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

Management buyout from Square Enix agreed and as of today have complete control of the Hitman franchise

After a relatively quiet week at Japanese retail, Mario Kart 8 Deluxe is back at the top of Japan’s weekly charts, according to the latest numbers from Famitsu. The title had been inched out of the number one spot for a couple of weeks following the launch of Nihon Falcom’s …

MIDiA Research’s lead analyst for research on games and the mobile content economy Karol Severin shares his views on Nintendo’s recent game announcements and how they look set to prepare the platform holder for the launch of its Online Service. He can be reached @karel_kayo Nintendo made a number of game …

Reuters reports that a listing for the Angry Birds developer "could be possible"

Finnish publisher and developer Next Games has landed the rights for a mobile game based on upcoming sci-fi movie Blade Runner 2049. The game comes as a result of a direct partnership with Blade Runner 2049 production company Alcon Entertainment. Details about the nature of the title have not yet …

Academic studies of video games have long pondered the relative merits of gameplay vs story, or ludology vs narratology as it’s often called. While we leave such critical musings to the experts, the debate has rarely been played out in such stark terms across the two primary platform holders’ showcases. …

Almost two years on from a damning report about life for Konami workers, fresh allegations have been made about the company’s treatment of its workforce. Specifically, it has been alleged that Konami makes a pro-active effort to prevent former workers from gaining new employment. Nikkei reports that a former Kojima …

There has been much debate about Microsoft’s decision to price the Xbox One X at 449 ($499 in the US). That’s the same price the original Xbox One launched at (and the PS3, for that matter) but $100 more than both the PS4 and PS4 Pro launch prices. Speaking to …

Beta version to be released on the Tranquility server in June

E3 press conferences were once littered with titles that wouldn’t see retailers’ shelves for years. But there looks to be a new sense of immediacy spreading across these events and the industry as a whole – and publishers are keen to point this out to consumers. Bethesda was a key …