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The Week in Review news piece summarizes and highlights the most important gaming related news and rumors over the past week. This weekly article will keep you plugged in and in-tune. Important news was on the light side, but perhaps the biggest tidbit came from Ubisoft. The France-based game developer and publisher has announced that it will be opening a fourth creative studio in Canada – this time in Toronto, Ontario. The new facility will eventually employ (over the next 10 years) an additional 800 employees to Ubisoft’s already impressive 2,300 Canadians already working for the company. As such, the Canadian government has subsidized the creation of the new studio to the tune of $263 million (CAD) – nearly $227 million (USD). Ubisoft Toronto will be modeled after the wildly successful Ubisoft Montreal. Yannis Mallat, current CEO of Ubisoft Montreal, will oversee both studios. In addition to collaborating to produce games, Ubisoft Toronto will also fill an important role in creating the company’s non-gaming endeavors including film and other graphical projects. Square Enix has announced that their acquisition of British game developer/publisher Eidos Interactive has led them to change the name of the entity to Square Enix Europe. However, games created by the European arm of the company will continue to use the Eidos moniker for brand recognition purposes. Former Eidos CEO Phil Rogers will helm the new company. Unfortunately, this reorganization will likely mean jobs will be lost during the transition. Valve’s VP of Marketing Doug Lombardi informed the gaming world that the company has listened to demands from fans and is trying its best to bring cross-game play between Left 4 Dead and Left 4 Dead 2. Lots of fans of the franchise were worried by the announcement of the second edition, as it would spell the end of the beloved original. Thankfully, continued support through DLC and now cross-game play will allow players to keep gunning zombies regardless of the version they’re playing. In another fan victory, EA has decided to include face button controls to Fight Night Round 4 by releasing a free to download patch for the option in September. Additionally, EA SPORTS also announced that they are planning on releasing a DLC pack by early August. Both the PS3 and Xbox 360 DLC versions “will include a new training gym, new gameplay sliders, as well as a host of new equipment that can be used for outfitting boxers.” Xbox 360 users, on the other hand, will also receive “an exclusive alternate version of Sugar Ray Leonard in their first DLC pack.” Cover art for Modern Warfare 2 was released this week and it has become apparent that the game will include the Call of Duty moniker. It was previously thought Infinity Ward was going to be going its own way, branching off from the main series. However, Activision made it clear that despite the apparent offshoot, Modern Warfare 2 is still clearly in the CoD wheelhouse. The official word went like this: “We have focused our attention on Modern Warfare in order to most effectively communicate the fact that this is the first true sequel in the Call of Duty series. Infinity Ward, the original creators of the Call of Duty franchise, has said from the beginning Modern Warfare 2 resides in the Call of Duty universe. This is reflected in the title’s package.” |