Codies online
Codemasters, one of the UK's leading games developers, is launching a multiplayer network that will cater exclusively to Codemasters titles. The first game to use the network will be Insane, a new 4x4 off-road racer for the PC. It will be launched on November 24, but there's already a demo up for testing at www.codemasters.com. The network will allow PC gamers to play against PlayStation 2 and Microsoft Xbox owners when they finally make it online. Players will also compete against one another in a series of perpetual leagues, called Ladders.
Hope for TLC
Mattel, the American toy giant, is disposing of its loss-making Mattel Interactive division to the Gores Technology Group, with no cash apparently changing hands.
What was originally TLC was acquired at a cost of $3.5bn in shares only 18 months ago, and included such once-great names as The Learning Company, Broderbund and Mindscape.
If GTG's chairman Alec Gores can turn the business around, Mattel will collect a share of future profits.
Dream revives
Sega's Dreamcast console has enjoyed something of a boom in the US, with sales rising by 92% from August to September. Partly this is because of a price cut to $149, partly because of the success of the American football game NFL2K, and partly because of stumbles by Sony, which announced it would not ship as many systems as expected.
NFL2K has attracted online players because it was sold with 50 hours' free access to SegaNet. It was also offered with Sega Sports NBA 2K in a bundle with a limited edition black version of the Dreamcast for only $169.95.
NFL 2K went to the top of the games charts, selling 409,260 units. Great things are also expected of the new Quake III Arena, where the Dreamcast version allows four simultaneous players in split-screen mode, and a planned broadband SegaNet DSL service.
The Dreamcast has also been helped by the realisation that, at the moment, it has better games than the Sony PlayStation 2, and that the PS2 is twice the price.
Peter Moore, president and chief operating officer of Sega of America Inc, is optimistic that the Dreamcast will have a US installed base of 5 million units by the end of March -about twice what it is at the moment.
Thriller
Sequels sometimes fail to live up to the predecessors, but Midway's Ready 2 Rumble Boxing: Round 2 sounds as though it could improve on the wonderful original.
Michael Jackson will appear as a celebrity, and the 12 new boxers "rumblized" for the cartoony game include Shaq O'Neal, the "undisputed NBA heavyweight champion" basketball player. The original 11 boxers will reappear in enhanced versions.
R2R2 should be out in November for the Dreamcast and PlayStation 2.
PC, Nintendo 64, PlayStation, Game Boy Color and arcade versions will follow, as Midway cashes in on its surprise smash hit.
