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

Whether Blu-ray’s rise to ascendancy will gather the required pace needed before the mainstream adaptation of digital movie downloads arrives is yet to be seen, but sales of HD discs players have performed well year-on-year. TechRadar reports that annual Blu-ray player sales climbed 72 per cent in 2008 in North …

Somerfield has unveiled a shock warplan to become a leading games retailer – as fellow supermarkets Asda, Tesco and Sainsbury’s aggressively expand their buying teams in a bid to grab more market share. In yet another new route to market for UK publishers, The Co-operative, which bought Somerfield for 1.5 …

Publisher deems difference between console and arcade quality as â??negligibleâ??

Amidst all the numbers and gushing praise for Guitar Hero, Activision Blizzard also found time in its recent financial posting to stoke up the hype machine for Bizarre Creations’ upcoming new racing IP Blur. From a business perspective, we are targeting Blur to do for racing what Call of Duty …

Following impressive financial numbers, Activision Blizzard’s Mike Griffith has stated that the franchise now accounts for the majority share of music game genre sales in Europe and North America – in other words, it’s beating Rock Band. The publisher also revealed that 34m DLC tracks have been downloaded by Guitar …

New York publisher picks up Flatout and more; But who did it buy rights from?

Organisers LMI Asia extends its call for papers deadline to May 30

Head over to the RETAIL BIZ previews section for a look at some of the hottest games approaching retail in the near future. This week, MCV takes a look at EA’s The Sims 3, the third iteration in Will Wright’s renowned virtual dollhouse series that is set to satisfy millions …

This month we've published the latest edition of the Develop 100. The Develop site is publishing major extracts from the book - here we present the details of positions 51 to 100â?¦

Activision Blizzard has excelled expectations by posting revenues of $981 million for its first quarter in 2009, along with profits rising to $189 million, all driven by a strong slate lucrative franchises such as Guitar Hero, Call of Duty, and World of Warcraft. Those figures had smashed analyst expectations, as …