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Welcome to another GamesBeat weekly roundup! The Game Developers Conference has kept up plenty busy, as you can see below. Elsewhere, Metal Gear Solid V has a release date, and PlayStation 4 sales pass 20 million.
Happy reading, and have a great weekend!
GDC 2015
The DeanBeat: The game industry’s struggle with light and darkness
Women claim their place in the game industry
Sony’s latest VR prototype proves we’re just waiting on the games
Blockbuster game publishers describe harassment policies in the modern era of hate
Independent Games Festival host denounces Internet hate and Gamergate, gets standing ovation
Intel aims to double the number of women in gaming
Zoe Quinn and other female game developers speak out against harassment
Raptr allies with Intel to make mainstream PC gaming a better experience
Valve’s and HTC’s Vive is the most believable virtual reality experience yet
Epic Games’ new ‘A Boy and His Kite’ tech demo points to blue skies for the game industry
Weta Digital partners with Oculus and Epic Games for a new VR experience
Oculus’ John Carmack endorses Otoy’s VR light field rendering tech
Oculus technology guru John Carmack explains why he’s spending all his time on mobile VR
Microsoft to launch new tools that enable cross-platform play across Windows, Xbox, and mobile devices
Nintendo welcomes change and is open to experimentation for its digital future
Ubisoft and new HMD developers join Open-Source Virtual Reality group
The MindLeap virtual reality game system runs on your brainwaves — no controllers needed
Watch Mozilla preview WebGL 2, the first major update to plugin-free 3D graphics in the browser
Nvidia shows hands-on demo of Shield set-top box (video)
Nvidia CEO explains why the Shield set-top box fits in your living room (interview)
Nvidia’s set-top box aims to do for gaming what Netflix did for movies
Nvidia announces its $200, 1,080p Shield Android TV Console — launches in May
Sony has a new Project Morpheus virtual reality prototype — consumer product launches in 2016
League of Legends developer on fighting with fun, depth, and complexity
AMD teams up with Oculus on LiquidVR technologies for virtual reality
Crossy Road earns $3M in revenue from Unity’s video ads
Unity Technologies ships its next-generation multiplatform game engine
Mobile game visuals will get better with upcoming successor to OpenGL graphics standard
Pieces of flair
GamesBeat giveaway: Two awesome gaming headsets
Watch Portal come to life thanks to Microsoft’s Kinect
Above: Rock Band 4 is coming.
Image Credit: Harmonix
News
First recipients of Epic’s Unreal Dev Grants deserve every penny
Man dies after 19-hour World of Warcraft session
Harmonix announces Rock Band 4 for Xbox One, PlayStation 4, coming this year
Logitech tapped players to design its newest gaming mouse
Phil Harrison out at Microsoft, report claims
Elite: Dangerous warps to the Xbox One — but not the PlayStation 4
Two-thirds of consumers say they’d like to shop using Oculus
EA closes SimCity and The Sims developer Maxis Emeryville
Microsoft partnering with Motiga to publish Gigantic for Xbox One and Windows 10
Nvidia announces the Titan X graphics processor, the most powerful GPU available
Wolfenstein: The Old Blood is a standalone $20 prequel to The New Order
Valve announces Source 2, Steam Link, and Steam Lighthouse VR technology
Sony’s PlayStation sales top 20.2 million worldwide
Metal Gear Solid V: The Phantom Pain is coming Sept. 1
ARM launches Enlighten 3 global illumination tool for games
Google X exec Mary Lou Jepsen leaves to pursue new ‘moonshots’ with Oculus
Game developers favor Steam and PC over other platforms
Unreal Engine 4 goes free — but Epic Games still gets its 5% cut of your royalties
Shinra Technologies gets a new developer to use its cloud-gaming inventions
Ex-SSI Gold Box devs go ‘back to the future’ with tools to transfer characters across role-playing games (updated)
World of Warcraft’s new real money-for-gold effort brings more free-to-play to Blizzard’s cash cow
PC gaming expected to be worth $35 billion in 2018
Trine 3 announced, check out the gorgeous first trailer
U.K. retailer Game acquires events and e-sports specialist Multiplay for $30.8M
Akili is testing its cognitive games as a treatment for autism, ADHD
Mobile and social
Vainglory is no longer just on Apple devices — mobile arena battler preps for Android beta
Facebook beefs up its recommendations for mobile games
DeNA releases first-person shooter Protocol Zero for Samsung Gear VR
Games dominate App Annie’s annual list of top-grossing app publishers
Amazon comes to Mobile World Congress looking for more gaming love from developers
Carmack: Consumer Gear VR will hit before the end of the year with full Samsung media blitz
DeNA partners with Fyber for mobile-ad monetization
InMobi’s Appographic Targeting takes personalized marketing to a new level
Monument Valley takes the top honors at mobile game awards
Corona Labs mobile game-development platform goes free
DoubleDown Casino launches St. Patrick’s Day slots game
500 iOS games per day: Flooded mobile market is tricky for indie devs
Warner Bros. gets serious about mobile with 5 new games, including Game of Thrones
Mobile publisher Storm8 hits a billion downloads for its casual games
Mobile developer Wooga’s latest hidden-object game Agent Alice finds success
Paris Hilton chases Kim Kardashian into celebrity mobile gaming
Google updates Play Services API with new location features for Android apps
Google unveils a slew of new features for Android game developers
RockYou raises $23M in funding based on its business of running older games
Tapjoy unveils ‘complete marketing automation and monetization platform’ for freemium mobile apps
SpriteBuilder game developer tools introduce three tiers of subscriptions
Yvolver launches its VIP rewards service for mobile game developers
Above: A Vengevine from Magic: The Gathering.
Image Credit: Wizards of the Coast
Previews and interviews
Asteroids: Outpost isn’t a traditional Asteroids game, and I can live with that … I think
Magic: Origins sees the card battling series go free-to-play
Afro Samurai’s latest game is a simpler, more elegant affair
Zynga’s Dawn of Titans features thousands of soldiers fighting on an iPad screen
Armikrog’s claymation style is screwing with my head
Couch multiplayer or online multiplayer? Super Dungeon Bros. combines both — and across platforms
Stardock’s new Ashes of the Singularity turns you into a hive mind, commanding thousands of ships at once
Build and unleash your mechs in a new real-time strategy game
Ubisoft’s therapeutic video game Dig Rush treats ‘lazy eye’
Supersonic sees big growth for ‘rewarded video ads’ in mobile games (interview)
Reviews
Helldivers is a challenging arcade-style bloodbath set in a boring universe