Twitter has become quite an interesting Tour de Force website. One would think that only having 140 characters would hinder people, but somehow everyone is doing it. Not to be kept out of the social media loop two companies have hopped on the bandwagon. One definitely understands the medium, the other seems to have joined but hasn’t implemented much.
Tecmo Ltd stock has dropped over 10 percent following Tomonobu Itagaki’s highly publicized departure from Team Ninja earlier in the week. Itagaki is seeking 148 million yen in damages over an unpaid bonus for the completion of Dead or Alive 4, and claims Tecmo president Yoshimi Yasuda told him to “quit the company or sue it” if he was unhappy with the decision not to pay up. Tecmo responded to the suit, calling Itagaki’s comments “distortions” - however the share price dropped from 1102 to 985 yen on Wednesday morning - a 10.6% drop.
Story via GamesIndustry.biz
Image via Kotaku
Havok tools have been used in high-caliber games like BioShock, Halo 3 and MotorStorm - and now you can use them for free.
The Intel-sponsored release allows any developer to build a commercial PC game using the Havok tools - and if you’re selling your game for under $10, you don’t need to worry about getting a license to release it.
In the UK, France and Germany, Rock Band is available now - but only for the Xbox 360. Other versions will arrive later “this Summer”. There is still no news for the rest of Europe, nor Australia.
Seems crazy, with copycat Guitar Hero World Tour preparing for a pre-Christmas launch. Of course, I still think PS3 owners should import Rock Band if they’re sick of waiting. I paid a lot less than £180 / EUR 240 - and that was with super-expensive 7-day International shipping from the US to Australia.
Electronic Entertainment Design and Research has compiled two graphs showing the average, highest and lowest Metacritic score of the 10 major console video game publishers. This does not include PC or PS2 releases, so Valve are not present - but their average of 88 would put them in a clear lead of the first graph.
Ever wanted to know how many copies of Street Fighter II have been sold over the years? Capcom has released lifetime sales figures for its best sellers and biggest franchises…and it makes me wonder what happened to their Disney license? It’s a damn shame they didn’t get to make the Pirates of the Caribbean games.
Series Unit Sales
01. Resident Evil Series (50 titles, 34,500,000)
02. Mega Man Series (120 titles, 28,000,000)
03. Street Fighter Series (59 titles, 25,000,000)
04. Disney Series (33 titles, 13,200,000)
05. Devil May Cry Series (10 titles, 9,500,000)
06. Onimusha Series (12 titles, 7,800,000)
07. Monster Hunter Series (10 titles, 6,300,000)
08. Dino Crisis Series (13 titles, 4,400,000)
09. Ghosts ‘n Goblins Series (15 titles, 4,300,000)
10. Final Fight Series (10 titles, 3,200,000)
11. Breath of Fire Series (15 titles, 3,000,000)
12. Ace Attorney Series (11 titles, 2,800,000)
13. Commando Series (2 titles, 1,200,000)
14. 1942 Series (3 titles, 1,200,000)
Variety have included Jenova Chen and Kellee Santiago of ThatGameCompany in their recent feature, 10 Innovators To Watch. Congratulations are in order for the indie team whose first game, flOw, was the most downloaded game from the PlayStation Store in 2007.
“We believe in the snowball effect,” Chen says. “If we keep making these games, more and more gamers will want to see stuff like this. It’s not about killing each other, and that could change the world’s perception that videogames are just about teenage boys and violence.”
Today is a great day for nostalgia freaks - with the next-gen Splatterhouse announcement and now the news that Douglas TenNapel, creator of the Earthworm Jim character, has entered a partnership with Interplay to resurrect the forgotten classic. TenNapel will play creative consultant for the development Earthworm Jim 4, an animated series and a feature film based on the character.
Activision CEO Bobby Kotick has revealed their plans for the Guitar Hero franchise to Conde Nast’s Portfolio magazine. In short, they’re making it more like Rock Band. Kotick told Portfolio:
It’s not just about guitars […] We’ll include a lot of other instruments, vocals.
Epic Games president Mike Capps cares not for the massive audience of Wii owners salivating for a decent game not based on Nintendo IP, he cares only about technology. “We go forward, not back. It makes more sense for us to invest in the next-generation tech,” he said in a recent IGN interview.
