Category Archives: Denmark

Whoops. Denmark’s TV2 used a screenshot from Assassin’s Creed, showing Damascus of 720 years ago, to illustrate a news article on conflict in present-day Syria, Times of Israel reports. An employee is said to have found the image online and believed it to be a photograph. This sort of embarrassing mixup happens all the time; the BBC once used a Halo logo instead of the UN’s, and ITV famously presented footage of ArmA 2 as video of actual combat.

Thanks, Kotaku.

The World of Warcraft habit of Norwegian mass killer Anders Behring Breivik was presented as initial evidence in his trial yesterday. Julie Horup examines the fallout amid media demonisation of games.

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The third annual Danish Game Awards were held tonight, and The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim walked home with not only and award for Best RPG, but Game of the Year as well.

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A much loved indie is getting a second lease on life. Julie Horup checks in with the dinosaurs, tank maggots, and WWI trenches of 1916 – Der Unbekannte Krieg.

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Next time you ready a whinge about our mutual hobby, spare a thought for gamers outside Japan, the UK and US – like Mike Bowden, whose lament for our Danish brethren is echoed across Europe.

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The Danish developer of Interstellar Marines has described how it eschewed traditional publisher funding and reached out to its fans. The fans, it seems, have reached back.

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Computerworld.dk’s reporting that’s IO’s dropped 35 staff.

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Last night, the first ever Danish Game Awards were held in Copenhagen and the big winner of the night was Modern Warfare 2, getting two awards.

One for Game of the Year, and another for Best Action Game.

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The first ever Danish Game Awards are being held tonight, and it looks like some very popular names are up for awards.

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According to a Microsoft fact sheet, ten more countries will be getting the Xbox Live Video Marketplace this fall.

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Eurogamer’s published the latest of its European versions, this time in Denmark.

“Eurogamer is a true icon in European gaming and I’m proud to be part of the Danish expansion,” added editor in chief of Eurogamer.dk, Kristian West.

“Personally I look forward to sharing with Danish gamers this fresh take on our games and the vast industry behind them.

Eurogamer now has local language sites in France, Spain, Germany, Italy, Portugal, The Netherlands, The Czech Republic, Romania and the UK.

Boomtown’s reporting that Watchmen dev Deadline has filed for bankruptcy.

The Danish firm’s issued a statement saying it’s no longer able to fulfil its financial obligations.

More through there.

Catastrophe this morning for the Nordic region, as news hits that the Animal Crossing-Wii Speak bundle won’t be available in Norway, Denmark and Sweden.

Apparently our Northern cousins will be able to buy the game and microphone peripheral separately, but not in the same pack.

Expect viking fury about this over the course of the day. Or not.

From Tendografen, via N-Europe.

NXE’s XNA community games don’t appear to be available in all European regions.

Reports on the Eurogamer forums suggest that both Denmark and Norway simply don’t have the Community Games menu option in the new dash. Which means we can’t play them either. Catastrophic.

Perhaps it’s just Scandinavia that has been left out? We’re contacting Microsoft to get official word on the subject.

Update: Finland, Sweden and now Ireland can add themselves to the list of regions without a Community Games section, so we’re told, and it appears the title, Weapon of Choice, is not available in France. Thanks to Paavi, netsabes and Michael O’Connor.

By Mike Bowden

Not pretty. Ekstra Bladet – or “The Sun of Denmark,” as Mike would have it – has put some basic archaeology questions to Lara model Alison Carroll on camera despite constant protestations. The results are a bit of a car crash.

Said the paper, translated from the Danish: “She’s beautiful to look at, but the actress behind the new Lara Croft game is not the sharpest of knifes in the draw, to put it mildly. See what happens when Ekstra Bladet asked her three question about ‘her field’.”

Eidos will be thrilled.

Whilst talking about Unity middleware platfrom in Copenhagen, Atari exec Phil Harrison has said that the reason many games fail is due to going from “concept to production in one jump.”

“Here is my EUR 10 million gift to this room — all of the mistakes I have made in software development have been based around one problem and one problem alone, which is accelerating through this pipeline without successfully and properly satisfying the requirements of each of the stages – and typically it involves going from concept to production in one jump,” said Harrison.

“That’s pretty much the definition of why projects fail — because you don’t know what you’re building, you don’t know how you’re going to build it, you don’t know who you’re building it for, but you’ve got 60 people working on it and they’ve all running in different directions — that’s how most games fail.”

Thanks, Kotaku.

An Assassins Creed-themed PEGI video hit Danish television this week, of a man dressed as Altair telling parents about violence and the appropriateness of certain games for their children.

This isn’t all the Danes have done to bring parents up to speed, however. A website entitled Mediarådet (Media Advice) has been set up with a special section relating to video games. There’s stuff in there for kids to discuss with their class at school and lots of help and information for adults about how to recognise what games are suitable for their children.

There’s even an article that looks philosophically at the question of whether games are harmful or not. Surprisingly, it’s one that doesn’t jump to conclusions and recognises that there are differing opinions on the matter, and even links to a research note that outlines the empirical data collected so far.

You can see the PEGI video down below, and hopefully soon we’ll be getting some English equivalents on British television before too long. Although, in fairness, the British Government did give itself until autumn 2008 “to begin raising awareness of videogame ratings to the general public.”

The sooner the better.

By Mike Bowden

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Denmark’s largest games retailer, EBGames (a subsidiary of the US firm, Gamestop) is selling copies of Grand Theft Auto IV for 599kr on 360 and 549kr on PS3, which by our calculations makes them the most expensive copies of the game in the world.

That’s a whopping £63 for the Xbox 360 version and £57.75 for PS3.

In euros, our currency converter makes it €73,34 for PS3 and €80 for 360. And just so our American friends don’t feel left out, that’s a whopping $125.25 for 360 and $114.79 for PS3.

In case you’ve been asleep, GTA IV comes out at midnight tonight.

By Mike Bowden

The founding members of IO Interactive have reformed as Reto-Meto, the studio announced today, a brand initially created in 1997 as part of joint IO/Nordisk Film venture.

The Copenhagen, Denmark-based venture is apparently “committed to redefining the online multiplayer space.”

IO Interactive is best known for its Hitman series, and was the subject of a £20m buy-out by Eidos.

By Mike Bowden