News (Page 3875)

Console giant Nintendo is set to have a presence at ECTS this year for the first time in three years - but it won't be within the event hall, instead opting for a large tour bus outside the Earls Court venue.

The beginning of summer holidays in Japan has seen a marked improvement in software sales, with Konami's Jikkyo Power Pro Baseball 10 topping the charts and other key new releases also selling strongly.

Your weekly guide to the hottest jobs in the games industry, courtesy of Aardvark Swift. This week - loads of positions for programmers, artists and designers both in the UK and abroad.

Global sales of the PlayStation 2 may well have peaked, with Sony's results for the quarter ended June 30 revealing a steep decline in sales of the console and a drop in overall revenues for the games division of the corporation.

New measures to drive the installed base of Xbox in Japan, including a significant push for Xbox Live with new features and lower pricing as well as a wider range of software, have been confirmed by Microsoft this week.

Publisher THQ has announced its financial results for the first quarter, ended June 30, revealing a major climb in revenues thanks to the success of Pixar movie tie-in Finding Nemo.

A new poll of the best brands in the USA has placed Sony in the number one spot for the fourth year in a row - ahead of console rival Microsoft, which has nonetheless shot up to fifth place this year.

Infinium Labs has changed the date for the public unveiling of its Phantom networked PC gaming device following the sudden postponement of the Ultimate Gamers Expo, choosing now to reveal the device online instead.

The European Commission yesterday issued a warning against Greece for passing a blanket ban on electronic gaming, design to crack down on Internet gambling, which also made it illegal to play any form of videogames.

Giant publisher Electronic Arts has announced its financial results for the first quarter of its financial year, revealing a massive 148 per cent leap in profits over last year and exceeding all analyst expectations.

Los Angeles based Conspiracy Entertainment has filed a lawsuit against rapper Eminem claiming that the entertainers management company is guilty of fraud and breach of contract over a potentially lucrative game licensing deal.

Speaking at a press conference in Tokyo, Sega president Hisao Oguchi has outlined his future ambitions for the company - including a target of doubling the company's global market share in the next five years.

Publisher Activision has announced its results for the first quarter of fiscal 2004, revealing a small profit which beat analyst forecasts of a break even quarter, but forecasts for the rest of the year are down.

The industry-wide probe of videogames companies by the Securities and Exchange Commission is now known to extent to four publishers - but key analysts believe that the investigation will exonerate the industry's accounting practices.

The Interactive Digital Software Association, which represents game software publishers in the USA, has officially changed its name to the Entertainment Software Association (ESA), effective immediately.

Eidos' Tomb Raider: Angel of Darkness has dropped back into second place in the UK sales charts after only a two week stint at number one, while Sony's Eye Toy: Play has taken the top spot in its third week on sale.

As pre-orders for Nokia's N-Gage game deck open in the USA, the mobile phone giant has announced plans to bring the system on tour around 50 cities in Europe, kicking off on August 9.

The Securities and Exchange Commission in the United States has begun a probe into a number of accounting practices in the games industry, with Acclaim, Activision and THQ all confirming that they are under scrutiny.

Nintendo's GBA re-release of Super Mario Bros 3, Mario Advance 4, has debuted on top of the Japanese sales charts - adding to the some 18 million units the game has already sold in previous incarnations.