VESTI iz industrije igara

Development Programmer:
Junior: £18-£25k
Regular: £20-£35k
Senior: £35k-£50k
Lead: £40-£60k

Artist:
Junior: £18k -£21k
Regular: £20-£27k
Senior: £27-£35k
Lead: £38-£55k

Designer:
Junior: £18-£21k
Regular: £20-£28k
Senior: £25-£35k
Lead: £38-£55k

Producer:
Junior: £18-£27k
Regular: £28-£40k
Senior: £35-£60k
Executive Producer: £45-£80k

UK Managing Director:
Start-up company: £50k+
Mid-range: £60k - £85k

Top 10 publisher: £100k - £250k+
Marketing Director:
Start-up: £50k - £70k
Mid-range: £60k - £80k
Top ten publisher: £75k - £120k

Sales Director:

Start-up: £50k - £70k
Mid-range: £60k - £80k
Top 10 publisher: £75k - £120k

Finance Director: £50k - £120k

Sales Manager: £45k - £70k

Senior Brand Manager: £30k - £55k
Junior Brand Manager: £20k - £38k

In-House PR Manager: £25k - £50k

Games Journalist: £15k - £30k

World of Warcraft brings in billions for games maker


It’s no secret that the World of Warcraft is one of the biggest cash cows in today’s games industry – a point further punctuated by the $1.2 billion in revenue raked in by Blizzard Entertainment in 2007.
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Toshiba announced Tuesday it was abandoning its next-generation high-definition disc format, saying it would no longer make and market players and recorders. The announcement followed a series of defections, including Friday's decision by the nation's largest retailer, Wal-Mart Stores Inc., to stop selling HD DVD hardware and movies and devote its shelves exclusively to Blu-ray.

Havok Offers Core Physics Software Free for PC Game Developers

Havok™, the premier provider of interactive software and services to digital creators in the games and movie industries, today announced that the company will offer the PC version of its award-winning physics and animation software product – Havok Complete – for download free of charge.

Available for non-commercial use, Havok Complete for the PC will be freely downloadable in May 2008.

Havok’s core platform, Havok Complete combines the industry-leading Havok Physics engine and Havok Animation, the company’s premier character animation solution. Havok Complete is already the most popular solution in the cross-platform AAA games market, featuring technology used in over 200 games. By making Havok Complete for the PC freely downloadable, Havok will further build on its leading position by completely removing the barriers to entry for the large number of independent developers, academic institutions and enthusiasts in the PC space.

“Havok has an excellent revenue base generated by sales of our three products across multiple platforms and into multiple industries,” said David O’Meara, Managing Director at Havok. “This enables us to make an industry-changing move and opens up a much broader market for products such as Havok Behavior – and our new products Havok Cloth and Havok Destruction – that really come alive when adopted on top of our core platform, Havok Complete.”

Havok has entered into an agreement with Intel, Havok’s parent company, under which approved game developers on the PC platform can execute a commercial distribution license with Havok for free.

“Intel is very pleased to be sponsoring this direction in the PC market. This aligns well with our ongoing strategy of putting the best software tools in the hands of PC games developers,” said Renee J. James, Corporate Vice President and General Manager, Software and Solutions Group, Intel Corporation.

With the free PC download of Havok Complete, Havok enables broad non-commercial development use for artists and engineers around the world, which Havok believes will boost creative game development throughout the industry.

“This is fantastic news for commercial PC game developers as well as the independent game development community, who will really benefit from this move,” said Mark DeLoura, creator of the Game Programming Gems series. “It’s great to see a leading middleware company like Havok show such support for PC game developers by making its physics and animation system freely available.”

Havok’s overall focus remains cross-platform and Havok will continue commercial licensing of Havok Complete for other platforms and in other industries such as movies and serious gaming. This initiative does not apply to license fees that may be payable to Havok for console versions of Havok Complete or to applications developed for other purposes such as game engines for redistribution, other middleware, movies, training, military or industrial simulation.

Havok’s physics software is featured in over 200 AAA games available on stores shelves today. With well over 90 games currently in development to be released this year, use of Havok’s ubiquitous software is up 100% over last year at the same time. Best-selling titles featuring Havok physics include: Halo 3, Assassin’s Creed, Guitar Hero III, BioShock, World in Conflict, Half Life 2: The Orange Box, and Heavenly Sword. Havok’s software will also be featured in the highly-anticipated upcoming games Alan Wake, Indiana Jones, Star Wars: The Force Unleashed and Starcraft II.

With a broad and deep range of tech partners including AMD, Intel, Nvidia, Nintendo, Sony and Microsoft as well as a host of world-class publishers and developers, Havok is well known industry-wide for its excellent customer service.

In addition to the PC software download, Havok also unveiled two new software products, Havok Cloth™ and Havok Destruction™ at this year’s Game Developers Conference. Havok Cloth and Destruction provide artists with dramatically increased control over interactive cloth and destructible objects within games. The company also announced several new features and enhancements across its award winning modular suite of run-time technology and artist tools.
Havok also celebrated a number of key entertainment and technology awards in 2007, including a National Academy of Television, Arts & Sciences Award, Game Developer Frontline Award, and a Develop Industry Excellence Award.

Otkriveni dirigovani „srećni dobitnici”
Predrag Bećirić priznao da je osmislio kompjuterski program koji nepogrešivo računa najnižu jedinstvenu ponudu. Grupa je koristila 20 umreženih kompjutera i 200 mobilnih telefona

Istražni sudija Specijalnog suda doneo je rešenje o sprovođenju istrage protiv Predraga Bećirića (40), Ognjena Petra Todorovića (31), Marijane Mijanović (38), Miloša Banduke (30) i još deset osoba zbog prevara i udruživanja radi vršenja krivičnih dela korišćenjem nedozvoljenih tehničkih sredstava u igrama na sreću. U pritvoru je 13 članova ove grupe, dok je jedan od njih pušten da se brani sa slobode.

Za nešto više od mesec dana, od 18. januara do 25. februara, koliko je ova grupa „igrala” SMS licitacije, ne znajući da su pod „onlajn” prismotrom policije, postali su dobitnici 23 glavne nagrade, u vrednosti od ukupno 40 miliona dinara, dok samo dva puta nisu „imali sreće” u licitaciji. Kompjuterski program koji je ovo omogućavao osmislio je Predrag Bećirić, čovek bez ikakvog formalnog obrazovanja o radu na kompjuterima, i to, kako je rekao – iz hobija.

– Bećirić je osumnjičen da je bio tvorac softvera koji je nepogrešivo određivao koja je najniža jedinstvena ponuda u igrama na sreću koje je organizovala Državna lutrija Srbije na televizijama „Pink” i RTS. Grupa je koristila 20 umreženih kompjutera i 200 mobilnih telefona. Kada se na telefon nagradne igre pošalje poruka, organizator dostavlja infoporuku sa povratnom informacijom da li je ta ponuda najpovoljnija, odnosno jedinstvena. Ta informacija korišćena je u kompjuterskom programu za dobijanje najniže jedinstvene ponude – kaže za „Politiku” Miljko Radisavljević, specijalni tužilac, ističući da je pravilima Državne lutrije zabranjeno organizovano igranje igara na sreću, zbog čega je ono što su osumnjičeni uradili okvalifikovano kao krivično delo prevare.

Policija je utvrdila da su članovi ove grupe od 18. januara do 25. februara postali „srećni dobitnici” 18 automobila marke „fijat punto”, jednog „pasata”, jedne „škode oktavije” i tri stana u Beogradu. Zatim su angažovali poznanike u koje su imali poverenja koji su za naknade od 50 do 200 evra odlazili u televizijske emisije, slikali se sa navodno dobijenim automobilima i po potrebi priređivali slavlje.

Među osumnjičenima nema lažnih „srećnih dobitnika” koje su gledaoci mogli da vide na televiziji, a svi ljudi koji su gostovali na televizijama, kako bi im bile uručene nagrade, sada su – svedoci. Tokom istrage biće obavljeno veštačenje oduzetih kompjutera, pa će se znati i svi detalji ove nesvakidašnje prevare.

Tužilac Radisavljević ističe da grupa ni tehnički ni kadrovski nije povezana sa televizijama na kojima su emitovane nagradne igre, kao ni sa Državnom lutrijom. Prevara je izvedena tako da je sistem Državne lutrije ostao netaknut, a upravo su zaposleni u lutriji, na osnovu svojih sistema zaštite, došli do informacija o tome da postoje nelegalni igrači SMS licitacija.

Na osnovu podataka dobijenih iz Državne lutrije, Specijalno tužilaštvo i policija su od 18. januara pratili zbivanja u igrama na sreću i ubrzo identifikovali Bećirića, a zatim i ostale članove grupe. Bećirić i većina ostalih osumnjičenih priznali su sve za šta ih tužilaštvo tereti. U Bećirićevom stanu u Novom Beogradu, kod „Arene”, odakle je funkcionisao čitav prevarni sistem, otkriven je kompjuterski centar sa 20 povezanih kompjutera i 200 telefona.

– Istraga za sada obuhvata samo januar i februar, ali sumnjamo da je grupa delovala tokom čitave 2009. godine. Kod njih smo našli automobile koji su ranije dodeljeni u igrama na sreću. Za sada je zaplenjeno 60 vozila – kaže tužilac Radisavljević.