It is difficult for smaller mobile devs to avoid problems that can affect the development and lifecycle of their games. ZiMAD M&A manager Yana Vesnina discusses the key challenges and shares some professional tips in an article for Game World Observer.
Yana Vesnina, M&A Manager at ZiMAD, told about the challenges facing young mobile game developers in her column.
The first edition of the continuation of the book “Kojima Genius” (in the original The Kojima Code) has been shipped to Russian retail, ” Bombora publishing house reports. It’s called “Genius Strikes Back” (in the original A Stealth Game). The author is the same — Canadian blogger Terry Wolfe, who became interested in amateur theology after video games. As for the book, it is devoted to a speculative theory about possible competition between Hideo Kojima…
The Japan Fair Trade Commission (JFTC) has reviewed Microsoft’s proposed acquisition of Activision Blizzard. According to the regulator, the $68.7 billion deal won’t reduce competition in the market.
Last week, U.S. Senator Maria Cantwell accused Sony of monopolizing the “high-end console market” in Japan, saying that the company owns a 98% stake. Now 10 more members of the US Congress have joined her accusations.
Women who accused Chris Avellone of sexual misconduct have now dropped their claims. The video game writer will receive monetary compensation as part of a confidential settlement between the parties.
The UK’s Competition and Markets Authority (CMA) has updated its provisional findings related to Microsoft’s proposed acquisition of Activision Blizzard. Due to new evidence, the regulator has narrowed the scope of its concerns.
At the end of last year, 10 gamers from the United States decided to prevent Microsoft from buying Activision Blizzard and sued the corporation. Their attempt was unsuccessful. Judge Jacqueline Scott Corley dismissed the lawsuit, ruling that there was not enough evidence in it.
Adobe is preparing to launch its own family of neural networks capable of generating images. According to the company, it uses only licensed art and copyrighted content for AI training.
The Canadian court will not consider charges against Electronic Arts (EA) concerning violations of the gambling law. He did not agree that the company uses gambling practices by adding loot boxes to games.
Robert Kurvitz and Aleksander Rostov, original creators of Disco Elysium, have shared an update on their legal dispute with ZA/UM. Both stated that they didn’t drop their unfair dismissal claims.
Robert Kurvitz and Alexander Rostov commented on a recent ZA/UM press release, in which it was reported that the former developers of Disco Elysium had abandoned claims against the studio. They stated that this was not the case.
The US Federal Trade Commission (FTC) is now demanding additional documents from Microsoft. The regulator wants more information related to the company’s $68.7 billion acquisition of Activision Blizzard.
The US Federal Trade Commission (FTC) wants to know more about the 10-year agreements that Microsoft has concluded with Nintendo, NVIDIA and other companies.
ZA/UM studio has announced that the creator of the Disco Elysium world, Robert Kurvitz, and the former art director of the game, Alexander Rostov, have dropped their claims against her. They withdrew claims of unfair dismissal due to lack of evidence.
The legal fight between ZA/UM and Disco Elysium original developers has taken a new turn. It appears that the game’s co-creators Robert Kurvitz and Aleksander Rostov have dropped their claims to the studio.
Bleak Faith: Forsaken developer Archangel Studios purchased some assets on the Unreal Engine Marketplace that turned out to be a ripoff of Elden Ring animations. Epic Games, however, says it can’t guarantee that third-party sellers own the copyright for their work.
Dynasty Loop, an independent game development studio based in Montreal, is going through turbulent times. Dozens of workers haven’t been paid since the end of 2022, with some of them even locked out of the office.
On March 9, Epic Games introduced a set of publishing tools that are available to all owners of the developer account. However, each game must meet the following requirements:
From now on, game developers will be able to self-publish their titles on the Epic Games Store. All thanks to new tools available to any studio as long as it meet the platform’s requirements.
Microsoft and Sony have responded to the provisional findings of the UK’s Competition and Markets Authority. The main stumbling blocks are the potential exclusivity of Call of Duty and the impact of the Activision Blizzard deal on consoles and subscription services.
In 2020, several gamers from Austria sued Sony. In their lawsuits, they stated that they spent hundreds of euros to buy loot boxes in the PlayStation version of FIFA, but never received valuable cards with football players. In March 2022, the court sided with gamers and fined the company.
In December 2022, seven members of the US Congress sent a letter to Valve, Epic Games, EA and 11 other major gaming companies. Politicians demanded to explain how they fight extremism and other harassment in games. The answers received did not please at least one congressman.
The US Federal Trade Commission (FTC) has ruled on Sony’s motion to ban Microsoft from searching its internal documents related to the Activision Blizzard deal. The Japanese publisher will now have to mostly comply with the subpoena.
Comparitech came to this conclusion. In a recent study, she looked at whether apps and games for children comply with the so—called “Children’s code” – a set of rules in the UK prohibiting online services from tracking the personal data of minors.
South Korea’s National Assembly has passed a new amendment to the Game Industry Promotion Act. It will force developers to disclose the probability of obtaining chance-based items.
The Russian age-marking system for video games was proposed at the start to be distributed only to digital publications, Hogwarts Legacy sold over 12 million copies in the first two weeks, the developers of the calendar application TheDayBefore confirmed that they are trying to defend the rights to the trademark of the same name — we tell you what happened in the gaming industry this weekend.
Belka Games development director Vitaliy Kuzmin has opened up about how the team restructuring helped the company increase the frequence of update releases and set two records for daily revenue.
Game Insight’s scandalous exit from the Russian market has taken a new turn, as the Lithuanian mobile publisher has just been hit with a lawsuit in Moscow.
The Game Insight scandal has a new twist. On February 21, the Russian Game Insight appealed to the Moscow Arbitration Court and demanded that the Lithuanian company pay her 154.3 million rubles.
Microsoft has officially signed a long-term agreement with Nintendo. This means if the Activision Blizzard deal eventually closes, Call of Duty will come out on Switch.
While Microsoft’s proposed acquisition of Activision Blizzard is under regulatory scrutiny in the West, some Chinese companies have supported the deal. The country’s gaming giant Tencent is reported to be one of them.
The Sami Union demanded that Square Enix remove a set with traditional folk clothing from Final Fantasy XIV, and Steam has the opportunity to transfer games over a local network — we tell you what happened in the gaming industry this weekend.
We are publishing a new list with gaming vacancies. Wanted this week: delivery director at Playkot, game designer at JustMoby and financial manager at Fun to Mass Games.
VK has started work on the creation of a Russian open source game engine. It allocates one billion rubles for its development. This was announced during a press conference with the participation of Maksut Shadaev and Vladimir Kiriyenko. App2Top has prepared an edited* transcript of the event.
The European Commission will soon hold a closed hearing on Microsoft’s bid to acquire Activision Blizzard. The company will try to convince the EU regulator to approve the deal, with some of its rivals also likely to participate.
A group of Danish researchers have created a model to generate Super Mario Bros. levels. Here is how MarioGPT works and what limitations it has.
The Moscow Arbitration Court rejected Apple‘s cassation appeal. The corporation asked to recognize as illegal the fine imposed by the Federal Antimonopoly Service of the Russian Federation (FAS) for abuse of power over the distribution of applications on iOS.
Epic Games appealed to the Court of Appeal in New Delhi. She said that Google violates the antitrust laws of India by not letting the Epic Games Store on Google Play.
The Bombora publishing house announced that the book “The Witcher. The history of the franchise. From fantasy to cult game saga” by the authorship of game journalist Raphael Lucas. It primarily tells about the problems and successes of CD PROJEKT in the development of games in The Witcher series. But there was also a place for stories about the creation of the book cycle itself, the filming of film adaptations and the formation of the…
YouTube removed The Day Before gameplay videos due to trademark infringement, Bungie and CCP Games announced donations to victims of earthquakes in Turkey and Syria – we tell you what happened in the gaming industry this weekend.
The year 2022 was rich in legal initiatives against loot boxes. The Versus.legal law firm has prepared a detailed overview of them, broken down by country.
Morality is a great tool for game designers that adds depth and complexity to player decisions. So how do we transform morality into game mechanics? Let’s take a look at a few games that have done this well.
Microsoft and Activision Blizzard continue to send subpoenas to competitors as part of a lawsuit by the US Federal Trade Commission (FTC). This time they subpoenaed Nintendo and Google.
Ubisoft has gone even further in its fight against toxic player behavior. The company has signed a first-of-its-kind deal with the UK police to address some issues with online gaming.
VK Play platform has announced the launch of an investment division — “VK Play Investments”. She is going to invest 300 million rubles in gaming teams through him in 2023.
The UK’s Competition and Markets Authority (CMA) has published its provisional findings as part of its in-depth investigation into Microsoft’s acquisition of Activision Blizzard. The regulator proposed a few remedies such as excluding Call of Duty from the $68.7 billion deal.
The other day, sources of The New York Times reported that the British regulator may oppose the deal between Microsoft and Activision Blizzard — Microsoft itself allegedly expects this. However, the corporation later denied the rumors.
Microsoft’s $68.7 billion acquisition of Activision Blizzard is still under regulatory pressure in both the US and Europe. And a recent report claims that the Redmond-based company expects the UK agency to oppose the record-breaking deal.
id Software co-founder John Carmack has shared his thoughts on Meta’s decision to shut down its VR game Echo VR. The legendary developer explained why preservation is important and why every company should try to keep even their “dead” projects alive as long as possible.
