Organisers of IndieCade are calling for submissions ahead of this year's festival, set for October in Los Angeles. Submissions are invited from indie artists and designers worldwide, with works in progress encouraged. In addition to featuring, and being considered for awards at the October festival, those selected will be featured on the IndieCade website and promoted through social media. More >
Why US copyright law can give you a chance to take cloners to court.
"Just as our games and mechanics have inspired and accelerated the game industry, its 30-year body of work has inspired us too."
1Organisers of Develop In Brighton have issued a call for speakers ahead of this year's conference, which begins on July 10. The three-day event, now in its seventh year, plays host to over 100 sessions from industry experts. Speakers last year included David Braben, LittleBigPlanet developer Media Molecule, and SCEE's Mick Hocking. More >
Find your future designing quests for WOW, building new social games with Wooga or overseeing Dice's Battlelog.
Nintendo president Satoru Iwata has said that the company is using external studios to make games for Wii U which would previously have been developed externally. Speaking to investors following last week's disappointing financial results, Iwata moved to allay shareholder fears about the impact Wii U's processing power could have on Nintendo's development budgets. In addition to using the services of external developers, Iwata was keen to point out that not every Wii U game would take full advantage of its processing grunt. More >
1Marc Fascia, lead gameplay programmer on Ninja Theory's Enslaved: Odyssey To The West, has joined Brink developer Splash Damage as technical director. Fascia's remit will be overseeing all of the studio's technical efforts and setting the overall direction for programming teams. In a press release, Splash Damage hints it intends to spread beyond consoles, saying Fascia will support director of production Griff Jenkins "as the studio grows to additional gaming platforms." More >
6waves Lolapps under fire over "virtual duplicate" Yeti Town; fear of cloning will "stop people making original games," CEO tells us.
Zynga has again been accused of cloning the work of smaller developers, with Buffalo Studios following Nimbebit's lead in detailing the similarities between its own Bingo Blitz and Zynga's upcoming Zynga Bingo. In an infographic sent to VentureBeat, Buffalo points out the apparent visual and mechanical similarities between the two games. Nimblebit did the same last week when it accused Zynga of cloning Tiny Tower with upcoming mobile game Dream Heights. More >
Indie PSN hit PixelJunk Eden will be released on Steam next week, developer Q-Games has announced. Kotaku reports that Eden will be priced at $9.99 on Steam, and a 17-song soundtrack featuring Japanese multimedia artist Baiyon will also be available, for $5.99. More >
Hironobu Sakaguchi, creator of Final Fantasy and upcoming Wii RPG The Last Story, will speak at the British Academy Of Film And Television Arts' London headquarters next month, Nintendo has announced. More >
Over 600 staff worldwide are working on the recently announced Resident Evil 6, Capcom has confirmed. The figure was revealed by executive producer Hiroyuki Kobayashi, in a video introduction to the game's announcement trailer posted on Capcom-Unity. More >
World of Love organiser David Hayward is staging a new game design event called Bit of Alright next month. Taking place in the Battersea Arts Centre in London on February 3, the event includes speakers and sessions from Introversion's Mark Morris and Chris Delay; Hide&Seek;'s Holly Gramazio; Ricky Haggett and Nat Marco from Honey Slug, Gratuitous Space Battles designer Cliff Harris who will be offering advice on how to get out of bed and finish an indie title. More >
We chart Zynga's track record of copying the works of others.
3Indie studio Nimblebit has written an open letter to Zynga pointing out the striking similarities between iOS hit Tiny Tower and Zynga's upcoming mobile title Dream Heights. Posted on Twitter by Nimblebit's Ian Marsh, the letter contains side-by-side screenshots of Tiny Tower and Dream Heights which suggest Zynga has lifted not just the concept, but much of its execution as well. Players build skyscrapers, fit out individual floors as shops to be restocked and apartments for workers to live in, and drop off visitors at the floor of their choice. Tiny Tower's twin currency mechanic also appears to have been lifted. More >
3
Raph Koster on why QTEs might make for great experiences but are bad game design, plus the question of indie bundles.
9Following its debut at the Sundance film festival on the weekend, US TV network HBO has bought the rights to Indie Game: The Movie. [Initial reports](http://m.deadline.com/2012/01/sundance-hbo-and-scott-rudin-to-turn-docu-indie-game-into-series/) suggested that the documentary, which follows several high-profile indie developers, was going into development as a fictional comedy series, a remarkable turn for a serious-minded film that caused widespread confusion in gaming circles. More >
75 contestants from 16 universities, split into 15 teams, will each have 9 weeks to complete a working game prototype. Three of the teams will win a Bafta 'Ones to Watch' award. Applications must include a pitch for their game idea and a panel of judges will then shortlist potential teams for interview. More >
Tricky to find, awash with dross, and unreliable for revenue – whatever happened to Xbox 360's 'YouTube for videogames'?
2
The magic at the heart of Hyrule, the art of fantasy illustration, and the talk that called developers to exact revenge on society.