Chatting in an interview with GamesIndustry.biz today, Call of Duty and Modern Warfare director Keith Aremhe believes that the stellar success of games such as Modern Warfare and Grand Theft Auto have “changed perceptions” of gaming, and will benefit the future of both mediums.
“The success of the games industry is going to benefit those other movie industries. It’s providing more work, it’s providing more content,” said Arem. “Finding new content in the games industry is going to absolutely expand into the movie industry and vice-versa.
“By expanding these franchises out the film industry is going to re-seed stuff into games. As much as people are threatened by the fear of the unknown, it’s going to be a huge benefit to both industries as they grow hand-in-hand.
“There’s been a complete 180 in the past several years with games like Modern Warfare and Grand Theft Auto, and these have shown that these can change perceptions.”
So… Modern Warfare movie for 2012, then?
In the one time Michael Pachter may actually be right, he chimed in to say that in the current “war” between Infinity Ward and Activision, Jason West and Vince Zampella may be “unlikely” to get the rights to the Modern Warfare name (via Critical Gamer).
A leaked Activision memo might give some insight onto why Jason West and Vince Zampella were fired from Infinity Ward.
Well, it just keeps going, doesn’t it?
Seeking $36 million from Activision, Activision has responded to the claim and said that they are “disappointed.”
Bloomberg announced that West and Zampella are seeking “at least $36 million” from Activision in the lawsuit.
The $36 million is sought in addition to control over the Modern Warfare name, which is seen as “a subset of the ‘Call of Duty’ combat games, according to a copy of the complaint,” according to the Bloomberg piece.
First part of today’s IW vs Activision news here.
The shitstorm still goes on as ex-Infinity Ward heads Jason West and Vince Zampella seek action against Activision for unpaid royalties.
According to BingeGamer, Activision has not paid royalties to Infinity Ward over the success of Modern Warfare 2.
The article cites sources “associated with Activision” who says this could be one of the reasons for the confrontation between publisher and developer earlier today.
BingeGamer also mentions that Infinity Ward have been looking for a new deal with another publisher.
IW is contracted to Activision as a developer until October, and it’s rumoured that Activision’s move is a power play to try and bully Infinity ward into staying with Activision. Both developer and publisher owns equal parts of the Call of Duty Franchise, so Activision might be moving to acquire IW’s half of the CoD name.
[UPDATE] G4 reports that a source close to Activision has revealed that Activision CEO Bobby Kotick will adress the employees of Infinity Ward in a meeting today. There will also be a second meeting adressing the studio as a whole, but no details on either meetings are clear.
Trouble seems to be brewing within the halls of Infinity Ward. According to a report from G4, security guards of the “bouncer-types” showed up at the offices of Infinity Ward.
Studio heads Vince Zampella and Jason West reportedly met with Activision this morning and wasn’t seen by Infinity Ward employees since.
Growing up in the 80s and 90s, I was only privy to one very small, but very true, fact of life: young boys wanted to be only one of two things when they grew up – their dad or Optimus Prime.
So, I am incredibly hopeful and excited for Transformers: War for Cybertron, because the last two Transformers games based off of the movies have been tragedies in most senses of the word.
Head over to Joystiq to check out the screens.
Game’s coming out later this year. I’m hopeful.
Activision boss Bobby Kotick said during his DICE keynote last night that he regrets not purchasing Harmonix.
“When we were buying Guitar Hero and buying RedOctane, the makers of Guitar Hero, we knew about Harmonix,” he said. “We had always known them as sort of a somewhat failed developer of music games.”
“They always had really good ideas, but nothing that was really commercially viable until Guitar Hero and at first we thought, ‘OK, it’s a good piece of software, but if we gave it to Neversoft, they’re going to knock the ball out of the park with this.”
And Neversoft did achieve great success with Guitar Hero III: Legends of Rock, because it was the first game ever to rake in over $1 billion.
However, Kotick did say that had Activision purchased Harmonix itself, Guitar Hero’s landscape would have been completely different from what it is today.
Meanwhile, Harmonix is working steadily on Green Day: Rock Band and another title which may or may not be Rock Band 3.
Activision, relatedly, has already announced that a new Guitar Hero game will be out before the end of the year.
Thanks for the heads up, G4!
Well, it wasn’t just Neversoft and Radical that felt Activision’s layoff tremors–Luxoflux and Underground Development (companies involved with the making of Guitar Hero: Van Halen and BMX XXX) have had their doors closed completely.
But not only were those two companies closed, RedOctane (whom you might know as the company responsible for Guitar Hero peripherals) have had 30 to 40 employees let go and the remaining employees are now answering directly to Activision.
All this may have something to do with Guitar Hero CEO Dan Rosensweig’s quitting a few weeks back.
Reportedly, Neversoft may be reducing its staff with the release of Guitar Hero 6 this year.
One of the biggest announcements during Activision’s most recent conference call included an item that is on a lot of gamers’ minds–a StarCraft 2 beta.
Blizzard CEO Mike Morhaime stated that the closed beta would kick off this month, but didn’t really release a lot of details other than the that the beta would be available globally and allow thousands of players a chance to try the game.
StarCraft 2 is set to be released “mid-2010,” and surprisingly, will be made available to download from Battle.net upon its release.
Well, everyone, sit tight and twiddle your thumbs until then…
After releasing 25 Guitar Hero SKUs last year, Activision have announced that they are going to cut back the number of releases in 2010. Mind you, 25 items seems like a lot, but that’s counting each system a title was released for individually.
Scaling things back, Activision hopes to have ten or less Guitar Hero titles releases this year, maybe even limiting the titles to a single console.
One of the surefire titles to be released, however, is a Guitar Hero game application for the iPhone.
To nobody’s surprise, Activision announced that a new Call of Duty title will be available this year of 2010. They hope to make annual installments of the game, but really, what hope does Activision have of reaching the success they had with Modern Warfare 2?
(Hint: None)
No details about the new Call of Duty installment have been released.
Who wants to bet on another World War II shooter?
Did you buy Tony Hawk Ride last year? No, neither did we. Activision doesn’t appear to care though, as it seems convinced that people will actually want to jump around in their room like a wannabe skater, instead of going outside and breaking their legs doing the real thing.
“Game ratings for Tony Hawk Ride weren’t just high as we would have hoped last year. And in hindsight, it took longer to optimize the hardware leaving less time to develop the software we launched in 2009″ explained company CEO Mike Griffith, “Still, play testing and consumer feedback have been very encouraging. The premise of standing on the skateboard and performing tricks that only the pros can pull off is very compelling.
“This year, with the hardware complete, we’ll be focusing on improving the software in order to unlock the full potential of the board. We continue to believe that this innovative peripheral redefines the skateboarding experience and could potentially have different applications in the future.”
Crazier things have happened. I guess. Like the Wii Balance Board. Who ever thought that giant slab of concrete would ever take off, eh?
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