Category Archives: Jagex

Jagex has won a legal battle with a pair of Runescape bot makers, leaving the defendants “convincingly neutered”.

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A US venture firm has bough a 55%t controlling majority share in Jagex, increasing its stake by a further 20%.

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Nothing too overly exciting, but here it is. It’s a car turning into – what else – a transformer. It’s below the break, via Massively.

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Runescape-owner Jagex said today it’s developing an MMO based on Transformers. The game is to launch in 2012 in North America, Latin America, Europe, New Zealand and Australia. No other detail was given – as to whether this will be a browser-based affair, and so on – but it’s confirmed that Hasbro is to “launch” the game.

The Wilderness, Runescape’s most dangerous, deadly and loot-tastic zone is back – and so is trading.

What does this mean to you? It mean you should gather up all your best gear and hide it somewhere very safe before somebody bangs you over the head and loots your corpse to trade it all off.

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According to discussions set to take place during this month’s London Games Conference, with digital distribution “poised to outstrip traditional retail sales within three years,” 40 percent of the games industry is underprepared for the shift.

Speakers during the LGC will address the issue, along with Nick Parker of Parker Consulting, who believes that 2013 and 2014 will be the “likely dates for the next generation global launches” from Microsoft and Sony.

“For the first time ever, the games industry has a way of alleviating the pain that traditionally befalls it during generational decline, through online gaming in its many guises – it’s a genuinely exciting time for the industry and the London Games Conference is perfectly timed to discuss these opportunities,” commented Parker.

Speakers at the conference include Mark Gerhard from Jagex, Kristian Segerstrale from Playfish, Nick Pili from Sega, Pete Edwards from PlayStation Home and Neil Thompson from Xbox, along with an opening address from Ed Vaizey, Shadow Minister for Culture.

PR is through the break. The event takes place at BAFTA on October 27.

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Paltalk has filed a lawsuit against MMO publishers over claims that each are violating patent agreements.

According to Boston.com, Turbine, Sony, Activision Blizzard, NCsoft and Jagex have all been named by PalTalk which holds the rights to two data sharing patents.

Paltalk owns the patents that describe technology for sharing data which allows every player to see identical digital playing fields at the same time, which the company purchased from HearMe back in 2002.

Back in March, the company settled in its favor a $90 million lawsuit it brought against Microsoft over patent infringement, claiming that Halo and Xbox 360′s multiplayer features used its patents without permission.

More through the link.

Jagex Games Studio announced today that Jon Hare has joined the company as Head of Publishing, with a particular focus on further developing FunOrb.com, Jagex’s gaming website targeted at time-pressed gamers.

“Jon is one of the most highly rated game designers in Europe and has had a hugely successful career developing classic titles such as Sensible Soccer, Mega-Lo-Mania and Cannon Fodder,” said Mark Gerhard, Jagex CEO.

“Jon will be playing a very hands-on role, actively engaged in developing and optimizing all of our games. Jagex has always focused on creating games that we want to play, FunOrb is no different. We have specifically created FunOrb for the time-pressured gamer, people who want a high quality deep gaming experience but only have 30 minutes a day or perhaps even a week to relax and enjoy playing.

“The site isn’t for kids or for mums; it is designed for adult gamers who ask themselves ‘why don’t they make great games like they used to?’.”

Hare has developed more than 30 games on over 20 formats from Sinclair Spectrum to the Nintendo Wii, and was named one of the top 10 Britons who changed the games industry by The Times.

Vince Farquharson has been appointed the new head of UK-based developed Jagex’s hugely popular MMO Runescape, writes Edge.

Farquharson will oversee the Runescape expansion after work as creative director and development director for THQ for the last three years.

We wish Vince Farquharson all the best in his new job.

By Mike Bowden