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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, Epic Games president Michael Capps retired, Call of Duty: Black Ops II earned $1 billion in 15 days, Irrational Games pushed BioShock Infinite’s release date again, and Zynga filed to make real-money gambling games in Nevada.
You’ll also find reviews for Far Cry 3, The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim – Dragonborn, Call of Duty: Black Ops II, and Writer Rumble as well as previews for Tomb Raider, Crysis 3, and Sly Cooper: Thieves in Time.
News:
- The DeanBeat: Expert advice on staying alive in Call of Duty: Black Ops II multiplayer
- Army of TWO: The Devil’s Cartel makes the Mexican drug wars seem glitchy
- What do game investors think about Kickstarter?
- Irrational Games pushes back BioShock Infinite release date
- PMC and Machinima will tout this year’s DICE Summit video game awards show
- Call of Duty: Black Ops II beats Halo 4 in NPD’s dismal November game sales list
- These missing Tomb Raider games could be entombed for good
- Dishonored’s first downloadable add-on pack is all about challenging your skills
- This week in the Nintendo Download: Lego Lord of the Rings, Scribblenauts Unlimited, and New Super Mario Bros. 2
- Peanut Labs extends its self-serve platform for creating market surveys (exclusive)
- God of War: Ascension multiplayer finds a sweet spot between shooters and fighters
- With ex-Zynga developer carrying the flag, Kixeye invades Canada
- Zynga files for right to make real-money gambling games in Nevada
- Assassin’s Creed III’s first add-on pack is erasing player progress
- The Four Bikers of the Apocalypse usher in the second add-on pack for Trials Evolution
- Pikmin 3 slips out of Wii U ‘launch window,’ will debut in spring
- Fire Emblem Awakening out on 3DS in North America in early February
- Call of Duty: Black Ops II hits $1B in sales in 15 days
- Bunchball shows off the ‘rock stars’ of gamification
- ‘Toxic’ League of Legends player responds to his 1-year ban
- Zynga’s new theme park game CoasterVille goes live today
- Facebook announces top games of 2012: SongPop music trivia game comes out on top
- Social media surfaces layoffs at game companies NCSoft and Petroglyph
- A Wii U update is available now — it should improve system stability
- The Ins & Outs of PlayStation All Stars’ newest fighters: Kat and Emmett
- Epic Games president Michael Capps retires
- DICE slips in a Mirror’s Edge reference (tease?) into the latest Battlefield 3 expansion
- The Slingshot Content Pack for XCOM: Enemy Unknown available today
- First Assassin’s Creed III add-on pack available now for Season Pass holders
- Replay Games fetches a new game and a chief creative officer (exclusive)
- Guitar Hero co-creator’s Green Throttle Games raises $6M to reinvent TV games
- Adobe launches new cloud-based game development tools
- Dragonborn expansion definitely coming to PlayStation 3
- Try out wizard battles in Ni no Kuni’s magical world tomorrow (updated)
- Android game console maker Ouya shipping its developer prototypes this month
Mobile news:
- After closing OpenFeint, Gree cuts jobs in U.S. offices
- Ngmoco goes next-gen with high-end graphics in The Drowning tablet game
- Brazil’s biggest mobile content publisher unveils its first game for the U.S.
- Social casino app goes to the city with New York-New York slot machine
- Tylted welcomes several top social-game developers to its mobile platform
- PlayPhone adds 20 games to its mobile social gaming network
- German ‘startup factory’ HitFox expands globally with four new game distribution businesses
- Cut the Rope developer’s next game is Pudding Monsters
- Enterprise gamification goes big as Badgeville teams up with Capgemini
- Fingerprint Digital to launch 7 new mobile education apps for kids
- Rovio adds the ice world of Hoth to Angry Birds Star Wars
- Kabam acquires Balanced Worlds game studio in China
- Swarm hopes to swoop in and help out developers fed up with Gree (exclusive)
- The Walking Dead: Assault brings top-down black-and-white shooting action to iOS
Reviews:
- The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim Dragonborn is a pint-sized Morrowind (review)
- Threeview: Call of Duty: Black Ops II reviewed by a critic, an analyst, and an academic
- Far Cry 3 is a superior rumble in the jungle (review)
- Writer Rumble is a vicious but therapeutic exercise for former English majors (review)
Interviews:
- Ben Cousins wants to prove mobile first-person shooters aren’t a pipe dream (interview)
- With a new leader, Ngmoco shoots for mobile gaming empire (interview)
- ‘Reverse Tetris’ puzzler Dream of Pixels may be critically acclaimed, but how is it selling? (interview)
Previews:
- Fast monsters in the tall grass will scare you to death in Crysis 3 (preview)
- Flutter is a kinder, gentler Pokémon with real-world butterflies (preview)
- Pull off some ridiculous time traveling heists in Sly Cooper: Thieves in Time (hands-on preview)
- Tomb Raider is at its best when it’s not emulating Uncharted (hands-on preview)