Gamertell

Way back when I worked at Gamestop, I noticed that a lot of the new games coming out came with this extra junk that came bundled with the game as an incentive for reserving it. It would range from free in-game items or weapons to a Call of Duty dog tag.

Sometimes it seems like a wasted effort. If you reserved a copy of Harvest Moon for Gamecube, for example, you got a free stuffed cow. That’s cute but the only people who are going to reserve that game are people who wanted to buy that game in the first place. It’s doubtful some newcomer is going to walk into the store and think, “Well, I had absolutely no interest in this game but a free cow? How can I pass it up?!..”

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Canada has become a haven for European game developers who are looking for a tax reprieve.  The tax incentives being offered to game developers in Canada have ensured that the country gets a bigger chunk of the burgeoning videogame business while countries like Britain and France watch the exodus of game developers. Britain has decided that its time to take the war to Canada. And, no, Britain is not going to offer greater relaxation in taxes to the videogame industry, but it will challenge the very legality of the tax incentives on offer in Canada.

The UK Ministry of Culture, Media and Sport has convinced the European Commission to launch an inquest into Canada’s trade practices…

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Tournament.com, has launched a new incentive program to reel in new addicts/gamers. Aptly titled Frag-A-Friend, the new program awards users who bring a friend into the bet-based service with a bonus to their account.

From the press release:

“Players eager to start turning their friends into bonus cash need only refer them to Tournament.com. For every referred friend that creates a Tournament.com account, the referring player will receive $5 in bonus cash. If those friends then go on to deposit cash in the system, the referring player receives an additional $10 dollars that can be cashed out or left in the system. The amount of bonus cash that can be received is unlimited, giving players the ultimate incentive to refer their friends and get fragging.”

Tournament.com keeps the gambling addictions in check by limiting players to $10 bets per match, with a $150 cap on how much can be moved in any one account in a given month.  The featured games of choice are Half-Life 2: Deathmatch and Counter-Strike: Source, with Day of Defeat: Source coming soon.

Site [Tournament.com] Read [Develop Mag]

• Call of Duty 4 updates include kill cams, server migration
• Britain questions Canadian tax incentives for game industry
• The benefit of bundling stuff with videogames