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

HMV’s CEO Simon Fox has backed calls for Internet Service Providers to do more to prevent illegal downloading of copyright material. Fox echoed statements made by Nintendo head of piracy Neil Boyd, who said ISPs are in an ideal position to deal with infringements.” The Government last week introduced proposals …

TV giant Channel 4 has invested a multi-million pound figure in the development of its own Xbox and PC games. The broadcaster, famous for shows like Big Brother and Skins, has turned to gaming as a way to reach new audiences as part of its educational content remit, according to …

Morrisons has slashed the price of Wii Fit to under 50 in the latest round of supermarket price-cutting. The activity follows aggressive promotions on hardware at Asda and Sainsbury’s last week, when both supermarkets dropped the cost of Wii consoles to under 150. Morrisons has also cut the cost of …

MCV’s sister site Mobile Entertainment has this morning revealed a brand new look for the portal, which continues to be the leading news resource for mobile content on the internet. The sleek upgrade reinforces the site’s position as the leading news source for the global mobile content industry, featuring breaking …

Having enjoyed a massive sales boost in the UK following the arrival of the new Slim incarnation last week, the launch of the PS3 Slim in Japan has propelled Sony’s machine to a new sales record. Kotaku reports that the PS3 Slim sold 150,252 in its first week of sale …

Sony’s impressive sales leap this week following the launch of the PS3 Slim on September 1st has seen the console top the UK hardware sales charts for the first time since January 2008. PS3 software sales enjoyed a notable boom thanks to the increased hardware performance, up 17 per cent …

Publisher Oxygen is braced for its biggest video game release to date, as its DS and Wii mystery Cate West: The Vanishing Files leaps up the pre-order charts. The game’s success has been assisted by a six-month PR push, as well as extensive online and in-store advertising ahead of its …

Whilst Sony and LucasArts’ first collaboration, Star Wars Galaxies, may have ultimately failed to compete in the crowded traditional MMO space, rumours are suggesting that the two companies are to team up once again – this time for a casual MMO based on the famous adventure franchise. All the details …

Eidos’ latest title based on the Caped Crusader, Batman: Arkham Asylum, is enjoying its second week at the top of the ELSPA GfK-ChartTrack All Formats Top 40 this week, despite continued pressure from Nintendo’s Wii Sports Resort. The motion-based sports title has to settle for second spot for the third …

Having launched at UK retail last Tuesday, Sony’s PS3 console has enjoyed a colossal week-on-week sales jump, with numbers of ChartTrack’s Week 36 showing a 999 per cent sales increase over the week before. ChartTrack has told MCV that it is not releasing specific sales numbers, but did say: The …