Newsbriefs: Uru Goes Mac, Live Video Hungry, IGA Turns 50thNewsbriefs: Uru Goes Mac, Live Video Hungry, IGA Turns 50th

Author: by Staff

[UPDATED: 3:57pm PST] Today's regularly updated newsbriefs include GameTap launching a Mac port of Myst Online: URU Live, Microsoft announcing a 400 percent jump in Live downloads through the Video Marketplace, and in-game ad house IGA serving its 50th game title. - Subscription-based online game library GameTap has announced that the recently resurrected MMO Myst Online: URU Live has been launched for the Mac platform, with access to all of the recent content updates the game has seen since Cyan partnered with the service. New additions to the Myst Online universe include a new Age with a "reverse zoo" pod used to observe exotic wildlife, with, of course, mysterious features left to the player to discover, and a new arctic environment called Dereno launched just last week. - In a new release, Microsoft has touted the success of the launch of its Video Marketplace section of Xbox Live, saying that since its November launch, the movie and TV downloads have been a "runaway success." Currently, the company reckons, the past four months have seen Microsoft becoming the number two online distributor of TV and film content, second only to iTunes, and the number one distributor of said content to the living room -- a market where it currently runs essentially unchallenged. Since the launch, says Microsoft, the service has seen double-digit growth each month, with downloads from Xbox Live up 400 times their rate on November of 2006. - In-game advertising network IGA Worldwide has announced that the company has reached a milestone of placing ads in its 50th new title, and is currently serving 200 million ad impressions a week for such clients as Intel, Burger King, Discovery Networks, Paramount Pictures, T-Mobile, Jeep, 20th Century Fox, Nokia, Ben Sherman, FHM, Orange and Universal Pictures. The company says it expects to be delivering one billion impressions per week to a player-base of 20 million unique users by the end of the year through partnerships with publishers like EA, Atari, Acclaim, Codemasters and Valve. - The latest updates on Gamasutra sister alt.gaming weblog GameSetWatch include the deconstruction of a typical game design job posting, an examination of rougelike Nethack, and Game Developer's Brandon Sheffield's thoughts of his upcoming IGDA talk on 'What makes a next-gen game.' - The latest updates from Gamasutra sister website Serious Games Source include a new educational game study on the impact of serious games in UK schools. - The latest updates from Gamasutra sister website Game Career Guide include Student Categories for the Canadian Awards for the Electronic and Animated Arts, and a new feature by Full Sail instructor Robin Koman on teaching mythology in the context of vocational game design education. - Also updated today: the latest Gamasutra job postings, including openings from Amaze Entertainment, Backbone Entertainment, Budcat Creations, Cranky Pants Games, Gorilla Systems Corporation, Midway Games, Radical Entertainment, Shiny Entertainment, Snow Leopard Studios, Stormfront Studios, Sucker Punch Productions, Treyarch / Activision, Vivendi Games Mobile, and Zipper Interactive.