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

The best UK gamers can win up to 30,000 in a new video game league. Play the Gamer kicked off earlier this month, and is run by events agency Living It Loving It – better known for its live poker and crime scene nights in the UK, US and Europe. …

Publisher Activision has seemingly challenged the established norms of UK video game RRPs by apparently placing an official price of 44.99 on today’s new release Starcraft II. Though 45-50 tends to be the RRP of console titles, the very top rate for PC product tends to be between 35-40. However, …

New Rome setting and visit from Italian government youth minister

In a fresh move to cash in on what has become a globally popular brand, Sony has announced that it is to expand its licensing program to allow the use of the PlayStation brand on a range of non-gaming products. In June last year Sony confirmed that it was to …

Sony’s financial Q1 is set to bring with it a significant boost in operating profit, according to a report in Japanese paper Nikkei, as spotted by Andriasang. It claims that the period will see an operating profit anywhere between YEN 10m and YEN 30bn for the quarter ending June 30th. …

Flash-based games portal sold for an undisclosed sum

In what can only be described as a hugely significant move, video games retailer GameStop has acquired leading online Flash games portal Kongregate. The website boasts in the region of 10m users and is one of the most important players in the increasingly significant casual games sector. Kongregate will now …

Read the full letter by Demiurge Studios CEO William Reed

Curt Schilling gets approval for huge loan if he moves to Rhode Island, but locals urge him to stay

With developer relations remaining very much a touchy issue at Activision for the time being, Blizzard Entertainment’s VP and executive MD of internal operations Michael Ryder has told MCV that the merger between former owner Vivendi and Activision hasn’t made any difference to Blizzard’s internal workings. Since we had our …