Heyzap has announced that it has raised $4.3 million from Union Square Ventures and Qualcomm. The funds will be used for talent acquisition for the mobile social gaming platform.
“Our leaderboards, achievements and ads SDKs are taking off and we want to fuel the growth there,” said Heyzap co-founder Jude Gomila.
Source: The Next Web
Curse has announced that it is launching Gamepedia.com, an alternative to Wikia and its Wikipedia that will focus solely on video game wikis. The company will have exclusive content deals with certain companies, starting with Gazillion and Marvel, which will provide exclusive content to gamers through the official Marvel Heroes Wiki.
“Curse has a vast array of news and community sites surrounding specific games that feed Gamepedia wikis with passionate hardcore gamers who provide the most up to date accurate information,” said Hubert Thieblot, CEO & Founder of Curse. “The synergy between our properties provides a competitive advantage that can’t be matched by other wiki providers and results in the best game wiki content attracting exclusive partnerships.”
Pawel Dembowski, a veteran of Wikia, is heading up the Curse Gamepedia initiative. He wants gamers to know that the focus is solely on game content.
“Wikia used to focus more on games, but today it’s more focused on finding new audiences and developing the social aspects of the wikis,” said Dembowski. “Gamepedia is about video games and video games only.”
“Rather than adding stuff like achievements and badges and all the stuff that Wikia is currently doing, Gamepedia is focusing on gaming content,” said Dembowski. “The actual content at Wikia is limited to less than half of the page because the rest is taken up by gamification. People come to Wikis to look up info or to learn more about the world of the game, not to get badges and stuff like that.”
The various GamePedia wikis will be able to customize their looks more than Wikia, which has strict guidelines of appearance. Certain wikis like the official Minecraft Wiki will retain their separate domains, but they’ll be connected to Gamepedia.
“Part of this initiative is leveraging our good relationship with developers and publishers, which allows us to get exclusive content from them pre-release,” said Dembowski. “Wikia is not really a gaming community company. They don’t really do much directly with the publishers or developers. We’re going to encourage our existing communities to help create content.”
“The fact that we are also gamers and fans means our Gamepedia team is very much dedicated to helping the gamers and the communities to build the databases of the games,” he added. “Wikis are primarily built by fans, but we are also dedicated to building them with them and helping them whenever necessary. We have a clean and simple layout that’s customizable. We have less ads than Wikia, which uses pop-ups or Flash-based ads. We do have ads, but they are definitely less disruptive ads.”
Source: GamesIndustry.biz
Guillermo del Toro has revealed that there is interest in the game InSane from a major game company. THQ canceled the game last year as a cost cutting measure, handing the rights back to del Toro.
“We are in talks with a very, very big company. I can’t say who, but it’s one of the big ones. They really responded to the game, they responded to what we were trying,” said del Toro. “Some of the devices of the game I need to update, because now I’ve seen them in other games that just came out. That always happens. But the principle we’re trying to do with the game is to make it a really immersive narrative experience. It’s still a really challenging proposal.”
Source: Toronto Sun
Al Jazeera has announced that it is acquiring Current TV. The plan will be to shut down Current and start an English-language channel focused more on America, which will be available in more than 40 million homes with newscasts emanating from both New York and Doha, Qatar.
The challenge will be persuading Americans to watch, hard considering the number of 24 news stations and the stereotypes about the channel that persist to this day. “There are still people who will not watch it, who will say that it’s a ‘terrorist network,’ ” said Philip Seib, the author of The Al Jazeera Effect. “Al Jazeera has to override that by providing quality news.”
“There’s a major hole right now that Al Jazeera can fill. And that is providing an alternative viewpoint to domestic news, which is very parochial,” said Cathy Rasenberger, a cable consultant who has worked with Al Jazeera on distribution issues in the past. “[However,] there is a limited amount of interest in international news in the United States.”
Source: New York Times
American McGee and Spicy Horse have launched the Kickstarter for Akaneiro. Unique among Kickstarter campaigns is that this game exists right now — Spicy Horse is seeking to improve it with crowd funding.
Akaneiro is a free-to-play title that will be supported with content, maps and cosmetic items available for sale. With the Kickstarter, they are hoping to include a Android and iOS tablet version, co-op multiplayer, an equipment crafting system, and improved community support .
Source: Kickstarter.com
Nvidia’s Grid Cloud Gaming Platform has signed up with partners Agawi in the U.S., Cloud Union and Cyber Cloud in China, G-Cluster Global in Japan, Playcast Media Systems in Israel, and Ubitus in Taiwan. It is expected that this will help enhance the offerings of the company’s new portable console Project Shield.
“By using the Grid Platform, our partners will allow gamers to play anywhere, anytime, without being tethered to a box,” said Phil Eisler, Nvidia’s general manager of cloud gaming. “The world’s most exciting games can now be played as easily as you can stream a movie, right onto your TV or mobile device. No more discs to shuffle or files to download and install.”
[a]list daily operates out of Southern California, so it’s only natural that we want to share with everyone our first disaster of 2013. Orange County, California-based KDOC decided it wanted to put on a live New Year’s Eve show from the Sunset Strip in L.A., perhaps giving that staid old Times Square shindig a run for its money. It promised big stars like Eva Longoria, Mario Lopez and Jennifer Love Hewitt. They didn’t make it. Celebrities who did, like host Jamie Kennedy and singer Macy Gray, weren’t in their best form. Neither was the production crew, which may not have had a lot of experience running live television.
KDOC took their video down. Clips of the show’s “highlights,” all of which are presented as seen on TV, are starting to go viral. And for good reason. Caveat spectator – plenty of NSFW language here.
“The 7 Wonders of Crysis 3” is living up to its hype, as Albert Hughes delivers some cinematic chops along with some great bits of gameplay. Look for Episode 3, Cause and Effect, to come soon!
Most people would probably think that Gollum was the more dominant personality than Smeagol in the mentally deranged cave dweller. When it comes to rap battles, however, Smeagol can bring it just like his darker half!
It’s nail biting time for NFL fans, and for the sixth year in a row the same goes for a group of amateur TV ad makers vying for Doritos’ “Crash the Super Bowl” prize. The PepsiCo owned chip maker announced the five finalists for the contest. Fans can now vote which of the five should win the $1 million grand prize and air during the Super Bowl on February 3.
There’s an Ayzenberg connection this year, with staffer Nate Daniels on the defending champs’ team. Daniels ran social media for “Sling Baby,” which took home the top prize last year. This year, he’s on the team behind “Fashionista Daddy.”
[a]list daily will feature a video interview with Daniels next week on how he used social community, online videos and even a branded game to raise their visibility and rally enough votes to win last year’s contest.
Meantime, you can vote for your fave for this year at Facebook.com/CrashTheSuperBowl.
