PlanetSide 2: The War For Auraxis Has Begun

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Sony Online Entertainment announced that PlanetSide 2 has launched in North America and Europe. The MMOFPS is playable for free, with Premium Memberships available for $9.99 a month that include scalable gains for resources, XP and passive cert points.

“PlanetSide 2 sets the new standard for shooters,” said John Smedley, President of Sony Online Entertainment. “With thousands of players fighting simultaneously across several beautiful, massive continents, the size and intensity of PlanetSide 2 has no equal. You’ve never played anything like it.”

Players can also purchase additional in-game content with the $15.00 PlanetSide 2 game card sold exclusively at participating GameStop retail locations. In addition to the choice of 1500 Station Cash or 30 days of Membership time, the new game card will grant an exclusive PlanetSide 2 virtual item, the NS11 Rifle.

PlayStation Mobile SDK Now Public

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The PlayStation Mobile SDK has been released to the public. This SDK allows developers to build apps and games for the PS Vita, PSP and the PS3 along with PlayStation Certified Android hardware.

The annual license fee for the PlayStation Mobile SDK will be $99. Currently, Sony is also offering development support to the community and any projects started during the beta phase should transition over to the public SDK.

Source: Blog.PlayStation.com

Gree Closes Down OpenFeint

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Gree has announced that it will shut down OpenFeint on December 14, doubling back on Gree’s promise to keep the in-game social networking platform open until the third quarter of 2013. This gives developers a limited time to port their games.

“Our game GoNinja has had over 1.5 million downloads on Android and iOS,” said developer George Deglin. “Even if we push an update in time, thousands of our users won’t know to download it and will get a failed game. It’s very frustrating. If we do nothing, new users and users who have previously opted into OpenFeint in GoNinja will most likely not be able to launch our game after the OpenFeint shutdown — it will freeze on the loading screen,” said Deglin. “Since our game has been out for a while now and has so many people who have downloaded it, it’s possible that many of them will leave a bad review upon the game failing.”

Games that are migrated to Gree can reclaim their achievement definitions, screenshots, and game descriptions. The top 1,000 players from a game’s OpenFeint leaderboards can all be transferred to its service.

Source: VentureBeat.com

GTA V For Wii U A Possibility

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Right now, Grand Theft Auto V is only planned for an initial release on the PS3 and Xbox 360, with a PC release likely to come later. While there are no plans to bring the game to bring the game to Wii U, Rockstar vice president Dan Houser indicates that such a possibility is not off the table.

“Everything else is up for consideration,” said Houser. “That’s all I can give you. We are a third-party publisher. We’re not Nintendo, we’re not Sony, we’re not Microsoft. We love all of them in different ways. But, we can do what we want wherever there’s the appropriate business opportunity and chance to find a market. If that’s on Apple, we put something on Apple. Wherever it might be. I think that’s the fun in what we do. We see ourselves as a content company that uses technology. We don’t make it; we use it to make the most fun stuff.”

Source: IGN

Mobile Holiday Sales Are Expected To Jump 110 Percent

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For this holiday buying season, consumer confidence is expected to trump concerns about a global recession. The National Retail Federation estimates that total holiday sales this season will rise 4.1 percent, above the 3.5 percent average for the previous 10 years.

Accenture says that over half of Americans will increase their spending this year by $250 or more, with consumers on the whole spending an average of $582. 53 percent say they will go out and shop on Black Friday, up from 44 percent last year.

Shop.org estimates that November and December sales will grow 12 percent using data from the Commerce Department, the Conference Board and the NRF. Adobe, looking at e-commerce data from 500 retailers using its content and marketing data, estimates that sales between Thanksgiving and Christmas will grow between 7 percent and 10 percent.

Adobe expects Cyber Monday sales to rise 18 percent this year to $2 billion, while the second busiest online-shopping day is expected to be Black Friday, which will see a 12 percent bump in sales. Shopping on mobile devices will be a much larger part of that, as such devices will account for 24 percent of visits to e-commerce sites.

Mobile sales are expected to rise 110 percent overall, and account for 21 percent of all online sales, according to Adobe. Two-thirds of those mobile sales will come through tablets, while the other third through smartphones.

Some retailers are using text messages and push notifications to offer discounts to loyal customers, while others are enlisting them to be brand ambassadors for social sites like Pinterest. “Mobile is helping retailers have better relationships with people,” says Brad Rencher, vice president of digital marketing at Adobe.

Source: Fortune.CNN.com

Deus Ex Film To Be Directed By Scott Derrickson

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CBS Films has tapped Scott Derrickson to direct the movie adaptation of Deus Ex. He will co-write the script with C. Robert Cargill, while Roy Lee and Adrian Askarieh will produce and John P. Middleton will serve as exec producer.

“Deus Ex is a phenomenal cyberpunk game with soul and intelligence,” said Derrickson. “By combining amazing action and tension with big, philosophical ideas, Deus Ex is smart, ballsy, and will make one hell of a movie. Cargill and I can’t wait to bring it to the big screen.”

Source: Deadline.com

Zynga’s Mark Pincus Scrambling To Revive Zynga

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Zynga CEO Mark Pincus is reportedly discouraged over the current fortunes of his company. Apple director Bill Campbell met with Pincus at a meeting set up by Zynga investor Kleiner Perkins Caufield & Byers, and said the executive was near tears while talking about how to save Zynga.

“Rapid change in player habits and social technologies have dictated fundamental changes at Zynga,” said Pincus. “And when businesses change, it’s inevitable that some people will choose to leave.”

Primary among Pincus’ concerns is refocusing the company on the mobile space. Kleiner Perkins partner and Zynga board member Bing Gordon is among those who thinks that Zynga should have focused on mobile development much sooner.

“Mobile turned out to be more different than anyone expected, in terms of monetization and also user experience,” said Gordon.

Source: Wall Street Journal

OnLive App Comes To LG TVs

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OnLive announced that it has launched a game-streaming app on LG G2 Series TVs powered by Google TV. Those who currently own the TV can download an update for their sets, and the app will come pre-installed on all future LG G2s.

“We are proud to be working with OnLive to deliver an incredible home entertainment experience with a full range of interactive viewing and gaming possibilities on LG G2 Series TVs,” said Georg Rasinski, Director of Home Entertainment Brand Management, LG Electronics USA. “OnLive’s premium-quality gaming service offers customers a great opportunity to test the dual-core performance of our G2 Series TVs. We think customers will be very impressed.”

“Our partnership with LG has enabled us to take an important step forward in making high-end gaming accessible to everyone, across a variety of consumer electronic devices,” said OnLive chairman Gary Lauder. “Gamers can now enjoy hundreds of amazing console-quality games with no new hardware necessary beyond an OnLive controller and LG’s fast and intuitive Google TV.”

Call Of Duty: Black Ops II First Day Sales At $500 Million

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Activision believes that Call of Duty: Black Ops II generated over $500 million in its first 24 hours on release worldwide. 16,000 stores opened at midnight for release of the game.

“With first day sales of over half a billion dollars worldwide, we believe Call of Duty is the biggest entertainment launch of the year for the fourth year in a row,” offered Bobby Kotick, CEO of Activision Blizzard. “Life-to-date sales for the Call of Duty franchise have exceeded worldwide theatrical box office receipts for Harry Potter and Star Wars, the two most successful movie franchises of all time. Given the challenged macro-economic environment, we remain cautious about the balance of 2012 and 2013.”

“Call of Duty has become more than a product people buy, it’s a brand people buy into,” added Eric Hirshberg, CEO of Activision Publishing. “And every November we do more than just the launch of a game, we kick off an annual, unofficial but worldwide phenomenon called the Call of Duty season. I want to thank our incredible team at Treyarch for making an amazing game, everyone at Activision for making this brand a force of nature and our retail partners for their unprecedented support of this franchise. But most importantly I want to thank our millions of fans for their continued support and loyalty and for making us better every day.”