Game industry business news

Originally announced in June as an outlet for small-scale independent games, Nintendo’s promising WiiWare Channel has surprisingly arrived in the US today – albeit without any games. CVG reports that WiiWare currently offers a streamed preview video of Metroid Prime 3 – though its arrival could mean that original games …

Following Sony’s decision to withdraw PSOne trio Crash Bandicoot 2, Spyro 2 and MediEvil from the PS3 digital download service PlayStation Network, the platform holder has emailed customers to say that refunds will appear in the PlayStation Store wallet within seven days. The mail reads: You will be aware from …

Over one million pre-orders have been made in the US for Microsoft’s forthcoming FPS Halo 3, due for release on September 25th. Microsoft said it is expecting the Legendary Edition of the game to sell out on release day, reported Games Industry . A slew of big name US brands …

The new executive vice president and general manager of Vivendi’s European retail organisation has moved from her previous role spearheading Vivendi’s business in Central Europe. The news comes after a re-shuffling of the publishing giant’s European management operation, which will now come together under one management team. Balzola-Widmann (pictured) makes …

Wii and DS games make up eight of the current top ten selling titles in Germany, and seven in Spain, reports Next Generation . For the second week running Pokemon Diamond and Pearl top both charts. The top three titles in the Spanish charts are unchanged from the previous week, …

EAResults for the quarter ended June 30th: Net revenue: $395m (Down four per cent year-on-year) Gross profit: $229m (Seven per cent drop year-on-year) What EA said: This cycle is developing quite differently than the last cycle. The next-gen hardware build is going a little more slowly.” John Riccitiello, CEO What …

Toy specialist Hasbro has struck a major licensing deal with Electronic Arts – further verifying MCV’s recent exclusive that the kids’ firm is set to muscle in on the video games space. The partnership grants EA exclusive global rights to create games based on Hasbro IP including Monopoly, Scrabble, Yahtzee, …

Famed for its cinematic interpretations of World War II, Activision’s Call of Duty 4: Modern Combat, which as the title suggests abandons the 1940’s in favour of contemporary battling, will hit UK and European retail on November 9th, Eurogamer reports . The news apparently emerged a press event earlier this …

Compression middleware aims to help cut manufacturing costs

The Leicester-based firm is being headed up by Jonathan Hales as managing director. He brings with him seven years experience from Codemasters where he was most recently VP and general manager of Northern Region Europe. Founded last year by German games industry veterans Simon Hellwig and Stefan Marcinek, Kalyso Media …