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

Retailers have called on their rivals to quit selling R4 cards, after the revelation that DS software sales are suffering at the hands of growing piracy (MCV11/07). SimplyGames.com – one of the retailers highlighted in last week’s MCV story – has already pulled the R4 from its website, and boss …

The head of digital at Nickelodeon, Steve Youngwood, has told CasualGaming.biz that, to his firm: What video is to TV, games is to online.” Youngwood was speaking as part of a wider interview on Nickelodeon’s ambitions in the casual games space, to which it has pledged $100m. The goal is …

The president of Famitsu publisher Enterbrain, Hirokazu Hamamura, believes that PS3’s slow penetration” in Japan is improving – but that it could still use a price cut before year end. Speaking exclusively to Famitsu media partner MCV, Hamamura said: The PS3’s penetration pace has been slower than I expected. Its …

The last time we spoke the Japanese market was in decline – has there been a recovery? Nintendo’s DS and Wii attracted a huge amount of new users into gaming. As a result, Japan’s gaming market has actually greatly expanded. How is the Japanese market performing in general, and what …

Play.com is selling the Xbox 360 Premium console for just 169.99 in the UK – 30 less than the console’s SRP. However, Microsoft has distanced itself from the price drop, telling VG247 that it wasn’t a first-party directive. That must be their own deal,” said a Microsoft rep. It’s nothing …

EA CEO John Riccitiello has said that, as far as game content goes, his investors don’t give a shit about quality”. Riccitiello was speaking in an E3 interview with Venture Beat, in which he also asserted that Metcritic scores were a good way to judge the quality of EA’s games …

Eidos parent SCi expects to post a 100 million loss for the 2007/2008 financial year – which it calls a period of ‘restructuring and transition’. The news came in the firm’s trading update this morning, in which it also revealed that it is to sell off its Spanish distribution business, …

Bulgarian developer to be renamed Crytek Black Sea

UK independent developer readying for multi-platform partnership with Bethesda

Nintendo boss Saturo Iwata has admitted that there are flaws with Wii’s online Friend system – but reassured consumers the company is working hard to improve the service. Speaking to GameDaily, Iwata admitted that Wii’s system of Friend Codes was not perfect” – but that it gave parents of new …