Ashley Mitchell broke into the Zynga mainframe, stole the identities of two company employees and thus managed to transfer 400 billion virtual gaming chips into his own account. The chips, valued at approximately $12m (£7m) by the prosecution, were then partially sold to other gamblers through Facebook. According to The Guardian, Mitchell made £53,612 over a two month period, funds then used to fuel his own gaming addiction. Mitchell pleaded guilty to one count of computer misuse and four counts of money laundering, and was also sentenced to an additional 30 weeks in prison for breaching a 40-week suspended sentence from 2008, received for hacking into the computer system of Torbay council, his former employer. His final sentence two years jail time. … More

Trion Worlds, the developer of the massively multiplayer online role-playing game Rift, received an unexpected helping hand in addressing a serious Rift account security issue: the help came from a hacker who is also a Rift player. After being himself the victim of account theft, ManWitDaPlan took matters in his own hands and began investigating the source of the problem, reporting his findings on the game’s official forum. According to ManWitDaPlan as stated in an interview with fan-site ZAM Rift, Trion Worlds response to the issue was “spot-on”.

“Steve Chamberlin, the dev lead for Rift, was on the phone with me within five minutes of my sending the technicals on the exploit,” said ManWitDaPlan … More

Following the concern of the game’s community regarding the current situation in Japan resulting from the March 11th earthquake aftermath, Riot Games has taken initiative and decided to donate all money raised from specific purchases to the Red Cross to help the Japanese people in this hour of need. Thus all RP purchases of Akali or her alluring Nurse Akali skin will go towards helping those affected by one of the greatest natural disasters in recorded history. To encourage donations, Riot Games has cut the price for all relevant products by 50% and urges players to contribute in making a difference in the lives of those affected by this tragedy.  The fund raising period will end at 12:00pm on Sunday the 27th. … More

Dragon Age 2 is one of those games released carrying the burden of high expectations and predefined conceptions, both based on the standards setting success of the previous installment, Dragon Age: Origins. With the RPG genre being probably the most reluctant in the face of evolution, the new Dragon Age was met by the gaming community with mixed feelings, many claiming that the game doesn’t meet the nowadays RPG quota, while others fell instantly in love with what the game has to offer. Everyone is entitled to a personal opinion, but these opinions can be influenced by factors ranging from previous gaming or game developing experience to one’s personal favorite color, so in the end they might not have much value in deciding if a game is good or bad. … More

California Superior Court Judge Elihu Berle allowed the Activision vs. EA lawsuit to continue, considering that the plaintiff provided enough evidence to support this decision. Activision can now go ahead with three of the four original legal claims against EA. The lawsuit is scheduled for May, 2011 and Electronic Arts is facing the possibility of losing $400m in the process.

EA, the second largest US video game publisher, is accused of helping Infinity Ward heads Jason West and Vince Zampella to breach their contract. According to Activision, the rival company also received confidential information from the two former employees: “Electronic Arts conspired with two former senior Activision executives [West and Zampella] … More

Following the appeal submitted by the publisher Warner Bros. to the initial decision, The Australian Classification Review Board refused to give the new Mortal Kombat Reboot a MA15+ rating. Since Australia has no 18-rating for video games, through this decision the Board effectively banned the game from the country.

The board’s main concern seems to be related to the extreme violence of the signature fatalities present in The Reboot. “Despite the exaggerated conceptual nature of the fatalities and their context within a fighting game set in a fantasy realm, impact is heightened by the use of graphics which are realistically rendered and very detailed,” said the Board in an earlier report. … More

On March 14, 2011 the publisher Burda:ic announced new details concerning the gameplay modes available in ARGO Online, a Steampunk Fantasy MMORPG, details which offer information about PvP combat, Third-Person-Shooter (TPS) mode, and the ARGO Guide for iPhone and iPod Touch.

Plenty of PvP options are available in ARGO Online, ranging from dungeons to open areas. One such PvP dungeon is Mortalis, a place where players from each faction start from different entrances and fight their way through the dungeon to the boss waiting in the middle of the setting. … More

Paradox Interactive announced today the launch of Dreamlords: Resurrection, a Free-to-Play fantasy Massively Multiplayer Online Real-Time Strategy (MMORTS) for the PC. To celebrate its release, Paradox Interactive and Lockpick Entertainment, are giving away 1,000 Paradox Ducats valued at $10 to all players who sign up. The Ducats will allow players to purchase items and enhancements for their Dreamlord, making them more powerful and allowing them to conquer enemies faster. The promotion will last for a limited time, so players are encouraged to sign up and start a new character as soon as possible.

The game allows players to assume the role of an awakened Dreamlord and through its powers to control and command an army. … More

In a blog post which appeared yesterday on Insomniac Insider, Brian Hastings, Insomniac Games’ Chief Creative Officer, announced the creation of a new company division which will develop games for web and mobile consoles: Insomniac Click. The decision is being labeled as pragmatic one, meant to tackle an ever-changing market which comes with an unprecedented number of people playing games on a regular basis and astonishing games diversity. Hastings clarified that this move does not mean that Insomniac is no longer interested in creating hardcore games, but since over the years these games grew in complexity they also suffer from lack of accessibility. This leads to high production value games being addressed only to a handful of gamers, leaving the vast majority of people in the off-target area as they are simply not qualified enough to play such games. … More

Yesterday, at the South by Southwest Interactive Conference in Austin, Peter Vesterbacka, the maker of Angry Birds, compared the explosive growth of mobile and social gaming with the decline of console gaming, concluding that the latter is “dying”. His reasoning, as reported on VentureBeat, points at key differences between these industry sectors, such as the ability of companies targeting mobile or social games to develop and release new content more quickly.

He jeered at the traditional model which involves companies selling games priced around $40-$50 which are then extremely difficult to update, … More