ALPHA | WORLDVIEW
WorldView
Our regular round up of development stories from across the globe…
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Tiga boss Richard Wilson says studios shouldn’t be the ones to fund the Byron Review’s suggested awareness campaign.
“Developers already face intense competition from foreign government subsidised studios. The last thing they need is for the UK Government to impose additional costs on it…”
Never one to mince his words, Warren Spector offloads his problems with game narrative in an extensive interview on our website.
“When people say ‘wasn’t that cutscene cool?’ I just want to scream. If every player is doing the exact same thing, it’s not a game. Go make a movie and get out of my medium…”
N+ developer Metanet explains that, actually, it’s not just Xbox Live Arcade that’s ‘full of shit’. Keep digging, guys…
08 | APRIL 2008
“The larger rant is ‘why do the majority of games totally suck ass?’, which is a complex topic. Certainly, everybody is to blame – gamers, developers, publishers, press…”
LOS ANGELES, USA Viacom launched a double assault on the industry this month, with both Paramount and Nickelodeon stepping up activity in the games space. Paramount's first slate of games will be based on new film IP or its back catalogue of properties, with an emphasis on casual, handheld and mobile games. The studio will pursue a variety of funding models to bring its games to market in 2008, and plans to be flexible in terms of publishing – either publishing its titles itself, co-publishing with other firms or simply funding development. Nickelodeon, meanwhile, has started to flesh out the $100m casual games strategy it announced last year, saying it will develop a whopping 600 titles in the next few years. The company says that it has 25m unique users already playing its online games and, according to Yahoo, will host its titles on sites that target preschoolers, tweens, teenage boys and parents. www.viacom.com
ONTARIO, CANADA Ontario’s government has enhanced tax breaks for game production as part of its 2008 budget. Firms in the province now have longer to take advantage of the Ontario Interactive Digital Media Tax Credit, which has been extended until 2012 for small companies. At the same time, larger firms can now benefit from 25 per cent rebate on fee-forservice work, up five per cent. Plus, the region's Interactive Digital Media Fund will receive an additional $7million to help boost the number of games companies in the region. www.interactiveontario.com