Sometimes it can be easy to forget all the work that can go into a big reveal like the new Tomb Raider. This trailer illustrates some of the work that went into presenting the most ambitious vision of Lara ever with people from Visual Works and Crystal Dynamics.
Christopher Nolan’s Dark Knight series is coming to its epic conclusion with The Dark Knight Rises. Check out the first trailer here.
When last we talked to SpaceTime, they were having great success with Pocket Legends and getting their first commercial. Now, SpaceTime is readying their second title in Star Legends: The Blackstar Chronicles. We got a chance to catch up with SpaceTime CEO Gary Gattis about the plans for the impending launch of Star Legends and the continued success of Pocket Legends.
Since we last spoke, Pocket Legends has become even more incredibly popular. Right now, the game has gotten 5 million downloads on Android and iOS we’re seeing a 1.2 million plus game log-ins per week. It’s meant a tremendous amount for all of us at the studio; we’re still rapidly hiring. We’ve gotten a lot of really cool accolades, like being named to the 100 most successful game developers by Develop. We stared Star Legends for mobile about a month ago with a closed beta.
To go back further in time, originally were brought together by NCsoft in 2005; my partners and myself left SOE to make Blackstar for NCsoft. Some of us worked on Wing Commander at Origin before that and many worked at SOE on Star Wars Galaxies on the Jump to Lightspeed expansion. They wanted to make this high concept space game, the bar was set through the roof, so we hired this badass art guy who did Tron Legacy but before that he filled our office with beautiful concept paintings of all the different planets and alien races and everything and then NCsoft canceled the game because Auto Assault and Tabula Rasa did poorly and they pulled all external North American development and that was soul crushing at the time but it led us to do more with mobile.
If we had continued Blackstar the way it was it would have been a big PC game and those days are sort of numbered for those games; fortunately, we were able to negotiate the tools and IP rights from NCsoft. I’m thrilled the path that were on, and I think mobile and social will be huge. We got kicked out of PC MMOs and got into mobile MMOs before anyone else. Fast forward to present day and we modified it a bit to use the mechanics that we’ve evolved with Pocket Legends and when it launches in a few weeks, it’ll be the first simultaneous iOS and Android launch and its the initial fruition of our vision of playing regardless of the platform and play all over the world across different devices; same account and micro-currency platform that extends across all our games, We created the SpaceTime Nexus that’s a portal for all SpaceTime games where we can incentivize people to go to ‘like’ our Facebook page in the same way Tapjoy can have people download apps we can give platinums for visiting our sites. We’ve actually got a third game underway, so we have a series of titles we’re building and we’re entering pre-production for a launch by the end of the year and we’re just psyched to see Star Legends comes out after all these years. We’ve poured out hearts and souls into it and there’s been a lot of bumps in a road for it to come around this way. It’s a big step in a vision for a ubiquitous gaming system. It’s cool because people can play together regardless of platform or network and now it takes everything in Pocket Legends and adds some complexity like guilds that we’ll roll into Pocket Legends in the coming weeks. These games stands on the shoulders of the old games, but we can cross promote and rely and those old fans.
Star Legends in action.
Beta has been out for a couple weeks, we did a co-promotional deal that worked out well, gave use some time to polish it and and get it ready for prime time.
It’s still just English for the moment. We’re having discussions right now from people in China and Korea to launch it in those languages. So it’s on the roadmap but before we do that, we’re putting in a “language preference” options. The game does really significant matchmaking efforts right now and that’s part of the reason its successful, looking at what you’re doing and who your friends and now if you have preference in difference in language, your world will be populated with people of the same language. It’s an easy initial step to bring people together.
It was originally Blackstar and it turned into Star Legends as we realized were close to having this ubiquitous gaming system we want a brand of product, so it was a brand move. Blackstar is still in the subtitle and the ship is in the game itself, but as our capabilities and vision tightened up it make sense to make it a Legend title.
Star Legends introduces environmental gameplay. There’s doors and access panels that can be used only by certain classes. The artwork has been pushed an order of magnitude higher. We’ve introduced genders, allowing male and female characters for both classes. We’ve got guilds and guild halls and private spaces for players to meet. So really, when [Pocket Legends] launched it was a minimal product with just a game hub and now it’s a full featured MMO with PVP and auction house and Star Legends is shipping with that and we’ll continue to expand the system and integrate it. We’re heavily producing new content for Pocket Legends, well look to roll the new features into Pocket Legends eventually They’re live games and we’re heavily involved with the community so I’d only expect it to grow from there.
Our Pocket Legends players are very vocal; it is exactly what you want for a live product. There are different levels of communication, including forums Facebook and twitter. We play the game a lot ourselves and we let them know we’re playing and that helps us get some real-time Q&A. Sometimes we play anonymously. We played as PCs in Star Legend’s beta and asked people for the man-on-the-street point of view. We’ve got threads for bugs and suggestions and we’re in there every day. All of us have come from a live service background and I liken it to public mental health; it can be rewarding to connect the dots and see results almost immediately. We’ve found that being involved with the community builds trust and I think the expectations on our side is, “We’re going to make a lot of changes and turn around a fix for it, or if we feel strongly about it but some people think the other way, we look to mitigate those concerns.”
Get ready for space adventures with friends.
Pocket Legends was made by six guys in six months and it is like performance art, being in a band and then we jam out a record and release it then move on to the next product. The development cycle is much more satisfying to do than larger games.
Pocket Legends has changed our studio. Usually there’s a lot of work-for-hire for development studios, we were lucky to get something out the door that was a success and we got some great investors for the game, we’re in a different position than most developers. We’re not having to go to publishers and sign a deal where we get screwed in the end. We’ve been fortunate enough to be our own publishers and we feel very lucky and your insight is correct- working on games like this is a revelation. I’m not sure I could go back to doing it the other way, with a large studio.
We’re anticipating a smoother launch. Our guys have launched multiple MMOs and this is our third engine we’ve built together. We kinda went back and forth on a closed or non-closed beta for Star Legends and a lot of players were upset with the closed beta, but I stand by the decision because it allowed us to polish the product. With an MMO you can never anticipate all the crazy s*** people are going to do so getting it into a live environment is key. We did something similar with Pocket Legends so I’m hoping for a smooth launch with Star Legends.
We’ll have more marketing support and we’ll have more of an established audience. Pocket Legends came out with a whisper and hopefully come out with a bang. I’m very proud of the game.
We partnered with Sony Ericsson and built a version of Star Legends that used Xperia Play, the phone that has PlayStation buttons, and it’s a killer way to play the game and we were demoing the game and got a great response. A lot of people hadn’t played the game ever. The best part was 25 people chasing the droid around; we had the Android mascot in the game and people who found it got a bonus.
Yeah, that may have come from the original concept of the game. I will say that spaceflight is not off the table. Right now our priority is building on this franchise; as we get more bandwidth it would not surprise me to see that.
Ha ha, maybe!
We hope it’s a very big deal! We believe its a platform agnostic approach. Right now we believe we’re the only online game where Android and iOS play together. We’re going to have a browser based client later this year and you can play with the same players regardless of device. Our hope is you’ll play it at lunch at work or maybe in the bathroom and on the desktop when you get home and be the gaming experience that stays with you forever. World of Warcraft has the Armory but its not a whole game experience. We think the game is robust enough it’ll stand up on the PC space. We feel like it’s a big deal, and we feel lucky to be in the position that we’re in. We’ve had rags to riches to rags to riches again! We’ll scale to about 35 to 50 employees this year. We’ve got plenty of cash in the bank and we’ve got a lot of options. We want to continue to lead the field and our next title is really going to bring in social implementation that’s what we’re going to iterate our way around.
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THQ has announced some of the headlining talent for Saints Row: The Third. These include actress Sasha Grey (The Girlfriend Experience, Entourage) as Viola DeWynter of the Syndicate, pro-wrestler Hulk Hogan will voice Angel De LaMuerte leader of the Lucadores street gang and Daniel Dae Kim (Saints Row 2, Lost, Hawaii Five-0) will return as Johnny Gat, chief lieutenant of the Third Street Saints.
THQ also announced that both Sasha Grey and Hulk Hogan will be attending Comic-Con, signing autographs on Thursday, July 21 at the Saints Row Booth, #5145. Later, both will attend the Saints Row media event at the FLOAT rooftop bar at the Hard Rock Hotel at 7:00 PM for an invitation only party.
Source: Saintsrow.com/blog-post
Angry Birds is a huge hit in the West and now Rovio is turning their eyes towards the untold millions of consumers in China. In order to combat piracy, they’re looking to make it a significant brand in China and elsewhere.
We are betting everything on Angry Birds, said Rovio CEO Peter Vesterbacka at Casual Connect in Seattle. We want to be the first entertainment brand with a billion fans. That will take us two or three years to do. Next year, we want to be the leading entertainment brand in China.
You can t really fight that except by making better products than the copies, admitted Vesterbacka. Instead of sending lawyers, we are building products. It s not all about monetization now. It s about keeping the fans coming back and building the brand.
Source: VentureBeat
Sony revealed its Comic-Con plans for the Uncharted series, which along with multiplayer demonstrations and a panel on Uncharted 3, will also include a comic. Sony has been working with DC Comics on a comic series starring Nathan Drake.
“Uncharted #1 launches Nathan Drake on a journey to the center of the earth on a quest to see the legendary ‘Amber Room’,” says the announcement. “As enemies from Sir Francis Drake’s past come for revenge on his descendant, Drake must use all the skills at his disposal to stay one step ahead of the game. Uncharted #1 is written by Joshua Williamson (Superman/Batman), with fantastic art by Francesco Francavilla (Detective Comics) and featuring covers by the legendary Adam Hughes. The comic series is scheduled to debut just in time for the release of Uncharted 3: Drake’s Deception in stores. Stay tuned for more details soon! ”
“It wouldn’t be Comic-Con if we couldn’t get you something exclusive from one of the artists working on the UNCHARTED comic book series,” continues the description. “The one and only ADAM HUGHES will be signing a limited-edition UNCHARTED cover art poster on Friday and Sunday during SDCC 2011.”
There will also be the Uncharted novel at the Random House/Del-Rey booth, from the mind of Naughty Dog and author Chris Golden. “In Uncharted: The Fourth Labyrinth, Nathan Drake will embark on an all-new, original, action-packed adventure,” reads the description. “When Nathan’s partner, Sully, asks for his help in finding a friend’s murderer, Nathan begins to unravel a mystery that will uncover some even bigger secrets. Sully’s friend was close to discovering an ancient process of turning lead into gold” a secret that a shadowy international corporation would do anything to steal, and now Nathan and Sully may be their next targets! This thrilling adventure will take Nathan from the ruins of Crete to a secret crypt deep in the heart of China “and into a mysterious labyrinth that may be hiding the greatest secret of all!”
Source: PlayStation.Blog
One of the more interesting revelations of the recent 619 page document to the SEC from Zynga is the confirmation that Google was a significant investor. Zynga has raised a total of $845 million dollar in investment capital and it is believed that Google is one of the leading investors in that group.
This is the first time Zynga has disclosed that Google is an investor, despite multiple reports to the contrary, and a TechCrunch story written more than a year ago that said the investment totaled about $100 million, writes Tricia Duryee. Since then, we ve heard the investment may have been larger, and may be tied to the launch of a Google social games network that runs on top of Google+.
Source: All Things D
PressOK Entertainment has announced the the launch of PlacePlay. This new location-enablement platform lets mobile developers add location based tournaments to their titles to increase player engagement and drive revenue through targeted, location-enhanced advertising.
We’re excited about the new possibilities that PlacePlay opens up for us, explains Gary Toste, CEO of Brisk Mobile, a mobile game developer and publisher based in Mississauga, Ontario, Canada. The platform s ease of integration enables us to quickly address the specific needs of our gamers, and gives us the opportunity to drive repeat usage of our products, creating a brand-new revenue stream for our titles that didn’t exist before.
As a game developer, we always believed that a gamer s physical location could be made relevant to their game experience to drive engagement and revenue in regular games, and this is what PlacePlay delivers, adds Ryan Morel, CEO of PressOK Entertainment. By adding PlacePlay Tournaments, developers now have an easy way to increase engagement, and if they want, use our integrated local advertising to increase their revenue. That s pretty cool.
Apple has a big hit on their hands in the iPad though the company thinks that it may be hurting traditional Mac sales. They indicated they shipped 9.25 million iPads during the most recent quarter, a 183 percent increase over the same quarter last year, compared to 3.95 million Macs in the third quarter, just a 14 percent increase from last year.
“In terms of cannibalization, we do believe that some customers chose to purchase an iPad instead of a new Mac during the quarter,” said Apple Chief Operating Officer Tim Cook. “We also believe that even more customers chose to purchase an iPad over a Windows PC. We were still selling every unit we could during the quarter…[But] as we stepped into July, we have been able to increase the supply further.
Cook also noted, after looking over sales comparisons between the iPad and competitors’ Android tablets, “It doesn’t appear that other tablets are getting any traction to speak of.
Source: Cnet
A collector’s edition of Batman: Arkham City has been confirmed. The Batman: Arkham City Collector’s Edition will be available October 18, 2011 for $99.
The Collector’s Edition will include a custom Batman statue produced by Kotobukiya a collectible art book and a copy of the animated original movie, Batman: Gotham Knight. There will also be a digital soundtrack mad available along with early access to the Iceberg Lounge Challenge Map and Batman: The Dark Knight Returns skin in-game.
