iGame Radio

ETA: My emails to all current PR contacts within Aspyr ALL BOUNCED. This seems to back up the large layoffs story. More as I get the info.

Big Download posted on their website on Wednesday that they had been alerted by unnamed, but still “reliable sources”, that large layoffs have occurred at Aspyr Media several weeks ago. Once source was quoted as saying over 50% of the staff had been let go, and only a small team now remains to hold down the fort. Most Mac gamers know the Austin, Texas based developer and publisher as the source of many ported Mac games, including Neverwinter Nights 2, Call of Duty: Modern Warfare, and the Civilization IV series.

Last month, Aspyr released Star Wars: The Force Unleashed Ultimate Edition for the PC with a planned Mac edition. Now there is a big question whether that Mac version will ever see the light of day. If this news is true, it will be a very sad day for all Mac gamers.

I’ve emailed Aspyr Media to confirm or deny this rumor, and I’ll update this story as I get more information.

ETA: I misread the press release. Call of Duty Deluxe Edition is for both PPC and Intel Macs. This is just the first time that it is available to Intel Macs. I originally posted it incorrectly.

Aspyr Media announced today the release in digital form of Call of Duty Deluxe Edition. Featuring the combination of the original Call of Duty and the expansion, Call of Duty: United Offensive, CoD Deluxe Edition is available as a digital download from Game Agent.

In the war that changed the world, no one fought alone. Experience the cinematic intensity of World War II¹s epic battles including D-Day, the Russian Charge at Stalingrad and the Battle for Berlin.

I’m worried about Aspyr’s continued support of Mac gaming, actually. They’ve been a big supporter of Mac games, porting a large number of PC games over to the Mac over the years. In 2007, they released eleven games, I think (half of which were Sims 2 expansions), whereas in 2008 that number dipped to something like three. This year, they’ve announced two retail releases of deluxe editions of games that were already released several years ago and one expansion release, Guitar Hero: World Tour. But Guitar Hero: WT won’t be released until this summer. The last game released for the Mac was Guitar Hero: Aerosmith in October of last year. That means eight or more months between releases.

Reviewing the site, there is no indication from their calendar or anywhere else that they are planning on a release for the Mac anytime soon (I guess Guitar Hero: WT doesn’t merit the space). They mostly focus now on PC, DS, and Xbox 360 games. I suppose I shouldn’t blame them so much…they just had some layoffs in late 2008. Ya gotta make decisions. I wish them luck.

According to MTV Multiplayer, Activision|Blizzard (there’s something so very wrong about that mashup) have announced a bunch of games in the works, among them Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2. I’m hyped about that. Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare rocked big time, and I would really, really like to see its sequel brought about to the Mac as well (you listening, Aspyr?).

 

I’ve posted Episode 69, in which Corey and I chat about DRM, the used games industry, and piracy rates. Oh, and benchmarks for the Macbook and Macbook Pro. Corey does a review for World of Warcraft: Wrath of the Lich King, and I do a review of Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare (Not World at War, as I called it once during the show…that’s what happens when you have the two versions available in the marketplace at once).

Oh, and I’m very sorry about the mess-up with Episode 68…that being that I accidentally swapped the URL for Episode 67 into the RSS feed item for Episode 68. That’s all been fixed now.

BTW, I’m playing around with a podcasting plugin. My eventual intention is to post all of my podcasts using WordPress hosted through MacRadio, but for now I’m running some tests. So I’m actually posting my podcast link to Episode 69 below, complete with player, to see how it looks.