Archived News:
Activision Blizzard announces "better-than-expected" fiscal fourth quarter
and full year 2013 results. Word is: "For calendar year 2013, Activision
Blizzard delivered GAAP net revenues of $4.58 billion, as compared with $4.86
billion for 2012." For the quarter, they say: "For the quarter ended December
31, 2013, the company delivered GAAP net revenues of $1.52 billion, as compared
with $1.77 billion for the fourth quarter of 2012." They also offer the latest
World of Warcraft numbers, saying the MMORPG now has 7.8 million subscribers,
which is 200K more than their
last census.
Here's word from CEO Bobby Kotick: “As we look to 2014 and beyond, we
have the strongest and most diverse pipeline of games in our history. In 2014,
we expect these releases to enable us to grow non-GAAP revenues year over year
and generate record non-GAAP earnings per share. We expect Bungie’s Destiny™, an
innovative shared-world, first-person action game to be Activision Publishing’s
next billion dollar franchise. Activision Publishing also has terrific new games
planned for the Call of Duty® and Skylanders™ franchises, and Blizzard
Entertainment has an expansion to the top-selling PC and console game Diablo®
III and another major new release. Also in our pipeline for 2014 and the next
few years are at least three potentially groundbreaking new free-to-play
franchises—Blizzard’s Hearthstone™: Heroes of Warcraft™ and Heroes of the
Storm™, and Activision Publishing’s Call of Duty Online. We believe these games
have great global potential. Free-to-play as a business model has now achieved
scale, both in the West and in China. Hearthstone, which released in open beta
on PC last month and which Blizzard Entertainment plans to expand this year to
tablets and smartphones, is already attracting millions of players with strong
engagement and monetization in the West and China, putting it on track to join
World of Warcraft®, Diablo, and StarCraft® as their fourth mega
franchise.”
During the investor conference call following their latest financials,
Activision Blizzard announced Sledgehammer will take the helm of its own leg of
the Call of Duty franchise,
reports GameInformer, saying the military shooter series will now have three
developers operating on a three-year schedule, giving Infinity Ward and Treyarch
a little more breathing room while maintaining annual released. GameInformer
notes: "During the call, Activision listed three branches of the Call of Duty
franchise: Modern Warfare, Black Ops, and Ghosts. With Black Ops at Treyarch and
Ghosts at Infinity Ward, it seems logical to suspect Sledgehammer's entry will
be a Modern Warfare title."
This blog post offers the
intro story trailer for
The Last Federation, Arcen's upcoming sci-fi grand strategy game,
following a
previous post with a
trailer showing alpha combat footage. According to
Indie DB the game is due at the end of this month, but
this
forum post seems to indicate the alpha runs until later this month. Arcen
also notes that their AI War:
Fleet Command is on sale on Steam for 75% off, and that all profits from the
sale are "basically going right back into pre and post-launch development" of
The Last Federation. Continue here to read the full story.
Double Dragon: Neon is now available
on Steam offering this
reimagined remake of the co-op brawler. Here's the deal: Building on the
highly successful release on console, the PC version sports full Steam
integration and online cooperative play for a true Double Dragon experience. In
its console debut, Double Dragon: Neon revitalized the franchise with an updated
look and good ol’ fashioned street fights. The world’s most iconic arcade
brothers Billy and Jimmy Lee are back in a reboot of the classic side-scrolling,
beat-em-up that fueled a generation of gamers. When Marian is kidnapped by the
evil forces of the Shadow Warriors gang, the brothers set out to win her back
and take down their chief nemesis Skullmageddon. Along the way, players will
take on hordes of street-gangs, guzzle gallons of soda, and rock out to some
stellar tunes in the form of ability-enhancing mixtapes.
Positech now offers new Social Engineering DLC for Democracy 3, their
political simulation sequel. In celebration, the game is on sale for the first
time since launching, and will be 50% all weekend. Details on the sale are
posted on this
page, and here's word on the new DLC: "The Social Engineering DLC introduces
a plethora of new policies and governmental dilemmas that will help you
subversively guide your country to prosperity... or cause it all to come
crashing down upon you." Here's a
new Social Engineering
Trailer. Continue here to read the full story.
Steam now offers the
Windows PC edition of Dead Man's
Draw, Stardock's card-based strategy game originally released for iOS.
They explain that this edition of the game offers additional features and no
in-app purchases or microtransactions whatsoever: "The PC version contains all
of the content from the iOS original, plus all-new card abilities and player
traits with more than 20 extra tournaments added since the game's October
launch. Additionally, no in-app purchases or additional transactions of any kind
are present in Dead Man’s Draw on PC."
This trailer offers
a look at Resident Evil 4 Ultimate HD, the improved version of the
survival/horror sequel that's coming to Windows PCs at the end of this month.
The clip shows off the trifecta of gameplay; cinematics; and QTEs (with Xbox
prompts), all coming to an unfortunate conclusion. Continue here to read the full story.
Double Fine announces Amnesia
Fortnight 2014 is now underway. Don't worry if you've forgotten how this
works, since it's changed this year, as by running the two-week prototyping
marathon on Humble Bundle, they are providing the opportunity to pay what you
want to vote on projects you feel are worth pursuing. Word is: Members of
the public can now pay any amount for the chance to vote on dozens of ideas
pitched by Double Fine staff members, with the top-ranked choices becoming
two-week PC prototypes playable by contributors. Contributors decide the
percentage that will go to charity.
Buyers who beat the pay-what-you-want average will also get to vote for their
favorite idea contributed by Adventure Time creator Pendleton Ward, who will be
serving as a project lead on site at Double Fine over the course of the two-week
jam.
Link of the Day:
Audience Suggestion Box- The Big Lipinski. That rink really tied the room
together, did it not? Thanks Acleacius.
Amazon has acquired Double Helix
Games ( Killer Instinct), reports
TechCrunch, saying the giant etailer picked up the studio's talent and IP,
which includes the new Strider game
that's coming next week.
Double Helix was formed by a merger of Shiny and The Collective
in 2007 that formed a studio called
Foundation 9, which soon was renamed Double Helix.
Financial details of the deal are not public at this time, but this news is
fairly detail-free at this point, with Amazon providing the following statement:
"Amazon has acquired Double Helix as part of our ongoing commitment to build
innovative games for customers." TechCrunch also reports that Amazon has committed to
supporting Double Helix’s current lineup of games, though they reference two
future project that will no longer be pursued, saying Dirty Harry and Harker
(neither of which ring any bells) are no longer expected to follow Strider.
Just last week a
story on VG247 said Amazon is gearing up to launch its own Android-based
console this year, so this may relate to that, though Amazon acquired Reflexive
Entertainment in 2008 without launching
their own game system.
Though Respawn's Vince Zampella tweeted
earlier this week that
this month's Titanfall beta
testing would not be restricted to preorders,
a new
tweet clarifies that this will still be a closed beta, requiring a key for
access. Here is his explanation of why restricting access to the game will allow
them to get the most players into the test: "@VexX_mendes2878 @abbieheppe
@TitanFallBlog goal is to get as many people in as possible, doing it in waves
to make sure it works." Thanks
NowGamer.
The organization behind the World Cyber Games (WCG) will not run any tournaments
or events in 2014, according to a report
on onGamers,
where the have an email purportedly sent by WCG CEO Brad Lee which says in part:
"This year, World Cyber Games Inc. will not organize tournaments and events,
including the World Cyber Games finals world." That sounds temporary, but other
parts of the message seem more permanent. "Although the brand has disappeared
but WCG spirit will remain forever in the hearts of each player and fans," he
writes. "This moment is very difficult and painful for me. However, I must say
goodbye to the WCG." There letter also states that "each partner can use brand
WCG in your country from this point," however a follow-up on
Korea's Daily Esports (in Korean) refutes that, saying the WCG brand is not
free for anyone to use. Thanks
Kotaku Australia via
VG247.
Marek Ziemak and Maciej Szczesnik have departed CD Projekt RED, where they were
working on The Witcher 3, to join Polish developer 11bitstudios. While Ziemak's new
role is yet to be designed, word is Szczesnik will lead development of a new
game. "I'll be responsible for the entire design of a game that took shape in my
imagination," said Szczesnik in a prepared statement
posted on Polygon. "It's a really exciting feeling to create a new world
from scratch, make its characters and rules and to know that I have this blank
page to fill with my ideas and then bring them to life."
Surprise Attack Games takes the wraps off of Vertiginous Golf, a game
which combines a dystopian society with the dystopian pastime of miniature golf
in an alternate-history steampunk setting. The game should come to Steam Early
Access next month, but it is already available on the
Vertiginous Golf website for Windows, with
OS X and Linux support to follow. This is a first-person, physics-based game,
and this trailer shows
off the setting, which looks like BioShock Infinite golf. Here's
word: Vertiginous Golf is a physics-based, first person exploratory
mini-golf game, set in an alternate, steampunk-infused world where life on the
ground is enveloped in permanent smog, constant darkness and never-ending rain.
Players will chip and putt their way around floating courses with complex
machinery and Victorian-era décor, as they slowly discover what the hell is
going on.
"This sort of game is basically why we set up Surprise Attack in the first
place,” said Chris Wright, Managing Director of Surprise Attack Games. “I mean,
who makes a game about mini-golf in the sky, with elaborate victorian
contraptions, a golden mechanical hummingbird you can use to explore the levels
and a mysterious story to uncover? Awesome people, that’s who.”
1C Publishing announces a delay to Men of War Assault Squad 2, saying
the real-time strategy sequel is now due next month, after being expected
in two weeks (which was
was
confirmed less than a month ago). They say: "We would like to inform you that
Men of War Assault Squad 2 release date has been changed to March 20th 2014. The
reason for this decision is to deliver the best possible Men of War game to our
customers worldwide. The new release date will ensure that you will get the best
possible Men of War game experience. We will bring you more news regarding the
game in the upcoming days." Thanks Gamer's Hell.
Gearbox Software announces new updates are rolling out "in the coming days"
for the Windows, Xbox 360, and PlayStation 3 editions of Borderlands 2.
This page has the PC update notes, dated February 11th, which is
probably when to expect this. Word is this will add the
recently revealed colorblind mode along with a
bunch of bug fixes and support for
next
week's Mad Moxxi and the Wedding Day Massacre headhunter pack.
The
ManiaPlanet Blog outlines plans for ManiaPlanet Update #3, which they expect
to launch next month. This will add a universal ManiaPlanet demo and will
include some gameplay changes for ShootMania and TrackMania. Nadeo lays out the
following general goals of the new version, not cheaping out on the boldfaced
emphasis: "The goal is really to empower the players and to
open the access to Maniaplanet to increase the number of
players." Thanks Frans.
The
Steam Greenlight page for Rage Runner now offers a
gameplay trailer
hoping to inspire support for this corridor shooter/endless runner that hopes to
inspire occasional bouts of rage by being extra-challenging. Continue here to read the full story.
- Divinity: Original Sin on
Eurogamer. Alpha review.
Tonight kicks off the Winter Olympics, an event I could swear happens more
frequently than every four years. I always end up seeing more of the games than
I intend, since the plan calls for watching none of it, but I may be tempted to
tune in more this time around just to see if everything goes completely off-the-
rails as suggested by the reports of the various journalists who have been at
the venue for the past week.
|
Twitter 
