It faced down long-established booksellers in 1994, expanded that fight to big box retailers a few years later - and, in 2011, it took on Apple and Google with the launch of the Kindle Fire tablet. Now it has its eye on the mobile gaming market - and to win this fight, it will need to take its gloves off.The Kindle Fire is already a decent gaming device. 70% of all users play games on it - with ARPU's that are higher than Google Play and neck-to-neck with Apple. But there's room to grow. And while Amazon might be behind to the gaming world, Microsoft was also a latecomer in the console space - and it went on to be a leader.In fact, Amazon appears to be following a trail similar to the one Microsoft blazed, using a three-pronged strategy: Implement a top-down approach; invest in the necessary talent; and create a developer friendly ecosystem and platform.
When Disney bought LucasFilm (and, as a result, the Star Wars license), there was a little part of me that got excited at the prospect of great mobile games. You see, there was a time when the App Store was littered with Star Wars games like The Battle for Hoth, Falcon Gunner, and Star Wars Cantina - but like a certain galaxy far away, that was a long long time ago.Expired licensing deals killed of the past generation of mobile Star Wars games, but if today's announcement is any indication, we might be in line for a renaissance. Hot off the heels of their first Star Wars mobile game, Tiny Death Star, Disney has just announced Star Wars: Assault Team.While they're remaining mum on details, what little has been revealed makes it look like another entry in the crowded card battle space - the one dominated by games like Marvel War of Heroes and… well, another Star Wars game: Star Wars Force Collection. How terribly awkward.
Whoever said that a kitten and a dragon couldn't be best friends? Well I guess if you really think about it, one is a cuddly and fragile ball of fluff, while the other is a fire-breathing death machine with talons and scales, so maybe I can understand all you naysayers out there. But either way, that hasn't stopped GungHo Online Entertainment from announcing their latest Puzzle & Dragons collaboration today: this time with the adorable Hello Kitty World!Starting now and running until February 9th, Puzzle & Dragons players will be able to download an exclusive Technical Dungeon that features a colorful amusement park theme, four difficulty levels, and a slew of awesome "mash-up" characters taken from the two games, like Kitty Flamie and Kitty Bubblie, which can be earned by using a new Rare Egg Machine."On the flipside, Hello Kitty World players can also take advantage of the new crossover event by adding special Puzzle & Dragons-themed attractions into their Hello Kitty theme parks. See? And you thought that kittens and dragons would never get along!
Does anyone else feel like The History Channel confuses the word "history" with "fan fiction" an awful lot nowadays? But while that's aggravating as crap for an amateur historian such as myself, it's also downright riveting for a video game nerd who loves the idea of trench warfare against aliens. With that in mind, allow me to introduce you to a new concept: The Great Martian War.Set in an alternate World War I period (and based on a made-for-TV movie of the same name that aired last fall, because WHY WOULDN'T THE HISTORY CHANNEL MAKE A MOVIE ABOUT MARTIANS), The Great Martian War is an endless runner destined for the App Store and Google Play on February 5.If you're getting a little tired of endless runners, we get it - but don't judge until you've seen the trailer above. There's just something about World War I soldiering pitted against an HG Wells-style terror that's just has video games written all over it.Watch the skies for our full review next month.
Remember Johnny Mnemonic? Me too. In a career plagued by stinkers, Johnny Mnemonic might just be Keanu Reeves very worst. Still, those memories will serve us both well when checking out the comedy gold that is the trailer for Jazzpunk from Adult Swim and Necrophone Games.Weighing in at a hefty 2 minutes and 4 seconds, they only manage to squeeze a moment or two of gameplay in at the end - but it's certainly enough to whet our appetites. If you're looking for more, Necrophone's earlier teaser trailer from 2012 will give you a much better feel for what the game is about. But why would you want to know that when you could watch fake-Keanu flailing around like a fish out of water?Expect to see Jazzpunk, "an adventure comedy game and poorly made word processor," according to the developer, hit Steam for PC, Mac and Linux on February 7.
When we last spoke with Nathan Meunier, freelance writer and video game journalist extraordinaire, he had just published the first entry in what was to become a series of guidebooks for hopefuls looking to follow in his inky footsteps. That book, Up Up Down Down Left WRITE: The Freelance Guide to Video Game Journalism, covered a plethora of topics that are bound to hound the would-be journalist, including composing pitches, covering gaming conventions, and even getting your pajama-clad daily routine in order. His next entry in the series, Interview Fu: The Game Journo Guide to Conducting Killer Interviews, explores one of UUDDLW's many topics in greater depth and is already available for purchase in print or Kindle formats. We soaked up all of the knowledge present in this new guidebook and used it to pry even more wisdom from the mind of 10-year writing veteran Meunier."While interviewing is covered at a high level in UUDDLW, Interview Fu provides a hyper-focused expansion of the topic that was previously confined to a single chapter. Meunier also expanded the section on pitches into a longer, specialized PDF titled "12 Ways to Improve Your Pitches" after readers responded with overwhelming positivity to its coverage in UUDDLW. "Interview Fu wasn't driven as much by reader response as it was by my own desire to fill an inadvertent void in UUDDLW," Meunier told Gamezebo. "It's one of several areas that I didn't get into very deeply in the first book, in-part because it's a big enough topic to merit an entire separate book. It's also a subject that's near and dear to me, as readers of the book will discover."
Game developer Jindrich Stefan recently launched an Indiegogo campaign for his 2D action game, Super Scream Queen. Drawing inspiration from 1950s horror movies and the early works of Nintendo, Stefan is busy working on developing Super Scream Queen into an ode to his favorite film and game genres.Planned for Windows, Mac, and Linux, the game has players controlling a woman attempting to escape from hordes of pursuing monsters. Stefan plans to have around 70 levels in the final release, and while the levels themselves will be quite short, he explains that players will hardly be able to get through a level on their first try. He expects that players possessing average video game skills can beat the entire game in around ten hours.
On January 21st, Valve announced that fifty more titles have been approved through their Greenlight program. Included in the fifty selected titles is Catlateral Damage (which we just covered last week) as well as Dungeonforge, No Photos, Please!, and Path to the Sky."These titles were selected on the same criteria we have been using in the past," Valve explains in the announcement post. "Votes in Greenlight give us a hugely valuable point of data in gauging community interest along with external factors such as press reviews, crowd-funding successes, performance on other similar platforms, and awards and contests to help form a more complete picture of community interest in each title."