This week we consider the finer points of not starving in games like Minecraft, Terraria, and Don’t Starve. Then we discuss the latest and not-so-greatest in tower defense, why people are mad at Warren Spector, Diablo III’s Black Tuesday, how close we are and aren’t to getting to the heart of Peter Molyneux’s latest gimmick, who would win in a fight between Robin and Aqua Man, and why Victoria II is one of the Most Important Games of the 21st Century. Also, you haven’t heard Maureen Dowd’s name pronounced until you’ve heard it pronounced by Jason McMaster in this week’s message from our sponsor.
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Sony continues to court indie game makers. The official PlayStation Blog notes that Sony will waive the $99 licensing fee to develop games for their mobile platforms.
This summer we’re throwing down the gauntlet for PlayStation Mobile development and are removing any existing barriers to get your brainchild of a game on this new PlayStation platform. As you saw with our recent Indie Arcade event at GDC, we’re always looking to support new developer talent, so we’ve decided to waive the $99 publisher license fee for PlayStation Mobile, which means you can bring your games to PlayStation Vita or any PlayStation-certified device free of cost.
Get to it lazybones! If the $99 fee was going to blow out your development budget, then you have no excuse now. You could make the next Chronovolt or Hustle Kings!
Electronic Arts is severing its licensing relationships with firearms manufacturers. Reuters reports that EA will no longer seek licensing permission from gun makers to use the names and likenesses of their firearms in their games. EA says it will still use those real-world weapons in their games, by asserting fair use and a constitutional right to free speech.
“We’re telling a story and we have a point of view,” EA’s President of Labels Frank Gibeau, who leads product development of EA’s biggest franchises, said in an interview. “A book doesn’t pay for saying the word ‘Colt,’ for example.”
Publishers initially approached gun companies for licenses to safeguard themselves from potential lawsuits when using real-world weapons in their games during the late 1990’s. These licenses were usually traded for little to no financial compensation because gun manufacturers knew that having their weapon appear in a game was good advertising.
