DCEmu Featured News Articles

Increasing intricacy could rapidly see making mobile games mimic the triple-A console space, predicts Total War Battles lead

The man leading the Total War Battles team at The Creative Assembly has predicted that mobile developers could soon find themselves facing the same challenges currently prevalent in the sphere of triple-A console games making.
Speaking in a feature in the new edition of Develop, The Creative Assembly's Renaud Charpentier, who lead the internal division that created Total War Battles: Shogun for iOS, stated a belief that as mobile game development tools, team sizes and techniques increase in scope and complexity, studios making mobile titles will soon mimic those making big budget console games.

Initially reflecting on his pleasure at moving from working on the likes of The Creative Assembly's infamously intricate PC games to a small mobile team and a smaller team, Charpentier spoke fondly of the efficiency, creativity and energy he experienced in building an iOS title, drawing comparisons with the console development space in the mid-to-late-ninties.
"It sounds perfect," Charpentier stated. "But it is going to change quickly, because those [mobile] devices are getting more powerful all the time. As that happens, surely we will need more people. It's the same as the change in the console space from PlayStation 1 to Playstation 3. Perhaps the 'iPad 4' will probably be more powerful than a PS3, and you will have big players wanting to do triple-A on the device.
"I don't see how they will avoid having at least 30 or 40 people on the game. That is even already the case at some places making triple-A games for mobile. It's almost going full cirle. A console complexity is starting to be seem when making mobile games."

http://www.develop-online.net/news/4...ole-complexity
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A look at how the citizens of the world's largest phone market use their devices.
Last week, we reported that China has became the biggest smartphone market in the world, knocking the US from the top spot, thanks to a 45 per cent year-on-year increase.
Chinese mobile ad firm Guohe is behind the infographic, revealing that 47 per cent of iPhone users have over 50 apps, compared to just 16 per cent for Android.
Meanwhile, 62 per cent of iPhone users have paid for premium apps, falling to just 23 per cent for Android users.

http://www.mobile-ent.biz/news/read/...n-china/017993 ...

Coming in the next week or so, heres the details:



The complete Xbox 360 experience, including the controller-free fun of Kinect, now with 2 games, a 3 Month Xbox LIVE Gold membership and available in glossy white for a limited time. Additionally, this Celebration bundle comes with commemorative Union Jack console, sensor and controller skins.

Product Details

Enjoy the complete Xbox 360 experience – including the controller-free fun of Kinect. Jump, dance, and get your whole body in the game with the unique experience of Kinect. Or use your controller to play the blockbuster games your friends can't stop talking about. Plus, with built-in Wi-Fi, it’s easy to access great entertainment on Xbox LIVE from HD movies and TV shows to sports.* With Kinect, play, pause and rewind the action with a wave of your hand. When you are the controller, there’s nothing between you and the fun. Now for a limited time, includes the best-selling Kinect game**, Kinect Sports, as well as Kinect Adventures, a 3 month Xbox LIVE Gold membership, and glossy white finish.

Product Features

• Special Edition White Xbox 360 S Console: The Xbox 360 console is sleek and quiet, with a stylish design that will be the centerpiece of your home entertainment system, now with a special white finish for a limited time.
• White Kinect Sensor: You are the controller with Kinect, now with a special white finish for a limited time. Immerse yourself in full-body gameplay or watch HD movies and sports on Xbox LIVE* in a whole new way. Play, pause, or rewind the action with a wave of your hand.*
• Kinect Sports game: The best-selling game on Kinect** packs six fun events that transform your living room from ordinary entertainment into an extraordinary stadium! Bowling, Beach Volleyball, Table Tennis, Soccer, Track and Field and Boxing – you are the controller!
• Kinect Adventures game: Get off the couch and into the game in a whole new way. You and your friends and family will jump, dodge, and kick your way through 20 pulse-pounding adventures set in exotic locations.
• Built-in Wi-Fi: The Xbox 360 is the only console with 802.11n Wi-Fi built in for a faster and easier connection to Xbox LIVE. Download or stream HD movies, TV episodes, and games from Xbox LIVE Marketplace in 1080p and 5.1 surround sound from anywhere in the house.*
• White Xbox 360 Wireless Controller: This award-winning, high-performance white wireless controller matches the console and Kinect Sensor. It has a range of up to 30 feet and a battery life of up to 30 hours on two AA batteries.
• 3 Month Xbox LIVE Gold Membership: With an Xbox LIVE Gold membership, take your Xbox 360 online to play Kinect and controller games with friends wherever they are. Instantly watch HD movies, TV shows and sports, and with Kinect, your voice is the remote control. Plus, friends and family are never far away when you can video chat face-to-face on the biggest screen in the house. And now for a limited time you will get 3 Months of Xbox LIVE included.**
• Commemorative Union Jack Skins: Transform and protect your Xbox 360 console, Kinect sensor and controller. Premium vinyl skins with patented adhesive that prevents air bubbles from forming, allowing for easy application and clean removal.
• Xbox 360 Composite A/V cable: Use your Xbox 360 on standard-definition televisions using this connection over traditional composite connectors. Play high-quality audio with the included stereo connector.
• Warranty: One year limited warranty on console (90 days on accessories)
*Xbox LIVE Gold membership and/or other subscriptions and requirements apply for some Xbox LIVE features. See xbox.com/live. Not all functionality on Xbox LIVE is Kinect enabled. Only media content from Xbox LIVE supports voice and gesture controls. Broadband, games, add-ons and media content sold separately. Bonus items (game and Xbox LIVE Gold) inside marked packages, while supplies last. Game is downloaded from Xbox LIVE. 1080p HD available with select videos; requires HDMI cable, HDCP compliant 1080p display, minimum 4mbps broadband speed.

http://www.amazon.co.uk/Xbox-360-4GB...pf_rd_i=300703 ...

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With this morning's announcement that BioShock Infinite will now launch in February 2013, publisher Take-Two Interactive altered more than a game's launch date. Take-Two is a publicly traded company, and one fewer gigantic product launch during the holiday season – arguably Take-Two's only holiday product launch, unless you count fall launches of Borderlands 2 and XCOM: Enemy Unknown as "holiday" – means that shareholders will want to know what's up. That worry is reflected in Take-Two's stock price, which took a five percent hit since the market opened this morning.

But when Infinite got pushed out of the holiday season, it opened the slot up for another high-profile Take-Two-published title: Grand Theft Auto 5. "In our view, the delay opens the window for Grand Theft Auto V to be released in October 2012," Michael Pachter of Webush Securities wrote in an email this morning, echoing a release window leak from earlier this year.

In his eyes, Infinite wasn't just delayed to make it "something even more extraordinary," as Ken Levine put it, but because the folks at Rockstar, "notified Take-Two that GTA V would be ready for October." He believes this resulted in Take-Two offering Irrational Games an extra few months to prepare BioShock Infinite. His logic? "The studio [Rockstar Games] has scheduled every prior GTA release during that month (with GTA IV delayed to April 2008, due to bugs in the PS3 version)."

Furthermore, Pachter and co. speculate we could hear more about GTA 5's launch date "as early as May 22" during a scheduled quarterly investor call, or perhaps in a few more weeks at E3 2012. We've yet to hear back from Irrational, Rockstar, or Take-Two on the subject.

http://www.joystiq.com/2012/05/09/we...ch-in-october/ ...

Mystery, solved. That SGH-i667 'Mandel' Windows Phone that cropped up earlier in the month (and is shown above on the left)? Word on the street at that point was that it had been nixed from AT&T's lineup, but somehow, that same device actually made the trip to New Orleans. Sure enough, it debuted at CTIA as the Focus 2, a mid-range followup phone that's destined to tempt smartphone buyers to the WP7 side with a rock-bottom $50-on-contract price point. Hard to say if Samsung and AT&T mutually decided to carry through with launch plans after initially spiking 'em (or if that intel was just wrong to begin with), but we can think of it least one recently-canned phone that's hoping it's the former.

http://www.engadget.com/2012/05/09/s...e-focus-2-att/ ...

Activision confirms that 10 million people have registered for Call of Duty Elite, with 2m premium annual memberships
Activision, as part of its results for the first quarter of this fiscal year, has revealed the latest numbers from the Call of Duty Elite social service. Over 10 million people have registered for Call of Duty Elite, with over 2 million of them signing on for the premium annual membership.
Activision boss Bobby Kotick adds that the increase on paid membership represents a growth of 33 percent since January 31, 2012.
GamesIndustry International recently spoke with James Berger, VP of digital at Activision, about the growth of the platform. With over 2 million users on the mobile application, Berger believes that the platform is becoming all but a necessity for major triple-A titles.
"You have to be able to engage your consumers wherever they want to engage with you in lots of different and unique ways," said Berger. "You have to provide them social experiences that add to the game."
That addition to the game has helped put Beachhead and Activision at a promising junction for the company. Though Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 3 is not expected to
track the sales that Black Ops has, the newest Black Ops II has already been making pre-order sales records.

http://www.gamesindustry.biz/article...gistered-users



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John Riccitiello outlines his four major rules for the mobile games market
EA chief executive John Riccitiello was a keynote speaker today at CTIA Wireless in New Orleans, where he outlined the future of the mobile landscape as he sees it and how game publishers and mobile firms will become great partners in the years ahead.
"Games, more than any other type of application or function, are driving dramatic growth in the mobile industry. Mobile games will co-exist and even interoperate with games on consoles, PCs, and cable television," he began.
Riccitiello noted that 67 percent of all revenue generated on the App Store comes from games. He added that there are ten times the number of mobile devices as there are game consoles, and so "the inescapable conclusion is that mobile has become a game platform - it's a peer to PlayStation, Xbox and Nintendo systems."
The thrust of Riccitiello's presentation was an overview of his four major insights or "rules" about the evolving mobile games industry.

Rule #1 - "When a CPU is introduced to a consumer electronics device, gaming quickly becomes the dominant application."
Riccitiello stressed that games were never projected to be the number one sales generator on iPhone but that consumers spoke with their wallets. "History shows that whether it's a PC or a tablet or a phone, when people are allowed to choose their preferred content, games win," he said.
Although this doesn't apply directly to mobile, he said the rule easily translates to television. Riccitiello anticipates big things for IPTV and gaming.
"You're about to see what happens again, this time on television. IPTV holds tremendous promise and some very unique opportunities for our combined industries. I'm biased but I'm betting that when cable consumers have the option to play games, TV will become less popular and gaming will go through the roof," he said, which is an interesting comment in light of our recent op-ed from Mark Sorrell. "The point is games win every time."
Rule #2 - "This is a branded world."
Riccitiello pointed out that out of the many hundreds of thousands of apps on the App Store, about 75,000 are games. The sad fact for many game creators, though, is that most of these don't make money. Riccitiello says that's due to game quality and brand recognition.
"What's interesting is that precious few of these games are ever played, and fewer still generate revenue. We call many of these 'lunch boxes' - colorful graphics that sit on top of a poor application. What's inside is often a disappointment," Riccitiello observed. "But gamers are very smart consumers... they gravitate towards games with the best reputation and highest quality."
He noted that dramatic improvements in mobile technology and top developers flocking to mobile platforms, with many creating versions of core IPs that are as good or better than what's on a PS2. "You're going to see the game brands known for quality rising up in the charts," he said, reflecting on the success of EA's own Dead Space for iOS.

26 of the top 100 games on App Store are brands that come from other media. The bottom line, according to the EA boss, is that mobile gamers are actually willing to pay if the content is very good. "Consumers want and expect to pay for quality; they really expect to pay." He noted that there will always be room for quirky independents with breakout hits, but "the trend is going to benefit publishers with globally recognized brands - some will be new like Angry Birds and some will have been tested by time like The Sims and Plants vs. Zombies."
Rule #3 - "The platform wars won't be an A or B or C, it's going to be A and B and C."
For Riccitiello, all the talk of mobile and social gaming ruining the hardcore console business is hogwash. He sees all the platforms ultimately widening the audience and complementing one another.
"Frankly, I compare this to predictions in the 1950s when people said television was going to destroy motion pictures... TV didn't destroy movie box office, YouTube didn't destroy TV and mobile games are not going to wipe out the console business; quite the opposite," he said.
http://www.gamesindustry.biz/article...nsole-business
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RPG Dark Souls has sold 1.19m copies to become Namco Bandai’s most popular 2012 release across the US and Europe.
The sales figure was revealed in the publisher’s financial report for its fiscal year ending March 2012. It reported a year-on-year profit increase of 20 per cent.
Dark Souls was released on Xbox 360 and PS3 last October. It leads Namco Bandai’s top-selling games released during its 2012 financial year.
The best-selling games are as follows:
- Dark Souls (US, Europe) – 1.19m sales
- Ace Combat Assault Horizon (Japan, US and Europe) – 1.07m sales
- One Piece Kaizoku Musou (Japan) – 940,000 sales
- Tales of Xillia (Japan) – 770,000 sales
- Dragon Ball Ultimate Blast (Japan, US and Europe) – 700,000 sales
- Soul Calibur V (Japan and Europe) – 690,000 sales
- Mobile Suit Gundam Extreme Vs (Japan) – 570,000 sales
- Ben 10 Racing (US and Europe) – 460,000 sales
A PC version of Dark Souls, the Prepare to Die Edition, will arrive on August 24th.

http://www.mcvuk.com/news/read/dark-...m-units/095740 ...