EEG News

Game Developers See No 'Evil'

Nominees for the 2006 Game Developers Choice Awards have been announced.

God of War leads with six nominations, followed by Shadow of the Colossus with five, Guitar Hero, Project Gotham Racing 3 and Psychonauts with three nods each.

Noticably absent from honors is Resident Evil 4, which received only one nom in the Visual Arts category. RE4 has lead many game of the year lists for 2005 including Game Informer, GamePro, Gamespot, Chicago Tribune, Game Revolution, GameZone.com, UGO.com, G4TV’s X-Play, GameSpot Readers’ Choice, IGN Readers’ Choice and the Spike TV Video Game Awards 2005.

Game Developer Choice Awards is a peer-based industry kudofest with nominees chosen by members of the International Game Developers Association. The ceremony will take place March 22 at the San Jose Civic Auditorium and is hosted by the Game Developers Conference.

For those keeping score, the IGDA chooses the GDCA for the GDC.

Sayonara Atari

Variety’s Ben Fritz says his goodbyes to Atari. It’s dying again, you know.

Though it has existed since the ‘90s as a mere shadow of the company that brought us the 2600 – passed around by congloms like a bong at a String Cheese Incident concert – it’s sad to see the old girl go. Every time.

However, backrupty hits this company like a zombie bite. Atari will rise again – perhaps as a bloodthirsty mockary of what it used to be...but still existing.

Midway Loves In-Game Ads

Midway announced a multiyear agreement with in-game advertisers Double Fusion for – you guessed it – in-game advertising. Although the deal will span several games, thus far only third-person, action/adventure Stranglehold is confirmed to have the ads.

From Gamespot:

"We believe that the technology to allow for dynamic, in-game advertising will add a sense of cultural relevance and context for the mass-market audience," Midway's chief marketing officer Steve Allison said in a statement. "Our relationship with Double Fusion will not only add potential incremental revenue on top of our existing static ad placements, but allow us to work with a partner sensitive to game development and committed to making ad placements organic and credible."

'Wheelman' Signs Movie Deal

Vin Diesel

MTV Films and Paramount are teaming with Midway games to bring action title “The Wheelman,” as a simultaneous feature film and vidgame release. The studios bought the rights to the title which is already well into development for the Xbox 360 and PS3.

“Wheelman,” which will star Vin Diesel as “an expert driver who comes out of retirement to protect a woman from his past” is targeted for a late 2007 release.

The deal is a part of the cross-marketing pact between the companies that already have a holiday release of "L.A. Rush." underway. "Wheelman" was tapped to be developed into a film after Diesel came aboard.

The vidgame version is believed to have a comfy budget of over $15 million.

Sony Stock Falls After $900 Forcast

Stock-brokerage firm Merrill Lynch published a report Friday that made stock holders react like Chris Rock's Cheap Pete in an In Living Color sketch:

How much for that Playstation 3?  Nine hundred dollars? Good lord, that’s a lot of money!

The result of a $900 per-console manufacturing cost forcast along with scepticism about the company's next generation plans by the firm sent Sony’s stock for a 3.6 percent sink Monday. More predicted delays also continue to haunt the PS3 hype, despite Sony's contradictory statements.

Sony better release some figures if it wants to do damage control.

Lego-fied Vidgame Scenes

Some visionary has recreated several video games using Lego blocks; scenes from Duck Hunt, Excite Bike, Bionic Commando, Metal Gear and Katamari Damacy. Check out his (presumably) growing collection here.

Oh, Lego. Is there anything you can’t do?

(Link from Digg.com)

UMDidn't

Small disk, small sales

Playstation Portable’s UMD movie format isn’t the hot new medium Sony was hoping for.

Variety reports low sales have resulted in Sony Pictures Home Entertainment, Paramount Home Entertainment and Warner Home Video are cutting back on movie releases for the portable. It turns out – and this may shock you – movies targeted towards the male gamer demographic are the only movies that are selling well. Studio execs hoping grandma will buy a $250 portable game console to watch “The Last Time I Saw Paris” are shocked.

In the meantime, Sony is cutting back on new releases and adding to its comedy slate for PSP with Monty Python content and "Not Another Teen Movie." Feingold said comedy has turned out to be the sweet spot on the format -- the top-selling PSP release is Fox's "Napoleon Dynamite."

Paramount's biggest PSP successes have been TV comedies such as "Chappelle's Show -- Vol. 1" and "Beavis & Butthead -- The Mike Judge Collection: Vol. 1."

Others blame low sales on more nepharious reasons - demographics be damned:

Some have reasoned that sales may have slowed recently because of a shortage of new titles in the last month and because users may be illegally copying films from DVDs onto a memory chip the PSPs can read.

Or maybe it’s all the new disk formats battling for the hearts of consumers?

"With standard definition, HD DVD, Blu-ray and PSP, all these formats take up space," said one retail source. "Consumers aren't going to buy three or four configurations of the same movie. Something has to give."

On a vaugely related note, 1962’s “Something’s Got to Give” and 2003's "Something's Gotta Give" are not available on UMD.

Activision Sees EA’s 5%, Raises Them 2

The holiday sales slump continues to wreak havoc on vidgame companies. Activision announced they will be cutting 7 percent of their workforce, or around 150 people.

Do you see what happens when we don’t buy the Tony Hawk? DO YOU SEE WHAT HAPPENS!!? What have I done?

The announcement comes just a month after Electronic Arts announced they were laying off 5% of its workers.

4GB HDD for Nintendo DS

MAX Media Player for DS

The Nintendo DS joins the push to make portable electronic devices media players – although through third-party intervention.

Datel has announced a hard drive peripherial for the Nintendo DS that will allow the portable to run movies, play music and view photos.

The Max Media Player is a 4GB hard drive for the DS which connects the portable to a PC (no word on Mac support) for media playback and storage. The unit is attached to the DS through the GBA port and runs on the DS's battery.

But before anyone gets excited - the site advertises the product will be released in March for "a mere £129." That's about $225  – almost twice the amount of the DS itself.

(Link from Digg.com)

January Top 10 Game Titles

These are the top ten game titles for January 2006.

01: 360 Call of Duty 2 - Activision
02: PS2 Madden NFL 06 - Electronic Arts
03: PS2 MVP 06 NCAA Baseball -  Electronic Arts
04: PSP Grand Theft Auto: Liberty City Stories  - Take 2 Interactive
05: NDS Mario Kart - Nintendo
06: NDS Animal Crossing: Wild World - Nintendo
07: PS2 Need for Speed: Most Wanted - Electronic Arts
08: 360 Dead or Alive 4 - Temco
09: PS2 Star Wars: Battlefront II - LucasArts
10: PS2 Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas Special Edition - Take 2 Interactive

Source: The NPD Group / Point-of-Sale Information