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Nintendo videogame guru Shigeru Miyamoto says the future of indie games looks brightest outside his native Japan. "I think America has always been better at creating unique products," says Miyamoto, the head of Nintendo's game-development division and creator of Super Mario Bros. Nintendo has traditionally led its product launches with standout titles from its Japanese studios...
Valve, the developer of the Half-Life franchise, was one of the pioneers of digital distribution with its Steam delivery service. The company has managed to remain independent in this time of industry consolidation, and kept its focus on PC gaming at a time when some have declared it dead. GamesIndustry.biz spoke to Valve's VP of marketing, Doug Lombardi at a recent EA press event, about the challenges the company has faced, the boost it has given to indie game development and the changing PC market....
...it's likely that few were happy to hear about the digital rights management that will be unscrupulously bundled with the game...
BioWare endeared itself to Xbox owners the world over when it unleashed Star Wars: Knights of the Old Republic. It not only filled a void in the Xbox library with an RPG, Knights of the Old Republic did so with style. The follow-up, Jade Empire, solidified BioWare as the preeminent RPG developer on Microsoft's big, black box. Needless to say, expectations have been high for Mass Effect, the studio's first Xbox 360 release. After playing through the game more than once, we can say with confidence that Mass Effect delivers on those expectations. The ride may get a bit bumpy at times, but it's one you don't want to miss...
After writing the 3D platformer rulebook back in 1996 with Super Mario 64, Nintendo has had one hell of a mountain to climb to top that classic title. Super Mario Sunshine came close, but even the interesting new FLUDD mechanic and tropical setting couldn't disguise the fact that it was really just a remix of Super Mario 64, complete with similar styles of challenges and many of the same drawbacks. It's a challenge familiar to developers around the world. How do you create a sequel in a hugely popular and iconic series that actually takes a significant step forward, without losing what made the series great in the first place?
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