequently been amended. Eurogamer reports that the game was dated for a Christmas 2012 release on PS3, Xbox 360 and Wii. Hopes of a sequel to the 2010 Wii original had seemingly …

Upcoming system could provide iPad-like application service, report suggests

Sega has confirmed the second episode in Sonic’s digital-only series will arrive this year. Sonic The Hedgehog 4: Episode II is currently in development for XBLA, PSN and mobile platforms including the Apple App Store, Android Marketplace and Xbox Live on Windows Phone 7. It has been two years since …

Over a million. That’s the closest we’ve got to hearing any firm sales numbers for EA and BioWare’s new MMO title Star Wars: The Old Republic. The figure was issued by EA on Boxing Day following the game’s release on December 20th. The game entered the UK Charts in 10th …