Hurray for capitalism! Time for gamers to get prissy again.
Microsoft announced today that as of November 1, 2010, the price of Xbox Live Gold will increase in Canada, the US, UK and Mexico. The annual price for Xbox Live Gold increases with $10 in the US, with appropriate price hikes in the other mentioned countries as well.
One of the many horses still being flogged in the video game industry is Beyond Good and Evil 2. And today, we’re going to be flogging it some more. According to Ubisoft CEO Yves Guillemot, the title is (thankfully) still in development. He also says development on the title never stopped. This was confirmed by the man himself via Kotaku. And I’ve officially lost count over how many times Ubisoft has re-confirmed BG&E2.
“We were, as we are, working on the game,” Guillemot told me during a meeting at Germany’s Gamescom this week. “What is very import with this next product is that it will be perfect.”
Looks like its not all bad for Japanese devs this week. Nintendo may have seen their worst financial quarter in years, and Capcom’s money pit may be diving faster than a sinking ship, but Sega, on the other hand, has inexplicably managed to turn a profit.
Whoever said the video game industry was recession proof needs to get his head examined.
Capcom reports a profit drop of 90.4 percent year-over-year for the quarter ending June 30. Their profits have gone down from 2.2 billion yen in the same period last year, to 213 million yen this year.
Now here’s a news story in which it’s hard to decide if it’s surprising, or the inevitable. Nintendo has shown a very significant drop in profit and sales for it’s Q1 period, ending June 30. This has seen the company make a loss for the period, a situation which has occurred in years.
Is it just me, or has Capcom seemingly gone into overdrive? Dead Rising 2 is nearing completion, Marvel vs. Capcom 3 is currently in development, and Street Fighter X Tekken was just announced. And apparently they have no intention of stopping.
According to a recent story over on GamaSutra Microsoft has confirmed that Kinect won’t be seeing release in China. It’s received a dutiful ban-hammer from the country’s Ministry of Culture.
Microsoft’s China COO Michel Van Der Bel has explained that the technology has fallen victim of a government notice from June 2000, in which the Ministry of Culture banned gaming equipment. Some Nintendo consoles are on sale in the region, but both the 360 and PS3 are banned in the region.
Van Der Bel has stated that Microsoft intends to cooperate with the law.
Microsoft is currently undergoing a “massive shakeup” in their Entertainment & Devices Devision, resulting in the departure of president Robbie Bach.
According to Kotaku, J. Allard, one of the “top men behind the Xbox and Xbox 360″, is also leaving Microsoft alongside Bach. Bach has been working with Microsoft for 22 years, and is retiring from the company to spend more time with his family, and devote time to non-profit organisations. Allard will remain on in an advisory role.
Bach, Allard and Ed Fries were instrumental in bringing Microsoft into the videogame business. Back and Allard were the ones to introduce the Xbox 360 to the general gaming public at E3 2005.
Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer will stay in his position. Don Mattrick, who leads Microsoft’s interactive entertainment business, and Andy Lees, who leads Microsoft’s mobile communications business will report directly to Ballmer starting July.
So, hey, you heard the news? Bungie currently has a 10 year publishing deal with Activision. Curious what genre their first independent game might be? Well, according to a job listing on its website, it might be an action RPG.
According to the page, the studio is looking for writing leads to put together the storyline of the new game, according to, with a focus on “branching or non-linear narrative experience”.
It’s certainly a surprising direction for the company who has, for the past decade, been known almost entirely for the Halo franchise, but it’s important not to forget that the company was responsible for various different games before Halo even existed.
This will probably end up being a very surprising title.
Chatting in an interview with HeyUGuys, famous Hollywood director Jerry Bruckheimer believes that video games will soon be completely indistinguishable from movies within a decade.
“I really believe in he next 10 years you won’t be able to tell the difference between movies and games,” the producer told the website. “Games will be so realistic.”
What some may not know is that Bruckheimer actually has his own video game studio, named JB Studios, after himself.
It should be interesting to see what such a major name in the Hollywood movie industry is capable of doing with a development company under his control. Lets just hope it doesn’t take us a decade to find out.
Jason West and Vincent Zampella, the two executives that were unceremoniously fired from Modern Warfare studio Infinity Ward by owner Activision, announced today that they are forming a new studio, under Activisions biggest rival, EA.
The pair have formed the studio Respawn Entertainment, a name I would usually deem generic, but seems to fit their situation pretty well. This makes them the second newly formed studio to make a thinly veiled jab at their former employer.
After being fired on the spot by Activision, and escorted out by security, the two filed a complaint against Activision, and signed up with a Hollywood talent agency. Activision filed their counter-suit before the weekend, of which Kotaku has a pretty good summary. This move does lend credence to the claim by Activision that the execs were going behind their backs talking to EA, but it is of course entirely possible that they made the deal with EA after being fired.
Anyone who has been a fan of gaming for a while now is more than familiar with Insomniac Games, long time supporters of the PlayStation formats and creators of famous franchises such as Spyro the Dragon and Ratchet and Clank. If certain rumours are to be believed though, this exclusive support may soon come to an end.
A “trusted source” who spoke to IGN anonymously during GDC claims that the company intends to go multi-platform.
Existing franchise are, as far as we know, locked into exclusivity on the PS3 for now, but this does not stop the company from creating a new franchise for the other existing consoles, the Xbox 360 and the Wii.
Insomniac is refusing to comment on this rumour for the time being, but we’ll let you know if something comes of it. I personally would be extremely surprised if this turned out to be true.
Well, this is interesting. According to Andriasang, Square Enix’s recruit page has a listing looking for staff for work on a “next generation” gaming engine.
“At Square Enix, in anticipation of the appearance of next generation platforms, we’ve started development on a new generation game engine for competing beyond the level of the strong developers throughout the world, and are presently seeking a lot of talent.”
Square used the image of Cloud from Final Fantasy VII in the listing, but we probably shouldn’t read into that too much – it’s most likely just a picture for the sake of promoting the company’s image. The FFVII remake rumours stopped running their course a long time ago.
[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.
Shigeru Miyamoto previously talked about Nintendo working on some new hardware, but wouldn’t reveal what they were working on. Could it be a new Nintendo DS?
According to French website Game Kult, development kits for the successor to the DS has already been sent out. And if CVG is to be believed, The Pokémon Company was the first third-party company to get the kit. Both websites cite unnamed sources as their sources, so mark this up as a rumour for now.
CVG’s source also mentions the new hardware has got a tilt function, not unlike that of the iPhone, but one that “does a lot more”. This adds up with Satoru Iwata’s mention of a new DS with motion controls.
