Canadian game dev and blockchain infrastructure outfit Horizon Blockchain Games has completed a USD$3.75m (£2.97m) seed round. Reddit co-founder Alexis Ohanian’s venture fund Initialized Capital led the round, which was also supported by Golden Ventures, Polychain, Coinbase, Digital Currency Group and Inovia Capital. The seed round is likely to be a significant boon to bringing Horizon’s game SkyWeaver to market, and to the further development of the company’s blockchain video game network Arcadeum, which is pitched as a ‘crypto arcade’. Backing by [...]

TheGamingEconomy’s Daily Digest brings you the trending stories in gaming. In today’s news: Ubisoft surpasses Q1 2019-2020 targets; Nintendo announces update to Switch; and DouYu goes public with USD$775m (£624m) Nasdaq IPO. Ubisoft surpasses Q1 2019-2020 targets Despite not releasing a major new title within the first quarter of the 2019-2020 fiscal year, Ubisoft has smashed its projection for the period, earning USD$352.8 (£314.5m). This likely reflects the fact that players are perhaps staying with games longer thanks to a range of [...]

London-based studio Pixion Games has revealed that it has secured USD$2m (£1.6m) in seed funding to further its efforts developing mobile titles specifically geared towards esports. Private investment firm Eldridge Industries led the round, with contributions from Jabre Capital Family Office and three angel investors. As well as being used to develop the studio’s games, the funds will also be used to scale the team, which presently boasts talent formerly serving at King, Curve, Hutch and Konami. So far that reads like [...]

TheGamingEconomy’s Daily Digest brings you the trending stories in gaming. In today’s news: Private equity firm Blackstone buys Vungle; Tencent launches streaming app for WeGame; and Baidu renews partnership with Snap. Private equity firm Blackstone buys Vungle Private equity firm Blackstone has announced it is purchasing performance marketing platform Vungle, which serves in-app video ads with publishers including Rovio and Zynga. While the exact terms of the deal have yet to be disclosed, sources have informed Techcrunch that the all-cash payment is [...]

TheGamingEconomy’s Daily Digest brings you the trending stories in gaming. In today’s news: Niantic shuts down Field Trip; Growth slows on Twitch; Respawn forces cheaters to fight each other. Niantic shuts down Field Trip Niantic has announced that it will be shutting down its first mobile app, Field Trip, later this year. The location-based tour guide app was released in 2012, when the developer was in its former guise as Niantic Labs, an internal subsidiary of Google. While it is not unusual [...]

TheGamingEconomy’s Daily Digest brings you the trending stories in gaming. In today’s news: Monolith Soft doubles year-on-year profit, opens new studio; Fiverr launches ‘industry store’ for gaming services; and Ubisoft criticised for sourcing music through HitRecord. Monolith Soft doubles year-on-year profit, opens new studio Nintendo subsidiary Monolith Soft has announced that it has opened a new studio in Osaki, Tokyo, following a year in which the developer saw its profits almost double from JP¥138m (£1.02m) to JP¥274m (£2.02m). Originally founded in 1999 as [...]

Nintendo has developed a reputation for doing things differently when it comes to developing new gaming hardware. When the original Wii was revealed to come with a wand-shaped motion sensitive control, Nintendo reaffirmed itself as unafraid to forge its own path. Few industry observers around at the time will forget how it felt to see a Wii Remote for the first time. It was surprising, enthusing and invigorating. The DS handheld, meanwhile, introduced two screens at a time when convention dictated that [...]

Facebook is reportedly pursuing acquisitions and exclusivity deals in an effort to supply its VR hardware with big name, triple-A productions. That is according to The Information, which cites two insider sources with knowledge on the matter. One of those sources reported that deals have already been signed around Ubisoft game series like Assassin’s Creed and Tom Clancy’s Splinter Cell. The idea appears to be to bolster the fortunes and longevity of Facebook’s Oculus VR hardware range through high-profile titles. Meanwhile, the [...]

TheGamingEconomy’s Daily Digest brings you the trending stories in gaming. In today’s news: Over 4,000 developers have signed up to Google Stadia Partners; winners announced for the Develop:Star 2019 Awards; and the Nintendo Switch Lite not a replacement for the DS – Doug Bowser. Over 4,000 developers have signed up to Google Stadia Partners More than 4,000 game development companies have reportedly submitted applications to join the Stadia Partners scheme, according to Sam Cocoran, technical account manager at Google, who was addressing [...]

TheGamingEconomy’s Daily Digest brings you the trending stories in gaming. In today’s news: Cuphead to be made into Netflix show; Nintendo debuts Switch Lite; and Amazon is developing a Lord of the Rings MMO. Cuphead to be made into Netflix show Cuphead, the beloved indie 2D shooter from Studio MDHR, is to be made into a comedy series on Netflix. Itself based on classic 1940’s animated TV shows, Cuphead has been a huge success since its launch in 2017, having shifted over [...]