As a public service of sorts, I rounded-up the latest Android and iOS games that people should consider loading onto the devices they got for Christmas. Among them, my current favourites Infinity Blade II, Jetpack Joyride, and Where’s My Water. The full list ran in the Georgia Straight.

How many of you got a slick Android or iOS device for Christmas? Pretty much everyone is our guess. Flurry, in the business of mobile analytics, reported that in the week between December 25 and 31, 1.2 billion Android and iOS apps were downloaded. That includes 41 million downloads in Canada.

In the latest edition of the Georgia Straight I write about why “Glitch”, the clever, social MMO being developed in Vancouver, had a “big unlaunching”.

It’s not every day that a video game gets released to market and then recalled. But that’s exactly what happened with Glitch. Tiny Speck, which is developing the massively multiplayer online social game, decided to move Glitch out of beta testing in September. Two months later, the developers changed their minds.

This was just a few months after Keita Takahashi, the creative creator of Katamari Damacy, joined Tiny Speck’s dev team.

Stewart Butterfield raised some eyebrows when he hired Keita Takahashi to join Tiny Speck. As Butterfield admits, Takahashi doesn’t have a game-design background. And the Japanese sculptor, best known for creating the remarkable game Katamari Damacy, quit the video-game industry in 2010, suggesting that he might be done with games.

An action brawler, a platform puzzler, and a fantasy role-playing game each received five nominations for the 12th annual Game Developers Choice Awards.

Bethesda Game Studios’ The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim and Valve’s Portal 2 are joined by Eidos Montreal’s Deus Ex: Human Revolution, FromSoftware’s Dark Souls, and Rocksteady Studios’ Batman: Arkham City in the category of game of the year.

Supergiant Games, the creator of Bastion, is one of five studios being recognized for best debut. BioWare Austin, Eidos Montreal, Re-Logic, and the now-defunct Team Bondi are the others.

The Choice awards are notable because they come from peers. Winners are chosen by a group of 500 people working in the video-game industry who are invited to the jury.

They will be handed out in a San Francisco event on March 7 during the Game Developers Conference.

The full list of finalists for the 12th annual Game Developers Choice Awards:

Best Game Design

The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim (Bethesda Game Studios)
The Legend of Zelda: Skyward Sword (Nintendo)
Portal 2 (Valve)
Batman: Arkham City (Rocksteady Studios)
Dark Souls (FromSoftware)

Innovation

Skylanders: Spyro’s Adventure (Toys For Bob)
Portal 2 (Valve)
Bastion (Supergiant Games)
Johann Sebastian Joust (Die Gute Fabrik)
L.A. Noire (Team Bondi)

Best Technology

Battlefield 3 (DICE)
L.A. Noire (Team Bondi)
Crysis 2 (Crytek Frankfurt/UK)
The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim (Bethesda Game Studios)
Uncharted 3: Drake’s Deception (Naughty Dog)

Best Handheld/Mobile Game

Tiny Tower (NimbleBit)
Super Mario 3D Land (Nintendo)
Jetpack Joyride (Halfbrick)
Infinity Blade II (Chair Entertainment)
Superbrothers: Sword & Sworcery EP (Capy Games/Superbrothers)

Best Audio

Bastion (Supergiant Games)
LittleBigPlanet 2 (Media Molecule)
The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim (Bethesda Game Studios)
Dead Space 2 (Visceral Games)
Portal 2 (Valve)

Best Downloadable Game

Stacking (Double Fine)
From Dust (Ubisoft Montpellier)
Bastion (Supergiant Games)
Outland (Housemarque)
Frozen Synapse (Mode 7)

Best Narrative

Portal 2 (Valve)
The Witcher 2 (CD Projekt RED)
Bastion (Supergiant Games)
Uncharted 3: Drake’s Deception (Naughty Dog)
Saints Row: The Third (Volition)

Best Debut

Supergiant Games (Bastion)
Team Bondi (L.A. Noire)
Re-Logic (Terraria)
BioWare Austin (Star Wars: The Old Republic)
Eidos Montreal (Deus Ex: Human Revolution)

Best Visual Arts

Uncharted 3: Drake’s Deception (Naughty Dog)
Rayman Origins (Ubisoft Montpellier)
The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim (Bethesda Game Studios)
El Shaddai: Ascension of the Metatron (Ignition Japan)
Battlefield 3 (DICE)

Game of the Year

Batman: Arkham City (Rocksteady Studios)
The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim (Bethesda Game Studios)
Portal 2 (Valve)
Deus Ex: Human Revolution (Eidos Montreal)
Dark Souls (FromSoftware)

Cross-posted at the Georgia Straight

As BioWare, EA, and Lucasarts release Star Wars: The Old Republic to the masses today, here’s my interview with Greg Zeschuk about the development of the MMO and a capsule look at the game itself.

It’s something special. Whether it can convert enough players into long-term subscribers remains to be seen, but given BioWare’s track record, I’m not betting against them.

It’s certainly worth trying out.

At the end of October, I was privileged to moderate a panel discussion as part of Merging Media 2011, a conference exploring transmedia productions and opportunities.

I was joined by a group of knowledgable and talented creators from the entertainment industry:

• Caitlin Burns, a transmedia producer for New York-based Starlight Runner
• Scott Jones, writer and presenter on Electric Playground and Reviews on the Run
• John Meadows, writer on two Ubisoft games (Avatar, Lost: Via Domus
• Adam Sigel, a writer and producer working on John Woo’s The Red Book
• Armando Troisi, narrative director for the Halo franchise for Microsoft
• Ian Verchere, a cofounder of Roadhouse Interactive and the creative designer for Family Guy Online

They all had experience in both worlds – film/television and video games – and our conversation was, I think, interesting, and we touched on a number of issues that come up when films become games, and vice versa.

The panel was recorded, and is now available for viewing on YouTube. I’ve embedded the player here for your convenience.