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Rovio not planning public stock offering in 2012

Finnish developer Rovio, creator of global mega-hit Angry Birds, isn't planning to go public this year. Reuters reports marketing chief Peter Vesterbacka confirmed the company, which has moved over 600 million copies of the avian slingshot game and has been valued at up to $9 billion, won't slam into New York or Hong Kong stock exchanges in 2012.

"We are not in a rush. This year is way too early for an IPO, there are too many open things, and we are in a very early stage of the Angry Birds lifecycle," said Vesterbacka. "Hong Kong is very interesting, absolutely, but again it is totally dependent on how markets develop. Asia is where all the people are, and future growth."

Analysts have been skeptical of Rovio's IPO, particularly since the company continues to only have one hit franchise.

TIGA: UK 'brain drain' sees nearly half of laid-off devs leaving country

Britain's developer workforce has fallen 10 percent since 2008, and 41 percent of studio employees laid off between 2009 and 2011 have relocated out of the country, UK-games trade association TIGA reports. TIGA is publishing a survey from Games Investor Consulting that covers three-fourths of the UK games industry and warns of a brain drain in the UK.

Bizarre Creations, a Liverpool studio that closed in 2010, saw one-third of its former employees leave the UK for new jobs in the games industry, according to the report. It also claims that countries such as Canada can entice UK talent because they benefit from tax breaks that reduce the cost of game development. The UK currently doesn't have comparable tax breaks, but "the video games industry is exactly the kind of sector that the Government should be supporting to help rebalance the UK economy," TIGA CEO Richard Wilson says.

Portabliss: Puzzlejuice (iOS)

Did you know that you can download handheld games now? That's amazingly convenient! The only inconvenient part of it is finding the right games to buy -- and that's where we come in, with our Portabliss column. In each installment, we'll tell you about a downloadable game on the iPhone, iPad, Android device, DSi, 3DS, PSP, etc. Today: Portabliss.

Usually, if an iPhone game is crippled by its control scheme, I won't recommend it here. Most of the time, awkward controls are enough to get me to stop playing a game, and not bother with it.

However, Puzzlejuice's concept is so strong and so irresistible that I continue playing it, over and over again, despite there never being a time I'm not fighting with the controls. And I'm going to tell you to play it, even though you're going to be annoyed by the controls too. I think that's indicative of strong game design.

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Dance Central Dance Cam app electric slides onto mobiles

You know how Dance Central 2 is super fun because you can dance like a crazy person with utter disregard for the social consequences, thanks to the fact that you're alone in your own damn house? Well, take that same concept, add the watchful eyes of the entire Internet and remove any trace of humility or dignity, and you've got an exciting and new way to make a total fool out of yourself in 15 second bursts.

The Dance Central 2 Dance Cam app from Harmonix, available for free on iOS, Android and Windows Phone lets you choose snippets from 7 songs, record yourself dancing to said snippets and then "dancify" the resulting video, which can then be uploaded to Facebook or deleted forever in shame. The app also features dance-move diagrams for the included songs, just in case you ever find yourself suddenly and desperately unprepared for a dance battle while on public transportation.

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Minecraft Pocket Edition building worlds in 700K pockets

We don't know if you guys knew this or not, but Minecraft is, like, super popular. Not only has the desktop version of the game reached 20 million registered users, but Minecraft Pocket Edition for iOS and Android has broken the 700,000 sold barrier, according to Mojang's Daniel Kaplan.

Between iOS and Android versions, Mojang is selling around 5,000 copies per day, which is a pretty amazing feat considering the game costs $6.99 and has no crafting or survival elements. Well, not yet, anyway.
[photolinc via Shutterstock]

PSA: Soulcalibur now on iOS, is twelve freaking dollars

The Soul still burns a hole through your wallet.
Soulcalibur has finally arrived on iOS, meaning eager fans can keep the classic fighter on hand at all times. That is, if you're willing to part with enough cash to buy roughly a dozen other iOS titles. Yup, Soulcalibur will currently set you back $11.99 and it's on sale. The normal price will actually be $15.

For comparison's sake, the Xbox Live Arcade version costs $10 and features better graphics, more modes (like, an actual versus mode) and physical controls. There are more modes planned for the iOS version but ... really, fifteen dollars?

New Zynga titles struggle, analysts call for increase in daily active users

Zynga's two latest games, Hidden Chronicles and the iOS-only Scramble With Friends, have failed to accumulate the same daily active user (DAU) totals as two of the social giant's previous releases, Castleville or Empires and Allies. This spells big trouble for the company's trading value and future growth, at least according to a report released by financial analysis group Cowen and Company.

Hidden Chronicles' 12 day post-launch DAU total of 710,000 is well below the over 5 million DAU figure reached by Empires and Allies and Castleville during their first 12 days of existence; similarly, Scramble With Friends has failed to penetrate the Top 20 barrier on the App Store. Historically, Zynga's DAU totals peak 3 months after a game has been released (according to the report), and while it's possible that both Hidden Chronicles and Scramble With Friends could slowly acquire a larger user base, there's nothing in Zynga's statistical history to make that extremely plausible.

Now, 710,000 daily users sounds like a ton of people, but Zynga has set the bar so high that it's not enough to keep the company's overall growth even: "The quarterly rate of DAU decline for Zynga's titles that are at least three months old has averaged 18.4 percent per quarter for the last two years," explained Doug Creutz of Cowen and Company. "Assuming Zynga averages a 20 percent quarterly rate of decline for titles beyond their launch windows in 2012, the company must add 9-10 million DAUs per quarter from new games just to keep total DAUs constant."

So basically, any game Zynga releases in 2012 has to achieve at least 5 million daily users in order for the company's user base to break even. In other news, Zynga has constructed a super-sonic ultra-high-altitude aircraft to recover the bar it's accidentally set for itself in the exosphere.

Puzzlejuice summoned to App Store tomorrow

Greg Wohlwend, part of the team behind the amazing iOS version of Solipskier and the upcoming Ridiculous Fishing, has a new game coming to the App Store tomorrow. Puzzlejuice, a collaboration with Asher Vollmer, retains the neon color scheme of Solipskier, with a combination of falling-block and word gameplay.

We don't really understand it, but it appears that you direct Tetris-like blocks into a pile, then tap them to reveal letters, then select words within those groupings of letters. We look forward to figuring it out tomorrow, when the game will be released for $3.

Caverns of Minos offers minotaurs, Mothersheep through App Store



Jeff Minter's latest iOS installment doesn't directly involve goats, but it does bring back the illustrious minotaurs and disco-psychedelic flavor of classic Llamasoft style. Caverns of Minos has players grab minotaurs from the depths of vertical caverns to return them to the Mothersheep (yes, it's a giant, floating sheep), all in brilliant neon, old-school graphics.

Caverns of Minos is available now in the App Store for $1.99 from Minter's Llamasoft, which self-supposedly offers "the finest minotaur-rescuing games on the entire App Store."

Q.U.B.E. being prototyped for iOS, Mac and OnLive versions on the way

Not a PC owner? Take heart, because the folks behind the Indie Fund's first release, Q.U.B.E., are already hard at work on bringing the game to a platform more accessible to you. "We're currently prototyping an iOS version, and a Mac version has been in the works for two months now," Toxic Games managing director and co-founder Daniel Da Rocha told Joystiq by email earlier today. The game is also planned for an OnLive release in the not so distant future. "Hard to say right now, hopefully Q1 2012," Da Rocha said.

As for an Xbox Live Arcade or PlayStation Network port of the already profitable game, that concept is a bit more nebulous. "We would love to go in that direction," Da Rocha told us. "It's all dependent on how well the PC version does." You heard him, folks! Get crackin'!

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