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The PocketGamer.biz week that was: job losses, Nintendo sort of does digital and Keith does Unite 2012

The past 7 days in bite-sized portions

The PocketGamer.biz week that was: job losses, Nintendo sort of does digital and Keith does Unite 2012
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A new category has been added to our round-up of the last seven days of news, and it's an entirely unwelcome one.

The 'closures and lay-offs' category compiles some of the worst news of the week, including PopCap's 'reorganisation', Sony Mobile's 'restructuring', and Studio Liverpool's 'closure'.

Actually, we didn't really need inverted commas around that last one...

But the bad news doesn't end there. Rumblings this week seem to suggest that OnLive's future is mighty uncertain too, with reports claiming that the company racked up debts amounting to as much as $40 million before it pursued an 'assignment for the benefit of creditors.'

This alternative to bankruptcy allowed OnLive to transfer its assets to a new company (which will operate under the OnLive name), but less than half of the company's staff have been rehired.

These are tough times, of course, and it seems to have been a particularly tough week for the mobile and games industry. Let's just hope we can unceremoniously bin this new category next week.

Now, without further ado, let's move on to our bite-sized overview of the last seven days' worth of news.

Platform wars Monetisation
Funding, start ups and acquisitions
  • UK social studio Playdemic completes a funding round worth at least $3 million, and intends to spend that cash creating the "second generation of social gaming."
  • Juice co-founder Don Whiteford launches mobile and digital studio Nomad Games.
Closures and lay-offs
  • A reorganisation at PopCap sees 50 US jobs lost and the future of the company's Dublin office in question, as the studio struggles with the shift to free-to-play, social and mobile.
  • Sony shutters game development at the venerable Studio Liverpool, the team responsible for the Wipeout series.
  • Sony Mobile announces plans to cut 15 percent of its global workforce, resulting in the loss of 1,000 jobs by March 2014. Its offices in Sweden are hit particularly hard.
Discovery
Industry voices
Unite 2012
Click here for all of PocketGamer.biz's coverage from Unite 2012 in one handy list.
James Nouch
James Nouch
PocketGamer.biz's news editor 2012-2013