Game Business – Page 11

No Brütal Legend at E3 2008

Brütal Legend, the game prophesied for raw awesomeness, will not be appearing at this year’s E3, according to MTV Multiplayer.

They were sent a mail from Lord Awesome Tim Schafer himself, who informed them that the game will not be appearing at E3 and that there’s nothing to worry about: the game is in fine order. “We’re not going to be showing at E3, but soon after that we hope,” he said. As for when this “soon” comes, he says “As soon as the dust settles from this whole [Activision Blizzard] merger thing we should be able to talk about the game a lot more.”

For those not in the know, this is because the game was originally supposed to be published by Vivendi, which now becomes a subsidiary of Activision along with Blizzard, by the clauses of the Great Activision Blizzard merger.

Brütal Legend will see Jack Black playing the roadie protagonist as he travels across a surreal heavy metal-inspired landscape. The game will feature music and cameos from several Metal Gods, such as Ronnie James Dio, Lemmy Kilmister, Rob Halford, Black Sabbath, Wolfmother and many more. It is going to be one hell of a game! Check out our earlier coverage on it! You’ll love it!

Infinity Ward working on new IP

Infinity Ward is about as synonymous with Call of Duty as Valve is with Half-Life or Bungie with Halo. Okay, Treyarch did make Call of Duty 3 and will be alternating with Infinity Ward in making CoD titles now, but nobody seriously cares about them. Sorry, Treyarch. 🙁

Now, while Call of Duty is all fun and all, we’d like to see a little something different from Infinity Ward, and things seem to be on the right track. Talking from his blag, Robert Bowling, the Director of Communications at Infinity Ward announced that they have decided to reup their publishing contract with Activision, which kickstarts their future project, “a unique new IP” that they will have “complete control over”.

Since Bowling isn’t very willing to divulge any details on this “unique” new project, we’re guessing it’s going to be a long while before we actually find out what happens of this. I would be surprised if we get an announcement by February next year! Still, it’s great to know that Infinity Ward is up to something creative and not abother war shooter (which they are pretty good at anyways).

On a pretty loose guess, I’m thinking it will be a typical dystopian/space sci-fi shooter that will probably involve either zombies or aliens or alien zombies. What do you think of this? What is Infinity Ward up to?

Sony to launch even slimmer PS2 in India

Sony, abiding perfectly to the “believe in the sales” maxim has decided to release a fourth version of their immensely popular PlayStation 2 console in India by Diwali – the festival of Light, which occurs somewhere around late-October or early-November. While the Wii and Xbox 360 compete neck-to-neck in the International market and the PS3 slowly catches up, here we have Sony selling the PS2, the first version of which was released in *drum roll* 2000. That’s 8 years ago, people. 2 years shy of a decade.

AC adaptors will be integrated into the console itself now, but even then, the PS2 will be “slimer, sleeker and more suave” [sic]. It will be priced the same as before, at Rs. 6990 (approx. $165). The PS2 has become the best selling console in India very recently because of this cheap price, easy availability, combined with the fact that there are still games being made for it. The Xbox, on the other hand, was nowhere in sight until the 360 came along with its humongous price tag.

Another reason why the PS2 is big here is, that pirated games for the PS2 are pretty much everywhere. For the Xbox 360 though, you need to buy original titles, which cost somewhere around Rs. 2000, which no sensible Indian consumer will be willing to spend. The PS3 is too downright costly and the Wii isn’t available officially (I don’t remember the last Nintendo console available officially here…)

In addition, Sony will also be introducing the PlayStation Network for India by the end of this fiscal year, which should bring India into the realm of online PS2 gaming.

Sony Country Manager (awesome title there) Atindriya Bose said, when asked about whether it will affect the PS3 market:

“We do not market it as a PS-2 or PS-3. It is the experience of the PS that we market. PS-3 is for the next generation. People who are first timers in the gaming market want to pick up PS-2 and experience that, before upgrading to PS-3,”

Now that’s funny. “How do we make money off of casual gamers?” they asked. “I know, milk the PS2 until we’re totally out of stock, release the PS4 and then release PS3, because it’s the console for the better gamers which the Indian crowd has become! Perfect plan!”

Source: The Economic Times

Court Denies Preliminary Injunction Relating to Activision – Vivendi Games Combination

Activision, Inc. today announced that the Delaware Court of Chancery has denied the Wayne County Employees’ Retirement System’s request for a preliminary injunction relating to Activision’s proposed combination with Vivendi Games, Inc., the interactive entertainment business of Vivendi S.A.

A special meeting of stockholders of Activision, Inc. will be held on Tuesday, July 8, 2008, to consider and vote on proposals to approve the transaction and related matters. If Activision’s stockholders approve the transaction and the other matters to be considered at the special meeting, Activision anticipates closing the business combination on or about July 9, 2008.

The meeting will be at 11:00 a.m., local time, at The Peninsula Hotel located at 9882 South Santa Monica Boulevard, Beverly Hills, CA 90212.

Headquartered in Santa Monica, California, Activision, Inc. is a leading worldwide developer, publisher and distributor of interactive entertainment and leisure products. Founded in 1979, Activision posted net revenues of $2.9 billion for the fiscal year ended March 31, 2008.

Activision maintains operations in the U.S., Canada, the United Kingdom, France, Germany, Ireland, Italy, Sweden, Spain, the Netherlands, Australia, Japan and South Korea. More information about Activision and its products can be found on the company’s website, www.activision.com.

Valve: PC Gaming is where all the action is

We’ve had all sorts of articles going on lately about how PC gaming is “dying”. Valve doesn’t think so. At a press event in Bellevue, Washington, Valve held steadfastly to their love of the PC and declared it as a robust and relevant gaming system. Gabe Newell went so far as to say that “[the] PC is where all the action is, and there’s a perception problem”.

It seems that Valve is placing emphasis on Steam and other online software distribution methods, and with good reason. Citing figures, Newell said that DFC Intelligence data showing that PC online sales have been on an increase since 2001, while retail sales comparatively flat. Valve also expects online sales to overtake retail very soon.

An interesting statement he makes is,

“We don’t really have a champion of the PC platform. If you write a story about the Xbox 360, there’s just an army of people who are going to descend on you to make that picture look as polished and rosy as possible. Same things for the other consoles – but there’s no equivalent on the PC, and the people who are traditionally driving these messages, like Microsoft or Intel or Apple are, for various reasons, not very effective champions.”

As we say from Valve’s latest announcement of Steam Cloud, Valve has been pretty aggressive on establishing the PC as the best video game platform out there. It’s time they got some support!

BioWare CEO: More Licensed and Original Games coming

BioWare, pretty much a juggernaut in the RPG section of the games industry made waves with Mass Effect, and have no intention of stopping just yet. BioWare is already on a roll with several titles under development, such as the sequel to Mass Effect, their original IP Dragon Age and the unannounced, top-secret BioWare-LucasArts “interactive product” thing.

Ray Muzyka, CEO of BioWare talked in an interview about Mass Effect, working on original or licensed IP and what’s up with Mass Effect with a hint of Dragon Age in the mix. Hit the jump to find out the details!

Continue reading “BioWare CEO: More Licensed and Original Games coming”