Halo 4 & Mountain Dew Energy

Saw this in Sainsburys this morning - Post this picture into your Blog as evidence of.... What is it called when two independent companies work together for the goal of increased profit?

Video games and energy drinks - explain why this may be a good match for the Halo marketing department?

Grand Theft Auto IV Brand Map

GameVision asked 6,728 gamers about Grand Theft Auto IV to tell us about their experiences of the GTA franchise in more detail.

Revealed: The REAL size of the UK games market

The High Street may be having a tough time, but the UK games market is still incredibly healthy, MCV research shows today.

Is the UK games market fighting fit or fighting fire?

Rationally, a decline in UK industry Christmas marketing spend makes sense at a time when there are fewer games coming out, and the ones remaining are getting most of the attention.

Computer Game Publishing (an overview)

Some more notes on the role of a games publisher.

Computer Game Publishing (an overview)

Computer game software publishers are the “television networks” of the computer & video game industry. They commission and pay for the development of a game that is created by a developer, in much the same way that a television channel would commission a television production company to create a TV program.

Game localization

Game localisation or game globalisation refers to the preparation of video games for other locales.

This adaptation to the standards of other countries covers far more than simply translation of language. There are different areas, such as linguistic, cultural, hardware and software, legal differences, graphics identity and music. Globalization refers to general Eastern/Western variations, while localization refers to several regional sub-divisions within the globalization.

Latest trends in the game industry

A fairly recent practice, since the mid-1990s, of the video game industry is the rise of game players as developers of game content. The rise of video game players as fourth-party developers of game content allows for more open source models of game design, development and engineering. Game players create user modifications (mods), which in some cases become just as popular, maybe even more popular, as the original game created. An example of this is the game Counter-strike, which began as a mod of the video game Half-Life and eventually became a published game in its own right that was very successful

While this "community of modifiers" may only add up to approximately 1% of a particular game's user base, the number of those involved will grow as more games offer modifying opportunities (such as, by releasing source code) and as the international community of gamers rise. According to Ben Sawyer, as many as 600,000 established online game community developers will exist by 2012. This will effectively add a new component to the game industry value chain and if it continues to mature it will integrate itself into the overall industry.^[3]

The industry has seen a shift towards games with multiplayer. A larger percentage of games on all types of platforms include some type of competitive online multiplayer.

 

 

Celebrating the British Games Industry

The video games industry is the most profitable entertainment industry that exists, outstripping cinema, DVD and music in terms of profit accumulated and units sold, and this has been the case for a while, particularly in Britain. So why is the British games industry constantly overlooked by the mainstream press? When a British film makes a few hundred million at the box office or wins an Oscar then it is front page news but when a British games company, Rockstar, makes a game that generates more than $1 billion, GTA IV, this news is given a few inches in the technology columns of a Sunday supplement. Why is this?

GTA IV Case Study

What follows is an excellent GTA IV case study by Rebecca Lord, very useful and lots of statistics, an interesting read!

Case Study: Grand Theft Auto

The Game Grand Theft Auto was first developed in 1997 for the PlayStation, it was later released in 1998 for the PC. Grand Theft Auto was developed by DMA Design now commonly known as Rockstar North, which is a Scottish company. Other developers include BMG Interactive, ASC Games and Take-Two Interactive Software, Inc. Grand Theft Auto has developed from a small game into being a huge success with its fans and are now a highly popular video game with a large fan base. The game now spans across nine different games on a variety of consoles, ranging from places like Liberty City (New York), Vice City (Miami) and San Andreas (Los Angeles).

Target audience for video games getting younger

SAN FRANCISCO, Ca. (CNET) -- Video games have always been designed with kids in mind, but these days the target age group is getting younger and younger.
At this year's Electronic Entertainment Expo -- or E3, held annually in Los Angeles -- game and console manufacturers made no secret of designing games for young kids.
Experts say it's a trend that's been developing for years, but now the hardware technology has evolved for even easier game-play.
Jane Douglas, GameSpot section editor says, "It's extremely accessible because they've taken away the controller. Because you haven't got anything in your hands, there are no buttons to learn. The idea is there is no barrier to entry and that very young kids can be playing."