GamesBeat weekly roundup: Activision closes King deal, and new Pokémon announced

Activision also decided to host its Investor Day business meeting at BlizzCon.

---

---

Check out more of our 20th anniversary of Pokémon coverage this week at GamesBeat.

---

Welcome to another GamesBeat weekly roundup! This time, Fire Emblem: Fates is a hit, we learn more about the Iron Maiden mobile game, and Nintendo cuts its 2016 earnings guidance.

Enjoy, and have a great weekend!

---

Pieces of flair and opinion

• The DeanBeat: Nine memorable moments from gaming’s elite DICE Summit

• How to find Far Cry: Primal’s secret homage to Blood Dragon

---

Sun and Moon are coming.

Above: Sun and Moon are coming.

Image Credit: Nintendo

News

• Sun and Moon are Pokémon’s next games — coming this holiday

• Nintendo cuts 2016 earnings guidance and says it will sell 1M fewer 3DSes than predicted

• Capcom boosts its rerelease strategy with Resident Evil 4, RE5, and RE6 for PS4 and Xbox One

• Bandai Namco brings permadeath dungeon-crawler Necropolis to consoles

• Naughty Dog and Sony issue a new Uncharted 4 trailer without Ubisoft’s imagery

• After spending $32M, World of Tanks developer Wargaming is still figuring out esports

• Fire Emblem: Fates’ sales cement Nintendo’s strategy series as a retail hit in the West

• Uncharted 4’s newest trailer underscores the importance of story [update]

• AMD partners with Stardock to create awesome graphics for Ashes of the Singularity

• Bank Limit takes F-Zero and adds VR and combat, debuts at Oculus Rift’s launch

• Fueled by Twitch, Punch Club surpasses $2M in sales and preps The Dark Fist expansion

• UC Davis uses a game to chart its future

• Borderlands headlines free Xbox Live Games with Gold for March

• Fallout 4 mod support hits PC in April, Xbox One in May, & PlayStation 4 in June

• Interabang starts Fig crowdfunding campaign for Jay and Silent Bob video game

• Neverwinter prepares to unleashes its next expansion … and Orcus

• Nerf herding — Star Wars: Battlefront gets Twilight Hoth map and more in February update

• HoloLens video demonstrates Windows 10’s augmented reality user interface

• Xbox Live down again as persistent troubles haunt the Xbox One (update)

• Microsoft will show app reviews from some Insiders in the Windows Store

• Final Fantasy creator’s Mistwalker studio teams up with Bravely Default maker Silicon Studio

• How Fallout 4’s next update changes the game — and how to get it now

• The Division’s beta attracted 6.4 million players

• Halo World Championship’s $2.5M prize pool is the largest in esports shooter history

• What Stan Lee and Steve Wozniak are brewing for their 1st Silicon Valley Comic Con

• Twitch competitor DingIt rounds up 20M monthly viewers

• Facebook’s Zuckerberg appears at Samsung event to talk VR, confirms Minecraft is coming to Oculus

• HTC Vive will cost $799, preorder on February 29 and ships in early April (updated)

---

Pac-Man Puzzle Tour for iOS and Android.

Above: Pac-Man Puzzle Tour for iOS and Android.

Image Credit: Bandai Namco

Mobile and social

• Niantic raises $5 million to forge ahead with Pokémon Go

• Pac-Man: Puzzle Tour is another Candy Crush clone

• Mobile virtual reality on track to hit $861M in revenues this year

• mNectar’s new Spectra streaming network turns ads into playable games

• Virtual reality hype runs amok at MWC 2016, as mobile industry crowds onto bandwagon

• Finland’s PlayRaven launches Robocide ‘micro real-time strategy’ mobile game

• Kendall & Kylie game takes Glu Mobile to the top 10 again after poor Katy Perry launch

• FarmVille co-creator Mark Skaggs catches the express train to India to make mobile games

• Why positional tracking for mobile virtual reality is so damn hard

• Saudi Arabia’s mobile-gaming whales want what’s hot — even if it’s in another language

• RevTwo lets you call for help when you’re having an app fail

• Zynga puts its San Francisco headquarters up for sale

• Activision Blizzard adds a few hundred million users as it closes $5.9B King acquisition

• Hollywood backs Fifth Journey to take movie-licensed games to China

• Oculus’s Gear VR boss: Samsung Galaxy S7 beats the S7 Edge for virtual reality

• App monetization and distribution platform Appnext grew revenue 345% in 2015

• Kabam lays off 8% as it focuses on massively multiplayer mobile hits like Marvel: Contest of Champions

• Daily fantasy sports outlook: No profits, lots of uncertainty, and dying unicorns

• Facebook says people have watched 1 million hours of video with Samsung Gear VR, forms Social VR team

• Samsung arms every Unpacked attendee with Gear VR to watch its press conference

• Should Bethesda’s Todd Howard bet on mobile or console Fallout games?

---

Previews, reviews, and interviews

• Unicorn story: How this young woman went from student to indie game studio chief

• Iron Maiden: Legacy of the Beast turns iconic metal band’s mascot into a mobile gaming star

• How Bruce Shelley brought a board gamer’s view into designing Civilization

• Warren Spector wants to mine new ’emergent gameplay’ from System Shock’s nostalgia

• Far Cry: Primal rocks the Stone Age but feels stale

More information: