Today's round-up includes news on a new Reggie Fils-Aime editorial on THQ striking a deal with Polish developer People Can Fly, a final release date for 'Advent Children,' and a new board of directors for game rental service GameFly, along with the latest posts on GameSetWatch and Gamasutra job postings.
- THQ, one of the larger publishers of licensed games, has signed a deal with Polish developers People Can Fly to release its games throughout the world. The first game under the agreement, which has yet to be announced, will be released for next-generation systems in fall 2007. "THQ's strategy is to work with world-class developers to bring highly innovative, original IP to market," said THQ senior vice president of business development Dan Kelly. "It was immediately obvious to us that the team at People Can Fly has great talent and an exciting, innovative idea that supports this strategy." The studio will join THQ's stable of 12 in-house teams and 25 independent developers.
- Square Enix announced a firm release date of April 25th for the oft-delayed "visual content,"
Final Fantasy VII Advent Children. The 101-minute animated CG film shows the events in the
FFVII world after the game's conclusion, featuring nearly all of the game's original characters. Well-known American actors have been selected for the voice roles, including Steve Burton as Cloud, Rachel Leigh Cook as Tifa, and Mena Suvari as Aerith. The film will be released both on DVD and, for a slightly confusing two dollars more, on PlayStation Portable-formatted UMD.
- Internet video game rental company GameFly has named a new member of its board of directors in Scott Sassa, the Entrepreneur-in-Residence for the venture capital firm of Kleiner, Perkins, Caulfield & Byers. Sassa's previous ventures included serving as president and CEO of social networking site Friendster, as well as a position at NBC Studios. The new board member will join the existing board of Sequoia's Michael Moritz, Lehman Brothers' Tom Banahan, and Gap.com's Toby Lenk.
- Recent posts on Gamasutra sister weblog
GameSetWatch include oldschool
South Korean gaming consoles,
bad games with great names, an officially licensed
game for recording artists The Gorillaz, and tips and tricks for
luring children into dangerous chatrooms with the Nintendo DS.
- Also updated today,
the latest Gamasutra job postings, including positions from Blizzard Entertainment, Spark Unlimited, Vivendi Universal, Factor 5, Sony Computer Entertainment America and Bandalong Entertainment.
