It’s almost hard to believe. Ten years from today, Blizzard’s now-classic RTS StarCraft was born. Since its release on March 31, more than 9.5 million copies have been sold worldwide, with 1.5 million units sold within the first year of the game’s release.
To celebrate the big day, Blizzard has written up a mini-retrospective on the StarCraft franchise as a whole. Give it a read if you’re feel nostalgic, and in the meantime, don’t forget to cross your fingers for a 2008 release of StarCraft II.
Ubisoft’s Tom Clancy’s Rainbow Six Vegas 2 has sold an impressive 2 million units worldwide, the publisher announced today.
Ubisoft said the title exceed expectations and as a result is raising its revenue guidance for fiscal 2007-08. The French-based publisher now expects full-year sales of around 920 million Euro, compared to previous estimates of around 875 million Euro.
With sales like this, it’s no wonder they bought out the Clancy name. more »
As part of an ongoing restructuring effort, Atari today announced that it has appointed former Vivendi Universal exec Jim Wilson as Chief Executive Officer and President. Wilson will assume his responsibility immediately as CEO, taking the place of Curtis Solsvig, who has served as interim CEO since October 2007.
“Atari, Inc., with its world-renowned brand and strong library of game franchises, has a tremendous opportunity in North America. I look forward to working with the Atari team and shareholders to lead Atari, Inc. into its next phase of growth,” said Mr. Wilson. more »
Update #2: Finally, confusion regarding the release date has come to an end. Activision’s official website for the Game of the Year Edition is now listing an April 4 release date for the Variety Map Pack.
Update: Activision says the map pack is delayed, Bowling says no.
In a brief email today, publisher Activision gave a revised release date of April 10 for the Xbox 360 version of its upcoming Call of Duty 4 Variety Map Pack. The release of the map pack was originally scheduled for April 3.
Set to cost 800 Microsoft Points ($10), the map pack includes four new multiplayer maps, namely Creek, Broadcast, Chinatown and Killhouse. Alongside the confirmation of a release date, Activision sent over a new batch of screenshots from each of the aforementioned maps.
Can’t wait for the release of SOCOM: Confrontation in September? Here’s something that may tide you over. In a surprise announcement, Sony revealed that a new downloadable map pack for SOCOM 3: U.S. Navy SEALs and SOCOM: U.S. Navy SEALs Combined Assault is now available for download. The best part? It’s FREE.
The map pack is composed of SOCOM and SOCOM II maps Crossroads, Fishhook, Guidance, and Frostfire. Each map supports up to 16 players in a day or night setting. Hit the jump for details on each of the maps. more »
The Wii installment in Square Enix’s long-running Chocobo’s Dungeon series will make its North American debut on July 8, the company announced today.
Entitled Final Fantasy Fables: Chocobo Dungeon, the game follows the story of Cid and mascot Chocobo. As two treasure hunters, the two find themselves transported to a town where townsfolk are losing their memories. With the town in a state of peril, players must journey through a number of dungeons in order to retrieve everyone’s memories.
Apart from exploring the depths of randomly generated dungeons, players can compete online in pop-up style virtual card battles over Nintendo WiFi connection.
Final Fantasy Fables: Chocobo Dungeon will retail at an MSRP of $39.99. more »
Publisher Ubisoft today announced that Emergency Heroes is set to the Wii later this May.
Described as a family friendly type open world rescue driving game, players assume the role of a emergency hero, whose mission is to protect the streets of San Alto. Players can hop in one of 16 high-tech vehicles in their effort to restore peace. The game’s vehicle lineup will consist of police, fire and EMT vehicles.
In addition to single player, Emergency Heroes will feature a two player co-op mode in which players can challenge friends or combine forces to protect their city. more »
Harmonix developer Sean “hmxsean” Baptiste today announced on the company’s official forums that all Rock Band owners will soon receive free DLC in the form of Portal’s hit ending theme song, “Still Alive.”
The song is scheduled to hit the Xbox Live Marketplace tomorrow — on April Fools day no less. PlayStation 3 owners of Rock Band will have to wait until April 17, due to the fact that the PlayStation Store is currently undergoing a revamp.
LC April 1st! Huge success! [Harmonix]
While official numbers have yet to be released, reputable Japanese blogger sinobi is reporting that first day sales for Capcom’s newly released Monster Hunter Portable 2nd G were 670,000 units. If true, 2nd G would earn the title of the fastest selling Monster Hunter entry ever — on day one at least.
What’s shocking is that 2nd G is more or less an expansion to Monster Hunter Portable 2nd, not an entirely new game. Just for that reason, you wouldn’t expect the game to sell this well, but apparently it did.
Official sales figures will be released later this week on Wednesday.
Sony Computer Entertainment America just issued a press release in response to SCEE’s official announcement of a PlayStation Store redesign for Europe. The release confirms that the new look will also hit North America in mid-April.
Updates to the US store, as with the European store, will cease over the next two weeks in preparation for the redesign effort.
A new PS3 firmware update is slated to hit in mid-April as well. According to Sony, the update will enable access to the revamped store.
