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

Panel of industry experts explore the impact of production tax relief

Two audio heads doubt Jacquesâ?? claim that sound design remains under-funded

25MB of RAM allocation allows for dream audio work, says SCEEâ??s Dan Bardino

PopCap Games has announced that its new iPhone game Plants vs. Zombies has grossed more than $1m in revenues in just nine days on the App Store. The game – a conversion of the company’s existing PC title of the same name – has sold more than 300,000 downloads at …

Having revealed to the world earlier this month that he’s heading up development of a brand new mystery FPS title at Codemasters, Stuart Black has accused modern FPS shooters of being f***ing boring”. Black was the leading developer of EA’s similarly titled PS2 and Xbox FPS Black, which was released …

The reliability of the numbers can certainly be called into question, but a new report from Digital Battle claims to have identified the ten most expensive video games of all time – and it’s Grand Theft Auto IV that tops the pile. With a rumoured budget of $100m, Rockstar’s game …

Audio heads at SCEE and Ubisoft explore the state of sound design

It has emerged that GameStop CFO Cathy Smith has resigned from the global games retailer after just six months in the role to take up the role of CFO at US retail giant Wal-Mart. Current chief accounting officer Robert Lloyd, who has been at GameStop for 14 years, is to …

Following the confusion yesterday surrounding the future of the Sony Computer Entertainment brand, the electronics giant has looked to clarify the implications of its upcoming restructure. In a complicated set of manoeuvres, the current SCE will indeed change its trading name to SNE Platform (Sony Networked Entertainment), or SNEP. However, …

Future instalments in the popular Crackdown series could include support for Microsoft’s Natal motion-sensing camera, developer Ruffian has admitted. Speaking to CVG, producer James Cope stated: I think Natal as an experience is great because it’s opening up a kind of social gaming thing and there’s a good place for …