Reports in the British press over the weekend suggest that the BBC may be considering greatly increasing its creation and promotion of video games.  Specifically, newspaper Scotland on Sunday is suggesting that a major announcement is expected at the Edinburgh Interactive Festival on August 14th.

Officials from German producer 10tacle Studios have announced a “strategic partnership” with British developer Climax, which will see the German company acquiring a 29 percent stake in Climax Group ordinary shares.  The new partnership will see the two companies jointly develop computer and video games in “specific genres”. 10tacle Studios, which also operates its own mobile phone division, is best known for producing PC titles such as Codename: Panzers and SimBin’s GTR series. The company has around 400 employees in Europe and Asia, with a turnover in 2006 of €29 million ($40.1m).

GamePro analyst Michael Pachter says it was development difficulties on Sony’s PlayStation 3 that forced Take-Two to delay Grand Theft Auto IV for both PS3 and Xbox 360.  "We think it is likely that the Rockstar team had difficulty in building an exceptionally complicated game for the PS3, and failed to recognize how far away from completion the game truly was until recently," Pachter said in a statement.

Redwood City, CA - In what's believed to be an industry first, Redwood City-based game developer and publisher Electronic Arts (EA) said that it has teamed with The Weather Channel to offer real-time weather conditions and updates in its newly released NCAA Football 08 game. The latest version of the popular college football game will use information from The Weather Channel Interactive (TWCI) -- transmitted through the Internet -- to reflect accurate, real-time weather conditions at NCAA stadiums.

Tokyo - Nintendo Co. Ltd.'s Wii game console outsold Sony Corp.'s PlayStation 3 by a ratio of over 4 to 1 in Japan in July, game magazine publisher Enterbrain said on Friday.

Federal agents on Wednesday raided businesses, storefronts, and residences in 16 states in a crackdown on the importation of illegal devices used to play counterfeit video games, InformationWeek reported.

Moscow - Video game developer and publisher Electronic Arts on Thursday announced the establishment of new operations in Russia

Washington - The Entertainment Software Association (ESA), a U.S. trade group of video game publishers and developers, said on Thursday that so far over 100,000 Americans have joined the Video Game Voters Network, a "coalition of voting-aged Americans who defend their choice of entertainment from unnecessary government regulation," formed to "educate and mobilize gamers on issues affecting computer and video games.

San Diego - Microsoft announced on Thursday that it will lower the cost of the HD DVD player add-on for its Xbox 360 video game console from $199 to $179, beginning Aug. 1.

New York - Sony's PlayStation 2 accounted for 42% of U.S. video game console usage during June, and PC gamers played Blizzard Entertainment's "World of Warcraft" more than four times as much as any other PC game during the month, according to the first data from Nielsen's new GamePlay Metrics service.

 
Related Links:
http://www.acclaim.com