App2Top.com: site for game developers, publishers and marketers

Interview May 11, 2018

“A successful Kickstarter campaign allowed us to find investors”: interview about the development of INSOMNIA: The Ark

For 9 years Samara Studio MONO has been making INSOMNIA: The Ark, a dark role-playing game set on a giant space station. In March it became known that the publisher of the game will be Kaliningrad HeroCraft. As part of the announcement, we talked a little with Studio MONO CEO Anatoly Nekrasov about the project.

Games May 11, 2018

New Tomb Raider cost Eidos Montreal $135 million

Studio Eidos Montreal has revealed the total budget of the adventure thriller Shadow of the Tomb Raider. The company spent up to $135 million to create and promote the latest part of the Lara Croft saga.

Development May 11, 2018

The creators of RPG Maker MV will release a toolkit in the West to create sprite fighters

The companies Playism and Kadokawa Corporation will release the Pixel Game Maker MV toolkit on the Western market. It is designed to create two-dimensional games with sprite graphics. Working with the program does not require programming skills and other special knowledge.

Marketing May 11, 2018

SuperData: Mobile AR games are better to monetize with advertising

The analytical company SuperData considers advertising the best way to earn money for creators of mobile games and applications in augmented reality. This is due to the peculiarities of the format of AR applications, the researchers believe.

Industry May 11, 2018

Sega earned more from gaming retail last year than from digital sales

Sega Sammy Group summed up the results of fiscal year 2017 (ended March 31, 2018). According to the company’s report, Sega earned ¥57 billion ($522 million) from the sale of physical copies of its games, while digital sales of titles generated ¥38.5 billion ($352 million).

Conferences May 11, 2018

White Nights Prague 2018: Enhance on why it is necessary to know the obvious things

Report by Alexey Izvalov from Enhance. The speaker spoke about how, when developing a game, indie teams overlook important details that seem obvious at first glance.

Money May 11, 2018

Nexon earned $825 million in Q1 2018

Nexon, a major publisher of online games, reported a 21% increase in revenue in the 1st quarter of 2018. The company earned ¥90.5 billion ($825 million), and its net profit increased by 134% compared to the same period last year and reached ¥46.6 billion ($425 million).

Industry May 10, 2018

The creators of the Bioshock remaster fired 10% of employees

California studio Blind Squirrel Games has reduced one tenth of its staff due to the sudden cancellation of work on an unnamed project. Blind Squirrel Games is known as the creator of HD remasters for games of the Bioshock and Borderlands series.

Conferences May 10, 2018

White Nights Prague 2018: Drunken Monday about technical problems in multiplayer

Report by Alexander Simakhin from Drunken Monday. The speaker spoke about what problems can be encountered during the development of a mobile multiplayer mode in real time, and what solutions are available that have been tested in real projects.

Marketing May 10, 2018

Promotion School: Advertising conversion

Briefly about what conversion is and how you can work with it, — he told in the framework of a series of articles “School of Promotion” Nikolay Marchenko, media buyer at Mobio.

Conferences May 10, 2018

Applications for participation in the Indie Game Cup are open

The organizers of the White Nights conference for game developers have launched the next Indie Game Cup, a competition for game projects from independent teams. Representatives of Amazon and Appodeal, among others, will choose the best.

Industry May 10, 2018

SNK will release a pocket slot machine Neo Geo

Japanese gaming company SNK has announced a retro Neo Geo mini console. The device looks like a miniature automaton from the era of arcade halls with video games.

Industry May 10, 2018

Creative Director of DayZ leaves Bohemia Interactive

Game designer Brian Hicks announced his resignation from the position of creative director of the survival MMO action movie DayZ, which is being developed by the Czech studio Bohemia Interactive. In a farewell message, the game designer wrote that he no longer needed the project.

Money May 10, 2018

Bandai Namco’s gaming business grew by 14.2 over the year%

The Japanese corporation Bandai Namco officially closed the 2017 fiscal year (ended March 31 of this year). The company ended the reporting period on the rise — both total revenues and revenue of the Network Entertainment segment, which includes video games, increased.

Platforms May 10, 2018

Valve will allow you to play Steam games on mobile through the Steam Link app

Steam expands the possibilities for remote playback of games and videos. From the second half of May, users of the Valve platform will be able to play titles and watch videos from their libraries on mobile devices through the Steam Link and Steam Video applications.

Vacancies May 8, 2018

Vacancies of the week (May 8)

Wanted: art producer at G5, leading community manager at Playkot, programmer at MyTona, and bizdev at Nekki.

Platforms May 8, 2018

A new update for Chrome has deprived HTML5 browser games of sound

The update for Google’s Chrome browser caused unforeseen difficulties for developers and gamers. After the update in Chrome, the sound stopped working in some browser games created on HTML5.

Games May 8, 2018

Conan Exiles sales in Early Access exceeded 1 million copies

Conan Exiles, the developer and publisher of the MMO survival, the Norwegian studio Funcom, announced that the game had sold over 1 million copies by the date of its official release. Conan Exile officially launched today, May 8th.

Industry May 8, 2018

Study: Bad Game Design Infuriates Gamers More than Bugs

Canadian scientists from Queens University have found out what spoils the impression of video games. It turned out that bad game design annoys players the most when the gameplay is not exciting and makes them bored.

Industry May 8, 2018

Online Action Movie Loadout Closes Due to European Personal Data Law

The creators of the free-play action movie Loadout from the Edge of Reality studio have announced the imminent end of the project. The reason was the new regulation on user data protection (GDPR) for EU countries. Edge of Reality said that adjusting the game to the GDPR requirements would cost them too much, so it’s easier to close Loadout.