MCV/DEVELOP News, events, research and jobs from the games industry
Electronic Arts has lost its bid to be cleared from a bitter and expensive lawsuit between rival Activision and axed Infinity Ward staff. EA’s argument, that accusations thrown at it were without merit, was dismissed this week by a California judge. Activision is suing EA for surreptitiously recruiting two men …
Read More »Facebook helping reboot what games can be
Social network giant Facebook says its fast-growing global games platform comes from one thing: a focus on people. Speaking to MCV, engineers at the firm said Facebook’s social layer has helped reboot industries for the better. The higher level of what we are doing is working with industries to reimagine …
Read More »OPINION: Uncharted Territory
The question about why we don’t have a digital sales chart yet rolls around regularly. This time things are different.UKIE’s effort is so close you can taste it but need just a nudge at to make it a reality. Of course a ‘digital chart’ can broadly be anything – the …
Read More »Angry Birds gets Hollywood-sized marketing budget
The next game from Finnish studio Rovio may just outshine Q1’s biggest boxed game releases when it releases movie tie-in Angry Birds Rio next week. The smartphone app, which takes the original Angry Birds and themes it around 20th Century Fox bird film Rio, launches on March 22nd – and …
Read More »WoW bosses hopeful SWTOR will be a hit
Blizzard believes the eagerly anticipated EA/LucasArts MMO, Star Wars: The Old Republic, could be the biggest shot in the arm for the genre since World of Warcraft. The firm’s co-founder and executive vice president Frank Pearce told MCV that one of the keys to World of Warcraft’s success was building …
Read More »THQ: Big Three must let us experiment with new business models
THQ has urged all three major platform holders to be less rigid and open up to new business models. The publisher is currently undertaking what it calls a noble experiment” with racer MX vs ATV Alive, where it is charging 29.99 for the title and letting users add to it …
Read More »SWTOR to miss Q2 release
Publisher EA has said close to 1.5m people have signed up to become potential beta testers for BioWare’s upcoming MMO title Star Wars: The Old Republic. "It’s a great indicator in the interest level in the franchise," CFO Eric Brown said at the Lazard Capital Markets Technology & Media Day …
Read More »Doodle Jump hops onto Kinect
New York micro-studio Lima Sky has announced it is building an Xbox 360 port of its top-selling smartphone game Doodle Jump. The news comes about two years since Doodle Jump hit the market, and with the game now sold over ten million times. After such incredible first two years, it …
Read More »Homefront sells 375k in US
New first person shooter contender Homefront sold 375k units in its first day on sale in the US, publisher THQ has confirmed. "We are delighted with first day sales for Homefront and are already fulfilling re-orders for the game from multiple retailers," THQ boss Brian Farrell stated. By comparison, record …
Read More »BAFTAs: The winners in full
Sony’s Heavy Rain and EA’s Mass Effect 2 were the big winners at last night’s video games BAFTAs, hosted by comedian Dara O’Briain. BioWare sci-fi RPG won the coveted Best Game prize, though Quantic Dream’s Heavy Rain was arguably the star with three accolades – Technical Innovation, Original Music and …
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