Paysafecard Comes To U.S.

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Paysafecard has announced that its prepaid voucher service for online transactions is now available in North America. Popular in Europe, the paysafecard vouchers will be available at 12,000 U.S. retail outlets and is backed by Bancorp Bank Payment Solutions Group.

“The United States has the biggest economy in the world with tremendous market potential for prepaid payment solutions,” said Michael Mueller, CEO of Paysafecard group. “Although credit cards are widely used in the U.S., there are still millions of people who lack credit cards or bank accounts, or are uncomfortable using them to spend money in online games. Together with our partner, The Bancorp Bank, we now offer a secure and accessible prepaid cash solution for gaming developers and publishers to integrate into their games in the U.S.”

iPad Invades Walmart

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Walmart has announced that it will start selling the iPad both online and in stores on October 15. No special discounts will be applied to the devices and any orders via Walmart’s site will only be available through in-store pickup, not home delivery.

This timing should give Apple and the iPad a sales boost right in time for the holiday season, with the tablet device being available at Walmart’s 8,400 stores, along with the 221 U.S. Apple Stores, 1,093 Best Buy outlets and 1,743 Target stores. Walmart is apparently taking a wait and see approach to the various Android tablets.

Source: PC World

Conan Sidekick Andy Richter Returning

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TBS recently confirmed that Andy Richter will be Conan O’Brien’s sidekick on the Conan talk show, set to launch on November 8. Richter participated in O’Brien’s Legally Prohibited from Being Funny on Television Tour and has worked with him on late-night television since September 13, 1993.

“I’m thrilled to be going back to work with Conan, and very excited to start a whole new venture on TBS,” said Richter. “However, I am mostly looking forward to getting out of the house again.”

“This decision was made without my authority. I will get to the bottom of this,” quipped O’Brien.

TBS has been flooding the MLB Playoffs commercial breaks with their ads for the new Conan show.

Zynga, Facebook Apply Stock Sale Fees

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Sources say that Facebook and Zynga are applying fees of at least $2,500 for each sale of company shares. According to legal experts, this move is designed to discourage employees from giving away company equity prior to an initial public offering.

“The fee is being imposed for the administrative burden of providing the information that the seller by law is required to provide, and making sure the company is not screwing up its 500 shareholder count,” said Ted Hollifield, a partner at Dorsey & Whitney.

“Zynga in particular began imposing a fee of $4,500 for each private share transaction in August, raising the fee to $6,000 per sale in September. The $6,000 fee sounds exorbitant if you’re looking at purely administrative costs,” said Hollifield. “If you’re looking at it in the context of potential compliance with reporting obligations, then the $6,000 fee is actually reasonable.”

Source: Bloomberg

Your Shape Kinect’s Major Ad Support

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Ubisoft is highly optimistic about Your Shape: Fitness Evolved, and is planning on running a 1.2 million British pound campaign from November to January via online, TV and print. The Kinect game will also be supported by advertorials in lifestyle magazines like Zest, Men s Health, Cosmopolitan, Closer, and Fabulous.

“Our aim is to really get our product in front of a large audience and educate about its unique technology and benefits,” said Ubisoft’s U.K. brand manager Ombeline Wallon. “The results of Your Shape: Fitness Evolved are obviously dependent on the sales of Microsoft s Kinect, But the game certainly has all the attributes to succeed, as well as a strong marketing plan to support it from release all the way to January. The variety and depth of content will make Fitness Evolved a very serious contender on the market this winter.”

Source: MCV

DeNA Snaps Up ngmoco For $400 Million

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DeNA confirmed today that it is acquiring ngmoco, creating the world’s largest mobile social games platform company. The price was $400 million in cash and securities, with ngmoco s shareholders and employees receiving $300 million, with up to a maximum of $100 million in bonuses contingent upon the achievement of certain performance milestones through the end of 2011.

“In ngmoco and its team we see a lot of the same talent and dynamic traction that we have in the Japanese market, making the merger a perfect fit for us,” said Tomoko Namba, founder and CEO, DeNA. “This acquisition cements DeNA’s leadership position in the U.S. We re building the largest mobile social gaming platform in the world and populating it with incredible games and services.”

ngmoco will work on making DeNA s Mobage a global service and platform for games. Ultimately, the company hopes to combine ngmoco s smartphone technology framework with DeNA s Mobage Open SDK in order to reach both Western and Japanese customers on iOS and Android.

“We are delighted to be joining forces with DeNA, a company that we have admired and aspired to,” said Neil Young, founder and CEO, ngmoco. “The opportunity to be a part of creating the number one social mobile game platform company and to benefit from the unique learning and knowledge that DeNA possesses is an amazing way to accelerate our vision for gaming.”

Uncharted Gets David O. Russell As Director… Again

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David O. Russell has agreed to direct an adaptation of Uncharted: Drake’s Fortune for Columbia Pictures. Over the summer, it looked like the was leaving the project to adapt Pride and Prejudice and Zombies, but now he’s signed on to write as well, letting him really leave his stamp on the original script by Thomas Dean Donnelly and Joshua Oppenheimer.

“David is a tremendous choice to take on this film,” said Columbia President Matt Tolmach. “He’s equally adept at combining all the classic elements involved in this property: great character development, strong comedy and amazing action sequences. He has a brilliant vision for this material and we know he will bring his original, unique voice to this adaptation.”

Avi Arad, Charles Roven and Alex Gartner are producing Uncharted and the film will be overseen for the studio by Tolmach and Jonathan Kadin. Russell’s credits include Spanking the Monkey, Three Kings, Flirting With Disaster, and I Heart Huckabees, with The Fighter and Nailed set to release later this year.

Source: The Hollywood Reporter