Zynga Lays off 300+ Employees, Buys New Company: Bad news today for Zynga – the struggling web game and mobile game developer – revealed its purchase of NaturalMotion, costing the company $527 million. $391 million of the purchase was done in cash; the rest was conducted using 39.8 million shares of Zynga’s stock. NaturalMotion – primarily located in the UK – was founded in 2001. The company developed console games in the Backbreaker series, as well as iOS and Android games ranging from CSR Racing to Clumsy Ninja. Their impressive technology and toolsets are what Zynga seems to want to acquire, however. News of the acquisition comes on the heels of word from Zynga’s CEO that the company is implementing a “cost reduction plan” which affects 15 percent of the company’s workforce, “which impacts 314 employees.” “On a personal note, these are extremely difficult but important actions that are helping us drive improved results and create a new foundation for future growth,” Mattrick – formerly of Microsoft’s Xbox division – wrote, in part. “We are saying goodbye to good people and I want to thank them for all of their contributions to Zynga.” Our very best goes out to those affected by today’s news. Today, Aksys Games confirmed that it will be bringing Mind Zero (sometimes known as Mind=0) – the PS Vita-exclusive dungeon-crawling RPG from Acquire – to the west. Mind Zero will be released this Spring in both North America and Europe, and it will cost $39.99. It will be available both at retail and digitally. In Mind Zero, players take control of a high school student named Kei, a guy “whose life turns upside down when he forms a contract with a ‘Mind,’ a weapon/being with deadly powers.” Mind Zero is a dungeon-crawler at heart, though players will have access to a variety of in-party characters, powerful Mind-based skills, and a ton of different abilities. Twisted Pixel announced today having debuted on Xbox One as a launch title, Twisted Pixels insane so-bad-its-sorta-good bike em up LocoCycle will be launching for Xbox 360 in a couple of weeks time. Telling the story of sentient superbike I.R.I.S. and snagged mechanic passenger Pablo, LocoCycle is a freewheeling race across America thats completely and utterly bonkers. Warhorse Studios has today announced that it has been able to clarify with Microsoft the situation regarding the distribution of the Xbox One version of Kingdom Come: Deliverance, the open-world medieval-flavoured RPG thats been crowd funded via Kickstarter. The game has broken its $300,000 target, making $559,479 and counting with 21 days to go. In the games eighth update on its Kickstarter page, Warhorse has been able to confirm that a digital version of Kingdom Come: Deliverance will be available on Xbox One, with Soldier and Knight tier backers entitled to a copy of the game. Baron, Viscount and Earl tier backers can get a digital and physical copy, while Duke tiers and higher get 2 digital copies and a physical copy. At present however, the digital version of Kingdom Come: Deliverance is the only one to have been confirmed with Microsoft at present. Still, it sounds like a step in the right direction for the Cryengine powered RPG that promises to deliver over 70 hours of gameplay. Kingdom Come: Deliverance is scheduled for release in Q4 2015. Microsoft had told Twitter: After Nintendo had made huge announcements for their business and systems. What we had seen and we though Nintendo is great step and they try their best. Many of our people who is worked with us admit we all loved Nintendos IP games and we want to say good luck to Nintendo. Nice one Microsoft!! Big day for Nintendo. I want said bit myself. I love Wii U is because I love Nintendo and love Nintendos IP games like Super Mario series, Metroid series, Star Fox series, Super Smash Bros., Mario Kart series, Donkey Kong Country series and more. But I really want to see Nintendo step up and bring FPS, TPS, TPA and other mature type games. Nintendo should have it more for their systems like Sony and Microsoft. So this year we knew Bayonetta 2 is mature third-person hack-slash action and X is mature action role-playing games for Wii U. So Nintendo need to have more. At least Nintendo is owned Bayonetta and X (X is sequel to Xenoblade Chronicles). Nintendo also want to explains a bit about new IP games. Like early today they made huge announcements so they had said before Christmas 2013 about planned new IP games on way to Wii U this year and next year. Anyway they want explains a a bit as they had already admit about bad markets for Wii U so they trying to bring back more hardcore players who had played so much for First-Person Shooter, Third-Person Shooter and Action and other mature games. So maybe one day we see new first-person shooter games on way to Wii U? We have wait and see what new IP games is on way to Wii U this year and next year. But we knew Bayonetta 2 and X coming this year for Wii Us exclusives. Those 2 games is 15 years old and above. So it is seem we will have lots of more. Also few mature games already released last year like Deus Ex: Human Revolution - Directors Cut, Assassins Creed IV, Batman: Arkham Origins, Ninja Gaiden 3: Razors Edge and few other games from third party publishers and developers. So Wii U need to have more and this time first partys Nintendo should developing mature games. So maybe clue one or more for new IP games is mature games from Nintendo? We again have wait and see. Nintendo had announced for first new feature update for Wii U release this year onto system. Quick Start Menu Coming to Wii U: The new feature will be included in a system update coming this summer. Nintendo is doubling down on the GamePad with Wii U, and among the companys plans for making it a more attractive piece of hardware is a new quick start menu that will allow Wii U owners to launch into a game using just the GamePad. As the Wii U currently exists, there is a fair amount of waiting -- more than 20 seconds, according to Nintendo -- before gamers can select what they want to play (which, in turn, then has to be loaded, too). Nintendos solution, as shared by CEO Satoru Iwata during its financial results meeting last night, is to allow the GamePad to be used to select a game and a user profile almost immediately upon turning it on, thereby avoiding much of the waiting users currently have to do. This feature is currently in development and isnt expected to be available until a system update is released in early summer. As a result, Nintendo wasnt able to show it in action, but it did share the video above, which provides some sense of how the quick start menu will function. The quick start menu enables you to load one of the software titles you have recently played without being routed to the console menu, Iwata explained. From the start, the GamePad has been equipped with a TV Button, which is used to start the TV Remote functionality. The GamePad can complete this function without starting up the Wii U console, and so you can turn on the TV almost instantaneously by pushing the TV Button. The quick start menu uses the same mechanism as the TV Button. We think that this function will make you feel that the time to start up a Wii U software title is cut by more than 50 percent, and that it will also lead to more Wii U users understanding the appealing nature of the GamePad. For more on the future Nintendo outlined for itself last night, check out our recap of all the big news. It is great to see third party developer step and supports Nintendo since Nintendo made announcements about making better in future for their company and improving their business, bring DS games onto Wii U, new features and updates for Wii U and 3DS. Nintendo knew and they admit they bought Wii U for poorly markets (just like Sony had done with PS Vita in past so it is same boat for Nintendo now). Dreamcast developers Hucast and KonTechs Ltd. explains they want to help Nintendo and not only that but also Nintendo want have new IP games. So they happy to supports Nintendo on it and they also exciting in developing games for Wii U and 3DS. Dreamcast developer has plans for Wii U and 3DS: Did you guys know the Dreamcast is still around? Yup, it is. Even though Sega’s left it for dead, 16 years after it’s release developers still continue to make games for it. Just this year developers Hucast and KonTechs Ltd. released their Kickstarter funded bullet-hell space shooter Redux: Dark Matters onto the old system. Which itself was a remake of the 2009 Dreamcast title DUX. What you might find more interesting though is that one of the developers, René Hellwig, was recently quoted as saying: We have plans for Wii U and 3DS. We think Redux would look amazing with stereoscopic 3D graphics! Since we developed the game on PC with HD graphics it will be easy for us to port the game to Nintendo consoles. Nintendo is more straightforward with Indie devs, and we believe that in the coming years Nintendo consoles will be a great place to publish Indie games. Which suggests that Dark Matters may make it’s way to a Nintendo console sometime soon. Of course, if you’re interested in the game but don’t want to wait for an eventual eShop release you can order it here from the developers. Iwata announces Nintendo could begin to offer flexible price points for their loyal customers. So Nintendo might do same thing way as Sony already did with their PSN. We knew early news today that Nintendo want change and improves for their company so it is look like Nintendo going be stronger soon at some point then we though since Nintendo had said they want changes for better in future with their Wii U for markets, bring more exclusive titles for Wii U and 3DS, more updates and features for both Wii U and 3DS as well organize better for bring more third party publishers and developers to supports and developing for Wii U games as well 3DS. So look like flexible price points is add to it and making much better for their business. Look like Nintendo going have big step forward. We have wait and see for more updates for Nintendo this year when Nintendo will explains more about improving for their future. Is this true? A report NeoGAF found leak information about upcoming Microsofts Xbox One game releases... The source claims that Halo 2 Anniversary is in the works for Xbox One and will be released on November 11 this year in two special editions. The first will be a standard Collectors Edition that comes with beta access to Halo 5 and a Halo TV series (not the one rumoured to be directed by Neill Blomkamp). The second is a War Collection, which supposedly comes with everything from the Collectors Edition as well as Xbox One ports of Halo 3 and Halo 4. Elsewhere, the source claims that were unlikely to see anything of Crackdown 3 this year but its on the way, scheduled for release in 2016. A new Forza Horizon is meant to come autumn of this year, along with Sunset Overdrive, while Quantum Break will be out at Christmas. 2015 will allegedly see Fable Legends in summer and also the release of Halo 5 following beta in November 2014 (this is interesting, as last we heard Halo 5 was still on track for release this year). The insider also revealed that Black Tusk Studios will probably need two and a half years to produce a new Gears of War game, and the teams cancelled project was supposedly called Shangheist. Titanfall DLC is meant to be coming 45 days after release, then another batch 120 days after release. Will find out if it is truth or not. Answer will be come from Microsoft. A new Star Wars game, Star Wars: Assault Team, is coming to mobile devices this spring, Disney Interactive announced today. Very little about Assault Team is known at this point; our only information comes in the form of the screenshot below and some vague details shared on Disneys blog. Its described as a turn-based combat game that has elements of both strategy and card games. Players will collect classic characters -- presumably in the form of cards with different stats and abilities -- and use them to fight enemies by using them in conjunction with special tactics. This will all happen across a range of planets from the Star Wars universe, including locations from the original trilogy. As weve seen in the past with mobile games, Assault Team will first be available on iOS and Android in limited early access in certain international markets. Following that early access period, it will be officially released on iOS, Android, and Windows 8 devices around the world sometime this spring. DotEmu had announced R-Type II coming to Mobile. Irems seminal 2D side-scroller makes its way to mobile devices later this year. The release of Bloober Teams Basement Crawl has been changed back to the woolly Q1 2014 release window, following last weeks announcement that the game would be launching on PS4 in Europe on January 29th. The Polish developer announced that the PS4-exclusive maze-based strategy game has been delayed, following exciting opportunities to partner with major industry players. Its hoped that these partnerships will enhance, refine and add to the game. Although a difficult decision, we decided that the best choice for us, as a team, was to delay Basement Crawl so that we could take full advantage of these opportunities, Bloober Team CEO Piotr Babieno explained. We will be able leverage those new partnerships to further grow and improve the game while still providing an amazingly fun multiplayer experience for PS4 owners. We’ll be able to announce more details in the days and weeks to come. Promising classic Bomberman-style gameplay and grind-house flavour Basement Crawl will be available exclusively for PS4 via the PlayStation Network in Q1 2014 for £7.99/€9.99/$9.99. Sony had made announcements: Sony has announced the PS Vita Slim will be available in the UK on February 7, 2014 for around £180. At a briefing meeting this morning, the company confirmed the revamped handheld would launch at a suggested retail price of £180 and will replace the older, bigger Vita model as stock is exhausted. The new, slimmer PS Vita will come with Wi-Fi and a 1GB internal memory card. At a briefing meeting this morning, the company confirmed the revamped handheld would launch at a suggested retail price of £180 and will replace the older, bigger Vita model as stock is exhausted. The new, slimmer PS Vita will come with Wi-Fi and a 1GB internal memory card. Sony has announced the PS Vita Indie Game Megapack, a collection that bundles 10 indie titles together with a memory card. Currently only announced for Europe and Australia, the Indie Game Megapack will bring together big titles such as Hotline Miami, Thomas Was Alone and Limbo at a low price point. The other games included in the bundle are Alien Breed, Velocity Ultra, Mens Room Mayhem, Coconut Dodge Revitalised, Total Recoil, Superfrog HD and Floating Cloud God Saves the Pilgrims in HD. Two different versions are available. The first comes with a 4GB memory card and PS Store voucher to download the games and has an RRP of €24.99, while the second also adds one of the new, slim Vita models announced this morning into the mix for an RRP of €199.99. The Vita Indie Game Megapack will be available in February to coincide with the launch of the new PS Vita model. Telltale Games had made confirmed today The Wolf Among Us: Episode 2 will release next week for Xbox Live Arcade in Xbox 360, PlayStation Network in PS3 and PC Stream. Tropico 5 announced For PS4. Multiplayer will be first time into Tropico series and this will be in 5th series. Tropico 5 will release later this year for PS4, Xbox 360 and PC. Kalypso Media had confirmed. Nintendo had made announcements today: Updated: Nintendo said they still promise to gives other games for date releases this year include Super Smash Bros. 4, Bayonetta 2, X and other games on Wii U as well 3DS games. They will make announcements sooner like they had told last few days. But at least they told us Mario Kart 8 is now release in May 2014. - Mario Kart 8 for Wii U coming May 2014 for release. - Nintendo DS games will coming to Virtual Console app in Wii U this year so you will play every DS games on Wii U. - Nintendo had told today they will not bring any of their games onto other platforms like PS4, XB1, Mobile or other gaming devices. They want their games on their main systems - Wii U and 3DS. Nintendo will never go into third party publisher. They said they had plenty money and yes losing money leads to Wii Us market problems but Nintendo going improving so much this year. - Nintendo said they going to make better markets for Wii U since they had trouble markets with Wii U moment. (Exactly like Sony did with PS Vita in last year.). Nintendo on its future so Nintendo want forcing on better markets for Wii U and improving much more for Wii Us Gamepad and bring lots of new features and new updates for Wii U system. Bring lots of exclusive titles for Wii U and 3DS. Also organize better for third party publishers and developers supports on Wii U too.
Posted on: Thu, 30 Jan 2014 23:30:16 +0000