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

American TV giant NBC has followed contemporaries Warner Bros and Disney to stake a big claim on the games market, acquiring a controlling stake in German casual site Bigpoint for €70m ($110m). NBC’s equity firm Peacock has teamed up with UK-based private funding firm GMT to grab a 70 per …

Studio head tells Develop that staff are hopeful

The latest Wedbush Morgan mailout has revealed raised estimates for the combined business’ income FY ’09 revenue to $3.70 billion – up significantly from $2.41 billion. On July 8th, shareholders are expected to approve the deal, with Wedbush Morgan predicting that the merger will be officially closed by July 11th. …

MCV sister site Develop has received word that Razorworks, the last internal development house of publisher Empire Interactive, is set to shut its doors – or be sold – in the coming days. For the rest of the story, head over to Develop here.

Empire Interactive's last internal studio on the way out, say insiders; studio confirms closure

Epic, EA, Sierra and Gamelab representatives to talk at July event

Jack Thompson, the US attorney and frequent critic of video games, has been disbarred from practising law for a minimum of ten years. The transcript of the hearing, where the Florida Bar recommended the disbarring for professional misconduct, has now been released and is available here from GamePolitics. The disciplinary …

Nintendo has denied being responsible for a voyeuristic Y ouTube video that shows a young lady gyrating to Wii Fit’s Hula Hoop game, according to a full page report in the Metro newspaper. The video clip entitled ‘Why Every Guy Should Buy Their Girlfriend A Wii Fit’ was filmed by …

As the Activision Blizzard deal and EA-Take Two saga suggest that the publishing community is set on expanding significantly, Ubisoft head of studios Christine Burgess-Qumard has told our sister site Develop : We are in the race, definitely – and we’re not in it to come last.” The comments came …

And in exclusive Q&A Guy Whitmore reveals new deal with Wave Arts to bring its pro-audio plugins to 360