games

Microsoft’s Xbox division has snapped up Beam Interactive, a startup whose live-streaming service lets users not only watch their favorite gamers but also play along with them. With the deal, Xbox is looking to one-up Twitch, the live game broadcaster Amazon bought in 2014 for a reported $970 million. Beam’s secret sauce is that instead of viewers simply engaging in …

Naturally, there’s a virtual-reality companion for the “Assassin’s Creed” movie starring Michael Fassbender based on Ubisoft’s popular video-game franchise. To promote the action film’s Dec. 21 theatrical release, 20th Century Fox and New Regency are launching a VR experience promising to take viewers deep into the world of the Spanish Inquisition — from the perspective of a member of The Assassins …

“Mean Girls,” Tina Fey’s 2004 comedy cult classic about a nasty high-school clique, is paying new digital dividends for Paramount Pictures more than a decade later. Characters from the movie including Janis, Damian, Gretchen and Karen return to Pocket Gems’ Episode choose-your-own-adventure story game with “Mean Girls: Sorority Rush,” in which players navigate freshman year at college — the “University of …

TBS will broadcast the first-ever “Injustice 2” eSports global finals this fall, featuring Wonder Woman, Batman, Superman and other characters from the DC universe fighting in the arena for glory — and $250,000 in prize money. Turner and IMG’s ELeague joint venture acquired the TV rights to the “Injustice 2” World Championship series under a deal with Warner Bros. Interactive Entertainment. …

Alcon Entertainment and Finnish mobile game developer and publisher Next Games are partnering on a mobile game for “Blade Runner 2049.” Next Games CEO Teemu Huuhtanen made the announcement Wednesday, the second day of the Electronic Entertainment Expo 2017, also known as E3. The companies did not disclose when the game will be released or a specific title. Alcon is …

Twitch, the Amazon-owned live game-broadcasting service, announced a deal to acquire privately held Curse, a company that provides news, information, guides, in-game chat and voice products, video and databases for some 30 million video-game fans each month. Terms of the deal weren’t disclosed. Curse, based in Huntsville, Ala., had raised $58 million in funding from investors including GGV Capital, Idinvest Partners, Riot Games, …

Mobcrush, a two-year-old startup that enables live-streaming video of mobile games, has closed a $20 million Series B round led by Evolution Media Capital, the investment venture of CAA, TPG Growth and Participant Media. Also participating in the round were Kleiner, Perkins, Caufield & Byers, which led Mobcrush’s Series A financing in September 2015, along with existing investors including Raine …

Sam Barlow, the acclaimed British indie video-game director behind 2015’s “Her Story,” has set his next project with Annapurna Pictures’ recently formed games division. Barlow’s forthcoming project: “Telling Lies,” which will follow the same interactive-movie format as “Her Story” — but will have a much bigger canvas and higher production values with Annapurna’s support, he said. Barlow and Annapurna Interactive, …

Ever since full-motion video made its way into 32-bit games, the marriage of live-action content and video games has felt hokey and forced. However, Finnish game developer Remedy Entertainment stepped up to this age-old challenge when creating its latest game, “Quantum Break,” by telling a time-travel story through motion-captured in-game storytelling intercut with four half-hour TV episodes. The story works …

If any director should have two films in the official selection at this year’s Cannes Film Festival, it may as well be shaggy Korean iconoclast Hong Sangsoo — a prolific auteur for whom doubling and déjà vu are recurring concerns in his narratives, not to mention for viewers trying to keep pace with his oeuvre. Luckily, there’s little chance of confusing …