MCV/DEVELOP News, events, research and jobs from the games industry
Global literary superstar J.K. Rowling has today announced a new digital expansion to the Harry Potter universe, Pottermore. Interestingly the project is being designed in collaboration with Sony, though there’s no indication of any video games tie-ins – presumably as Warner currently owns the video game rights. Pottermore will first …
Read More »Crysis 2 ‘backfired a little bit’
German developer Crytek has admitted that its decision to target the wider games market with Crysis 2 has "backfired a little bit". The studio has been open about its intentions to bring the franchise to a wider audience. It has also said on record that it had reservations about Crysis’ …
Read More »PopCap rep withdraws EA denial
"Sorry, I might not have been clear. I was simply stating that@TechCrunch‘s article is not true." That claim was this morning made by PopCap’s community rep Jennifer Kye, according the Venturebeat. Shortly afterwards the tweet was deleted. While it may simply be a case of PopCap ensuring that employees stick …
Read More »Infinity Blade becomes F2P
Epic Games’ iOS blockbuster Infinity Blade will launch in Japan as a free-to-play game, a leading Japanese games company has said. Tokyo-based smartphone games giant Dena has won a contract to be the exclusive vendor of Infinity Blade in Japan, the company said. It will launch ‘Infinity Blade X’ as …
Read More »EA linked to $1bn PopCap swoop
One leading tech site claims to have it on good authority that EA is on the verge of one of the largest acquisitions ever seen in the games industry. If true, TechCrunch‘s claims that EA is the mystery bidder behind a supposed $1bn swoop for PopCap would dwarf the $17m …
Read More »Portal 2 passes 3m sales
Valve’s recent release and critical hit Portal 2 has now sold in excess of 3m copies. The number comes from Gabe Newell himself and was revealed at the Games for Change event at New York yesterday, according to Joystiq. It’s understood that it covers both boxed retail and digital sales …
Read More »3DS back on top in Japan
Having very much taken the back seat to PSP in the weeks that have followed its debut in Japan, Nintendo 3DS is finally back at the top of Media Create’s Japanese hardware charts. The machine sold almost 41k units last week, significantly up on the 25k sold the week before. …
Read More »Hacker suspect charged by MET
The Metropolitan Police has charged a hacker it arrested earlier this week with five offences under the Criminal Law Act and Computer Misuse Act. As previously reported by MCV, the 19 year-old Essex teenager in question is indeed Ryan Cleary. He is accused of constructing and distributing bots designed to …
Read More »Free 180-day Music Unlimited trial
Sony is offering a free 180-day trial of its Q Music Unlimited service. It offers users the chance to sample the ad-free internet radio style experience with a library totalling 7m tracks. The deal is open to PS3 owners who haven’t previously or aren’t currently subscribed to the service. PS3 …
Read More »Sony to launch PSVita at Games Media Awards
Sony’s PSVita will sponsor this year’s Games Media Awards in association with Grainger Gamess as Gold Partner. The firm will use the event to promote its upcoming handheld to the UK’s 200+ elite games media at what has become the big night of the year for the UK’s specialist press. …
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