Monthly Archives: March 2009

Stargate Worlds developer Cheyenne Mountain is being sued by Capital Princess, a data center, over an “unpaid open account”.

The company went through financial trouble last year, with employees going 25 days without being paid.

BioWare’s released a solitary new Mass Effect 2 image to celebrate the fact millions of PS3 owners are crying into their soup tonight.

And here it is. It’s a bar. With a picture of a “saucy” lady in it.

The hugely anticipated RPG was confirmed to be a 360 and PC exclusive earlier. It’ll launch in early 2010.

Develop recently surveyed 528 UK developers, and found that 66 percent of employees are satisfied with their current pay scale.

The average salary was found to be £30,442 ($43,087) a few thousand higher than average base pay in the UK as a whole, and that number drops £4,000 when you compare salaries between the north and south.

Northern developers not only make less, but are also provided with less training. The average northern training percentage was 74.1, while the south’s training percentage was 67 — both relatively low figures.

Still, despite being pleased with their paycheck, 26 percent of employees polled stated that motivation for looking for new work was pay-related.

In comparison, American counterparts make considerably more money. Average pay in 2007 was $73,316, down $5,000 from 2006. Pay scale runs anywhere from $20k to $100k depending on who you work for and your experience.

Google will be at GDC on March 25 giving a “sneak peak” at the new “game gadgets” currently in development for iGoogle using OpenSocial.

The company will also be on hand to demo the new iGoogle homepage.

Here’s the rundown:

Please join us on the night of March 25th as we give you an exclusive sneak peak at our new collection of gaming themes for iGoogle, Google’s personalized homepage. We will be creating an interactive experience that will bring the gaming industry’s most iconic characters to life and allow you to ride through their adventures. You’ll hear from some of the game publishers involved in the project and Google’s VP of Search Products and User Experience, Marissa Mayer. As an added bonus, you can see an early preview of a few of the game gadgets that developers are building for iGoogle using OpenSocial. It’s an event you won’t want to miss.

Nothing like a last minute announcement to pique the public’s interest.

Cowen and Company has said that Grand Theft Auto: Chinatown Wars could sell two million units in America this year.

Thanks to positive reviews and the amount of players who already own a DS in the US, sales could go through the roof, said firm analyst Doug Creutz.

“Although the handheld platform has a younger-skewing installed base, we believe many core gamers own the DS,” he said.

“The strong critical rating will likely increase the game’s chances of becoming a commercial hit.

“If the title’s subsequent reviews are consistent with the initial critical response, Chinatown Wars would be the highest rated title on the DS to date.”

Chinatown Wars currently has a Metacritic score of 95 percent.

More through here.

Capcom just announced that the Devil May Cry series has passed the 10 million unit shipped mark.

Since the franchise hit the scene in 2001 it’s sold like hotcakes, with the latest iteration, Devil May Cry 4, selling 2.2 million copies, a record for the series.

Can’t keep a good demon hunter down it seems.

Press release through the jump.

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Mass Effect 2 won’t release on PS3, BioWare just confirmed, with the game hitting PC and 360 only in “early” 2010.

“In this dark second chapter, Saren’s evil army of Geth soldiers has just been defeated, and humans, who are still struggling to make their mark on the galactic stage, are now faced with an even greater peril,” said the developer in a press release.

“We’re going to surpass the extraordinary gaming experience we brought our fans in Mass Effect by delivering intensified combat and expanded weapon options as well as increased depth of planet exploration, all while delivering a powerful, emotionally engaging story,” said BioWare head Ray Muzyka.

“Mass Effect 2 is shaping up to be an unforgettable RPG-shooter experience, taking players on a non-stop roller-coaster ride filled with stunning plot twists and no-holds-barred action.”

Cue fanboi madness.

Full thing after the break.

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Peter Molyneux has said he’s learned not to push his staffers too hard when making a game.

Speaking in an interview with Develop, Molyneux said that Lionhead basically “destroyed lives” while working on Fable, and he made sure not to make the same mistake with Fable II.

“If I’m honest, on Fable we just burnt people’s lives; we destroyed the team,” he said.

“Week after week, month after month, they worked 50, 60, 70, 80 hour weeks. It destroyed their lives and destroyed their marriages. You just can’t do that anymore.

“So looking back at Fable 2, yeah, we crunched at the end, but it was only at the very, very end that we used up people’s whole weekends. There’s a few exceptions, but a lot of Sundays this studio was empty, which I thought was great.”

In comparison, Molyneux says that Lionhead is now a much better place to work for. So hooray for that.

Bill Roper, design director for Cryptic, says that he prefers the “darker, more realistic” Diablo to the “Blizzard interpretation” of Diablo III.

Speaking in an interview with VideoGamer.com, the ex-Blizzard North exec said he does not think that the new Diablo looks bad as such, just that he liked the more gritty version better.

“You know, I liked the darker, grittier. I liked the differences in art style, to be honest. So, I think I would personally, from a player standpoint, prefer that.

“I think that one of the things that we always tried to get across was that Diablo was Gothic fantasy, and I think there was just a need that was put in there from the visuals that I didn’t necessarily get,” he continued.

“I got it from the architecture and to a degree from the character design but not the feeling of the world. I can’t say that I dislike it. I didn’t look at it and go, ‘Oh my God that’s horrible.’ But I looked at it and went, it’s not really… To me, as a player, it just didn’t really ring with Diablo.”

Say it ain’t so, Bill. More through there.

And it’s a co-op platformer.

The video after the break shows a “super-early” version of Behemoth’s “Game #3″.

There’s no further detail on the latest from the Castle Crashers developer, aside from the fact it’s out in 2010.

From the company’s blog:

Release Date: See Trailer

Console : No specifics yet

Price: No idea

Game Details: Coming Soon

And there we are.

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A new interview dishing about Dead Space: Extraction has gone up over on IGN, and Steve Papoutsis says that fans worried over the “on-rails” aspect should not be skeptical.

Man’s been everywhere lately.

“I would tell the Skeptics [sic] that our team is passionate about innovation. Extraction is going to include all of the mechanics that made Dead Space a memorable experience: Stasis, Telekinesis, Strategic Dismemberment, and Zero-G,” he said.

“Our game is going to also deliver on some all new features like Co-op that really involves both players for example cooperative puzzles, brand new weapons, new characters, new enemies, new bosses, new story, and new locations. Our goal is to create an all new experience on the Nintendo Wii that feels custom built for that platform, and I think we are on track to do that.”

He then went on to chat a bit about the game, these being the high points:

• The heroine of Extraction, Lexine, is in her early 20′s and that you are “introduced to her pretty quickly in the game”.

• Controls will be fairly simple. Stasis: Point the Wii Remote at enemy or object then hit the Stasis button to fire the projectile. Dismemberment: Aim your Wii Remote at limbs, fire and then “pop goes the Necromorph”.

• The Arc Welder is one of the new weapons added for the game and it fires a bolt of energy which will arc between enemies. It damage depends on how many enemies it “comes into contact with”.

• Game will be just as bloody and gore filled as the first release.

Hit the link for the rest.

EA’s confirmed that Red Alert 3′s PS3 demo will release this week, as confirmed by the game’s site.

It’s a single-player demo that’ll feature the game’s cinematic opening, one campaign mission from both the Soviet and Allied campaigns, and an interactive tutorial.

The full thing’s out on March 24.

Zombie’s Halo-alike, Backlight, is to be turned into a movie and comic as well as a game, the company announced today.

The property “is a covert military action epic set twenty-five years in the future.”

Read lots of words like “atomic” and “union” after the break.

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Here are the top Xbox Live titles for the week of March 9. Capcom’s Resident Evil 5 and Street Fighter IV both debuted on the chart, while the top three continue to trade places with one another.

Xbox 360 Top Live Titles

1. Halo 3
2. Call of Duty: WaW
3. Call of Duty 4
4. Gears of War 2
5. GTA IV
6. Resident Evil 5
7. Halo Wars
8. Left 4 Dead
9. FIFA 09
10. Street Fighter IV

Get all the Arcade and Community charts after the break.

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Massive Entertainment’s Martin Walfiszhas left both the studio he founded and its new owner, Ubisoft.

Formed in 1997, Massive was purchased by Vivendi in 2002 and was acquired by Ubisoft after being put up for sale by Activision Blizzard last year.

“Ubisoft is saddened by the recent departure of Martin Walfiz from Massive Entertainment and we wish him all the best in his future projects,” said the company.

Details regarding the reason for his departure are unknown at this time.

The PSP Store may soon be getting a new service allowing downloads of digital comics and graphic novels.

According to a movie you can watch below, SCEE sent a survey out to PSP users asking if they would prefer a subscription-based service or a la carte prices for digital comics.

Take a look.

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One of our magic retail sources just popped through a couple of shots of a new 360 bundle, this one featuring a Pro, Halo Wars and Halo 3 in the same pack. See them after the break.

This is presumably to honour the release of Halo 3 as a Classics product this week.

This hasn’t been announced yet, but we’ll check with Microsoft now.

Update – This was listed in January and came out on the Continent a few weeks ago.

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More than 10 million Call of Duty: World at War videos have been viewed on GameTrailers.com, the site said today.

That’s it, really. There’s a map pack arriving for the game on Thursday. Get the press release after the break.

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Fallout 3 DLC The Pitt will appeal to both obsessives and casual players just looking for fun and story, Bethesda’s told VG247.

“The content works well for both camps,” said Jeff Gardiner, lead producer on the 360 and PC content.

“If you’re a ‘completist,’ you’ll find not only new Raider Armor, weapons like the AutoAxe, and a new set of power armor, but also be able to experience a new part of Fallout that has been hinted about both in Fallout 3 and the canon as a whole.

“If you’re a casual player, you’ll get hours of new content, a compelling story, plus all of the above.”

The DLC, the game’s second piece after Operation: Achorage, was set in Pittsburgh for several reasons, we were told.

“Pittsburgh has a special resonance with several of our team members,” Gardiner added.

“Plus, it was fun to build large buildings that aren’t completely bombed out, as the city itself escaped direct bombardment during the war. It’s
also relatively close to Washington, DC. Pittsburgh also fit thematically with the notion of exploring a Raider society, which the player will now finally be able to do.”

The Pitt releases for both PC and 360 on March 24, priced 800 MS Points. You’ll get about four hours play from it.

Journalists can now register for the inaugural gamescom, Koelnmesse just confirmed.

Hit this to get started.

In case you missed it, gamescom is the “new Games Convention,” taking place in Cologne this year from August 19-23.

Get all the details after the break.

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