battle-tag posts

Battle Tag, the "real world deathmatch" game from Ubisoft that got a splashy reveal at the publisher's E3 2010 press conference last June, has pretty much been under the radar since then. Today Ubisoft sent over word that the toy-game hybrid will go on sale in a limited capacity tomorrow in Texas. The toy will show up in 15 Toys R Us stores in Houston and Austin. In Canada Battle Tag will show up in that country's Zellers department stores on November 22. It's also available for pre-order for all of North America at Ubishop.com but the online listing shows a ship date of December 15.

For $129.99 you can get the Battle Tag starter pack which includes two plastic light guns, two vests, two "bases", two ammo packs, two medkits, and the UbiConnect, the radio frequency device that you hook up to your PC. The Game Master software runs the game while up to eight players battle out in the real world by firing their light guns with a variety of gameplay modes. The software stores the stats from the battles and those stats, along with user generated content, can be shared by other players. It will be interesting to see if Battle Tag takes off, especially at the current price point.

[Via Joystiq]

Ubisoft's latest financial report is the definition of the term "mixed". The France-based game publisher reported that revenues for the first six months of its current fiscal year (which ended on September 30) came in at 260 million euros, up 57 percent from the same period a year ago. However the company still recorded a net loss of 89.8 million euros for the time period compared to a loss of 52 million euros from the same period a year ago. Ubisoft stated it had lower than expected sales for its RTS game R.U.S.E. as well as the console version of H.A.W.X 2 (the PC version was released just a few days ago).

Ubisoft also said it took a one time 62.1 million euro charge for a reorganization of its studios which it said "resulted in the termination of certain projects". The report didn't name any specific games as being cancelled. In another part of the financial report it said there have been "team reductions" at some studios while others have seen team increases. Overall Ubisoft said it currently has 6,200 employees compared to a year ago when it had 6,400 team members

Big Download has now come to the end of its coverage of E3 for its 2010 installment. We went to cover and for the first time to film tons of activities at or near the Los Angeles Convention Center. We saw some good game demos, saw some that, well, didn't wow us and saw some really odd stuff along the way.

While other web sites and media outlets like to give out awards to games at the show, our philosophy is that giving awards like "Best RPG" to unfinished products is a little silly, especially since very often the final game doesn't turn out as well as its E3 demo. So as we did last year, we are giving awards in categories that are a little different and also showcase what it's actually like to attend the event for those of you who can't go. As always we hope you like it.