Hasta La Gadget!

Fresh from putting smiles on the faces of tabletop gaming geeks everywhere, with yesterday’s news that it would be helping to bring Dungeons & Dragons to iOS devices later this year, mobile game publisher Playdek has closed a $3.8 million Series A funding round.

The round was led by Qualcomm Incorporated, via its venture investment arm, Qualcomm Ventures, with IDG Ventures and ff Venture Capital also participating. Existing investors Deep Fork Capital, Greycroft Partners, Jarl Mohn and unnamed angel investors also joined in. The company had previously raised $1.56 million in funding from its seed and Angel rounds — taking its total funding post-Series A to $5.36 million.

Playdek said the new funding will allow it to expand its digital hobby games portfolio with new launches, including its forthcoming app, Agricola, based on the strategy board game of the same name. Flagship existing titles from Playdek include its Ascension series.

The company’s other big plan for the funding is to build a hobby gamer community and online platform for players to meet and hang out, due to launch later this year. It said this platform will “provide the services that hobby gamers value” — so presumably stuff like leaderboards ranking players by score and forums to discuss the merits of different gaming strategies. In a press statement, Joel Goodman, CEO, said it would be about “giving gamers that ‘around the table’ feeling in the digital realm”. The platform will also offer events and tournaments.

Commenting on the funding in a statement, Phil Sanderson, Managing Director, IDG Ventures said: “The market category is poised for growth, and Playdek has proven that it is the expert when it comes to bringing this dedicated audience what they want in mobile gameplay.”

“Playdek gives gamers what they want — compelling online games based on the franchises they know and love.  Playdek allows people to explore these worlds and stories in a compelling new way,” added John Frankel, ff Venture Capital, also in a statement. “We love the team, the strategy, and what they have done to date; we expect great things from them in the future.”

The 2013 Game Developers Conference has been going on all week long, and the Game Developers Choice Awards ceremony was held last night. Out of the 11 total awards that were given out, Journey took home six of them. The indie video game was released just over a year ago as a PS3 exclusive, and it’s been all the rage as of late.

Journey took home the crown jewel of awards during the conference: the Game of the Year award, as well as winning Best Audio, Best Game Design, Best Visual Arts, Best Downloadable Game, and the Innovation Award. As for the first-ever Audience Choice Award, that honor went to Dishonored, a 2012 stealth action-adventure game from Arkane Studios and Bethesda.

Other notable wins include the Best Narrative, which went to Telltale’s The Walking Dead, and the Best Debut went to the Kickstarter-funded FTL: Faster Than Light. Best Technology went to Ubisoft’s Far Cry 3, and the Best Handheld/Mobile Game went to The Room, which is an iOS game that released back in September.

This year’s GDC Awards ceremony was quite interesting, and they highlighted some great games that probably wouldn’t have made it to the mainstream. The awards ceremony certainly outperforms Spike TV’s attempt at a video game awards show, with their Video Game Awards that take place every year that doesn’t quite live up to gamers’ expectations.

GDC 2013 award winners announced, Journey takes the cake is written by Craig Lloyd & originally posted on SlashGear.
© 2005 – 2012, SlashGear. All right reserved.

Nintendo has heard its Wii U gamers loud and clear: the Wii U’s loading times are pretty slow, but the company has announced that an update for the console will be arriving next month, but they just can’t hold back their excitement for the update, so they have released a video showcasing the speed improvements of its new console.

The video shows off a side-by-comparison of two Wii U Gamepads. The one on the left is a Wii U without the new update, and the one of the right is a Wii U with the update installed. The video shows how quickly the console returns to the home screen after playing New Super Mario Bros. U. It takes about eight seconds with the updated Wii U, while the older Wii U takes over twice as long.

Of course, even with the new update applied, it’s still a bit of a wait time to get back to the home screen, but it’s certainly an improvement, and one that most Wii U gamers will be grateful to have. If you still aren’t satisfied, however, Nintendo is expected to release a second update sometime later this year to decrease loading times when launching software.

The Wii U’s sales have been rather low lately, being the lowest-selling console on the market right now, with Microsoft’s Xbox 360 leading the way with its 26th straight month of being the highest-selling console. However, Nintendo isn’t giving up on the Wii U just yet. The company said that they’re serious about the new console, and have a bunch of plans lined up in the future.

Nintendo Wii U update coming in April is written by Craig Lloyd & originally posted on SlashGear.
© 2005 – 2012, SlashGear. All right reserved.

It seems like only yesterday when Battlefield 3 was announced and launched, but Electronic Arts has announced that the next installment in the series, Battlefield 4, will be launching this fall. The game will be coming to Windows, PlayStation 3, PlayStation 4, and the Xbox 360. The publisher confirmed, however, that the game won’t be heading to Wii U.

As expected, the game will be developed by DICE, the Swedish game studio owned by EA. The game is up for pre-order right now on EA’s Origin service, where you can either get the Deluxe Edition for $70, or the Standard Edition for $60. The Deluxe Edition comes with access to the beta, as well as a handful of bonus content.

Right off the bat, EA also released a whopping 17-minute gameplay trailer that shows off the prologue of the game, featuring a squad of soldiers on the run from Russian spec-op soldiers in Azerbaijan, Baku. It’s pretty intense to say the least, and it only gets us more excited for the game at this point.

No price for the PS4 version of the game was disclosed, but we should hear more about that soon. As for availability on Microsoft’s next-generation Xbox gaming console, we would be surprised if Battlefield 4 wasn’t arriving on the console, but chances are we’ll see DICE make an appearance at Microsoft’s next-gen Xbox reveal event to show off some new tricks.

Battlefield 4 announced, launching this fall is written by Craig Lloyd & originally posted on SlashGear.
© 2005 – 2012, SlashGear. All right reserved.

Let’s say you bought a pair of cartridge-based games to go with your Nintendo 3DS, but you’re embracing our all-digital future and want to replace them with downloadable copies. You won’t have to toss all your game progress at the same time: a newly available 3DS firmware update includes a tool to move save files from a retail copy to its downloadable version. The transfer is strictly one-way, though, so there’s no falling back for gaming Luddites. Nintendo offers a bonus if you’re fully in step with the online world, though — background downloads can now start just by closing the lid while the eShop is running. Both elements of the update are simple on the surface, but they could go a long way in helping us ditch a legacy of plastic game libraries.

Filed under: Gaming, Nintendo

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Source: Nintendo