Napalm Riot

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James Barr of TheGameReviews.com wrote this rather lengthy discussion about whether or not the game industry needs E3, and after reading over it, I think it bear repeating here. So, take a read over what Mr. Barr had to say, and form your own opinions.

"Once considered the biggest and greatest gaming event of the year, E3 would be home to the biggest announcements, best looking booth babes, hundreds of upcoming game demo’s and every major player in the game industry would be there; however, . . . Read more

Officials from movie studio Universal Pictures have revealed that the company is forming its own video game division, following the announcement of film tie-in Wanted at E3 last week.

The high profile merger of Vivendi Interactive with Activision saw the Vivendi SA (formerly Vivendi Universal) group effectively exit the video games market - although Vivendi Interactive was never focused on movie tie-ins, as the new division aims to be.

Instead, the new business appears to be following in t . . . Read more

Officials from British developer Rebellion have announced that the company has acquired Empire Interactive’s internal development studio Razorworks.

Empire Interactive parent company Silverstar Holdings recently announced that the studio would be sold or dispositioned as part of “organizational changes” at the firm. However, no potential buyers were named at the time.

Razorworks’ previous titles include Xbox Live Arcade releases Double Dragon and Speedball 2: Brutal Deluxe, as well . . . Read more

This morning Microsoft kicked off their E3 press conference with some big announcements pertaining to the Xbox 360 and Xbox Live.

In addition to a fall update that completely changes the old 360 dashboard into a brand new and easier to use interface, they well be rolling out Avatars, Mii-esque characters that users are able to customize to fit their own personal style. Users will now be able to install games from disc onto the 360 hard drive, although the game disc will still be required to p . . . Read more

Atari has announced that it has hired former SCEA marketing director Jeff Reese as its vice president of marketing, where he will oversee all consumer and retail campaigns for its published and third party output.

Atari notes that Reese was "responsible for setting PlayStation's First Party software product marketing roadmap and annual sales targets to deliver on revenue goals," and was responsible for the PlayStation's first Effie marketing award for a new software product launch. Reese was . . . Read more

EA Mythic boss Mark Jacobs spoke with the crew at MMORPG.com, unveiling that the company won't be called EA Mythic any more and will regain its former name Mythic Entertainment - this is what the company was called before being purchased by Electronic Arts. They also carried that name when they developed their pervious MMOG, Dark Age of Camelot.

Read More: http://www.actiontrip.com…ts_news.phtml?id=071108_7

Apple Inc. (Cupertino, USA) have pushed out the release of the iPhone 3G on the 11th July, with early copies already in the hands of some customers. The new iPhone is fully 3G compatible for faster download speeds, and also features AGPS (Assisted GPS) for navigation.

The biggest news for gamers is the release of iPhone Firmware 2.0, which supports the Application Store. The App Store is set to feature a range of games, some available at launch and more to follow, and it looks like the iPhone . . . Read more

Shareholders have approved the merger between game publisher Activision and Blizzard Entertainment parent company Vivendi Games, the transaction is expected to close on July 9th.

The new company, dubbed Activision Blizzard, is valued at roughly $18.9B.

Full Article: http://www.shacknews.com/onearticle.x/53496

Publisher Activision has announced that a special meeting of shareholders has given the company its approval to complete the proposed merger with Blizzard and Sierra parent company Vivendi Games.

The company says that when the transaction closes on its expected July 9th date, Vivendi Games will become a new wholly owned subsidiary of Activision.

Vivendi will at that time receive approximately 295.3 million newly issued shares of Activision common stock, and will purchase approximately $1.7 . . . Read more

Talking as part of an in-depth Gamasutra interview, Atari co-founder Nolan Bushnell has suggested that the company's issues in the past 15 years are because it "hasn't stood for anything", jokingly offering to help Phil Harrison revitalize the in-flux company.

Gamasutra's wide-ranging interview was conducted in reference to Bushnell's current role as chairman of the board of casual-specific in-game adverti . . . Read more

Wii Fit is still running strong in the market and continues to sell out on the same day it is restocked!

http://wiinintendo.net/20…and-sold-out-on-same-day/

It's a well-known fact in the world of game reviews that publishers wish to control every step of the process. They decide who receives early access to the titles, they make the rules about when the reviews can be run, and they can pick and choose which sites or magazines get the highly coveted "exclusive" review of big-name titles. What happens when a site goes against this system and runs a review before the embargo is up on a copy of the game not given to them by the publisher? In the case of . . . Read more

Storage—there is never enough of it. I still remember when I thought my 700MB hard drive was huge... until I tried to copy an entire CD onto it for faster access. After that, I spent a period stuck choosing music to stick on my three GB hard drive. Two weeks ago, I ditched six months' worth of simulation data because my 320GB hard drive was full. One TB of new drive later, and I'm wondering how soon it will be before I start feeling the squeeze again. Maybe never, if some of the latest researc . . . Read more

In a letter sent to the California Internet Service Provider Association last week, Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger and Attorney General Edmund G. Brown asked the group to block access to Internet newsgroups that contain child pornography.

"We applaud three of the largest Internet service providers—Verizon, Time Warner Cable and Sprint—for taking steps to block access to child pornography. It is not enough, however, for only a few Internet service providers to join the fight against online . . . Read more

According to The Escapist, Crave Entertainment will join Activision, Vivendi, LucasArts and id Software in leaving the ESA. At present, the company is still listed as a member on the ESA website, and neither Crave nor ESA will make an official comment yet, but it seems that GamePolitics has it on authority from a reliable source that the company is indeed leaving.

Crave is . . . Read more

According to a report in British newspaper Financial Times, representatives from both Activision and MTV Games are currently negotiating for the rights to use The Beatles back catalogue of music in future Guitar Hero and Rock Band titles.

The report suggests that both companies are pitching for a multi-million dollar deal, although it does not indicate whether any successful licensing arrangement would be exclusive to either company. A Financial Times source suggests a deal could be reached i . . . Read more

Yes G4 will be covering E3 this year in July... as many of you know E3 is now closed to the Public so you cant get in!

Watch to see whats there!

EA Mobile is keen to launch its own mobile game subscription service, charging people the price of a single paid download every month (i.e. a fiver) for up to five downloads.

"The kind of subscription we are thinking about is that you'd subscribe to an EA channel, and you can download five games a month maybe, and the price for that might be similar to what you'd pay per download now," says Javier Ferreira, in an interview on PocketGamer.biz.

EA clearly believes gamers haven't been put off . . . Read more

Two of the pioneers of the UK video games industry have been recognised in the Queen's Birthday Honours.

David and Richard Darling, co-founders of game developers Codemasters, were both made Commanders of the Order of the British Empire (CBE). They built up their company from a bedroom enterprise into one of the best known games developers in the world. The firm is behind well established titles including the Colin McRae Rally series and Sensible Soccer. More recently the firm has ventured in . . . Read more

Apparently it's becoming harder to come up with new ideas for games, or at least environments if "Limbo of the Lost" is any example. The reviewer at
gameplasma.com found multiple areas that were blatant ripoffs of areas found in Oblivion. Hopefully this won't be a growing trend in video games.

You can read the article and see side by side comparisons here.

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