Round Up: Ubisoft Leaks, Spectrobes In March, Hands-On COO

Today's round-up includes news of information and media from several upcoming Ubisoft releases that was mistakenly leaked onto the internet, a confirmed release date for Buena Vista Games' Spectrobes, and Hands-On Mobile's new chief operating officer., as well as the latest Game Career Guide updates, Serious Games Source posts, GameSetWatch posts and Gamasutra job postings. - Online reports have highlighted an apparent error made by French-headquartered Ubisoft concerning leaked PR materials for a number of the company's upcoming titles, some of which have not yet been formally announced. The mistake involved a 2GB archived file containing both images and documentation surrounding sixteen upcoming releases from the company which was mistakenly made available online for a brief period before being removed. Of those games included were a previously unknown sequel to popular first-person shooter Far Cry, as well as a version of the game for the PSP. Others included a fourth game in the Prince of Persia series, Rocky for the PSP, and a new Splinter Cell game, subtitled Conviction. The company, clearly displeased with the information leak, has issued an official statement, noting, “The publication of this type of information can only be harmful to the game development process and we will take all steps necessary to prevent this from happening in the future.” - Disney video game subsidiary Buena Vista Games has confirmed that its previously announced Spectrobes, which represents the company's first video game based on an original property, will ship for worldwide on March 15, 2007. Spectrobes is an anime-inspired action/role playing game that is being developed by close Nintendo affiliate and Kingdom Hearts: Chain Of Memories developer Jupiter Corporation in Kyoto - the company also developed titles including Mario's Picross, Pokemon Pinball, and Pokemon Pinball Ruby and Sapphire, which has sold over million units worldwide. - Mobile games publisher Hands-On Mobile announced the promotion of Keith McCurdy to chief operating officer. McCurdy was previously the company's president of studios and products, and brings more than 20 years of executive management experience in the development and publishing of electronic entertainment products. In his expanded role as COO, McCurdy will now be responsible for North America carrier sales, marketing and business development initiatives, in addition to overseeing the company's U.S. games and product development. Prior to joining Hands-On Mobile, McCurdy was president and CEO of Blaze Entertainment, a venture backed mobile games publisher. Prior to that position, McCurdy was a 10-year veteran of Electronic Arts, where he held a number of positions, including vice president of product development, vice president of world wide technology and vice president of online, where he was responsible for the creation of Electronic Arts' Online Division. - The latest updates on Gamasutra sister alt.gaming weblog GameSetWatch include an editorialized look at board game Arkham Horror and machinima in virtual world Second Life. - The latest updates on Gamasutra's sister site Serious Games Source include news of the Federation of American Scientists (FAS) showing off the educational game Immune Attack at the upcoming Games for Health. - News on Gamasutra's game education sister site Game Career Guide includes a student postmortem on Nanyang Polytechnic's Bashy Bashy and plans by game designer Ernest Adams to visit Carnegie Mellon University’s Entertainment Technology Center. - Also updated today: the latest Gamasutra job postings, including openings from Amaze Entertainment, Day 1 Studios, Electronic Arts Tiburon, Emergent Game Technologies, Mad Doc Software, nFusion Interactive, Radical Entertainment, and TimeGate Studios.