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If you follow VentureBeat but don’t regularly check our GamesBeat site, here’s a list of the best video game stories we ran over the last seven days that you may have missed.
This week, Zynga lost more executives but announced new games from its partners, Nintendo announced the North American price and release date for the Wii U, and Apple unveiled the iPhone 5.
You’ll also find reviews for Tekken Tag 2, Tokyo Jungle, Avengers Initiative, Joe Danger 2, Fractured Soul, and LittleBigPlanet Vita.
News:
- Obama runs presidential campaign ads in EA’s online games
- The DeanBeat: A stellar week for gamers
- Activision is finally swinging for the fences in mobile games (interview)
- Shocker! A video game trailer’s popularity foretells sales
- Startup Seeds makes a game out of microlending
- Take it to Vegas: 80M Madden 13 online games match NFL’s Week 1 results (infographic)
- Zynga confirms it hired real-money gambling chief
- Magic fingers: SoftKinetic is at the core of Intel’s ‘perceptual computing’ technology (video demo)
- Nvidia launches two new Kepler-based graphics chips
- 4 things gamers will appreciate in the new Wreck-It Ralph trailer
- Satirical new puzzle game brings out the fun in arguing about politics (exclusive)
- Report confirms that social casino games have hit the jackpot with $1.6B in revenue
- Clay Jam is a Michael Bay-infused explosion of color and crafts (with exclusive screens)
- Two game developers arrested in Greece under suspicion of espionage
- Half-Life remake among first batch of games cleared in Steam’s Greenlight approval program
- With Kinect-like gestures, SoftKinetic leads the way to Intel’s perceptual computing
- Coming to consoles: Dig deep and build high in the exploration game Terraria
- Everything you need to know about Planetary Annihilation, before it completes funding (Exclusive)
- Intel reinvents the PC for the age of ‘perceptual computing’
- Harvard’s ‘wise men’ tell Silicon Valley: Our country is losing its competitiveness
- Agawi to use Microsoft’s Windows Azure to bring cloud-gaming services to Windows 8
- Executive turnover continues: Zynga loses its chief marketing officer Jeff Karp
- Zynga cloud guru Allan Leinwand departs for ServiceNow
- Blast your way through Unova with the new Mythical Pokémon Genesect
- Valve launches beta for Steam’s Big Picture Mode: Now you never have to leave the couch
- Zynga launches first batch of partner games, adds nine more third-party studios
Wii U:
- Nintendo’s touchscreen TV service for the Wii U plays catch-up (hands-on video)
- Catch Mario, Bayonetta, and Sonic in these Wii U game videos
- Here are the Wii U games you’ll be playing at launch (or close to it)
- Nintendo targets the living room with Nintendo TVii
- Nintendo’s Wii U console lands in stores Nov. 18 in two flavors, base price of $300
- Nintendo announces Wii U price and launch details in Japan
Mobile news:
- BitGym brings motion gaming to mobile devices
- The iPod’s A5X vs. the iPhone 5′s A6: Does it matter for games?
- Natural Motion shows off cute Clumsy Ninja app on the iPhone 5
- iPhone 5 allows ‘ghost racing’ against another player’s best time in Real Racing 3
- In a twist, Zynga to import two mobile games from its Japan division
- From bikes to games to video games to…tablets? Toys ‘R’ Us bets on Tabeo
Interviews:
- Clumsy Ninja’s 10-year journey to make it to Apple’s iPhone 5 launch stage (video interview)
- Firefall dev discusses major gameplay changes and its Kickstarter-inspired monetization strategy (interview)
Previews:
- Guns of Icarus Online developers want to make ‘the most co-op game’ imaginable (hands-on preview)
- Contagion aims to save the zombie game genre from itself (hands-on preview)
Reviews:
- Tokyo Jungle is a comically rewarding journey through the vicious circle of life (review)
- Even with robots, dinosaurs, and tons of action, Joe Danger 2 repeats the same stunts (review)
- Touch controls make LittleBigPlanet Vita the series’s definitive entry (review)
- Fractured Soul is a clever, challenging platformer that requires all your brainpower (review)
- Tekken Tag Tournament 2 delivers entertaining yet uninspired beat downs (review)
- Avengers Initiative delivers thrilling bite-sized superhero combat but not much else (review)
Pieces of flare: