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

A leaked GameStop poster has revealed that the next DLC for Call of Duty: Black Ops will be released on Tuesday June 28th, according to Kotaku. Called Annihilation, the download will include four new multiplayer maps – Hangar 18, Drive-In, Silo and Hazard. It will also include another map for …

The phenomenon that is Angry Birds has now been downloaded 250 million times across all mobile platforms. This figure was confirmed to TechCrunch by Rovio founder Peter Vestebacka and product manager Ramine Darabiha, who offered a few teasers about what the mobile developer is working on next. In terms of …

Over 500,000 users visited the virtual Sony E3 booth through online PS3 hub PlayStation Home. In comparison, 46,800 people attended the event in person – a tenth of those who visited online – reports Venture Beat. PlayStation Home users were able to watch videos of the latest games on show …

Mass Effect developer the latest victim as mindless hacks sweep the industry

The freemium model for video games isn’t just a sector that Nintendo will be avoiding – it’s one that president Satoru Iwata believes actually threatens the health of the industry. "When we look at the entire system of freemium, it’s not always that everyone is happy with the offers," he …

LulzSec has hit EVE Online with a DDOS (distributed denial of service) attack for the second time in two days. The hacker group – which has already claimed responsibility for attacking Nintendo, Epic Games, Square Enix, Codemasters and Minecraft websites – hit EVE Online again last night. Its biggest series …

Publishing giant suggests Steam business terms are draconian

An experienced Rockstar North games designer has broken away from the company to open his own micro-studio. Anthony Gowland is building mobile and web content at the new Edinburgh outfit, known as Mainly About Games. With the varied distribution opportunities now available to developers, it felt like the perfect time …

Months after the game originally hit the headlines, Ubisoft’s We Dare has once again ignited the spark of controversy. The game went unnoticed for months earlier this year until Ubisoft went live with what some – although certainly not MCV – felt to be controversial trailer for the Wii title. …

Publisher 2K Games has confirmed that it has ditched US PR firm The Redner Group. Redner hit the headlines yesterday after publicly threatening to blacklist – as in, stop sending out review code for upcoming games – any media that it felt was too harsh on the critically slammed Duke …