Tim Schafer and Double Fine Productions have moved away from big budget titles in recent years, instead focusing on smaller games like Costume Quest, Stacking and the unique Kinect experience that is Happy Action Theater. But deep down, Schafer still has a passion for making huge AAA games.
Speaking to GamesIndustry International back at DICE, Schafer commented, “We have four teams and all it takes is to put two of them together to have a team the size that we made Psychonauts or Brutal Legend with.”
He continued, sidetracking himself with his own humor: “We’re not really moving away from… all the things I was saying about size issues, if that’s not too provocative, size issues, that sounds dirty. Ok, now everything I say is going to sound dirty… this is just taking an ugly turn.”
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Source: GamesIndustry.biz – News
EA BioWare’s Star Wars: The Old Republic is off to a good start, “with more than 1.7 million active subscribers and growing,” according to CEO John Riccitiello. While player churn is always a concern in MMOs, DFC Intelligence does see long-term success for the title.
In a report obtained by GamesIndustry International, the market research firm noted that The Old Republic “has the potential to be a successful long-term online subscription PC game… despite a general decline in high-end subscription game products and growing competition from numerous free-to-play games like Riot Games’ League of Legends, War Gaming’s World of Tanks, and S2 Games’ Heroes of New Earth.”
DFC, which conducted the study in conjunction with Xfire, tracked game usage data from the launch of the MMO on December 20, 2011 through February 20, 2012 and also surveyed over 4,000 Xfire users in January 2012. Based on this data, DFC believes that Star Wars can indeed reach over one million long-term paying subscribers (defined as a subscriber that pays for over six months).
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Source: GamesIndustry.biz – News
Former Frogster COO Dirk Weyel heads up the latest round of new hires at racing studio Eutechnyx, taking the role of non-executive director and joining the board.
“I’ve watched Eutechnyx grow into the world’s leading independent games studio over the past few years and I was especially impressed by the visionary concept of Auto Club Revolution, and the potential it has to become the number one worldwide platform for online racing fans and car enthusiasts,” said Weyel.
“I am pleased to have the chance to have a direct hand in making Auto Club Revolution the success I know it is sure to be, and I’m looking forward to being able to help Eutechnyx take its place as a leading developer and publisher within the fast growing online games and free-to-play arena.”
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Source: GamesIndustry.biz – News
Mojang has announced the hiring of four developers responsible for the Bukkit mod for Minecraft, a very popular unofficial tool for Minecraft players and servers. The team consists of Warren Loo, Erik Broes, Nathan Adams and Nathan Gilbert, who will be joining Mojang to officially turn Bukkit into a part of the full game.
While the four new developers are only a portion of the very dedicated group that plays around with Minecraft source code, Mojang noted that the Bukkit team was specifically designing modifications for Minecraft servers. Their work earned them a shot on the team, as Mojang has already confirmed that the new hires will be working on “more than just modding.”
As Mojang continues to support Minecraft, founder Marcus Persson is reportedly hard at work on Scrolls despite the continued legal battle with Bethesda.
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Source: GamesIndustry.biz – News
Alex Seropian recently left Disney Interactive to form his own mobile studio, Industrial Toys, but prior to that Seropian was a co-founder at Bungie. Now that Bungie has handed the hit Halo franchise over to Microsoft, some are wondering if the Redmond giant can do the series justice. Seropian recently told GameSpot that he believes the series is in good hands.
“I don’t think I can be anything other than hopeful that it will be great. We’ll see. Halo is one of the crown jewels in the Microsoft gaming IP, if not the crown jewel, so you would expect nothing less than for them to take the time needed and apply the resources needed to make it great,” said Seropian.
“I would be pretty surprised if they wiffed it. Maybe it will bring a fresh perspective, and that’s so hard because there’s so many fans that are used to a particular thing that bringing something new is often…it’s hard to bring something new to a franchise that’s so established. I’m looking forward to it.”
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Source: GamesIndustry.biz – News
THQ is going through a rough patch, but it still has some big titles on the far horizon, including Guillermo del Toro’s InSane and Valhalla Game Studio’s Devil’s Third. Valhalla is the current studio of outspoken Dead or Alive and Ninja Gaiden creator Tomonobu Itagaki. Itagaki recently mentioned to Game Informer how different it is to work with an American publisher versus a Japanese one.
“We’ve been working with THQ for two and a half years, and when I was working in Japan I was at the publisher myself so I can’t really compare because it’s different. The circumstances are very different. I really understand what the publisher thinks because I used to be the publisher myself,” Itagaki began.
“The one thing that’s completely different between the Eastern publisher and Western publisher is the budget. I’ve made more than 30 games, and if you put a little bit more [money] into the one I’m making now, Devil’s Third, I could make all of the 30 games I made before. The budget you use for the promotion is completely different too. Those are the biggest differences.”
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Source: GamesIndustry.biz – News
Meteor Entertainment has raised $ 10 million to help fund a downloadable online mech game called Hawken. The game is actually being developed by Meteor’s subsidiary, Adhesive Games, and is expected to be released this December.
According to VentureBeat, Meteor’s investors in this round of funding include Benchmark Capital and FirstMark Capital. It’s worth noting that these are the same investors who backed the hit online game League of Legends from Riot Games.
“We were tremendously thankful to be associated with Riot, but we viewed the market as much bigger than a single title,” said Benchmark partner Mitch Lasky. “We think that $ 8 billion to $ 10 billion will migrate away from packaged goods games and free-to-play will be a lightning rod for those dollars.”
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Source: GamesIndustry.biz – News
Sony Computer Entertainment will release the Killzone 3 multiplayer as a free download in the US on February 28.
While all the maps come gratis, players will need to stump up $ 14.99 to remove a level cap and unlock all weapons and skills.
It’s a shrewd move on Sony’s part. Current Killzone 3 players will benefit from an influx of news gamers into multiplayer to invigorate the leaderboards and game play, while the suite will promote and advertise a game that was released a year ago.
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Source: GamesIndustry.biz – News
