MTV and Harmonix parent company Viacom has labelled 2009 a “challenging year” for its Rock Band franchise and the videogame industry as a whole.
The firm's Media Networks division, which houses MTV Games, saw fourth quarter revenues decline six per cent to $2.3 billion (£1.47b), while operating income was up three per cent to $921 million (£588m).
The division’s full-year revenues were down five per cent to $8.29 billion (£5.3b) as operating income fell three per cent to $3.01 billion (£1.9b).
While it continues to languish near the foot of the US hardware sales chart, PSP was again the weekly winner in Japan.
Sony’s handheld came out on top during the week ended February 7, achieving 43,163 sales.
Console positions on the chart were unchanged from the previous week, with Wii and DSi LL taking second and third respectively.
Subscribers now have their hands on our latest issue, featuring Crysis 2 and its move from the rainforest to the urban jungle.
Arriving on UK newsagents' shelves on February 16, E212 shows how Crytek's technological masterpiece is not only undergoing a change of scene in terms of its New York City setting, but also in terms of the hardware on which it will run. The original Crysis spearheaded the leading edge of PC graphical power, but its sequel will also appear on 360 and PS3.
Microsoft has hailed 2010 its “biggest and most breakthrough year yet” as it confirmed Xbox 360 software release dates and exclusive content at its San Francisco X10 showcase.
Multiple Activision studios have reportedly been hit with layoffs, while one developer has supposedly been closed entirely.
Wii and DS were the bestselling hardware platforms in the US during January, while Xbox 360 comfortably outsold PS3, according to the NPD Group.
Nintendo’s home console sold 465.8K units during the month, while its handheld shifted 422.2K units.
Xbox 360 sales stood at 332.8K, ahead of PS3’s 276.9K. While sales of both consoles were up year-on-year, analysts had forecast greater PS3 growth.
Wii and Xbox 360 games dominated January software sales in the US, according to data from the NPD Group.
New Super Mario Bros. Wii was the top seller for the second month running, beating off competition from Mass Effect 2.
Wii Fit Plus was down one spot to third, followed by Modern Warfare 2 for Xbox 360 and Mario Kart Wii.
The only non-Wii or Xbox 360 title to make the top ten was the PS3 version of Modern Warfare 2 in seventh place.
The figures for January 2010 have been released by the NPD, which show a decrease in almost every sector of the industry compared to this time last year.
According to the data, January 2009 pulled in $1.34 billion while a year later the NPD reports that the industry could only generate $1.17 billion, a 13 per cent slide.
Hardware sales for January 2010 also took a 21 per cent hit with $353.7 million, compared to 2009’s figure of $446.8 million.
New talks on Deus Ex 3's "cyberpunk renaissance" look, Silent Hill producer Akira Yamaoka's ethos, and Batman: Arkham Asylum's art direction have been added to the bill for GDC 2010.
Eidos Montreal art director Jonathan Jacques-Belletete presents a lecture on "The Successes and Failures of Creating a Near-Future Cyberpunk Setting with a Renaissance Twist in Deus Ex 3", providing actual details on the game.
Break Media, an internet community for men, has announced the acquisition of FileFront, a gaming news website that also offers downloads.
According to Break Media, it will fold FileFront into its primary group of branded sites and invest significantly in the editorial components of the site, with an aim to provide both Break and FileFront users with additional gaming content.
EA studio Mythic Entertainment has said it will assume publishing, operating and subscription service rights for Dark Age of Camelot in Europe from GOA, a division of France Telecom.
Jason Rohrer seems to be smiling at all moments, as if he were just on the verge of breaking out in laughter. His eyes are focused and watchful, exposing a fast-moving mind and a taste for provocation. Rohrer's games have begun to popularise the idea of games about people, free of the weights of genre, story conventions, or even expectations of fun. From Passage to Between, his works are contained and earnest but enlivened with moments of discovery and emotion.
The demo for EA’s Battlefield: Bad Company 2 has been downloaded over two million times, according to the publisher.
The Xbox Live and PlayStation Network sampler of the DICE developed shooter “is on pace to become the fastest downloaded demo in EA history”, the company said.
“The recently launched PC beta has also met great success, with hundreds of thousands of players already signed up,” it added.
Zynga has signed an agreement to acquire social game developer Serious Business, the firm behind Facebook titles including Friends For Sale, Rock Legends and Happy Hour.
“Serious Business will bring many of the innovations they have developed, to games played by Zynga’s 60 million daily active users,” Zynga said in a statement.
Every week, the Edge Games Index, produced in association with Brandwatch, rates games according to the volume of positive and negative buzz they're inspiring on the web.
Downloadable content for original Xbox titles is currently unavailable over Xbox Live, but Microsoft says that it is working to resolve the problem.
With Live support for original Xbox titles set to be discontinued in April despite the presence of active users, numerous gamers attempting to enjoy a final hurrah with the service have been unable to download additional content for their ageing titles.
Nintendo of America has said that it’s currently struggling to satisfy consumer demand for Wii hardware.
The company’s director of corporate communications, Charlie Scibetta, told Joystiq: "In the short term, replenishing Wii inventories will be a challenge. But we are doing everything we can to satisfy consumers looking to purchase a Wii system."
Activision Publishing CEO Michael Griffith has outlined the company’s hardware and software sales predictions for 2010.
Activision has outlined its product release schedule for 2010, confirming new series entries for a number of its most popular franchises.
In the final part of a four-part series, Shadegrown Games founder Matthew Burns remembers trying to score his first job in the game industry as a tester.
Activision Blizzard has reported net revenues of $4.28 billion for the year (against $3.02 billion in 2008) and for the quarter ended December 31, 2009, net revenues were $1.56 billion on $1.63 in 2008.
The publisher has also announced that its board of directors has authorized a stock repurchase program under which the company can repurchase up to $1 billion of the company’s common stock.
Highlights from our community-written blogs, featuring the morals of murder and the future of games.
Games have us kill a lot of enemies, but Jason_Seip finds himself killing 800 people in five hours playing Call Of Juarez. Is that a little too many? And in what ways can games avoid such single-minded carnage in favour of deeper play experiences?
Grant Duncan “Do you think there are some people that are actually robots?”
The user-generated virtual world platform will close on New Years Day.
The company, founded in 2007 by Raph Koster, the game designer who worked on the seminal MMORPG Ultima Online as well as Star Wars Galaxies and EverQuest II, announced that it has not gained enough traction to be a viable product.
The announcement, communicated via email, read: "Today we have unfortunate news to share with the Metaplace community. We will be closing down our service on January 1, 2010 at 11:59 pm Pacific.
Blizzard has said it will "definitely work on a console game at some point," in an interview with Gamasutra.