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Ubisoft Casual Games Lead 33% Q1 Sales Jump

Ubisoft's Games For Everyone casual gaming brands led a 33% sales growth in the company's 2008 fiscal year first quarter, the company revealed in its quarterly report.

Sales for the first quarter amounted to €169 million ($263.6M), up 33% over Ubisoft's first quarter 2007 sales of €134 million ($209M).

The publisher added that its Games For Everyone brands—which include Imagine Babyz (DS), the Petz and MyCoach series, and many others—represented around 33% of Q1 sales, or roughly $86 million at current exchange rates.

Free Radical's Haze (PS3) and the PC edition of Ubisoft's Rainbow Six Vegas 2 (PC, PS3, 360) were also cited as contributors to Ubisoft's Q1 sales boost.

The company further noted that it intends to release more casual games for the Nintendo DS and Wii in its second quarter, and slightly raised its full-year sales guidance following strong Q1 performance and favorable market conditions.

Marvel: Ultimate Alliance 2: Fusion Trailer Shows Mixed Heroes

Publisher Activision has recently debuted this trailer from Marvel: Ultimate Alliance 2: Fusion, the latest installment of the comic-based action-RPG franchise.

Going by information revealed by a marketing leak, Marvel Ultimate Alliance 2 is set in Marvel Comics' recent Civil War event. The game includes over 20 playable Marvel heroes including Spider-Man, Hulk, Venom, Storm, Wolverine, and more.

In development for PlayStation 2, PlayStation 3, Xbox 360, Wii, Nintendo DS and PSP, the title is slated to hit retailers this fall.

Demigod Official Trailer Released, Chris Taylor's DotA-styled PC Game Takes Shape

Gas Powered Games today released the first official trailer for its RTS-RPG hybrid Demigod on GameSpot.

Using the Supreme Commander engine, Demigod will borrow aspects of gameplay from RTS mods such as Warcraft III's Defense of the Ancients (DotA), allowing players to control a single hero unit within a massive online battle.

Demigod is expected to hit in February 2009 on PC. A beta test is scheduled to begin this summer.

PlayStation Store Update: 1942, Siren: Blood Curse, Rock Band and Guitar Hero III DLC, More

This week's update to the PlayStation Store brings a weighty haul to the PlayStation 3's digital storefront, offering two new downloadable games, a new demo, and a load of new tracks for Guitar Hero III: Legends of Rock and Rock Band.

Backbone Entertainment's 1942: Joint Strike makes its PlayStation 3 debut today, following its Xbox 360 release earlier this week. Priced at $9.99, the top-down shooter revival offers updated 3D HD graphics, new weapons and online cooperative play.

The episodic survival horror game Siren: Blood Curse is now av...

Ratchet & Clank: Quest for Booty E3 Preview: The Downloadable Level That Became a Game

Warning: The following article contains endgame spoilers from Ratchet & Clank Future: Tools of Destruction.

Ratchet & Clank Future: Quest for Booty, the next entry in Insmoniac's cartoony platforming series due out on PlayStation 3 this summer, is a little different.

Instead of being a full-priced $59.99 retail title sporting 20 or so hours of gameplay, Quest for Booty is a smaller, shorter title that will be downloadable from the online PlayStation Store for $14.99.

It's the first downloadable game from Insomniac, which describes the effort as its way of "testing the waters" with episodic content. The studio had prev...