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

The line-up of speakers at the Edinburgh Interactive Festival continues to grow, with Second Life and EVE Online creators the latest to join the roster. Linden Lab’s Jim Purbick will explore the intricacies of developing for Second Life in the festival’s aptly-titled ‘Developing for Second Life’ strand on Tuesday August …

TV personality Keith Chegwin will host a quiz game from Oxygen for the PS2, Wii and PC, following a licensing deal set up by AT New Media. Cheggers’ Party Quiz will be released in November this year and will feature thousands of questions based on entertainment. Who doesn’t love Cheggers?” …

After hitting retail on Friday, all copies of Mario Party 8 have been recalled due to the ‘wrong version’ of the game – which contains the word ‘spastic’ in its script – being released. During the game, Kamek the blue wizard says: "Magikoopa magic! Turn the train spastic! Make this …

This development process has already begun to bear fruit – we have seen fantastic results with Spider-Man 3, to the extent our market share rivalled that of EA in May, according to ChartTrack data for the UK. The success of the movie helps of course, but we feel the level …

President of Nintendo Satoru Iwata has predicted that sales of Wii could end up eclipsing those of PlayStation 2. Iwata said that the wide appeal of the console gave it a chance to catch PS2 – which has shipped over 120 million units to date. "Sony’s PS2 sales of 100 …

New version adds behaviours, tick-based physics

New edition shown at August's GameFest and includes new networking features

SCEA has ruled out any suggestion of it phasing out the 60GB model of the PS3 in North America. The news comes after a SCEE spokesperson appeared to suggest that stocks of the lower-end system would dry up by the holiday season” earlier today – leaving the more expensive 80GB …

A special edition of Gamer TV featuring highlights of E3 airs on UK cable and satellite channel Bravo this weekend. Included in the programme is analysis and reaction to the Sony, Nintendo and Microsoft press conferences, plus some of the more embarrassing moments of this year’s event. The programme airs: …

The changing of the guard at the Department of Culture Media and Sport has left some members of the development community anxious, having been used to the previous crop’s vocal recognition and support of the games industry – the extent of which would have seemed unlikely as little as five …