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

Chinese ecommerce outfit Alibaba have revealed that they lost "60 to 70 per cent" of their $20m investment in the World Electronic Sports Games (WESG). This comes via an interview with the South China Morning Post, a newspaper that Ali Baba owns, and was picked up by the smart crowd …

Michele Attisani co-founded competitive games outfit Faceit in 2012, but before that he’d been gaming competitively for 15 years, supporting the habit with a career working with various Fortune 500 companies and several tech start-ups. Attisani is, as a result, ideally positioned to talk about the state of the UK …

Latest figures from HMRC claim £119m has been paid since 2014

73m in video games tax relief (VGTR) was paid out in the 2016-17 financial year, representing an increase of 60 per cent year-on-year, according to the latest figures from HMRC. VGTR was paid out relating to 280 claims in 2016-17, which shows a growth of 115 per cent compared to …

VfB Stuttgart has joined the list of football teams to take a spin on FIFA, with Erhan ‘Dr Erhano’ Kayman and Marcel ‘Marlut’ Lutz signing with the team to represent the Bundesliga club in the digital beautiful game. VfB Stuttgart are the third Bundesliga team to take the plunge on …

PC peripherals manufacturer Razer is aiming for an initial public offering in Hong Kong valued up to $5bn, according to a new report from Bloomberg. At the moment, Razer is said to be aiming for a public debut in October, and it’s currently looking to value the company somewhere between …

Loot boxes dubbed Alpha Packs have breached Rainbow Six Siege in the latest update, giving players the opportunity to earn a variety of cosmetic items. But don’t turn your nose up just yet. Every player gets an Alpha Pack for free, and you can buy them for 5,000 renown, the …

Bethesda just released a new update for Doom, version 6.66, bringing a wealth of changes to the FPS. In a blog post, the publisher announced it has retired” Doom’s Season Pass, making all the DLC free for all players. That’s three multiplayer DLC packs, which include nine of our best …

Former executive director of the International Game Developers Association (IGDA) Kate Edwards has joined the board of directors at Take This, a non-profit charity that aims to inform the video game community about mental health issues. Edwards joins journalists Russ Pitts and Susan Arendt, who co-founded the charity, as well …

The theme of this year’s Gamescom is ‘Just play together,’ emphasising one of the most vital parts of today’s worldwide gaming industry. With more ways to play games with family and friends than ever before, this growing trend has been underpinned by a string of upcoming releases, including titles such …