Join independent journalists and industry decision-makers at GamesBeat NEXT, returning to San Francisco November 2–3. The event brings together 500 executives, founders, investors and tech leaders shaping the $200 billion interactive economy for candid discussions on gaming, entertainment, technology and AI, plus executive networking and opportunities to build partnerships and close major deals.
I played a lot of the original Pokémon when I was little, but I never thought that a group of thousands would try to beat the same game in one of the most bizarre social experiments I’ve ever seen.
You can find out more about streaming site Twitch’s Pokémon obsession by catching up on our entire week’s worth of video game coverage. You’ll also find a bunch of previews, including looks at the new Wolfenstein and Yoshi’s Island, plus reviews for Thief, Plants vs. Zombies: Garden Warfare, and more.
Happy reading!
Pieces of flair
- The DeanBeat: Will multiplayer-only games make the single-player campaign obsolete?
- Analysts: Titanfall bundle and Xbox One price cut ‘reveal the importance’ of Respawn’s shooter
- Why Steam matters: Valve’s ambitious plan for the future of the PC
- The Last of Us fan makes awesome Wolf of Wall Street-style trailer
- The best (and worst) of some recent Flappy Bird knockoffs
Game news
- Minecraft getting its own big-screen adaptation following the success of ‘The Lego Movie’
- Fantasy leagues are no longer for sports nerds — they’re for e-sports now, too
- That Steam account may cost you: Verizon wants to charge gamers extra for eating up bandwidth
- Twitch Plays Pokémon inspires ambitious Zelda, Mario, and Street Fighter spin-offs
- Pokémon anime coming to Netflix this weekend
- Veteran developers’ new take on a 30-year-old wizard game comes together in the cloud
- Live from London: U.K. game conventions turn to Twitch to broadcast expos online
- Nintendo pulling the plug on Wii and DS online gaming (updated)
- Minecraft is mainstream with 100M registered PC accounts and 14.3M copies sold
- Activision shuts down Call of Duty Elite premium subscription service
- Valve gives control of sales on Steam to developers
- South Park: The Stick of Truth’s abortion, anal-probing scenes censored in Europe, Middle East, and Africa
- Microsoft: Twitch broadcasting looks ‘crisp’ on Xbox One
- Following fan outcry, Konami cuts price for its upcoming Metal Gear Solid V prologue
- How to get Pokémon X or Y for free in March
- Xbox One Twitch streaming release date is March 11
- Confirmed: Former Nokia chief Stephen Elop will run Microsoft’s Xbox and tablet businesses
- Xbox One getting Titanfall bundle on March 11 — includes game and console for $500
- Seth Rogen and Evan Goldberg to direct a movie about how Sega took on Nintendo
- DayZ creator plans to leave developer Bohemia Interactive
- Freddie Wong’s Video Game High School hits crowdfunding target — and sets a record
Mobile and social
- Cloning for good: Code.org eases kids into programming with Flappy Bird
- Google Play’s game-related revenues are growing twice as fast as iOS
- Live Gamer adds MasterCard’s new payment service to digital game and app storefronts
- Only 0.15 percent of mobile gamers account for 50 percent of all in-game revenue (exclusive)
- EA founder Trip Hawkins’ If You Can raises $6.5M for social-emotional learning games
- Court dismisses shareholder lawsuit against Zynga [update]
- Bingo! GSN buys Bash Gaming for an estimated $160M to $170M
- Play chess against world champion Magnus Carlsen in this iPhone app
- Candy Crush Saga publisher abandons the ‘Candy’ trademark in the U.S. after acquiring Candy Crusher
- Nextpeer makes it easy to challenge your friends in mobile multiplayer matches
- Mobile game Shapist was inspired by ancient Asian block games
Previews and interviews
- Yoshi’s New Island makes us question all of his dino-egg tossing (preview)
- Murdered: Soul Suspect turns a ghost story into a fascinating, original video game (hands-on preview)
- Know your developer: An interview with Shadowrun Returns creator Harebrained Schemes
- The Dutch want gaming startups to sprout like tulips (interview)
- Game changer: VC Chris Dixon talks about Oculus and his occasional forays into gaming (interview)
- Wolfenstein: The New Order brings the franchise into the Call of Duty gen (by way of Tarantino)
Reviews
- Inazuma Eleven’s fantastic take on soccer is better than the real thing (review)
- Professor Layton and the Azran Legacy provides an epic and emotional series finale (review)
- Plants vs. Zombies: Garden Warfare dumbs down a smart series (review)
- Castlevania: Lords of Shadow 2 is a much more focused experience than its predecessor (review)
- Thief pilfers some needed improvements but forgets to steal a personality (review)