Strategy Informer  

Age of Conan developer Funcom has been granted $260k from the Norsk Film Institutt, to help in the development of a Snowboarding game.

It's the Norwegian government's digital arts division, and they're supporting Funcom's 'On The Edge Of The World'; a free-to-play onliner.

Future instalments of Pro Evolution Soccer could work with new motion control technology, such as the PS3's wand and Microsoft's Project Natal.

This is according to series creator Shingo 'Seabass' Takatsuka, who spoke to IGN about the matter.

EA Sports boss Peter Moore has revealed they've parked up NASCAR in favour of the new mixed martial arts franchise they started. Need for Speed to fill the void?

Moore "thoroughly enjoyed" the relationship with NASCAR when he first arrived, but EA Sports MMA looks too good to pass up. EA "had to redeploy" the racer devs to the MMA project.

THQ announced today that it will publish Blood Bowl in the UK.

A brutal team sport unfolding in a parallel fantasy world based on Warhammer and American football, Blood Bowl invites gamers to form a team of players from races including: Orcs, Elves, Humans, Dwarfs and many other fantasy creatures, and launch themselves into battle in the bloodiest of arenas. This strategy sports game combines a fine balance of tactics and bone crunching action.

EA Sports confirmed today that FIFA 10 will be available to purchase from stores worldwide on October 2nd for the PlayStation 3, Xbox 360, Wii, PC, PS2, Nintendo DS and PSP.

We already had this down for 2nd October, but just to reconfirm.

Sega today announced the development of Vancouver 2010 - the Official Video Game of the Olympic Winter Games. The game is being developed by Eurocom Entertainment and will be released for the PC, Xbox 360 and PlayStation 3.

Vancouver 2010 is an authentic simulation of a host of events from the upcoming Vancouver 2010 Olympic Winter Games, focusing on the adrenalin rush that comes from the extreme speed of winter sports. Including the all new challenge mode, it will allow players to immerse themselves in the world's greatest sporting event like never before.

Ubisoft CEO Yves Guillemot has told MCV that the publisher plans to expand its sports games in an attempt to gain more market ground in this category for 2009.

Shaun White Snowboarding has been doing well, with sales generating over €500 million in the three months to December 31st. This is why Ubisoft are planning to gain more ground in the sports market, as Shaun White Snowboarding has given the company a taste of how successful sports games can be.

2008 was a fantastic year for gamers, and we will be looking forward to seeing what is in store for 2009, with the release of Resident Evil 5, Lord of the Rings: Conquest, Empire: Total War, Aliens: Colonial Marines, Ghostbusters, BioShock 2 and Overlord II among our personal favourites.

Richard has written up a list of the 12 games of Christmas for you, which is his opinion on what games you should be hoping for this year. Check that out here.

We've prepared another competition for Strategy Informer members! Codemasters were kind enough to provide some cool prizes to pack it with. The prizes that we have are: Xbox 360 Faceplate, Statue, Keychain and a T-Shirt. They're all themed with the upcoming multi-platform RPG game, Rise of the Argonauts.

Strategy Informer has a Call of Duty 4 game server running with Before the Dawn mod installed on it. Those of you that have played this mod will know what it is about, and for those of you that haven't, well lucky you, you will get to experience it for the first time.