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

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Woolworths has announced that it is to drop HD-DVD from its product mix in March – leaving Blu-Ray as the sole ‘next-gen’ DVD format in its stores. The decision was made by Woolworths execs after Blu-Ray discs outsold HD-DVD by ten-to-one at the chain over Christmas. Woolworths will continue to …

A confident Sony chief executive Howard Stringer told Reuters on Friday: PS3 has now gone past Xbox on the Christmas market. It’s moving into its own as it gets into higher bandwidth … PS3 is out of the woods and beginning to hold its own.” His comments echo those of …

Kuno Tsunoda hired as Xbox general manager

The Government has endorsed proposals to use Nintendo’s Wii as part of its curriculum for PE lesson in schools. The Independent On Sunday reports that the console has succesfully been used in trials in five schools in Worcestershire to tempt pupils into ‘virtual PE’ – and could now be taken …

Combined data reveals that the Infinity Ward-developed title sold over seven million units worldwide in 2007, despite having only been released in November. The mega-selling shooter has attracted critical acclaim and is also the number one Xbox Live title at the moment, according to www.majornelson.com. We’re very excited about this …

Empire Interactive is to release a version of popular racer FlatOut on PSP on March 14th. FlatOut: Head On will feature eight cars per race and Empire has promised up to 4,000 destructible objects per track. The publisher claims the title will run at a ‘smooth’ 30fps. A company statement …

MCV can reveal that Gem will exclusively distribute Codemasters titles to UK retail with Gem Logistics handling primary distribution. Under the agreement, the first new Codemasters title that Gem will distribute is eagerly-awaited shooter Turning Point: Fall of Liberty. Further Gem-distributed highlights include HEI$T, Race Driver: GRID and Rise of …

SCEE president and CEO David Reeves has told MCV that both user registrations and online purchases through PlayStation Network are ahead of SCEE’s expectations. One thing that has surprised us is in the Network purchases and the general level of interest that has been shown around the Network business,” he …

Studio boss Jack Sorenson says acquisition of Big Huge Games will kickstart assault on the RPG genre