red-storm posts

While there have been a ton of Tom Clancy-branded games from Ubisoft over the past few years (with more to come) the author himself hasn't released a new novel for the past six years. That changes today with the release of his latest techno-thriller, Dead or Alive.

The story centers on "The Campus" a fictional counter-terrorist agency that fights the bad guys without an official sanction from the US government. One of the main characters in Dead or Alive is "Ding" Chavez. Fans of the Rainbow Six game series will know that character as the leader of Team Rainbow in several installments of the tactical shooter franchise.

Layoff news continues to hit the game industry. Today Kotaku reports that Ubisoft has give notices to 38 members of its Red Storm Entertainment studio in Cary, North Carolina. The story did not say how many team members remain at Red Storm, which created the Rainbow Six and Ghost Recon tactical shooter series.

A spokesperson for Ubisoft said the layoffs were due to "a realignment of production priorities" at the publisher but added that Red Storm team members affected by the layoffs will be given a chance " to consider positions in other Ubisoft studios." Red Storm's current project is working on the multiplayer features for Ghost Recon: Future Soldier which is due out in the first quarter of 2011.

The state of North Carolina just became more friendly to game developers. The Triangle Business Journal reports that the state''s governor Bev Perdue has just signed into law a new tax break that should encourage more game developers to work in North Carolina.

The law, which was signed by Perdue at the offices of Epic Games (located in Cary, NC), will give creators of " digital media products" a 15 percent tax credit on all all development costs that exceed $50,000. The tax break increases to 20 percent if the developer works with a university or community college. Besides Epic Games a number of other game developers already call North Carolina home including Ubisoft's Red Storm team, Virtual Heroes (America's Army) and Atomic Games (Breach). Most are located in the state's Research Triangle Park area.

Fact 1: Ubisoft has said a new Ghost Recon game has been in the works for over a year.

Fact 2: Ubisoft has not revealed any details on that new Ghost Recon game although it has trademarked the title Ghost Recon Future Soldier.

Fact 3: There is a Twitter account for "UbiKimi" who is actually Kimi Matsuzaki who works at Red Storm. The studio has been the primary developer for the Ghost Recon series.

Fact 4: Her Twitter account announced today, "TGIF all! Looking forward to a Big announcement coming up next week! :)"

Add all that up and it's pointing in the direction of maybe, just maybe, we will get the first details on the next Ghost Recon game in the next seven days. Or maybe it's something else entirely.