News
Battle of the NASCAR Kids!
To celebrate the launch of NASCAR Unleashed on Xbox 360, PS3, Wii and 3DS, NASCAR and Activision have got together to create a special charity tournament- Battle of the NASCAR Kids, featuring the children of 8 renowned Drivers. The event takes place on November 19th during the weekend of the NASCAR Sprint Cup Series Championship at Homestead-Miami Speedway
Utilizing the NASCAR Unleashed videogame, Activision is taking the storied rivalries and competitive NASCAR spirit off the track and putting them in the hands of NASCAR kids, who will compete against one another for pride and glory. As their dads coach and their moms manage them, these kids will race for first place and the honor of being crowned the first ever "Battle of the NASCAR Kids" champion. The event aims to bring together NASCAR families and ultimately raise money for charities, with each participating family donating $5,000 to a charity of their choice. Post race all the racers will band together to hand a check to The NASCAR Foundation for $25,000 from Activision.
The eight-person, bracket-style-tournament will use the recently released NASCAR Unleashed video game to help prove which family produces the best drivers. See Battle of the NASCAR Kids for more information.
Crawfish Games' First Releases
Firebrand's Louisiana Studio, Crawfish Games are delighted to announce the release of their first two games for Apple iOS devices.
Cutesy: Quest of the Unicorn tells the story of a Unicorn’s magical journey in search of love and acceptance. Creepsy: Monsters Never Have Enough! Follows a monster who, thinking that he isn’t creepy enough, goes on an adventure to become even creepier. On the way, he meets a variety of other monsters who all help him down his path to accepting his own creepiness.
Both games are now available for free Download from the App Store- click on the images below. Or head over to Crawfish Games for more information.
Cars 2 DS Chart Success
Cars 2 DS developed by Firebrand Games in Florida, has been number 1 in the UK Nintendo DS Chart for the last four weeks now! Holding off challenges from the likes of Art Academy, LEGO Pirates of the Carribean and Pokemon.
Chart Track DS Full Price Chart.
Need for Speed The Run
Firebrand Games are delighted to announce they are in the final stages of completing Need for Speed The Run for Nintendo 3DS and Wii- due to ship in November, published by Electronic Arts.
The 3DS game has been designed from the ground up for Nintendo's newest console, and as well as stunningly smooth 3D graphics, it also features classic Need for Speed Gameplay, Multiplayer with Online play, support for StreetPass and the inclusion of the Autolog system first seen in NFS Hot Pursuit last year.
The story is told over 26 episodes, runs in parallel to the HD versions of the game and tells of an epic 150 car coast to coast race across the USA from San Francisco to New York. Firebrand Games in Glasgow worked with British Comic Book artists to develop the hand-drawn story which is presented as a motion comic in stereoscopic 3D.
As well as the ability to race your friends over The Run, trying to beat their elapsed times with Autolog, the game also features 40 further varied Challenges. We're incredibly proud of what we've managed to achieve with our first 3DS game!
Five Years of Firebrand
Firebrand's fifth Birthday came and went in the Spring with most of us so busy we barely had time to notice!
The cake was not a lie, however, and when we did pause to look back on everything we've achieved in this time, we had plenty cause to celebrate.
In five years the company has released 15 games with 7 more to come in 2011. We've grown from a single tiny studio in Glasgow to two medium sized studios in Scotland and Florida, and our brand new studio in Baton Rouge, Louisiana- more on that below!
Welcome to Crawfish Games
Firebrand Games' newest development studio in Baton Rouge, Louisiana has been renamed Crawfish Games. This new brand reflects the studio's goal to develop fun, family friendly casual and social games.
Crawfish have a number of titles in development- lots more details coming soon!
In the meantime follow them on Twitter @crawfishgames
Firebrand is Four Years Old!
We recently celebrated our Fourth Birthday- complete with cake! In four years we've developed and released 10 Nintendo DS titles and have 2 Wii titles and a further 4 DS games in progress. We've also expanded from a small studio of seven guys in Glasgow, to open a sister studio in Florida and now have over 40 full time employees.
More exciting news coming soon!
Square-Go Interview!
Firebrand Games were recently interviewed by Gaming website, Square-Go.
Editor of Square-Go, Phil Harris spoke to CEO Mark Greenshields, Creative Director Pete Shea and Producer Dan Fletcher. As well as enquiring about TrackMania Wii, Phil also quizzed us on our fourth birthday and a little of our history.
Read the interview here!
Colin McRae: DiRT 2 DS now in Stores!
Colin McRae: DiRT 2 DS has now been released in Europe and North America published by Codemasters. The game marks our third collaboration with Codemasters, following the award winning DS titles, Race Driver: Create and Race, and Race Driver: GRID.
Featuring off road racing and rallying from around the world and a brand new 3D Track Designer, DiRT 2 DS is already garnering postive reviews!
Need for Speed Nitro DS in stores now!
Need for Speed Nitro DS is the brand new title in Electronic Arts' massively successful Need for Speed series.
Exclusive to Nintendo Wii and Nintendo DS, Firebrand Games worked closely with EA Montreal to develop the DS version from the ground up.
Read a preview of the game on Pocket Gamer
Planet 51 DS developed by Firebrand.
Firebrand Games can now confirm they developed the Nintendo DS version of Planet 51, which was published by SEGA in conjunction with the film in November 2009.
With a US theatrical release through Sony on Thanksgiving, Planet 51 is the tale of US astronaut Captain Charles “Chuck” Baker (Dwayne Johnson, The Scorpion King, Be Cool) who lands on Planet 51 thinking he’s the first person to step foot on it. To his surprise, it’s already inhabited by little green people who are happily living in a world reminiscent of a cheerfully innocent 1950’s American. The film also features the voices of John Cleese, Gary Oldman and Seann William Scott.
Firebrand Games CEO, Mark Greenshields said of the news:
"We have a track history of creating incredibly successful handheld titles and now, with the opportunity to work on a huge film tie-in like Planet 51, Firebrand is taking our core skill of producing triple-A driving titles into a wider arena."
TrackMania DS in North America
TrackMania DS has now shipped to stores in North America published by Atlus. Reviews have been extremely positive.
Official Nintendo Magazine UK awarded the game 86% and said:
“Ignore this at your peril: in terms of pure arcadey fun, it’s second only to Mario Kart DS”
EDGE Magazine has awarded the game 8/10 saying:
"The most remarkable thing is how smoothly it runs: a flawless 60 frames a second..." and
"For racing on DS, there's nothing to compare, in either depth or style."
Eurogamer Website also awarded the game 8/10 saying:
"...whether you're a fan of the series or a total novice, the slick, compulsive fight to gather all the game's golds will have you plugging away until you've exhausted its content."
"What's more, it's that rarest of things: a DS game with amazing graphics."
IGN Best of 2008 Award
Race Driver: GRID has won the IGN Award for Best DS Racing/Driving Game of 2008. This is the second year in a row, Firebrand Games have scooped this award following the success of Race Driver: Create and Race in 2007.
Pocket Gamer Plaudits
Excellent games website Pocket Gamer have been singing our praises recently.
First they placed Race Driver: GRID at number 7 in their Top 10 DS games of 2008 list.
Then they ran a feature on... Five Developers they'd like to see working on N-Gage.
Before requesting a Firebrand Racing Game in their feature about...10 games we'd like to see made for DSi.
We may have more news on that one soon!
Gamasutra Interview
Firebrand Games were recently interviewed by renowned Development website, Gamasutra. As well as asking about TrackMania DS, the interview touches on our Wii development and our plans for the future.
Read the whole interview here!
