MCV838 June 19th by Future PLC

THE BUSINESS OF VIDEO GAMES ISSUE 838 FRIDAY JUNE 19TH 2015

LADIES AND GENTLEMEN EA ON WHY FIFA 16 IS THE BIGGEST LEAP FOR THE SERIES YET P04

That’s more like it E3 delivers the games O Major blockbusters due every month from August until well into 2016

by Christopher Dring

COMING SOON: THE HIGHLIGHTS

UK retailers have hailed a ‘momentous’ E3, as the event delivered on the games the industry desperately needed. Big titles such as Uncharted 4, Zelda, The Division, Dead Island 2 and Quantum Break had all been moved out of 2015 earlier this year, leading stores to tell MCV that E3 had to provide more games to bolster a lean release schedule. The show saw a number of major announcements, including a fourth Fallout title that will arrive

This has been a momentous E3. A real win for the games industry. on November 10th, plus huge new releases that will be landing on shelves from as early as August. “We are delighted,” said GAME category manager Charlotte Knight. “The more regular this content the better for GAME and for engaging our community who tell us that they want regular new releases. “It also oﬀers the chance to give each title bespoke marketing campaigns when we do not see a collision of content launches. October and November is traditionally a crowded period, so we completely support earlier releases.” A leading buyer at a major retailer added: “This has been a momentous E3. From August onwards, there’s just a regular stream of great triple-A content. A real win for the games industry.”

This year’s E3 has solved the release schedule drought suﬀ ered by games retail

Rare Replay Aug 4th, 2015 Gears of War: Ultimate Edition Aug 25th, 2015 Until Dawn Aug 26th, 2015 Dishonored: Definitive Edition Aug 28th, 2015 Metal Gear Solid V Sep 1st, 2015 Mad Max Sep 4th, 2015 Tearaway Unfolded Sep 11th, 2015 Super Mario Maker Sep 11th, 2015 Forza Motorsport 6 Sep 15th, 2015 Pro Evolution Soccer 2016 Sep 18th, 2015 FIFA 16 Sep 25th, 2015 Skylanders Superchargers Sep 25th, 2015 LEGO Dimensions Sep 29th, 2015 Rock Band 4 Oct 6th, 2015 Uncharted: Nathan Drake Collection Oct 9th Rainbow Six: Siege Oct 13th, 2015 Guitar Hero Live Oct 20th, 2015 Assassin’s Creed Syndicate Oct 23rd, 2015 Halo 5: Guardians Oct 27th, 2015 Need for Speed Nov 3rd, 2015 Call of Duty: Black Ops III Nov 6th, 2015 Fallout 4 Nov 10th, 2015 Rise of the Tomb Raider Nov 10th, 2015 Star Wars Battlefront Nov 20th, 2015 Trackmania Turbo Nov 27th, 2015 XCOM 2 Nov, 2015 Disney Infinity 3.0 Q3/Q4, 2015 Just Cause 3 Dec 1st, 2015 Xenoblade Chronicles X Dec 4th, 2015 Hitman Dec 8th, 2015 StarFox Zero Q4, 2015 Mario Tennis Ultra Smash Q4, 2015 Tony Hawk’s Pro Skater 5 2015 Dark Souls III Early 2016 Mirror’s Edge Catalyst Feb 23rd, 2016 Tom Clancy’s The Division Mar 8th, 2016 Project Morpheus Q1/Q2, 2016 Plants vs Zombies: Garden Warfare 2 Spring, 2016 Dishonored 2 Spring, 2016 Doom Spring, 2016 ReCore Spring, 2016 Ratchet & Clank Spring, 2016 Uncharted 4 Spring, 2016 Street Fighter V Spring, 2016

PLUS THE RACING GAME RENAISSANCE GET READY FOR GAMESCOM

CHEAT SHEET

Market Data Revenue shoots up 83 per cent week-onweek as The Elder Scrolls Online launches £20m

Xbox’s Nichols says its price drop and the ability to play 360 games will help it compete with Sony

£15m

£10m

£9.7m 338,223 units

£5m

£7m 248,828 units

£12.8m 364,465 units

Microsoft targets Xbox 360 owners with backward compatibility announcement by Christopher Dring

Week Ending Week Ending Week Ending May 30th June 6th June 13th

UK RETAIL TOP 10

THE ELDER SCROLLS ONLINE

BETHESDA

LEGO Jurassic World

Warner Bros

The Witcher III: Wild Hunt

Payday 2: Crimewave Edition

Grand Theft Auto V

FIFA 15

Call of Duty: Advanced Warfare

Splatoon

Battleﬁeld Hardline

Farming Simulator 15

Bandai Namco 505 Games Rockstar EA Activision Blizzard Nintendo EA Koch Media

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PRE-ORDER TOP 10

BATMAN ARKHAM KNIGHT DAY ONE EDITION + DLC WARNER BROS

Fallout 4 (PS4)

Arkham Knight Day One Edition + Harley Quinn DLC (XO) Warner

Uncharted: The Nathan Drake Collection (PS4)

Bethesda Sony

Fallout 4 (XO)

Bethesda

Amiibo Pikmin and Olimar (Wii U)

Nintendo

Amiibo Bowser Jr (Wii U)

Nintendo

Amiibo Dr Mario (Wii U)

Nintendo

Metal Gear Solid V Day 1 + Steel Book (PS4)

FIFA 16 (PS4)

June 19th 2015

MICROSOFT has ramped up in its battle to convince Xbox 360 gamers not to defect to PlayStation. The platform holder’s backwards compatibility announcement at E3 was designed to try and convince some of the 84m Xbox 360 owners to stick with Microsoft. The platform holder, which has called this year’s line-up the biggest in the company’s history, continues to struggle in the face of a resurgent PlayStation. But corporate VP and CMO Mike Nichols believes this year’s lineup, backwards compatibility and the recent price drop to £299, will allow the ﬁrm to claw back ground on Sony in the UK. “If you are an Xbox 360 customer, we just put our best foot forward about why now is a good time to upgrade to Xbox One,” he told MCV.

“Between the games you own ultimately being able to work on the new system, and the exclusives line-up we have, as well as the third-party games where we have some exclusive oﬀers there... if you take the totality of it, that’s why we said this is the best games line-up in Xbox history. Those things, combined with the permanent price drop to £299, means that now is a good time to move across. “As a marketing guy I was worried that maybe there was a bit too much hyperbole when we were saying this was the greatest games line-up in Xbox history. But we certainly will deliver on the claim. In fact, if you think about everything we are doing, perhaps we are underselling, especially when you take into account some of the third party games we didn’t show on stage at E3. It might be the best games lineup for a console ever.”

Konami EA

Fallout 4 ‘must not miss 2015 release date’ BETHESDA’S Fallout 4 must arrive this side of Christmas as promised, say UK retailers. Triple-A titles have continued to slip out of 2015, including the likes of Uncharted 4, Dead Island 2, Zelda, Quantum Break, The Division and more, weakening what had once promised to be a blockbuster end to the year. So the announcement that Fallout 4 will arrive on November 10th is welcome news to physical retailers. “It’s really important that Fallout 4 hits this year and doesn’t become yet another marquee title that slips into 2016,” said the sales boss of Simply Games Steve Moore. “It’s very

encouraging that Bethesda has announced a date so early on for Fallout 4. To bring it out within days of this year’s Call of Duty shows massive faith in the title. Early indications are that Fallout 4 will be one of the biggest releases of the year if they nail the date.” The game’s pre-orders are already sky high, according to Green Man Gaming and GAME “When Bethesda Game Studio launches a new game, it is really is a deﬁning moment for the world of video games and we expect sales of Fallout 4 to surpass those of Skyrim,” said GAME’s third party content manager Mandip Bhachoo.

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CHEAT SHEET

THE EDITOR

Ubisoft: We will be a VR industry leader by Christopher Dring PUBLISHER Ubisoft is the first major third-party publisher to back virtual reality. The firm is developing multiple VR projects with an aim of becoming an ‘industry leader’ in the technology. Ubisoft’s stance comes in contrast to some of its rivals, who have decided to wait and see before investing significantly in VR. Ubisoft announced that Trackmania will receive VR support, but outside of that it only announced a handful of tech demos - Eagle Flight, a Rabbids Theme Park ride and a scene from Far Cry 3. Nevertheless, the publisher promises there will announce ‘multiple projects’ in the months to come. “These projects are just the beginning. Ubisoft has a reputation

for being an innovator and leader for all new platforms and technologies,” said David Votypka, creative director at Ubisoft’s Red Storm Studio. “And that is going to be the case with VR as well. Where it is appropriate we will bring our brands to VR and create new brands where necessary, all with the goal of becoming an industry leader in amazing virtual reality experiences.” Ubisoft Montreal boss Yanis Mallat added: “Ubisoft has always taken certain risks with the games we create, some pay oﬀ, and some of them don’t. But each time, regardless of the outcome, we learn something from them “We invested early on Wii and Wii U with games in diﬀerent genres. And we are one of the only big publishers to invest money in our team’s passion projects.”

UBISOFT’S GAMBLE COULD BE A GAME CHANGER FOR VR

R has unquestionably been the most hotly debated topic in Los Angeles this week. There are those that will vehemently insist that VR will be a motion controller fad at most. That pricey peripherals never work and that virtual reality headsets are destined to go down the same route as 3D or second screen gaming. Then there are those on the other side of the debate. The ones that will tell you that VR is a platform not a peripheral. That it will change the way games are played and be a permanent revolution akin to HD or analogue sticks or touch screens. The truth is, we just won’t know what VR will do until its makers stop tinkering with it and put it out there for consumers to buy. But what will be crucial, as is the case with any new technology, is the content. VR need games, good games, and its biggest issue thus far is that not enough of the big guys have been willing to back it. There are a massive amount of VR developers out there now, but they’re primarily independent studios backed with venture capital funding. VR has yet to receive signiﬁcant support from the likes of EA or Activision. Take-Two has even openly said it won’t be the ﬁrst to release a VR game, instead adopting a ‘wait and see’ approach. Yet if everyone adopts a ‘wait and see’ approach, then nothing will ever happen. Someone has to roll the dice and see if it can work.

Red Storm’s Votypka (above) and Montreal’s Mallat (left) have high hopes for Ubisoft’s VR output

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If everyone adopts a ‘wait and see’ approach to virtual reality then nothing will ever happen. Someone needs to roll the dice. Of course, it was Ubisoft that took on that challenge. This is the firm that was first on Wii, and in a big way. This is the business that backed Kinect and PlayStation Move and Wii U from the moment the tech was announced. Some of this paid dividends, others did not. But as Ubisoft’s Yannis Mallat said at E3 this week, even the failures have been worthwhile lessons. Every studio at Ubisoft has a VR development kit. The company’s Red Storm development unit is solely working on multiple virtual reality projects. This is exactly the sort of backing Valve, Oculus and PlayStation have needed. I won’t pretend that VR will be the next big revolution in video games. It’s not cheap and the industry’s history is littered with high profile failures. But the technology now has the makers of HalfLife, Assassin’s Creed and Uncharted tinkering with it, and this will prove crucial in the sector’s efforts to convince the VR sceptics. cdring@nbmedia.com

June 19th 2015

INTERVIEW NICK CHANNON, EA

‘Female players are one of the most important additions we’ve ever made to FIFA’ Nick Channon, senior producer for FIFA 16, claims this year’s entry might be the biggest leap forward for the football franchise yet. Matthew Jarvis finds out why

ver more than two decades, the FIFA series has made hundreds of additions to its virtual recreation of the beautiful game. From ‘97’s six-a-side indoor matches and 2001’s one-button ‘hack’ fouling to 2002’s cardcollecting system and 10’s Manager Mode, there’s little that EA’s monster sports IP hasn’t embraced. Or so it would seem. In reality, there has been one glaring omission from each and every FIFA instalment released to date: female players. Despite the first FIFA Women’s World Cup taking place two years before EA’s 1993 franchise debuted, women have been absent from all 59 FIFA titles. This finally changes with FIFA 16. HERE COME THE GIRLS It may be a little late, but adding female teams to FIFA 16 comes at a prime time for football fans. The latest Women’s World Cup kicked off in Canada earlier this month, and has already garnered more press attention than previous women’s tournaments. The first set of women’s teams to come to the game will be a dozen national sides: Germany, USA, France, Sweden, England, Brazil, Canada, Australia, Spain, China, Italy and Mexico. “We wanted the best players, which is why we went with international teams,” explains senior producer Nick Channon. “Fundamentally, we’re going to let the game speak for itself.” EA announced the addition with a star-studded teaser trailer, featuring a host of famous faces such as Canadian forward Christine Sinclair and England captain Steph Houghton.

June 19th 2015

The unveiling was plagued by some detractors, who reacted with misogynistic comments and claims that the female teams would result in corners cut elsewhere during development. It even prompted EA COO Peter Moore to lament such ‘vitriol’. However, Channon says this was the minority. “We’re really pleased with the reaction. It’s been fairly overwhelmingly positive. As it should be.” It’s still early days for women in FIFA, with club teams not currently set to appear in this year’s entry – Channon hints that they will be added in following titles. But getting them in the game at all has been long overdue. Channon states that the delay in diversity was down to the team’s drive to make sure the female players were able to stand on their own two feet – and be more than just male competitors in drag. “We’ve been wanting to do this for quite a while, but we wanted to make sure that they played authentically – we got the body scaling right to make them look authentic and so on,” he details. “We wanted to go about it all the right way and, for us as a developer, that was about making sure that when we put women in the game, it was authentic as possible.” This included bringing in American striker Abby Wambach, the top female international scorer of all time with 170 goals, who lent her motion-captured movements to the new female models in the game. Afterwards, pro players from around the world were face-scanned to ensure their likenesses were on par with their male counterparts. The desire for authenticity does mean that male and female sides

ALL ABOARD INTRODUCING women to FIFA 16 isn’t the only step senior producer Nick Channon and his team are taking to be more inclusive. The title also sees the addition of the FIFA Trainer: an integrated teaching system that will help players both new and old dig into the game’s mechanics by providing contextual button prompts during matches. “It’s been something we’ve been researching and working on for a while,” Channon explains. “There have been a number of things that we’ve done in the last few years to help people learn the game. “The problem was, especially for new players, that once the game came together, you kind of forgot the things you’d learned because there’s so much going on. “To truly teach people the game they needed to be

If we want to be the most authentic football game around, women need to be part of that. Nick Channon, EA

learning while playing. People don’t really want to go through tutorials; it’s not what you want to do in any game by choice. “There are some games that do a very good job of teaching you while playing, and that’s what we wanted to do. “It’s been through a lot of research. The idea was that everyone just wants to play the game – so let’s teach them while they’re playing. “There are multiple levels to it – you can set it to higher levels straight away – so you can learn things you didn’t know even if you know the game quite well. By having it be contextual – while we don’t display every mechanic – you will learn something. “It will be on for new players, and we’re looking at what the default will be for returning players, but you can switch it off as well.”

can’t face-off against each other, but the women’s sides are otherwise fully integrated into the title. “We as a development team are incredibly happy with how the feature has come together and we wanted to make sure there were multiple ways to play – with kickoff, tournament mode, playing online and so on,” Channon continues. “As producer, I couldn’t be happier with how we ended up bringing women to this year’s title. “It’s probably one of the most important additions we’ve ever made to the series – certainly during the last five years. The

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NICK CHANNON, EA INTERVIEW

12 national women’s sides will be added to this year’s FIFA

women’s game has become very popular and the growth of it in the last few years has been huge. If we want to be the most authentic football game around, which we do, women need to be part of that.”

some we just can’t do. We’re not animating the hair on the older consoles and body scaling is not in any way as elaborate as it is on the new machines. The female players still look great on those consoles; we just haven’t been able to do quite the nuances that we have on PS4 and Xbox One.” Xbox 360 and PS3 have declined in popularity rapidly since the launch of the new machines, while FIFA 16 is not coming to Nintendo or handheld platforms – the first such occurrence for the franchise in 15 years. Could FIFA be due for an early departure from the older home consoles? “I can speak for this year and what we did last year,” responds Channon. “We are still investing in innovating in PS3 and Xbox 360, regarding gameplay in particular, but the philosophy will be to focus on the high-end technology and not inhibit ourselves in any way. We will then take whatever we can to make sure that we’re still creating a really cool new experience for PS3

MAKING IT WORK Countless ‘Men Are From Mars, Women Are From Venus’ books may not always be true when trying to distinguish between the genders. But for FIFA 16, at least, introducing women to the pitch did require some special treatment, including improved hair animation and a complete rewrite of how body shape affects the physicality of players – male and female alike. These efforts will be most prominent on PS4 and Xbox One, with the aged power of the older hardware proving a limitation. “Some of the improvements will be coming to PS3 and Xbox 360,” explains Channon. “Not all of them;

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and Xbox 360. We did last year and we will continue to do that this year. The game will feel different and great again, and people will really enjoy it. “As for the decision as to whether we make games for certain consoles, there’s a variety of thought that goes into that, not just technology.” FOOTBALL FUTURE FIFA 16 is just the start for women in the series, and one that opens up the franchise to a brand new female demographic. For Channon, the addition is just the next step in bringing the franchise up to the standards of its real-life counterpart. “Fundamentally what we want to do is continue to innovate and make the best football game we can,” he concludes. “It sounds clichéd, but it’s as simple as that. “To make the most authentic and fun experience that we can, that’s the goal for FIFA; that’s what we’ve lived by for a long time now, and that will continue.”

June 19th 2015

DATA ANALYSIS Source Games and Charts compiled by GfK Chart-Track

DATA & RESEARCH The Elder Scrolls Online brings an end to Bandai Namco’s five-week run at the top BETHESDA’S The Elder Scrolls Online debuts at No.1 in the All Formats Top 40 and had the second biggest Week One sales of the year to date. The MMO is the third title to break the 100,000 unit Week One sales barrier this year, but it couldn’t surpass The Witcher III: Wild Hunt’s impressive debut. It did manage to beat EA’s Battleﬁeld Hardline’s Week One sales. The Elder Scrolls Online launched last April for PC, with the updated Tamriel Unlimited SKU coming to stores last week. This is Bethesda’s ﬁrst No.1 since Wolfenstein: The New Order in May 2014. Meanwhile, WARNER BROS’ LEGO Jurassic

World debuts in second place, having launched alongside its film counterpart. It is one of four LEGO games in the Top 40. Wii U-exclusive Splatoon drops further down the charts to No.8 as sales dip 44 per cent. But we could see a sales resurgent for the colourful shooter as a hardware bundle for the title launches today (June 19th). And topping the Steam charts for a second week is new Early Access title, Ark: Survival Evolved. The game launched on June 2nd and generated $10m in its first week. Meanwhile, Warner Bros’ Minecraft competitor LEGO Worlds drops five places to No.3

TOP 10 STEAM (GLOBAL)

01 TW 02 03 04 05 06 07 08 09 10

LW 02 06 04 RE RE RE 03 RE RE

ARK: SURVIVAL EVOLVED DEVELOPER: STUDIO WILDCARD PUBLISHER: STUDIO WILDCARD

TITLE PUBLISHER Grand Theft Auto V Rockstar Counter-Strike: Global Oﬀensive Valve The Witcher III: Wild Hunt CD Projekt RED Metro Redux Bundle Deep Silver Homeworld Remastered Collection Gearbox Wolfenstein: The New Order Bethesda LEGO Worlds Warner Bros Cities Skylines Paradox Interactive Borderlands: The Pre-Sequel + Season Pass 2K Games

TOP 40 UK RETAIL 01

THE ELDER SCROLLS ONLINE BETHESDA FORMATS: PS4/XO/PC

TW 02 03 04

LW NEW 02 03

Title LEGO Jurassic World The Witcher III: Wild Hunt Payday 2: Crimewave Edition

Format Publisher PS4, XO, PS3, 360, PC Warner Bros PS4, XO, PC Bandai Namco/CD Projekt RED PS4, XO 505 Games

05 06 07 08 09 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 26 27 28 29 30 31 32 33 34 35 36 37 38 39 40

RE 04 06 05 10 07 08 09 11 12 14 15 17 16 19 18 20 22 21 25 24 RE 23 37 13 28 27 RE 26 33 30 RE 34 35 38 RE

Grand Theft Auto V FIFA 15 Call of Duty: Advanced Warfare Splatoon Battleﬁeld Hardline Farming Simulator 15 Destiny Minecraft: Xbox Edition Project CARS Minecraft: PlayStation Edition Dying Light Mortal Kombat X Wolfenstein: The Old Blood Halo: The Master Chief Collection Terraria Forza Horizon 2 WWE 2K15 LEGO Batman 3: Beyond Gotham LEGO Marvel Super Heroes Watch Dogs Disney Inﬁnity 2.0 Pro Evolution Soccer 2015 The Sims 4 Assassin’s Creed Unity Far Cry 4 Plants vs Zombies: Garden Warfare The Amazing Spider-Man 2 The Evil Within Middle-Earth: Shadow of Mordor Mario Kart 8 Super Smash Bros Skylanders: Trap Team Resident Evil Revelations 2 The Crew Bloodborne The LEGO Movie Videogame

PS4, XO, PS3, 360, PC Rockstar PS4, XO, PS3, 360, 3DS, Vita, PC EA PS4, XO, PS3, 360, PC Activision Blizzard Wii U Nintendo PS4, XO, PS3, 360, PC EA PS4, XO, PS3, 360, PC Koch Media PS4, XO, PS3, 360 Activision Blizzard XO, 360 Microsoft PS4, XO, PC Bandai Namco/Slightly Mad Studios PS4, PS3, Vita Sony PS4, XO, PS3, 360, PC Warner Bros PS4, XO, PC Warner Bros PS4, XO, PS3, 360, PC Bethesda XO Microsoft PS4, XO, PS3, 360, PC 505 Games/Merge XO, 360 Microsoft PS4, XO, Wii U, PS3, 360, PC 2K Games PS4, XO, Wii U, PS3, 360, 3DS, Vita, DS, PC Warner Bros PS4, XO, Wii U, PS3, 360, 3DS, Vita, DS, PC Warner Bros PS4, XO, Wii U, PS3, 360, PC Ubisoft PS4, XO, PS3, 360, Wii Disney PS4, XO, PS3, 360, PC Konami PC EA PS4, XO, PC Ubisoft PS4, XO, PS3, 360, PC Ubisoft PS4, XO, PS3, 360, PC EA PS4, XO, PS3, 360, PC Activision Blizzard PS4, XO, PS3, 360, PC Bethesda PS4, XO, PS3, 360, PC Warner Bros Wii U Nintendo Wii U Nintendo PS4, XO, Wii U, PS3, 360, Wii Activision Blizzard PS4, XO, PS3, 360, PC Capcom PS4, XO, 360, PC Ubisoft PS4 Sony PS4, XO, Wii U, PS3, 360, 3DS, Vita, DS, PC Warner Bros

Week ending June 13th

June 19th 2015

DEVELOPER: BETHESDA

Week ending June 13th

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MARKETING

[INFO] Formats: PS4, Xbox One, PS3, Xbox 360, PC Released: June 24th Publisher: PQube Developer: Milestone Distributor: CentreSoft

CAMPAIGN OF THE WEEK

Contact: 01216 253 388

THIS WEEK: MOTOGP 15 TWO-WHEELED racing title MotoGP 15 is once again teaming up with BT Sport to get in front of motorcycle racing fans during this year’s race weekends. This includes not just the main event, but the full build-up from Friday through to the mid-week MotoGP show. Publisher PQube will deliver a major online campaign online with BT Sport. The broadcaster recently reported a rise in audience numbers over race weekends. The traditional UK biking press will also be involved, PQube working closely with outlets including Bauer and MCN, the most widespread biking weekly in the UK. Lastly, PQube’s social media campaign began much earlier this year, beginning to target racing and MotoGP fans from early April. This eﬀort has continued to build as the game approaches launch day.

PRESENTS

IN THEIR OWN WORDS MOTOGP 15 is, without a doubt, the finest motorcycle simulation available on console and PC, with exceptional physics, handling and the kind of attention to detail fans will be ecstatic about. At a time when the racing genre is getting increasingly crowded, bike races offer a very different, almost refreshing experience for racing aficionados. MotoGP continues to be an excellent seller year-on-year, and this looks set to improve with a full new-generation version on both PS4 and Xbox One. We’re also seeing a great deal more interest in the sport in general. This has also been reflected in greater interest from supermarkets in the brand, with last year’s MotoGP 14 performing

GERAINT EVANS Head of Marketing, PQube

5 SECOND FACTS

exceptionally well and continuing to show strong sales throughout the year and well into 2015. With more formats on oﬀer this year, we expect to see a signiﬁcant jump in performance over 2014. This year has seen a huge leap forward for MotoGP’s much-loved career mode. The emphasis this year is very much on putting the player in control of as much of their MotoGP Career as possible. The mode isn’t a case of playing for an afternoon and rising to the top – it’s a real slow burn, demanding great skill. Players will be able to sink hundreds of hours into the in-depth mode, whether they’re courting new sponsors or unlocking new data packs for bikes. It’s everything series fans have been asking for.

Read and remember these stats so you can sound clever at the next Monday morning meeting...

$10M

$4.7M

35%

£2.99

Oculus is investing an extra $10 million into supporting indie developers on its virtual reality headset, the Rift

Castlevania spiritual successor Bloodstained: Ritual of the Night is now the most-funded game in Kickstarter history, with over $4.7m raised

Over a third of the preorders for Valve’s upcoming Steam Machines and Steam Link have already been sold, ahead of release in November

The UK rental prices for streaming service PlayStation Now have been revealed, starting at £2.99 and running up to £9.99

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ANKA Headset - PDP Design and manufacture the Oﬃcially licensed Microsoft – fully Wireless Headset for Xbox ONE europesales@pdp.com

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June 19th 2015

INSIGHT

Getting the most out of games streaming You can stop YouTubers and Twitch users from streaming your games, but should you? Rouse Legal partner ARTY RAJENDRA reveals the legalities and opportunities around this new form of games media

nline streaming can be extremely lucrative. A recent piece by Forbes reported that streamers can earn up to $100,000 a year streaming games like StarCraft and Magic: The Gathering. Is this fair? What are the pros and cons of developers and publishers asserting their IP rights? There is no doubt that unauthorised online streaming for commercial purposes amounts to IP infringement. The InfoSoc Directive requires EU Member States to give copyright owners – usually the games publisher – the exclusive right to authorise or prohibit any communication to the public, including by electronic means, of their copyright works. The Court of Justice of the European Union has held in the context of TV broadcasting that online streaming is a communication to the public. Therefore game streaming is actionable and publishers are able to stop it. Downloading, uploading and hosting Let’s Play videos is also likely to involve copying the bundle of copyright works which make up a game. This too amounts to copyright infringement or, in certain circumstances, facilitating copyright infringement. Online streaming may also involve trade mark infringement, as the game’s name and characters,

June 19th 2015

particularly in large well-known franchises, are often protected. Any unauthorised use of those trade marks will be an infringement, although there is a defence if the use relates to the brand owner’s own product and is in accordance with honest commercial practices. PRO STREAMING So why aren’t publishers taking action to prevent streaming? As we have seen several times, publishers are careful not to invoke their IP rights in a way that upsets gamers; enforcing directly against streamers could be seen as unduly restrictive. Publishers could take a cue from the music and film industries and try a different route by going after the intermediaries, such as thirdparty websites hosting infringing content. Those industries regularly obtain injunctions against ISPs, blocking access to websites hosting pirated films or music – and the law is so developed in this area that the ISPs rarely object to such injunctions. But publishing companies have arguably gone one step better and are actively engaging with streaming

There is no doubt that unauthorised online streaming for commercial purposes amounts to IP infringement. Arty Rajendra, Rouse Legal

Actively engaging with streamers has allowed publishers to ensure fair IP use

websites. This ensures fair use of IP and revenue sharing from streaming. Twitch counts Microsoft and Sony amongst its commercial partners. Other gaming companies work closely with YouTube to police videos and obtain fair recompense. This seems a good way of keeping the publishers, streamers, viewers and websites happy. Streaming can also have a positive effect on the public awareness of the game. As reported in MCV, streaming by PewDiePie of Skate 3 renewed public interest to such an extent that EA was asked to reprint copies of the four-year-old game to meet demand. Traditional forms of advertising or promotion are very unlikely to lead to such a resurgence in popularity. SPORTING LICENCES eSports presents a similar challenge. From an IP perspective, there may not be copying as such, but the public performance of a game’s soundtrack amounts to copyright infringement of both the sound recording and the musical work. Reproduction of the soundtrack in front of a live audience needs consent. eSports fixtures are also avidly watched online and that would trigger the engagement of the communication right and the need for a licence. But again, these are great tournaments and rather than preventing these events, publishers are keener to get in on the action and sponsor them or put on their own events – thereby controlling the revenue stream. IP is hugely important for game developers and publishers. What is difficult is balancing publishers’ right to fair IP monetisation, while also keeping gamers happy.

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PLAYSTATION UK MCV AWARDS WINNER

Playing to win This year, PlayStation walked away with not one, but two of the marketing prizes from the MCV Awards. Alex Calvin catches up with Sony’s game marketing gurus Congratulations on picking up two of the marketing prizes at this year’s awards. What are your proudest moments from the last twelve months? Murray Pannell, marketing director: I’m very proud of how we worked with key third party partners throughout the year, especially around Watch Dogs, Destiny, Grand Theft Auto V and Far Cry 4 to over-index on market share for software attach and hardware sell-through around these key launches. And our Black Friday and Christmas plans were a real test of our ability as a coordinated marketing and sales team to roll out dynamic deals, supported with continued above-the-line advertising support. The PlayStation 4 is still enjoying a rather healthy lead in the UK. What contribution has your marketing had on this? Richard Keen, head of product marketing: We’ve undoubtedly been aided by the fact that PS4 is the superior device compared to our existing competition. Consumers have voted in numerous awards to demonstrate this, as well as by buying the console at a rate we’ve never seen in the UK before. Our biggest marketing challenge has been to ensure we maintain clear, focused communication on PS4’s benefits. Where do smaller platforms like the Vita and PlayStation TV fit into your overall plan? Keen: They are an important element of our eco-system. Remote Play is a powerful and

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with our products and services were possible. Our main challenge is undoubtedly to meet this at retail without comprising on the main product USPs. We are spending a lot of time and effort promoting our range of digital products at retail. Gamers are clearly becoming increasingly comfortable with downloading digital content. So we are constantly improving our visibility and routes to market both online and through retail channels, and this is something we’ve committed to taking forward. We continue to work closely with our retail partners to ensure they have all the information and assets required to communicate and educate their customers about the great digital games and also the benefits of PlayStation Plus membership.

PlayStation’s Keen (above) with the Marketing Team prize..

...while Buahin (left) collected the Trade Marketing Award. Both are big wins for marketing boss Pannell (in set)

unique feature that provides our players with new ways to enjoy their PS4 experience and as such - with every PS4 we sell we gain a customer who is more likely to purchase a supporting device. This is an opportunity from which all our partners can benefit.

Our biggest challenge is ensuring we maintain clear focused communications on the PS4’s benefits.

What would you say the challenges are in marketing games at retail at the moment? Rose Buahin, head of trade marketing: We adopt a ‘show not tell approach’ at retail and encourage consumers to engage

Richard Keen, PlayStation UK

There are a number of products like Guitar Hero, Rock Band, as well as toys-to-life figures coming to stores this year. Are you worried about competing for shelf space? Buahin: Pressure on shelf-space is always a factor, especially in the build up to the key selling period around Christmas, but in many ways, all these new products will help to drive platforms sales further - and illustrate that PlayStation is the best place to play. We welcome the opportunity to host these products in our console bays at retail and work with the respective third party partner with a consolidated strategy. We have high consumer demand and appeal for PlayStation products, so we’ll be working hard to secure our fair share of shelf space.

JJune 19th 2015

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RACING’S RESURGENCE

The racing game renaissance After years of the same old racing IP, suddenly there’s a plethora of new franchises in the sector such as Project CARS, DriveClub and The Crew. What has caused this spike in new racing titles? Alex Calvin talks to the experts

he racing genre can be incredibly difficult to keep up with. One moment it is among the biggest sectors and everyone is releasing their own driving game; the next moment, the bubble bursts, titles start underperforming, the big publishers lose interest in the sector and declare it dead. Repeat ad infinitum. In recent years, the genre has all been about big sequels like Dirt, Gran Turismo and Forza. And that’s largely due to the racing collapse of 2010. Back then, confidence was so high in the genre that both Disney and Activision went headto-head with new IP. Disney had Split/Second, while Activision launched Blur. Both were met with great reviews, and both flopped, resulting in the closure of two top UK developers. This reluctance and hesitation towards the racing genre was something that Slightly Mad experienced when pitching Project CARS to publishers four years ago. “When we started with Project CARS, we went to Activision and all the other big companies and we said that we had this cool idea for a racing game. We were hot off the heels of making EA’s Need for Speed: Shift 2, we’ve been making games for ten years like this and they’ve all done really well,” creative director Andy Tudor explains. “We thought we had everything going for us. But all the publishers were saying that Project CARS was way too risky, that the costs involved for the licensing for cars and tracks is a lot of money. We have a new IP, which is scary as

June 19th 2015

people don’t know who we were, we’re trying to take on the big guys – Forza and Gran Turismo – how could we ever hope to compete?”

Slightly Mad’s Tudor (below) and Codemasters’ Robinson (bottom)

RISING CONFIDENCE Some of the concerns surrounding the racing genre seems to have dissipated in recent years, and the sector appears to be in rude health. In the last twelve months Sony released DriveClub – a title that was the top-selling single-platform game last year – while Ubisoft launched The Crew and Slightly Mad released Project CARS. Both saw big sales numbers. “The racing genre is currently very vibrant on every major platform – from console and PC through to mobile – and new games are entering the market, while old favourites continue to perform well,” Codemasters’ director of marketing Dan Robinson says. “There are some great experiences out there right now for all kinds of players. It feels that there’s a renewed interest and renaissance amongst players for racing games.” He continues: “The popularity of the current generation of consoles has given many people renewed faith but racing is a tough and complex category to enter and very easy to get wrong. You have to meticulously build the right product, and the gap between success and failure is enormous, because the cost and complexity of building a very large, contentrich racing game and engine is huge, before you even consider marketing budgets.”

Four years ago, publishers said Project CARS was too risky. They didn’t think we could compete with Gran Turismo. Andy Tudor, Slightly Mad Studios

PQube’s marketing boss Geraint Evans adds: “The last couple of years have been fantastic for racing game fans as there’s such a decent amount of choice across a range of formats. We’re also seeing the racing game communities like Team VVV really strengthen in numbers and activity. There’s a definitely a renewed hunger for the genre.” So, after years of low confidence within the racing genre, why are we seeing so many new IP launching? “It’s always easier to release a new franchise early in a consoles life cycle,” Evans says. “People are buying new hardware and tend to be much more open to trying new experiences - you’re always going to see the genre stalwarts performing well, but in the opening couple of years of a console’s life, while the catalogue of games is relatively low, it’s much easier for something fresh to get noticed.” Robinson adds: “There’s a relatively uncongested market, while developers spin up their established franchises, which provides a window for new players to join the genre, and an opportunity for new IPs to establish themselves early in the cycle,” he says. “Normally, hardware stepping forward enables something that wasn’t possible on previous generations, so the new IP can offer something genuinely exciting, with higher fidelity.” (See Works of Art boxout) THE INSIDE TRACK And it isn’t just these new IPs, either. Publishers argue that there is an opportunity for slightly smaller racing franchises, such as

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RACING’S RESURGENCE

No-one wanted to publish Project CARS four years ago. It sold 1m units globally in three weeks

PQube’s MotoGP and MXGP titles, as well as Codemasters’ F1 series. “Racing fans will always want a variety of different types of experiences and it’s our job to provide this,” Robinson says. “Fans generally embrace games which can bring something new to the genre, whether that is a deeper experience, or can capture some aspect of racing that is missing from the market. We’ve always worked hard to ensure that with F1, Grid and Dirt, we do just that.” Evans adds: “The opportunities lie in offering a racing experience that sits outside what the main titles are doing. Competing with Forza or Gran Turismo or Need For Speed is always going to be hard - but racing is such a broad genre that you don’t necessarily need to go head-tohead with those titles. There are loads of different motorsports, and a wide range of vehicle categories you can explore, many that have huge audiences and dedicated core fanbases, but that also have decent appeal to wider audiences.”

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WORKS OF ART IT might have taken slightly longer than expected, but there are now a number of new racing franchises on Sony and Microsoft’s fancy new hardware. And of course, racing games, are an excellent way of showing off the graphical power of the new machines. “People want to push what the new hardware is capable of. Racing games are ideal for that,” Slightly Mad creative director Andy Tudor says. “Cars are made of metal and glass and things like that, and computers are really good at rendering those really, really accurately. It’s not like you’re doing a face with emotions and hair and all that. They are quite a rigid object. When new consoles come out, racing games are one of the go-to genres to really showcase what they are capable of. It’s nothing more than that. There are always loads of new

Competing with Forza or Gran Turismo is always going to be hard – but racing is a broad genre. Geraint Evans, PQube

racing games out early in the console cycle.” Robinson adds: “Obviously for platform-exclusive titles like DriveClub and Forza, showing off the new hardware is a big motivation - there’s no better way to show off new hardware than shiny, curvy beautiful cars in gorgeous environments. But the racing games launched so far have been more than superficial experiences; which is great for fans and still ticks all the boxes for showing off new hardware to envious friends.” And PQube’s head of marketing Geraint Evans agrees: “For as long as I can remember, nothing shows off new console hardware like a shiny new car,” he says. “It’s always an excellent baromoeter for how far we’ve come - from the quality of your reflections, to tarmac textures, weather and lense flair.”

June 19th 2015

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HANS VAN BRAKEL, SOEDESCO INTERVIEW

Meet the industry’s next big indie publisher Physical and digital publisher Soedesco is fast making a name for itself in the indie publishing scene. Alex Calvin finds out more about the Dutch specialist from executive manager Hans van Brakel

here’s a good chance you haven’t heard of Soedesco. The firm was founded in 2001 and was focusing on creating accessory and game bundles for publishers and retailers But now it is joining the growing ranks of firms publishing indie games, competing against the likes of 505 Games and Team 17. “There’s been a big growth in the indie scene in the last couple of years and we’ve seen that the bigger publishers are only focusing on their own projects because the risk on smaller projects is too high,” executive manager Hans van Brakel says. “That creates a new problem. A lot of developers don’t know anything about the business side of things. When we started doing the publishing, we looked at the market, looked at what the opportunities were and saw that at the moment it’s important to form a partnership with a developer, to look together at what the risks are for them, and where the opportunities to get the most out of their games. “We’re offering developers what they need. We are asking them what they need to get to market. With some, we only help with a physical release; for others we do a Steam release, we do marketing and PR, we do sales, we’re doing deals with Sony, Microsoft and Nintendo. We’re capable of doing QA and localisation. We offer a range of services.” As well as helping market and distribute other people’s titles, Soedesco is beginning to fund its own games. Recently it purchased the IP for adventure

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title Adam’s Venture from Vertigo Games – and is working on a new release, entitled Adam’s Venture: Origins – and it is funding [football management-cum-RPG] Soccer Legends, too. “We have a few other projects coming up, too,” van Brakel says. “So we don’t just do physical distribution or digital distribution, marketing and PR – we want to have projects of our own.” Soedesco released Wild Season onto Early Access this year

PHYSICAL PROBLEMS Unlike some other indie publishers, Soedesco hasn’t turned its back on the physical retail space. “Of course with physical retail you don’t have the same margins, it’s a bit more expensive because there’s a higher cost of goods,” van Brakel says. “But there are a lot of consumers that just don’t want to buy digital downloads. For them it’s interesting to buy physical games. And there are lots of parents who buy games for their children, and they don’t buy them digital download codes, they want to buy them a game in-store. “They are not going to digital markets and checking out prices and seeing what the best deal is or waiting for the Steam Summer Sale. They just want to walk into a store and grab a game. There’s this big market for physical games in general, especially for indies because they aren’t counting on that revenue. For them it’s all just a bit of extra money.” He continues: “There are a lot of reasons that people still go

Developers shouldn’t be using Early Access for funding. That’s where things go wrong. Hans van Brakel, Soedesco

to physical stores. Nobody is debating whether to buy digital or physical. People who buy digital will buy digital, and those who buy physical will do that. They’re different markets.” But as well as physical retail, Soedesco is dabbling with Steam Early Access, and it recently launched Wild Season onto the scheme. Early Access has had its challenges, with players frustrated by the lack of pace on finishing games, such as DayZ. But it has its benefits, insists van Brakel. “Developers shouldn’t use Early Access for funding – that’s where things go wrong,” he says. Developers can learn a lot from Early Access. For example, in the first week of Wild Season, there were a lot of problems and bugs with the game, which they hadn’t checked at all. They learnt so much from doing Early Access that we are certain that in the end they will deliver a better product. “So if it’s for the learning experience, then it’s very good.”

June 19th 2015

INTERVIEW TIM ENDRES, KOELNMESSE

47 days to Gamescom The dust hasn’t even settled on E3, but already it’s time to think about the next major trade show. Alex Calvin catches up with project manager Tim Endres to find out what we can expect from Gamescom 2015 This Gamescom is the seventh. How would you evaluate the show’s success thus far? Gamescom is more than just a trade fair. It is the world’s largest event for interactive entertainment. It is the only event in the world that has the right offer for all players who are involved in the international games industry. The successful concept of Gamescom is based on four pillars: the business area, the entertainment area, the Gamescom city festival and the Game Developers Conference Europe. As such, Gamescom positions itself across the entire value chain with its different, individual platforms. With its wide spectrum of exhibits, it equally addresses developers, publishers, the trade and the consumers. The whole of Cologne becomes the entertainment Mecca for a week: at the exhibition grounds and - thanks to the Gamescom city festival - also in Cologne’s city centre. Since moving to Cologne in 2009, Gamescom has been a real success story, and we’ve built on that success every year. Gamescom began with a total of 458 exhibitors in 2009; last year‘s exhibitor figures were at 703. And the number of trade visitors has also increased year-on-year. In 2009, a total of 17,326 trade visitors used Gamescom as a business platform; by 2014, that number had risen to 31,500. Last year, a total of 335,500 visitors (including

June 19th 2015

space by 16,000 square metres compared to the previous year. Both exhibition areas of Gamescom are being increased. The entertainment area is being expanded to include Hall 5.1. This means that the exhibition space of the entertainment area will be around 12,000 square metres larger. The business area, which was formerly accommodated in Halls 4 and 5, is relocating to Halls 2, 3.2 and 4, whereby both floors of Halls 2 and 4 will be open. This means that the exhibition space

consumers) came to Gamescom, thereby confirming the fair’s status as the leading European business platform and the world’s biggest event for the games industry. Gamescom has ten per cent more floor space this year. What is the extra room allowing you to do? Due to the growing demand for exhibition space, the ‘biggest playground in the world’ will span 180,000 square metres this year. An increase of exhibition

335,500 people attended last year’s Gamescom

in the business area is being expanded by a further 4,000 square metres. The new hall layout leads to more efficient routes for the trade visitors. Up until now, there was one main corridor between both areas. This was located on the well-frequented central boulevard. In addition to this familiar corridor, in future there is going to be a second corridor, from the Piazza in the passage between Halls 3 and 4. Furthermore, the West Entrance, which had already been used as the trade visitors’ entrance in the past, is now positioned closer to the heart of the business area. Additional catering and lounge areas with entertainment value are intended to enhance the quality of stay. What can we expect from the show this year? All the indications for a successful Gamescom 2015 are very positive. Many renowned companies from all sectors of the games industry have already taken advantage of the first application stage to register. In addition, the line-up will include eSports presentations from Wargaming and Turtle Entertainment, among others. GAME Bundesverband (German Association for Games, Art, Media and Entertainment), Gaya, Marketpoint, Mifcom, Nvidia and Roccat will be using Gamescom 2015 as a business platform as well as a venue to showcase their new products. Around 90 per cent of the planned gross exhibition space is

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TIM ENDRES, KOELNMESSE INTERVIEW

Augmented and virtual reality headsets are finally coming consumers soon. What presence will this new tech have at Gamescom? Generally speaking, Gamescom is a platform for new products and concepts and is thus used as a showcase for trends by the games industry. It can be assumed therefore that these trends will be showcased at Gamescom. Precisely how and in what form VR and AR will be presented at the fair remains to be seen and even we will have to wait until the exhibitors reveal their line-ups, so we are equally excited to see just what manifestation of VR and AR will be presented at Gamescom.

Show organiser Koelnmesse is expecting high visitor numbers this year after a dip in attendance in 2014

now booked up. We are expecting a total of over 700 exhibitors from more than 40 countries. Due to the strong participation by exhibitors and the very positive booking status, we can assume that Gamescom visitors will once again be treated to spectacular new products and concepts and exceptional product presentations. Gaming fans from all over the world will have the opportunity to test the industry’s new products firsthand. Gamescom also offers the trade audience the world’s largest business area for interactive entertainment software. Sony isn’t holding a media briefing at Gamescom, instead moving its press conference to Paris Games Week. How do you think this will impact the show? Gamescom has established itself as a fixed part of the industry and its persuasive unique concept means it’s the only one of its kind in the world.

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Of course, we accept Sony’s decision not to hold an international press conference at Gamescom this year. This is because E3 and Gamescom are scheduled so close together. The organisation of Gamescom is decided jointly together with numerous committees, this also applies for the venue date. The key factor taken into account when planning the venue date of Gamescom is when the highest possible amount of attention can be achieved. A venue date during the summer holidays in Germany and the majority of the European countries enables many visitors to attend Gamescom and is thus in line with the aim of attracting the highest possible amount of attention Regarding the presence of Sony with a stand at Gamescom 2015, close negotiations are currently being held with Sony. In-line with previous years, Sony has reserved the corresponding amount of space.

At this year’s Gamescom we are expecting over 700 exhibitors from more than 40 countries. Tim Endres, Koelnmesse

How are you attracting new visitors to the show? One of the goals is to approach new attendees and target groups using a variety of activities. One element is the identification and an even more targeted approach of top trade buyers from trading companies across the whole of Europe. We are also pursuing this goal for Gamescom 2015. In addition, we are presenting Gamescom as part of our international roadshow to those markets identified as important by our exhibitors. Consistently important countries within Europe, the US, China and Korea, as well as important growth markets such as Brazil, are included in our ongoing internationalisation strategy. Last year’s Gamescom saw a slight decrease in attendance. Is this a concern? No, definitely not. For Gamescom 2015, we are once again expecting a high number of visitors. Ticket sales are healthy. As of mid-May we were sold out for Saturday private visitors. In general, the total number of visitors alone is not important. The quality of visitors and their quality of stay also plays a prominent role.

June 19th 2015

INTERVIEW KARLA PETT, BANDAI NAMCO

J-Stars in their eyes It may currently be basking in the chart-topping glory of The Witcher III and Project CARS, but Bandai Namco is far from abandoning its Japanese roots, and its next release is a fighting game based on long-running manga publication Shonen Jump. Alex Calvin finds out exactly what J-Star Victory Vs+ is

know what you’re probably thinking – what the devil is J-Stars Victory Vs+? Bandai Namco’s fighting title gathers characters from the long-running and hugely popular Japanese manga comic anthology Shonen Jump to celebrate the publication’s 45th anniversary. Think Super Smash Bros, but featuring a roster of Japanese comic book characters. J-Stars Victory Vs came out in Japan last year, and its Western debut – Vs+ – is an enhanced version of that title. “For anyone unfamiliar with the game, J-Stars Victory Vs+ brings together 32 licences to create a huge roster of 52 characters from series such as the well known and loved Dragon Ball Z to others that the UK might not have come across, like Rurouni Kenshin,” Bandai Namco product manager Karla Pett explains. “This is the game’s first outing in the West, but the Japanese release was very positively received and performed well when it was released out there last year.” BALLS OF STEEL Some of the 52-strong roster of playable fighters are better known than others. Present are characters from Dragon Ball, including leading man Goku, and the protaganist from ninja anime series, Naruto. And it’s these characters that Bandai Namco is focusing on to sell the game, to start with anyway. “Initially, we’ll be focusing on the better-known characters like Goku,” Pett explains.

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the title is a hit, could we see regular entries in the series? “Making this into an annual franchise would lose a little of the magic,” Pett explains. “Will it return in the future? At this time we don’t know in all honesty.”

Bandai Namco is focusing on more popular characters like Dragon Ball Vegeta and Goku to promote J-Stars

“But we’re hoping these characters will act as a gate to introduce people to new series that maybe they haven’t heard of before. When they take a closer look they’ll see characters they recognise but haven’t seen in a while, and so hopefully they’ll get even more out of the game than they initially thought.” She continues: “We’re focusing on communicating the game to the fans of these series and the fighting community. There are so many wonderful characters from varied backgrounds and with such different fighting styles that it really is a dream come true for anime and manga fans. It also gives people the chance to play as some of those lesser known characters that maybe won’t get their own games. “We’re making sure that this title gets the attention it deserves. It’s a love letter of sorts to anime and manga fans and we want them to play and enjoy it above all else.” As mentioned earlier, this is a special game, to celebrate Shonen Jump’s birthday. But if

You may not see it in the mainstream press, but anime and manga fandoms are alive and well. Karla Pett, Bandai Namco

ANIME-NATION J-Stars is going to speak to a very niche segment of the UK population. Anime and manga has a core, cult following, but just how big is the scene in the UK? “The anime and manga market’s visibility in UK consciousness fluctuates,” Pett explains. “But, as we’ve seen from shows like MCM Expo and Hyper Japan, there is a considerable audience out there and they’re not going anywhere. “You may not see it in mainstream press but the anime and manga fandoms are alive and well, and with streaming services like Daisuki.net (which is fairly new to the UK), CrunchyRoll, Netflix and Viewster increasing the access audiences have to Japanese shows – and the increasing public comfort with ‘geek culture’ – the market will only continue to grow.” And in spite of its recent Western success with the likes of Project CARS and The Witcher III: Wild Hunt – two titles that helped Bandai Namco achieve its first monthly UK publisher No.1 – the publisher isn’t going to abandon its roots. “We’re a Japanese company and our anime and manga titles are some fan’ favourites,” Pett says. “Plus, with the success of Dragon Ball Xenoverse, and franchises like the Tales Of series and Naruto, we definitely won’t be neglecting our Japanese heritage.”

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KARLA PETT, BANDAI NAMCO INTERVIEW

FIGHTING TALK COMPETITIVE gaming and eSports are booming at the moment, and fighting titles like Super Smash Bros are often played for huge prize pots. Is this something that Bandai Namco would like to see happen for J-Stars Victory Vs+? “While we don’t have any plans at the moment to make J-Stars Victory Vs+ a competitive title, if the interest is there and the players want to, and they drive that, we’ll support them,” Bandai Namco product manager Karla Pett says. “We’ve been doing a number of streams on Twitch for J-Stars Victory Vs+ and hope to do more.”

LIFE IN THE VITA J-STARS Victory Vs+ is coming to all current PlayStation platforms, including the Vita. This shouldn’t come as a huge surprise – Sony’s handheld has a very niche user base. But Bandai Namco says there are other factors at play. “The PlayStation Vita is a substantial piece of kit,” product manager Karla Pett insists. “Sony invested a lot into making a powerful, high spec handheld console and they have created a great piece of hardware that we’re proud to support. Plus, J-Stars Victory Vs+ is the perfect game to jump in and out of, especially with the new arcade mode, and what better way to do that than on the move?”

J-Stars brings together 52 characters from manga publication Shonen Jump, including Seiya from the Saint Seiya series

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June 19th 2015

MARKET MOVES

APPOINTMENTS

Nintendo UK’s Pearce leaves for Anki Marketing boss departs after 17 years O ITV hires industry vet David Miller O Curve picks up UKIE’s Enticknap ANKI | Nintendo UK marketing and PR boss SHELLY PEARCE has departed the platform holder, and is moving to toys-to-life specialist Anki Europe as senior marketing director. A Nintendo veteran, Pearce joined the firm in 1998 as UK PR and communications manager, before rising to head of European PR in 2001. She returned to the UK in 2012 as marketing and PR director, helping to launch the Wii U and 3DS. Nintendo’s UK GM SIMON KEMP will be overseeing the marketing team until Pearce’s replacement is found. “Shelly has been a key part of the Nintendo family and we are

Miller has over 15 years of experience within games, having held senior marketing roles at the likes of Bossa, Bandai Namco and Capcom. Most recently he has been doing marketing and business consultancy work for PR firm Indigo Pearl. At ITV, Miller is tasked with expanding its kids games in the digital market, and will be focusing on the recentlylaunched Thunderbirds Are Go. “David has vast experience of games development, marketing and distribution across all areas of the global digital games market,” said ITV’s EVP of kids content and distribution, STEVE GREEN. “David’s expertise will prove essential as we look to

very sorry to see her go,” said Kemp. “Shelly has played a key part in our communications team and we’d like to thank her for her ongoing commitment and drive.” Anki chief marketing officer CRAID RECHENMACHER added: “Shelly’s extensive marketing experience with one of the great games companies of our time is a welcomed addition to the Anki family. Her knowledge and expertise in the games and toysto-life markets will help amplify the awareness for Anki Overdrive.” ITV STUDIOS | The broadcaster has hired marketing veteran DAVID MILLER to the newly-created role of VP of digital games.

establish relationships in nonlinear content and gaming.” CURVE DIGITAL | The indie publisher has hired UKIE’s RICHIE ENTICKNAP as PR manager. Enticknap worked at the UK trade body since June 2013, having previously spent six months as a PR intern. “Richie’s experience working with a wide range of different developers will be invaluable as we continue to expand our indie catalogue,” Curve senior marketing manager ROB CLARKE said. Enticknap added: “I am excited to be joining Curve. As leaders in the world of indie publishing, I can’t wait to get stuck in.”

AROUND THE INDUSTRY SECRET SORCERY | Former members of DriveClub developer Evolution Studios have formed a new venture in North-West England. Called Secret Sorcery and based in St Helens, the firm will be focused on creating VR games. It will be headed up by Evolution co-founder and technical director Scott Kirkland, who is MD of the new developer. He is joined by four alumni from the studio. This isn’t to be confused with the VR-focused studio – also in North-West England and crewed by former Evolution staff – being opened by PlayStation. “We’d love to hear from creative and skilled developers who share our enthusiasm for VR gaming,” said Kirkland. “This is the beginning of something magical; we’re looking forward to sharing more exciting news over the coming weeks.”

June 19th 2015

BAD JUJU | The parent company of digital game distribution network Desura and game bundle seller Indie Royale has filed for bankruptcy. This follows news in May that Desura was behind on payments to game developers. Bad Juju acquired Desura from Linden Lab last November. AMAZON GAME STUDIOS | The development arm of the retail giant is recruiting for an ‘ambitious’ new PC game. According to Amazon Game Studio’s site, there are 70 jobs to be filled. RELOAD STUDIOS | The LA developer has secured investment of $2m from tech firm World Innovation Lab towards its current VR project. Reload was founded last year by former Infinity Ward developer Taehoon Oh.

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EDITORIAL CONTACTS

EDITORIAL CONTACTS Christopher Dring Editor

Michael French Publisher

cdring@nbmedia.com

mfrench@nbmedia.com

Ben Parﬁtt Associate Editor

Conor Tallon Account Manager

bparﬁtt@nbmedia.com

ctallon@nbmedia.com

Alex Calvin Staﬀ Writer

Sam Richwood Designer

acalvin@nbmedia.com

srichwood@nbmedia.com

Matt Jarvis Staﬀ Writer

Laura West Business Development Consultant

mjarvis@nbmedia.com

lwest@nbmedia.com

Production Executive: Elizabeth Parker eparker@nbmedia.com

Finance Manager: Michael Canham mcanham@nbmedia.com

Head of Operations: Stuart Moody smoody@nbmedia.com

Head of Design and Production: Kelly Sambridge ksambridge@nbmedia.com

Circulation: Lianne Davey ldavey@nbmedia.com

Saxon House, 6a St. Andrew Street, Hertford, Hertfordshire, England SG14 1JA Newbay Media specialises in tradededicated print and digital publishing for entertainment and leisure markets. As well as MCV, Newbay publishes Develop, PCR, ToyNews, Music Week, MI Pro, Audio Pro International and BikeBiz. It also has two onlineonly brands: Mobile Entertainment, dedicated to the growing mass market smartphone sector, and Licensing.biz, for everyone in the global licensing industry. It also runs a number of events including the MCV Industry Excellence Awards, the London Games Conference and the Games Media Awards.

US Correspondent Erik Johnson ejohnson@nbmedia.com

© Newbay Media 2015 All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording or any information storage or retrieval system without the express prior written consent of the publisher. The contents of MCV are subject to reproduction in information storage and retrieval systems.

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THE RETAIL ADVISORY BOARD MCV takes soundings from its Retail Advisory Board on the biggest issues in the industry. The current members are...

Charlotte Knight GAME

Steve Moore Simply Games

Jennifer Johnson Shop Direct

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Sarah Jasper The Hut

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Robert Lindsay Games Centre

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Niall Lawlor GameStop

Stephen Staley Robert Hennessy Paul Sulyok Gameseek John Lewis Green Man Gaming

Phil Browes HMV

Craig Watson Dixons Retail

James Cooke Argos

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June 19th 2015

INDIE INTERVIEW KRISTIAN ANDREWS Sponsored by

Breaking the ice It has just released its first game, dungeon crawler Barbara-Ian, but Studio OwlBear is ramping up for its second, more ambitious project: cyberpunk hacking title, Ice Breaker. Alex Calvin learns about the new game from animation director, Kristian Andrews

“T

he sky above the port was the colour of television, tuned to a dead channel.” So begins William Gibson’s 1984 novel Neuromancer, a seminal work that helped launched the cyberpunk genre of science fiction. It’s a movement that analyses the effects of tech on society and stars hackers, criminals and augmented humans. And it’s this genre that Studio OwlBear is hoping to recreate with its upcoming hacking game, Ice Breaker. “We wanted to take cyberpunk back to the source material and analyse the discrepancies,” animation director Kristian Andrews tells MCV. “With Gibson, there are so many concepts that he coined in terms of what we are experiencing in the internet generation, such as cyberspace. But there’s also a lot that he missed. None of the protagonists have mobile phones or anything – they’re relying on magnetic tapes and these obscure bits of obsolete tech. We were quite keen to bring that kind of stuff back to the genre and focus on the funny inconsistencies, and try and stay as true as possible to the source material.” LICENSE TO HACK OwlBear is clearly hugely indebted to Gibson’s work. On the firm’s website, there’s an image of a cyberspace deck [laptop] featuring the Ono Sendai logo – which is a hardware company from Neuromancer. So did the developers ever consider attempting to acquire the licence to those books? “That would be amazing,” Andrews says. “To secure those IP

June 19th 2015

Hacking title Ice Breaker is inspired by classic cyberpunk ﬁction

rights would be great. But I can’t imagine the Gibson estate will grant them to some tiny start-up indie studio. For now we won’t approach Gibson for any of the rights. And we’ll end up editing Ono Sendai off our cyberspace deck. At the moment it’s a bit of a springboard into the material, but we want to avoid any potential lawsuits. “We are making a homage to Gibson, but also all of the other cyberpunk greats that are out there. But we don’t want it to be an absolute carbon copy of any of that stuff because there has to be some creative room for us to express ourselves. We’re borrowing from a lot of this stuff but we’re trying to do things a bit differently from the way that other developers have with similar source material. We’re trying to cut out a little niche where we’re able to have a play in this big great genre playground where there are all these fun things to explore.”

We’re looking into how we can develop Ice Breaker in a professional way, and we’ll potentially be looking for publishers. Kristian Andrews, Studio OwlBear

GETTING THE GREENLIGHT Ice Breaker is, in fact, the firm’s

second game. OwlBear released its first, dungeon crawler BarbaraIan, on Steam Greenlight earlier this year. It was self-published, but the developer is keeping its options open for Ice Breaker. “Barbara-Ian was a real fun side project, to see if we could make and release a game,” Andrews says. “The joy of it has been doing things immediately and making things happen ourselves. We’ve come to the end of that creative journey and so we don’t see the advantage of bringing on a publisher at this stage. Had the timings been different, we might have explored the option of getting a publisher on board but it felt more like this fun little visceral experience that people are going to be playing for 30 minutes and then discarding. “We’ll probably look at Ice Breaker in a slightly different way. We have an idea that we are really proud of and we want to do it justice. We’re looking into how we can develop it in a professional way and potentially we will be looking to publishers and development funds to try and make it the best it can be.” He continues: “We’re just about to get a prototype out there for Ice Breaker. But it’s very much a proof of concept. In the next three months we hope to approach different publishers and look for opportunities to get it made to a level we feel it should be. The burden of responsibility is on us to show what we think is an experience that is fun to play. “If we don’t get it through that prototyping stage and realise it isn’t going to work, or isn’t going to be fun, then we’ll have a re-think. It’s a testing time for us.”

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Call our specialist sales team 01279 822 822 exertis.co.uk/home exertis.co.uk/home/store

MARKETPLACE

SHELF LIFE MCV speaks to Kevin Garraway of Maidenhead’s 24-7 Gaming on the bundling battle between the PlayStation 4 and the Xbox One, and how pre-orders have been faring for the store in recent weeks and Assassin’s Creed. With PS4 you had GTA V, Bloodborne and loads more. That’s kept the PS4 fresh with all the diﬀerent bundles it has going on. They’ve both been aggressive with their pricing.

How has business been for you recently? It’s actually been going up yearon-year. Skylanders Trap Team has been selling a lot better than Swap Force did, and Disney Inﬁnity 2.0 sold really well, too. Grand Theft Auto V continues to be a great seller – that’s really evolved over time as Rockstar has added in content to the Online mode, like Heists. It’s a combination of everything coming together.

How have the consoles been performing? PS4 has been a constant big seller for us, whenever we can get stock. Xbox Ones have picked up as well. The Evolve bundle didn’t sell as well as we thought it might, but the Master Chief Collection pack did really well. PS4s are still outselling Xbox Ones, though. The variety of bundles that Sony has been putting together has helped that. The Xbox One bundles have just been for Halo, Evolve, FIFA

PRE-ORDER CHARTS

PRICE CHECK: MAIDSTONE

Has the competition between PS4 and Xbox One surprised you? Not really. For us, as trade prices remain fair, we don’t mind. It does mean that a lot more people are coming on board with the nextgen machines and buying games.

TOP 10 PRE-ORDERS 1. FALLOUT 4 Bethesda, PS4

ASSASSIN’S CREED UNITY

2. Batman: Arkham Knight Day 1 Ed + DLC Warner Bros ...............................................................PS4

CALL OF DUTY: ADVANCED WARFARE

3. Amiibo Pikmin and Olimar Nintendo.................................................................... Wii U 4. Fallout 4 Bethesda .........................................................................XO

BATTLEFIELD HARDLINE FIFA 15

Ubisoft, XO

Activision, PS4

£25.85

£37.85

£26.86

N/A

£33.95

8. Batman: Arkham Knight Day 1 Ed + DLC Warner Bros ..................................................................XO

£32.99

£29.99

£39.99

9. Until Dawn Extended Edition Sony................................................................................PS4

£54.99

£49.99

£39.99

£44.99

10. FIFA 16 EA ....................................................................................PS4

N/A

£35

7. Amiibo Dr Mario Nintendo.................................................................... Wii U

UPLOADING The latest digital releases coming to market

I AM BREAD

RUGBY LEAGUE TEAM MANAGER 2015

PAYDAY 2: CRIMEWAVE EDITION

Bossa’s comedy physics-based game is heading to PlayStation 4

The rugby management sim has kicked oﬀ its launch on PC

505 Games’ multiplayer heist title is making its way to PS4 and Xbox One

OUT SUMMER

June 19th 2015

IN STORE

N/A

6. Uncharted: The Nathan Drake Collection Sony................................................................................PS4

ONLINE

5. Amiibo Bowser Jr Nintendo.................................................................... Wii U

EA, PS4

EA, XO

OUT NOW

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MARKETPLACE

24-7 Gaming Nicholson’s Shopping Centre, Maidenhead, SL6 1LB

Phone: 01628 629 246 Facebook: facebook.com/ pages/24-7-Games-Maidenhead/528263960542368

How have your pre-orders been recently? Unless it’s a big triple-A game – something like FIFA or Call of Duty – we aren’t getting massive pre-order numbers. When we get the new IPs like Splatoon, we get hardly any pre-orders because consumers aren’t sure what to expect. Something like Batman Arkham Knight hasn’t had a massive amount of pre-orders. It’s the big games at the end of the year that secure the huge

numbers of advance orders. To be honest, more places sell games these days and consumers know they can walk in and just pick up the game on day one. If they don’t pre-order it doesn’t matter. What is your online retail output like at the moment? We sell a lot of Skylanders over Amazon Marketplace. We don’t sell through Ebay anymore. We don’t make much from there. We only sell the stuﬀ we have too much of.

INCOMING TITLE

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The end of June is an exciting time for MMO and superhero fans, as Batman Arkham Knight and the ﬁrst expansion to Final Fantasy XIV hit on the same day FORMAT

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July 16th Rory McIlroy PGA Tour

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July 24th

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June 19th 2015

BATMAN

BATMAN The Dark Knight is one of the most popular characters of all time, having spawned countless smash-hit games. Ahead of his latest outing, Matthew Jarvis looks at the merchandise that fans might not need, but deserve

HE may almost be an octogenarian, but Batman’s popularity only seems to be growing among all age groups. Serviced by various film tie-ins throughout the 1990s and 2000s, Batman’s gaming success fully took flight with Rocksteady’s Batman Arkham Asylum in 2009. Critically acclaimed, the game sold almost two million units worldwide in its first three weeks on sale and topped the UK All Formats Chart for two weeks.

Batman Arkham Knight was voted the most anticipated title of 2015 by UK retailers.

Asylum’s sequel, 2011’s Batman Arkham City, shipped more than 4.6 million units worldwide in its first week on shelves. But it’s not just Batman’s gritty outings that have proved big sellers. The first LEGO Batman title was crowned as the best-selling superhero video game of all time in December of last year, having sold more than 12.8 million units worldwide since its launch in 2008. As of 2013, the LEGO Batman franchise had sold 14.4 million

BATMAN ARKHAM KNIGHT: THE RIDDLER’S GAMBIT Serving as an oﬃcial prequel to the upcoming Batman Arkham Knight game, this novel sees the Caped Crusader facing oﬀ against the tricks and tests of fan-favourite villain The Riddler. The Riddler appeared in preceding Arkham entries Asylum and City, and this paperback follows the baddie after the events of the last game. The book stretches to 320 pages and was written by award-winning author Alex Irvine, who has also written licensed tie-ins for Star Wars, Transformers and Iron Man. SRP: £7.99 Manufacturer: Titan Books Distributor: Titan Books Contact: sales@titanemail.com

BATMAN ARKHAM KNIGHT SKYLINE T-SHIRT

BATMAN ARKHAM 2015 CALENDAR

BATMAN SNAPBACK CAP

The watchful protector safeguards reﬁned abs and beer guts alike on this top branded with the Arkham Knight logo.

Bat-fans can count down the days to the Caped Crusader’s next appearance with this calendar showcasing art from Arkham Knight.

When Batman isn’t dressed in his iconic cowl, he probably likes to kick back in this snapback hat decorated with the bat logo. Probably.

SRP: £16.99 Manufacturer: Completely Independent Dist. Distributor: Completely Independent Distribution Contact: 0116 258 1450

SRP: £8.99 Manufacturer: Danilo Distributor: Danilo Contact: sales@danilo.com

SRP: £35 Manufacturer: Starter Distributor: Refuel Global Brands Contact: 01296 658 717

June 19th 2015

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BATMAN

DIRECTORY

MCV DIRECTORY KEY CONTACTS Sony DADC ............................................ +44 (0) 207 462 6200

CREATIVE Fink ................................................................. info@ﬁnkcreative.com

GAMING ACCESSORIES DISC REPAIR

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£70 per two column box (100mm x 75mm). To run weekly for a minimum of 1 year. Please phone for other size and/or position requirements.

Enarxis Dynamic Media ............................. +302 1090 11900

DISC REPAIR

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Tel: +44 (0) 1202 489500

June 19th 2015

Web: www.totaldiscrepair.co.uk

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DIRECTORY

ENQUIRIES CONOR TALLON Tel: 01992 535647 ctallon@nbmedia.com

FINK

CREATIVE

DISTRIBUTION

CLICK ENTERTAINMENT

Artworking Mastertronic Brand Identity Ukie Localisation Rising Star Games Advertising BBFC Website Design Deep Silver Exhibition Bethesda Illustration Just Flight Appynation Digital Media IntentMedia Charity GamesAid Banners & Takeovers Konami Packaging Design Just Flight Email: info@ﬁnkcreative.com CREATIVE DISTRIBUTION

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SONY DADC

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Tel: +44 207 462 6200 games@sonydadc.com

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June 19th 2015

DIRECTORY

L3I

GAMING ACCESSORIES

Tel: + (0)1923 471 020

Web: www.logic3.com

VENOM

GAMING ACCESSORIES

ADVERTISE WITH US

WANT TO ADVERTISE IN OUR DIRECTORY? Web: www.venomuk.com

Venom UK Gaming

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CALL CONOR TALLON ON 01992 535647 OR EMAIL HIM AT CTALLON@NBMEDIA.COM

Tel: +44 (0)1763 284181 June 19th 2015

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INSIDER’S GUIDE

INSIDER’S GUIDE DECIBEL-PR

DIRECTORY

WHO? Specialism: PR

Develop is the only dedicated publication for the UK and European games development community. It reaches over 8,500 subscribers every month.

Location: London

Sam Brace, head of PR at Decibel–PR, talks about making the leap from triple-A to mobile

FOR GREAT ADVERTISING OPPORTUNITIES, CONTACT CHARLOTTE NANGLE CNANGLE@NBMEDIA.COM

Tell us about your company. Decibel-PR is a small agency with a global reach specialising in app, indie and console video games. I’ve been working speciﬁcally within games PR for the last 15 years, enjoying stints at Capcom as UK PR manager, Bethesda as European PR manager and THQ as senior PR manager, as well as heading up accounts at major PR agencies such as Weber Shandwick, Golin Harris and Lunch/Lick PR.

THIS MONTH’S DIRECTORY SPOTLIGHT: Epic Games .................................................. www.epicgames.com/careers

What is your biggest success to date? Working with Nick Burcombe and his indie studio Playrise Digital on iOS, Android and Vita title Table Top Racing has been a definite high point. The coverage we’ve managed to generate has helped push the download total for the game well past 7m. What projects do you currently have in the works? I have a new partnership with Marvelous Europe, working on some of its 3DS titles, and I’m taking on app projects as they come in, the latest of which are Criminel from 4PM Games and Ticklefluff from HyperLiger. What are the biggest challenges you face? Having worked on some of the biggest and most successful triple-A titles of all time such as Fallout 3, Resident Evil 4 and 5 and Devil May Cry 3 and 4, meant that switching to apps To be included in the Develop Directory (which appears every month in Develop and now every week in MCV) contact cnangle@nbmedia.com

Switching to apps was initially a tricky business. But I’m careful about the clients I work with. and getting coverage was initially a tricky business. But I’ve been quite careful in the clients I’ve chosen to work with; I only work on titles I believe in and that I think will be of interest to my contacts and gamers at large. It wasn’t as difficult as I feared it might be to make the switch, but it has definitely been a challenge. How did you choose your company name? Decibel-PR is a direct reference to audio, of course, and I’ve also been a semi-pro musician my whole life, so it seemed like a good fit.

WANT TO FEATURE YOUR COMPANY IN INSIDER’S GUIDE? PLEASE CONTACT MJARVIS@NBMEDIA.COM OR CALL 01992 515 303

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Contact: W: decibel-pr.com E: sam.brace@decibel-pr.com P: 07813 988 908 T: @themule

June 19th 2015

FACTFILE LUXEMBOURG Sponsored by

INTERNATIONAL FACTFILE: LUXEMBOURG Population: 549,680 Capital City: Luxembourg Currency: Euro GDP (Per Capita): $96,267 KEY RETAILERS La Caverne Du Gobelin, Le Réservoir, Domino, Electric Viaduc, Free Record Shop, Coin BD, Saturn, Pixmania, Player One, Amazon, eBay

TOP DISTRIBUTORS BigBen Interactive, Koch Media TOP DEVELOPERS Nexon, Kabam, Live Gamer PUBLISHERS IN THE REGION Zynga, Valve

DESPITE being one of the smallest countries in Europe, Luxembourg plays a big part in the global games industry. The tiny nation has long been regarded as a flagbearer for online gaming, thanks to dedicated investment in the sector by the local government. Game streaming service OnLive set up its data centres in the country in 2011 due to its advanced infrastructure, including lowlatency fibre optic networks. MMO outlets Nexon and Kabam soon joined OnLive in the country. According to Luxembourgish cloud service provider EBRC, 70 per cent of Europe’s GDP can be accessed within a radius of less than 700km in Luxembourg, highlighting the key role the region can play for online companies on the continent. Luxembourg’s tactical positioning between two of the biggest games markets in

Europe – Germany and France – has led many other retail firms to open offices in the country, including PayPal, Amazon and eBay. The geographical placement also has benefits for localisation and language support firms. Steam owner Valve moved into the region in 2012, utilising the country’s VAT laws to cut down the price of games on its digital platform. However, the loophole allowing firms to charge a minimum VAT rate of three per cent was closed at the start of 2015. In terms of consumer behaviour with games, the Luxembourgish market mimics the UK sector. Popular franchises include Call of Duty and FIFA, with local retailers telling MCV that demand for more recent releases has grown in recent years, allowing more games retailers to successfully set up a business.

70 per cent of Europe’s GDP can be accessed in Luxembourg, making it a key region.

June 19th 2015

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LUXEMBOURG FACTFILE

MEANWHILE IN... NEPAL Bungie and Activision have harnessed the power of Destiny players to raise money for the relief efforts in earthquake-hit Nepal MORE than $1 million has been donated towards helping those struck by the earthquake in Nepal by Bungie and Activision. The firms utilised the audience of Destiny to raise the money, offering fans a $30 T-shirt that included an in-game shader and emblem, the proceeds of which were poured into the relief effort. Each company additionally put in $50,000 of their own money. Nepal was struck by a 7.8-magnitude earthquake in April, killing more than 8,800 people. “This was an astounding act of generosity on the part of Bungie and the larger Bungie community,

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and we are deeply grateful,” said Direct Relief’s president and CEO Thomas Tighe. “The community’s amazing support will translate immediately and directly into help for people in

Nepal who experienced a tremendous blow. “Every penny will help strengthen essential health services that were needed before the earthquakes and much more so now.”

June 19th 2015

INTERNATIONAL DISTRIBUTION Sponsored by

GLOBAL DISTRIBUTORS IF YOU ARE LOOKING FOR NEW PARTNERS OVERSEAS, THEN LOOK NO FURTHER

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IRAN

BRAZIL Sony Music Entertainment Brasil # 1 Physical Distributor in Brazil Rua Lauro Muller n°. 116 – 40°. Andar Salas 4001 a 4003 Botafogo Rio de Janeiro RJ CEP. 22.290-160 Tel. +55 21 2128-0771 Fax: +55 21 2128-0747 Email : rodrigo.altieri@sonymusic.com Website: www.sonymusic.com.br | www.day1e.com.br

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WENDROS AB SWEDEN, NORWAY, DENMARK & FINLAND Jakobsdalsvägen 17 12653 Hägersten Sweden Phone: +46 8 51942500 Fax: +46 8 7466790 Email: HM@wendros.se LM@wendros.se Web: www.wendros.se

CLICK ENTERTAINMENT LIMITED Email: info@click-entertainment.com Web: www.click-entertainment.com Phone: +44 (0)203 137 3781

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MORE DISTRIBUTORS AUSTRALIA AFA Interactive, Bluemouth Interactive, Five Star Games, Mindscape, Namco Bandai Partners, Turn Left Distribution BENELUX CLD Distribution, Koch Media, Gameworld Distribution B.V. CANADA E One, Importel, Just4Games, Solutions 2 Go, Vidéoglobe CYPRUS Access, Gibareio, Zilos, Nortec Multimedia CZECH REPUBLIC Cenega, Conquest, Comgad, Playman, ABC Data DENMARK Bergsala, Elpa, Impulse, Koch Media, Nordisk Film Interactive, Nordic Game Supply, PAN Vision FRANCE Big Ben, Innelec, Koch Media, SDO, Sodifa GREECE Zegatron, CD Media, Namco Bandai Partners, IGE, Nortec, Enarxis, Beacon HUNGARY CNG.hu/Cenega Hungary, CTC Trading, Magnew, PlayON, Stadlbauer ICELAND Sena, Myndform, Samfilm, Ormsson INDONESIA Maxsoft, Uptron, Technosolution IRELAND MSE Group, Baumex JAPAN Ajioka, Happinet, Jesnet NORWAY Bergsala, Game Outlet, Koch Media, Nordic Game Supply, Nordisk Film, Pan Vision POLAND CD Projekt, Cenega, Galapagos, LEM PORTUGAL Ecoplay, Infocapital, Koch Media, Namco Bandai ROMANIA Best Distribution SERBIA ComTrade, Computerland/Iris Mega, Extreme CC SPAIN Digital Bros, Koch Media, Namco Bandai Partners, Nobilis SWEDEN Bergsala, Koch Media, Namco Bandai, Nordic Game Supply, PAN Vision, Wendros, Ztorm (digital) UAE Red Entertainment Distribution, Pluto Games (LS2 Pluto), Viva Entertainment, Gameplay Entertainment, Geekay Distribution

TO ADVERTISE IN THIS SECTION PLEASE CONTACT CTALLON@NBMEDIA.COM June 19th 2015

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MENA TERRITORY REPORT Sponsored by

TERRITORY REPORT: MIDDLE EAST AND NORTH AFRICA The MENA market is predicted to almost triple in size over the next seven years. Matthew Jarvis takes a look at how digital and mobile are propelling this fast-growing region

he Middle Eastern and North African games industry is booming, growing quicker than much of the rest of the world. According to a study conducted by consulting firm Strategy& and Abu Dhabi media body twofour54, the MENA games market is expected to nearly triple in size over the next seven years. The total sector was valued at $1.6 billion (£1.04bn) in 2014, which is predicted to rocket to $4.4 billion (£2.85bn) by 2022. “Gaming in the MENA region is growing faster than the global average, exceeding even other fast-growing emerging markets such as Russia, China and South Korea,” observed Strategy& partner Jayant Bhargava. The report added that Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates will comprise the largest portion of the market, accounting for almost two fifths of the sector’s value from 2014 to 2020. International market research outlet yStats estimates that the entire MENA games industry will reach a value of $3.2 billion (£2.1bn) by the end of 2016. It adds its expectation that games software revenue alone will triple to hit $3 billion (£1.94bn) by 2017, having totalled $1 billion (£0.65bn) in 2014. Analyst Deloitte, meanwhile, estimates that the Middle Eastern games market alone will generate $1.7 billion (£1.1bn) during 2015. There is a strong regional foundation for growth in the region; research firm Newzoo states that MENA has the highest compound annual growth rate (CAGR) in the world. The local market expands

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at a rate of 21 per cent every year – nearly triple the average worldwide CAGR.

£1.04bn

OUTSIDE INFLUENCE The MENA market consists primarily of titles imported from international developers and publishers. Strategy& and twofour54 estimate that around 90 per cent of the titles sold in the region’s retail outlets are from studios outside of the local area. Despite this, homegrown talent is increasing in prominence. The number of locally-developed and published games is said by Strategy& and twofour54 to be growing, with 15 per cent of the sector’s revenue predicted to be generated by local productions within the next five years. The report highlighted the growth of young game creators in MENA as a key driving factor behind the shift, which also includes an evolution in the mobile and digital segments. Digital expansion is being catalysed by online retail, with the current $2.3 billion (£1.49bn) ecommerce sector set for an estimated 13 per cent annual growth from this year until 2019. Deloitte adds that the average millennial (those aged roughly between 15 and 35) in the Middle East will spend approximately $27 on video games in 2015 – almost a quarter of the North American average spend of $100. However, this is still higher than what these consumers spend on music and pay TV.

The MENA market was worth $1.6bn (£1.04bn) in 2014.

DIGITAL DOMINATION Overall, digital distribution is flourishing across MENA. YStats believes that the number of Middle Eastern consumers downloading video games via online services has approximately

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TERRITORY REPORT MENA

Middle Eastern consumers are willing to pay up to $26 (£17) a month for mobile apps and games. doubled over the last five years. This is particularly ubiquitous on mobile, with one in 10 users in the UAE, Jordan and Saudi Arabia downloading titles on smartphones and tablets. In the latter two countries, the interest in digital services also expands to consumption of games media coverage. Monthly traffic for games websites accounts for 10 per cent of Jordan and Saudi Arabia’s entire online population. This has also contributed to a sharp rise in the number of localised online games outlets, with Arabic on track to soon become the fourth-most-used language on the internet. MOBILE IN MENA The Middle East now boasts the second-largest mobile population

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in the world, with more than half a billion users, according to yStats. Of those mobile gamers in MENA, at least half download titles, with a further 12 million Arab users playing social games on services such as Facebook. Deloitte adds that two thirds of Saudi Arabian internet users will play games online during 2015. By the end of this year, the number of consumers using smartphones in this region is expected to rise by 39 per cent, says yStats. Of this audience, around three quarters (72 per cent) are under 34 years old, with the majority (62 per cent) being male. Deloitte continues that games are the most popular kind of application for mobile users in MENA, with consumers willing to pay up to $26 (£17) a month for smartphone and tablet apps.

THE FACTS INFO Countries: Bahrain, Kurdistan, Cyprus, Egypt, Iran, Iraq, Israel, Jordan, Kuwait, Lebanon, Northern Cyprus, Oman, Palestine, Qatar, Saudi Arabia, Syria, Turkey, United Arab Emirates, Yemen

TOP DISTRIBUTORS LS2 Pluto/Pluto Games, Tanweer Group, Red Entertainment Distribution, Geekay Distribution, Maysalward, Games XP, Cloudgam.es

Population: 371.1 million

TOP DEVELOPERS Peak Games, Falafel Games, Game Cooks, Maysalward, QuirKat, Tahadi Games, Piranha Byte, Nezal Entertainment, Wixel Studios, Nezal Entertainment

Languages: Arabic, Aramaic, Armenian, Azerbaijani, Balochi, French, Greek, Hebrew, Kurdish, Persian, Somali, Turkish KEY RETAILERS Virgin Megastore, Geekay Games, Sony, Emax, Jacky’s, Jumbo Electronics, Emax, Carrefour, Toys R Us

LOCAL PUBLISHERS Peak Games, Sony, Microsoft, Ubisoft Abu Dhabi, Tahadi Games, Game Power 7, Gameguise

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WHY ACTIVISION IS FUNDING IND S: IE GAMES

by Christopher Dring

ACTIVISION surprised Gamescom this week by resurrecting the Sierra Games publishing business. A subsidiary of Activision, Sierra is to publish a range of titles from independent Sierra’s Loya studios. This includes (far left) and classic Sierra IP like King’s Marshall (left) Quest and Geometry Wars, are bringing as well as new IP and back Geometry possibly HD remakes. Wars this year It’s surprising because added: “We wanted to do Activision has a reputation this stuff for a long time, and for just publishing triple-A unfortunately there wasn’t billion-dollar franchises a path in Activision to do it such as Call of Duty, because we were focused Skylanders and Destiny. on the big blockbusters. “The indie movement is “With digitally distributed happening,” said Sierra’s MacLean Marshall, Sierra games becoming bigger MacLean Marshall. “And for every year, we were able to Activision not to be involved devs with the right ideas – make a compelling business in that... it has the big brands whether that is bringing back argument that we could be sure, but I think it would be a an old Sierra IP or something financially successful doing miss if we didn’t look at the entirely new.” this, while working with indie movement as well. For Senior director of external really cool indie talent on us, it is about finding the right development Bob Loya great IP.”

It would be a miss if we didn’t look at the indie movement

.2014

07.10

Hall 4.2 Stand A052 www.mxvsatv.com 06/08/2014 12:51 05/08/2014 14:11

Return of the hugely successful MCV @ Gamescom Daily The daily print & online resource for visitors to Gamescom Championing and promoting the international video games companies at Gamescom 2015 Latest games business news, insight from the trade show and company spotlights Delivered to 30,000+ games industry professionals at Gamescom Promoted to a global audience of 380,000+ via MCVuk.com

To be involved please contact Conor Tallon ctallon@nbmedia.com or call 01992 535647

OFF THE RECORD

OFF THE RECORD This week, dinosaurs run rampant in Hyde Park, Nomad Games magics up some fundraising and GAME stays up late to explore The Elder Scrolls Online

JURASSIC IN THE PARK LEGO found a way in Hyde Park’s Education Centre earlier this month after Warner Bros took over the entirety of the venue to transform it into LEGO Jurassic World ahead of the eponymous game’s launch. Activities put on by event host Brown Betty PR included LEGO dinosaur egg hunts, dinosaur face-painting and demos from TT games with LEGO prizes up for oﬀer, plus free ice cream, candy ﬂoss and popcorn for kids. Among the mainstream press outlets to avoid bricking it and bravely venture into the park were The Guardian, ITN, The Times and Shortlist.

SPECIAL SHAMAN A brand new character for PC and mobile title Talisman is helping the industry do good. Released on June 10th as part of a collaboration between developer Nomad Games and disability charity SpecialEffect, the Shaman is the result of a competition held by the two firms earlier this year to create a brand new hero for the title. The community selected Graham Zaretsky as the winner. His character idea was then brought into the game by three artists supported by SpecialEffect: Amandeep Singh Heer, Ben Clark and Gareth Garratt. Now all Talisman players, on both mobile and PC, can have the chance to play as the Shaman. Revenue raised by the £1.49 downloadable content on mobile will go towards helping SpecialEffect’s various causes. Meanwhile, PC gamers have the opportunity to pay what they like for the character, with Nomad hoping that the loyalty of its fanbase will help raise even more for SpecialEffect going forwards.

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June 19th 2015

OFF THE RECORD

SIX DEGREES OF MIKE FETHERS

THE WEEK IN 140 CHARACTERS

AFTER A CHALLENGE FROM THE HUT GROUP’S SENIOR GAMES BUYER TO LINK HIM WITH THE BIG BACON, MCV PULLS OFF THE IMPOSSIBLE

The Tweets you might have missed in the last seven days @ForkParker If I don’t get 10,000 followers by E3 they’re not going to let me announce that Half-Life 3 is coming exclusively to Dreamcast 2.

KEVIN BACON appeared in the movie Death Sentence with...

Fork Parker, Devolver Digital Monday June 8th @cliﬀski This is how gamers talk to developers. Be aware, if you were thinking of joining the industry.

Cliﬀ Blenszinski, Positech Games Tuesday June 9th

...Aisha Tyler, who has hosted the last few Ubisoft E3 conferences, towering over...

...Yves Guillemot. The Ubisoft CEO previously counted among his many senior employees...

@bill_at_zeboyd Can’t remember the last time I saw a new IP explode onto the fan art scene the way Splatoon has. Love it.

Bill Stiernberg, Zeboyd Games Wednesday June 10th @RichStanton I think when developers de-prioritise splitscreen co-op because of how ubiquitous online is these days they’re drawing a false equivalence...

...Uplay co-creator and head of EMEA marketing Ian Chambers. He eventually ended up at GAME, where he worked with...

Richard Stanton, freelance journalist Wednesday June 10th @J0EL_G The new Alone In The Dark game comes out today. As it’s a co-op shooter, and subtitled Illumination, you are neither alone, nor in the dark.

Joel Gregory, GamesMaster Friday June 12th

...the perpetually young Mark Burgess, who before joining the specialist retailer worked at Tesco alongside...

@Vahn16 [Ubisoft E3 conference] Ok, but when will the sequel, Tom Clancy’s Long Division, come out?

Nathan Grayson, Kotaku Monday June 15th

@TheSteveBurnio [EA E3 conference] Peter Moore’s changed his suit, presumably because he got the blood of the idiot who published the Battlefront footage early on it.

Steve Burns, VideoGamer.com Monday June 15th

...MIKE FETHERS, senior games buyer at The Hut Group.

@keefstuart I like the way EA’s press conference is actually backwards compatible with the last ten EA E3 press conferences.

Keith Stuart, The Guardian Monday June 15th

June 19th 2015

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OFF THE RECORD

STORE SCROLL-OUT GAME decided to stay up all night last week in honour of The Elder Scrolls Onlineâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s release on PS4 and Xbox One. 75 stores opened at midnight on Tuesday June 9th for consumers dedicated enough to wait in line. The devout were then rewarded by the sight of many of GAMEâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s staďŹ&#x20AC; decked out in their ďŹ nest fantasy garb. The tiredness clearly drove some staďŹ&#x20AC; mad, leading to clashes of swords and shields. And an arrow to the knee.

Geralt in The Witcher - he comes across as so taciturn, yet heâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s full of jokes and emotion. Lovely acting.

Georgina Kamsika @Thessilian Burt Reynolds in Saints Row 3.

:+$7Âˇ6 <285 )$9285,7( 9,'(2 *$0( $&7,1* 3(5)250$1&( 25 &$0(2" #GMGASKS

Brian Demodulated @demodulated Mark Hamill as the Joker. 0RUH VSHFLÂż FDOO\ ZKHQ KH sang â&#x20AC;&#x153;Only Youâ&#x20AC;? during the credits of Batman Arkham City.

The entire voice cast of Resident Evil on PS1. seymour asses @UJustGotCarled ,Q UHFHQW WLWOHV ,GULV (OED and Kevin Spacey in CoD: Advanced Warfare. Star-Lord @NgoKevin7 Sebastian Dewar @PanzerDusk

Fake Sean Connery Guy, the narrator for all of the Majesty games.

Samuel L. Jackson in GTA San Andreas and Tim Curry in C&C Red Alert 3.

Alex Flower @Alex_J_Flower

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James Woods was hilarious as the government agent Mike Toreno in GTA: San Andreas.

Uncle Stephan @Hula121

L-Face @lface8 Lee from The Walking Dead LQ WKH Ă&#x20AC; DVKEDFN LQ 6HDVRQ or the ranch scene in The Last of Us.

Philip Huard @PhilipHuard Ashley Johnson as Ellie in The Last of Us. Snarky, funny, DQG FDSDEOH

ZodiakHunter @ZodiakHunter

June 19th 2015