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

Special report: THQ addresses dev tensions as worker says schedule has pushed team to the limit

Read the full letter sent to Develop by Kaos general manager David Votypka

Online retailer The Hut Group has seen its sales spike 70 per cent. Sales are up from 51m in 2009 to 87m in 2010. More than 80 per cent of these sales were generated by the Group’s own websites, including Zavvi.com and Thehut.com. The rest was generated through services to …

Activision’s Call of Duty: Black Ops has returned to the top of the UKIE GfK Chart-Track All Formats Top 40. EA’s FIFA 11, which sits in second place this week, had pipped the shooter to the top spot in the last two weeks. In fact, it had looked as if …

UK TV star and Twitter powerhouse Jonathan Ross has been doing his part in building the hype for Nintendo’s 3DS by discussing the device on the micro-blogging service. Ross, who has 825k+ followers on Twitter, revealed that he has "been invited by Nintendo to host a conference next week that …

Economic weakness, a change to the traditional hardware cycle, the growth of digital – there are plenty of things we can point the finger at when trying to assess the declines seen in all of the major games markets last year. But Wedbush Morgan analyst Michael Pachter has footed responsibility …

Publisher THQ has predicted that upcoming triple-A shooter Homefront will make more money than either of the company’s big fighting franchises, WWE or UFC. "I don’t think [WWE and UFC] make more money than I expect Homefront to make," core games executive vice president Danny Bilson stated in an interview …

Develop's monthly dissection of a recent hit game

Sony has announced a new movie sponsorship deal with Channel 5. The partnership will see PS3-branded promos running around all peak and family movies on Channel 5, Fiver and Five USA. It has kicked off with movie-themed idents for the upcoming LittleBigPlanet 2. The deal covers 760 films and will …

Platform holder Microsoft has revealed that DLC for THQ’s upcoming shooter Homefront will be a timed exclusive on Xbox 360. The news, reported by Eurogamer, comes from THQ’s ongoing press gathering in New York. Additional content for the game will be released on PS3, but only after an as-of-yet unannounced …