North Americans are going to love this new MMO basketball game called “Freestyle”. Known to be one of the world’s popular sports today, JC Entertainment Corp. (JCE), an online game developer from South Korea, announced the launch of the MMO basketball game “Freestyle” in the North American market.
“Freestyle” is an online basketball game with streetball gameplay against other online gamers, and is one of the most popular online games in Asia since 2005. “Freestyle” was previously serviced through Sierra Online of Vivendi Games in North America market and already has more than 80 million users around the world, but JCE now provides the game service directly through its own global game portal “www.gamekiss.com”.
“Freestyle” combines hip-hop and street basketball through unique characters and gameplay. Each character has unique ability according to their basketball position, and the players can play 3 on 3 half court or 5 on 5 full court basketball game. “Freestyle” users can maximize their fun by creating multiple basketball moves through simple game interface with just A, S, D, and W key and arrowkeys on the keyboard.
In order to enjoy “Freestyle”, users can download Freestyle at www.gamekiss.com for free game client and learn more about the game in the “Freestyle” webpage.
(Source) Press
The sci-fi space MMO EVE Online, celebrates its sixth anniversary these days, as developer CCP Games announced that the amount subscribers has reached 300,000 users, a growth of 22 percent this year alone.
The MMO has seen the record of consecutive users online being broken several times this year, topping out at 53,850 players playing in the same realm.
THQ released their annual earnings report, and like with EA, it doesn’t look good. THQ’s revenue declined 22 percent to $800 million, while overall, the company saw losses of $431 million in fiscal 2008, compared to a loss of “just” $35 million in 2007.
Common with earnings reports, sales numbers for games were released as well. The number showed that THQ’s two best franchises were doing fairly well; Dawn of War franchise has sold over 4.5 million units, while the Saints Row franchise has sold over 5 million units.
Richard Garriott, creator of Ultima Online and Tabula Rasa (and part time amateur astronaut), has sued publisher NCSoft for $27 million, for forcing him to leave the company ahead of time, whereas NCSoft merely says Garriott departed with NCSoft “voluntarily”.
This forced Garriott to sell his assets in the company, apparently losing millions of dollars, which he now wants back. And them some, naturally.
The upcoming Duke Nukem Forever release just got a lot less likely — Duke Nukem developer 3D Realms has officially shut down. The employees have reportedly already been let go and the company is in liquidation.
However, luckily, the shutdown of 3D Realms has not affected the development of the upcoming Duke Nukem handheld trilogy, developed at Frontline Games.
If you’ve been dying to see what the cover of Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen looks like, today is your lucky day.
Activision has recently released the above image showcasing the game’s cover art featuring (who else?) Optimus Prime.
Expect to see this art featured on the cover of Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen when it hits shelves on June 15th for the 360, PS3, PS2, PSP, Wii, DS, and PC.
Read (Kotaku)
Want to increase your chances of getting access to the Starcraft II beta? Here’s how — Blizzard has recently announced that there will be an all new chance for Starcraft II enthusiasts to get access to the upcoming beta.
First and foremost, you must have a Battle.net account. After you have secured one of those you are going to want to head here, the beta profiles page. Once there, you will find an option to download a utility that will determine your system specs and upload them to Battle.net. Finally, check off Starcraft II and click Update Preferences.
While this won’t gaurantee your access to the Starcraft II beta, it doesn’t hurt to try, right?
Read (Kotaku)
It was recently made known that mega-mobile-publisher Gameloft has inked a deal with Sega Europe to produce mobile games based on Sega property:
“We are confident this agreement will be the first step towards a long term partnership between Gameloft and SEGA,” said Michel Guillemot, president, Gameloft. “SEGA’s great brands coupled with Gameloft’s long standing history of excellence in mobile game development can only result in an extraordinary mobile experience for consumers.”
The first game to come from the deal is Sonic Unleashed, which Gameloft is describing as a “high speed 2D side-scrolling adventure”.
Gamers will be able to choose from Sonic the Hedgehog or Werehog when this game is made available in Europe, the Middle East, Australia and New Zealand in June. I wonder what other games Gameloft has cookin’.
What would a game be now-a-days if pre-orderers didn’t get some sort of bonus? It would probably be fine, but Activision evidentally didn’t want to take the chance.
It was recently announced that those who pre-order Prototype from GameStop will recieve Alex Mercer (the game’s main character) in action figure form and a map/poster.
Those who pre-order it from GameGrazy will recieve a hardcover book that includes different illustrations based on ingame characters, enemies, and locations.
And finally, those who pre-order Prototype from Amazon will receieve an exclusive comic based on the game put together by Wild Storm.
So what are you waiting for? You have three option, choose wisely.
Read (Joystiq)
