Gamasutra News

GamesBeat@GDC Confirms OnLive, GameStop, PlayStation Home Speakers

Tue, 9 Feb 2010 19:56:00 -0500

The GamesBeat@GDC Summit taking place at Game Developers Conference in San Francisco next month has announced new keynote and panel speakers including OnLive's Steve Perlman, GameStop Digital's Chris Petrovic, and Sony's Jack Buser. The summit is a partnership between technology site Venturebeat and the Think Services Game Group, and will take place on Wednesday, March 10, the second day of the GDC Summits. The theme for the business summit is "Disruption 2.0," and according to ...

Top-Grossing iPhone Apps: Riddim Ribbon Beats Doodle Jump

Tue, 9 Feb 2010 17:28:00 -0500

Every week, sister iPhone site FingerGaming rounds up the top-grossing iPhone and iPod Touch applications, as current that day in the iTunes App Store, and this chart is now available on Gamasutra. This week's U.S. iPhone revenue charts see the Tapulous-developed Riddim Ribbon surpass Doodle Jump in its debut week, as Assassin's Creed II rivals Chinatown Wars in daily sales numbers. This chart allows end users to see who is making the most money on ...

German Online Game Publisher Bigpoint Opens Silicon Valley Office

Tue, 9 Feb 2010 17:23:00 -0500

Bigpoint, a developer and publisher of browser-based and downloadable games like DarkOrbit and The Pimps, has opened a new multipurpose office in Silicon Valley, California, to strengthen its U.S. presence. This makes the second U.S. location for Hamburg-headquartered Bigpoint, which also operates in New York as well as Berlin and Malta. The new studio will include game development facilities, business development, and marketing staff. For the next several months, Bigpoint founder and CEO Heiko Hubertz ...

Gamasutra Member Blogs: From Broken Emotions To The Game Of Game-Making

Tue, 9 Feb 2010 16:25:00 -0500

In highlights from Gamasutra's Member Blogs, our weblog writers examine how the game medium often destroys emotional ties with characters, why chasing perfection can be a bad thing, and how making games is a game in itself. Member Blogs can be maintained by any registered Gamasutra user, while invitation-only Expert Blogs -- also highlighted weekly -- are written by selected development professionals. Our favorite blog post of the week will earn its author a lifetime ...

Road To The IGF: Star Guard's Loren Schmidt

Tue, 9 Feb 2010 16:21:00 -0500

[In the latest Road to the IGF interview with 2010 IGF finalists, Gamasutra speaks with Star Guard's Loren Schmidt, who explains why "retro" isn't always the best term for a "low-fi" game.] Loren Schmidt's Independent Games Festival finalist Star Guard resembles an Atari 2600 game, but don't call it "retro." The side-scrolling platform shooter is up for the Excellence In Design award for IGF 2010. It might appeal to a gamer's innate sense of nostalgia ...

Ubisoft Announces Ghost Recon: Future Soldier For Multiple Platforms

Tue, 9 Feb 2010 15:19:00 -0500

French game publisher Ubisoft announced Tom Clancy's Ghost Recon: Future Soldier, the latest in the company's popular line of military-themed shooters. During a Tuesday conference call, Ubisoft CEO Yves Guillemot confirmed the game is in development for Xbox 360, PlayStation 3, PSP, and Nintendo Wii and DS. A press release that only mentioned an Xbox 360 release said the game is under development by the team behind Ghost Recon: Advanced Warfighter and Ghost Recon: Advanced ...

Analysts: EA On The Right Track At Last

Tue, 9 Feb 2010 15:12:00 -0500

Analysts say that Electronic Arts may finally be on the right track after nearly two years of investor disappointments, and that this time, the fiscal year guidance the publisher offered might actually be attainable -- if not conservative. Kaufman Bros.' Todd Mitchell calls EA's recently-announced third quarter "pretty abysmal, but as expected." And while EA did narrow its losses, it's also scaling back distribution and modeling for a 3 percent decline in packaged goods. With ...

Flickr Co-Founders Return To MMO Design With Glitch

Tue, 9 Feb 2010 13:20:00 -0500

Stewart Butterfield and Cal Henderson, best known as two of the original creators of successful photo sharing site Flickr, are getting into MMO development with their latest project, the 2D Flash-based Glitch. Described on its official website as a "massively-multiplayer game playable in the browser and built in the spirit of the web," Glitch is a sidescrolling game that allows the player to explore "the minds of eleven great giants walking sacred paths on a ...

Ubisoft Q3 Sales Edge Down, As It Ramps Up Big Franchises

Tue, 9 Feb 2010 12:32:00 -0500

French Assassin's Creed publisher Ubisoft posted a sales decline for its October-December quarter, despite the release of the high-profile multiplatform action game, Assassin's Creed II. Ubisoft said it generated sales of € 495 million ($678.9 million) for the fiscal third quarter ended December 31, 2009, a 2.7 percent year-on-year drop. The decline came even as November's Assassin's Creed II has sold 8 million units worldwide to date--1.6 million of that coming from its opening week. ...

Analyst: Industry Sales To Rebound In March On Strong Core Slate

Tue, 9 Feb 2010 10:46:00 -0500

When NPD results for the month of January come out this week, expect year-over-year sales for U.S. retail game software to be down 2 percent, says Cowen Group analyst Doug Creutz -- who, like many analysts, pegs the coming March as the month the industry will finally see a return to growth thanks to core releases. "We expect industry software sales to return to year over year growth during Q1, most likely in March, due ...