Booyah, developer of location-based iPhone/iPod Touch app MyTown, picked up $20 million in a round of funding led by Accel Partners, with previous backers Kleiner Perkins Caufield & Byers and DAG Ventures also participating. This investment brings the total amount of financing raised by the studio since 2008 to $29.5 million.

MyTown is similar to other location-based apps/games like Foursquare, tracking real-world locations that users visit through the iPhone's GPS features. In Booyah's app, players level up, unlock rewards, and earn virtual cash to buy digital versions of their favorite real-life places -- charging rent to other MyTown users who visit that location.

That premise has attracted more than 2 million users since MyTown's launch in December, and Booyah says over 100,000 new users are joining the game every week. Its passed over 60 million check-ins at different locations and 250 million virtual item impressions a month, too. The developer adds that users spend around 70 minutes per day with MyTown, too.

Booyah plans to take advantage of its new financing to "ignite and accelerate" its real and digital world offerings. The Palo Alto-based company has also set a target of attaining 6 million users across MyTown and other future unannounced products by the end of this summer, according to a report from TechCrunch.

With this new investment, Accel's Jim Breyer will join Booyah's Board of Directors. Breyer is currently the lead and presiding director of Wal-Mart, a director of Dell, and an investor/board member of other companies like Facebook, Etsy, Marvel Entertainment, and Brightcove.

"The combination of Jim’s expertise in real world retail and cutting edge digital media mirrors our dedication to creating the most compelling real-world experiences," says Booyah CEO Keith Lee. "MyTown is a bold step to achieving this goal and we have very exciting plans in the near future to move far beyond the check-in."

GDC Online organizers are reminding that the call for submissions for the leading online game-focused conference -- taking place this October 5-8 in Austin, Texas -- are only open until this Wednesday at midnight EDT.

GDC Online, formerly known as GDC Austin, continues to accept submissions through midnight EDT on May 19th to present lectures, roundtables, tutorials and panel sessions at the largest worldwide industry event to concentrate specifically on social games, free-to-play titles, MMOs, and more.

To address the unprecedented growth in the online and social game space over the last year, development and business-oriented submissions for GDC Online are being sought after, in content tracks including Business and Marketing, Design, Production, and Programming.

Notably new to this year’s event is the “Live” track, which will discuss successful post-launch strategies to help increase profitability and retention. This topic covers metric-driven live development, design patterns for viral mechanics, and the balance between customer service and community relations.

GDC Online is keenly focused on development of connected games including social network titles, free-to-play web games, kid-friendly online titles, large-scale MMOs, and more, with a leading advisory board guiding the evaluation and choice of lectures.

In addition to the main conference content, GDC Online will present specialized Summit programs, with in-depth business and technical advice on major up-and-coming facets of the game industry, including 3D stereoscopic games and iPad development.

Social game developer CrowdStar (Happy Aquarium, Happy Island) announced that it's appointed Niren Hiro, formerly an executive at mobile advertising marketplace AdMob, as its new chief executive officer. Hiro pledges to help the company release new titles across online and mobile platforms, expand to new markets, and add new sources of revenue.

Hiro has held management positions at various internet, mobile, and media companies including Yahoo!, CBS Sportsline, MTV Networks, and others. Immediately prior to CrowdStar, he was at AdMob, where he worked for more than four years, most recently as vice president and managing director of the firm's Asia-Pacific and Latin America division.

CrowdStar's games have attracted more than 42 million monthly active users on Facebook, according to figures from AppData. Its most popular title, Happy Aquarium, alone has around 17 million players since launching last September and is currently the 13th most popular application on the social network.

The studio has extended Happy Aquarium beyond Facebook, too, launching the free-to-play, microtransactions-based game on Japanese social network Mixi across both PC and mobile phone platforms, where CrowdStar says the title is "growing rapidly".

"Niren brings an incredible wealth of knowledge and experience to CrowdStar from high growth media, entertainment, and mobile companies like Yahoo!, MTV, and AdMob both in the U.S. and internationally," says CrowdStar co-founder and executive chairman Peter Relan.

He adds, "Social games, virtual goods, and micro-transactions will grow manifold in the coming years and I look forward to working with Niren as he leverages his entertainment and media background to steer CrowdStar's network of games to even higher levels of success."

UK-based Mind Candy, developer and publisher of free-to-play online game Moshi Monsters, is planning to launch a standalone site and a section of its existing Moshi Monsters site dedicated to minigames.

In a job listing posted by Mind Candy CEO and founder Michael Acton Smith for a "Head of Mini Games", the company revealed that it's looking for someone to help build a brand new section of Moshi Monsters and to involve themselves in "every aspect of developing a successful mini games site".

The listing reads, "... We’re now planning to launch a new section of the site that will feature dozens of fun mini games from a wide range of talented developers. On top of this we’re also planning to launch a standalone mini games site outside of MoshiMonsters.com. "

Two months ago, Mind Candy announced that Moshi Monsters reached 15 million registered users since it launched in April 2008, and was seeing rapid growth with more than 150,000 new players joining each day and over 2 million new gamers signing up for the online world each month.

The browser-based game is designed for "parents and children of all ages", and allows players to adopt, customize, and nurture a virtual monster. Users can explore the game's magical world with their monster, solving puzzles that test different skills (basic math, spatial awareness, logic, and vocabulary), earn virtual currency, buy accessories to decorate their in-game homes, play minigames, and more.

[Via Games Brief]

Just after Runic Games' Torchlight revealed it had sold 500,000 units in six months, the game's publisher, Perfect World Entertainment, has bought an $8.4 million majority stake in the developer.

The details come from Perfect World's first quarter financial results, where it said the strategic investment in Runic is geared at strengthening its R&D capabilities.

"By collaborating more closely with Runic’s professional team, we seek to combine their creativity and expertise in game development with our deep understanding of the online game market to create global titles," says the company in a statement.

On Runic's official website, the company says it's currently working on a new MMORPG in the Torchlight world, with Perfect World to publish.

Perfect World is a Beijing-headquartered company that publishes a variety of MMORPGs, including Battle of the Immortals and the eponymous Perfect World. The company has operated a U.S. office since June 2008.

Anipark, a Korean online game developer, will use Epic Games' Unreal Engine 3 for its next two PC titles: an online baseball game and an MMORPG.

The baseball game will use the real-world player statistical data Anipark has been gathering for its current title, MaguMagu, part of why Anipark says it chose UE3.

For Epic's part, it credits the company with South Korean "firsts" -- MaguMagu, says Epic Games Korea's Ray Park, was the country's first 3D online baseball game, and Project A3 was the first MMORPG in the region aimed at mature audiences.

"We selected Unreal Engine 3 for our baseball game because of its ability to handle massive amounts of integrated data easily and efficiently," says development director Kwon Min Kwan. "There was no question that Unreal Engine 3 was the right choice. We know the Unreal Engine team has the right tools and support to help us realize our vision for our next titles."

Anipark's MMORPG will be a sequel to its Project A3 -- "We're always excited when developers choose Unreal Engine 3 for the sequel of a popular game," said Ray Park, territory manager of Epic Korea.

Cary, NC-headquartered Epic Games established its wholly-owned Korean subsidiary, Epic Games Korea, in 2009. The office has been working to build more UE3 licensees and support projects in the region.

ESPN announced a two-year agreement with Mobsters developer Playdom to release branded sports games for several social networks, including a FarmVille-like title called ESPNUville.

Playdom is working with ESPN's Interactive division to create a series of social games, the first two of which are in development and scheduled to launch this fall. One of the branded titles in the works is ESPNUville, the cable sports network's take on Zynga's popular FarmVille, according to a report from Eric Fisher of SportsBusiness Journal.

Though Playdom has popular titles on Facebook like Tiki Resort and Social City, it's stronger on MySpace, where it currently runs seven of the top 15 most popular apps. It plans to launch its ESPN-branded games on Facebook, MySpace, Bebo, Tagged, Hi5, ESPN.com, and Playdom.com. The developer also intends to create mobile extensions.

"Our deal with Playdom marks ESPN’s first major presence into the social gaming space," says Raphael Poplock, vice president of ESPN Digital Media's Games and Revenue Strategy and Development.

He continues, "The sports genre for this category of games has gone virtually untapped thus far, and through this agreement, we have an opportunity to be in front of a highly engaged audience and at the forefront of what is currently the fastest growing games category out there."

Much has been made of the opportunities for Facebook as a gaming platform, but alongside the rise of the metrics-focused social gaming industry and exploding casual user bases, few developers see any relationship between this burgeoning space and the traditional business.

But Sony Online Entertainment sees a way to bridge that gap -- it's extending its massively multiplayer shooter property currently in development, The Agency, onto Facebook with a social game subtitled Covert Ops.

With its ability to expose properties to massive social audiences, using Facebook makes marketing and community management sense for core IP -- that's half the genius of Facebook extensions on home consoles, since friends viewing the activities of other friends become aware of games they hadn't yet heard of and become curious about the gaming interests of their pals.

The Agency: Covert Ops goes well beyond community relations, however. Development director Dan Kopycienski of SOE Tucson, responsible for creating the Facebook game, sees it as a true multiplatform collaboration with the Seattle studio developing the main online game.

Widely-reported tensions between Facebook and Zynga, the largest developer of games for its platform, seem to have dissolved with a new five-year agreement on virtual currency.

The source of the conflict between Facebook and FarmVille house Zynga comes down to Facebook's decision to introduce Facebook Credits, an over-arching currency system to be used in all games on its platform.

This allows users to purchase just one type of currency for use in Facebook games, rather than buying directly from individual developers -- a lack of direct control over its monetization that became a major point of contention for Zynga.

Also likely an issue is Facebook's decision to take 30 percent of revenues gathered from credits, with 70 percent allocated to the developers.

Zynga has also publicly urged Facebook to build a better infrastructure for gaming on its network, suggesting it should be more like "an open Xbox Live for the web." With today's agreement, Facebook has said it will use its 30 percent cut to "[invest] heavily into the ecosystem."

Although the two companies didn't disclose exactly how they resolved the dispute, they said the new five-year agreement will allow them to continue to work together. Zynga is currently testing Facebook Credits in some of its titles, and says it will expand to more in the months ahead. In addition to highly-popular FarmVille, Zynga also operates Mafia Wars, Cafe World and FishVille, among numerous others.

"We are excited about Facebook’s long-term commitment to social gaming and Zynga, and look forward to working with them and other platform providers to bring the best social gaming experience to users worldwide," says Zynga founder and CEO Mark Pincus.

“We are pleased to enter into a new agreement with Zynga to enhance the experience for Facebook users who play Zynga games,” adds Facebook COO Sheryl Sandberg.

Free-to-play online gaming portal GamesCampus, which is operated by Sunnyvale, CA-based company OnNet USA, announced that it is expanding to Europe with the opening of a new office in Germany.

Founded in 2006, OnNet USA itself is the North American arm of Korean company OnNet Co. The U.S. division offers a diverse range of massively multiplayer online titles through its portal, including sports games like Shot Online 2010 and MLB Dugout Heroes, as well as fantasy titles like Asda Story and Soul Master.

The first project out of GamesCampus's German branch and the European portal will be Manga Fighter (pictured), a casual third-person 3D shooter that features "unique map designs, colorful graphics", special moves and abilities for characters (e.g. character transformation), and a Skill Card system.

“Over the years we have built of a great fan base of European gamers for our GamesCampus titles so we wanted to take action to set up local servers and establish a physical presence to build upon that,” says GamesCampus CEO Kevin Kim.

Kim continues, "Our new office allows us a close proximity to local gamers and we now plan to bring a full slate of titles to German gamers with local servers that are fully localized into German."

German browser-based online game developer and publisher InnoGames has raised a round of financing led by Fidelity Growth Partners Europe (FGPE) -- funds that the studio will put toward expanding globally (it already has a subsidiary in South Korea).

Founded in 2007, InnoGames has three titles -- Tribal Wars, The West, and Grepolis -- which attract more than 50 million registered players around the world. Though its games are free-to-play, they allow users to purchase virtual goods and in-game advantages.

FGPE, a pan-European venture and growth equity investor, says it's formed a "strategic partnership" with InnoGames and has taken a minority stake in the developer. The firm's Davor Habel will join InnoGames's supervisory board, providing counsel and access to FGPE's resources.

Though neither company disclosed the specific terms of their agreement, InnoGames says the deal is in the "double digit millions", according to a report from VC news site VentureBeat. The game studio's three co-founders Eike Klindworth, Hendrik Klindworth, and Michael Zillmer will continue to manage the company.

"FGPE's investment - both in capital and serving as close consultant and advisor - will enable us to take the company forward at a faster pace", says InnoGames co-founder and managing director Hendrik Klindworth. "The online gaming market is experiencing tremendous growth, and we intend to be one of the dominant players. The combination of our gaming know-how and FGPE's invaluable and wide-ranging experience will get us there."

Alexander Gianturco is better known as "The Mittani" -- one of the most notorious EVE Online players, and in the latest feature at Gamasutra sister site Worlds in Motion, The Icelandic Model of MMO Development, he lays out how CCP's game differs from most on the market.

Gianturco delivered an intriguing and well-received talk on the topic of EVE's espionage metagame at the most recent GDC.

Writes Gianturco, "Launching a MMO isn't an easy business. The vast majority of subscription-model MMOs fail, with the signature 'death spike' of a surge of players at launch and reciprocal mass exodus once the first free month of playtime ends, followed by a humiliating and slowly declining subscriber plateau.

"Corporate resources are re-allocated away from the ailing title, and eventually the plug is pulled on the servers. As the market has become increasingly competitive, the life cycle of MMOs has grown ever shorter."

The alternative, he says, is to stop pursuing ever-increasingly costly linear content and move to a systems-based design -- a model which flourishes most in EVE Online but which could map to many styles and themes of MMOs, were it tried, he argues.

"[Endgame content] doesn't necessarily have to be a PvP sandbox such as EVE's; the sandbox can be cooperative, as seen in A Tale in the Desert. The sandbox is critical because it gives the players something to do to amuse themselves immediately after a minimalistic launch while revenue and new features are being developed," he writes.

"Too many developers with great ideas are intimidated away from creating intriguing MMO titles by the daunting startup costs of following the dominant blockbuster model. It doesn't have to be this way; just use a different business model! CCP began with a bare $2.6 million in funding," he concludes.

The full feature, The Icelandic Model of MMO Development, is live today on Gamasutra.

GDC Europe organizers have announced major new speakers for the August event taking place in Cologne alongside Gamescom, with notables from Sony, Playdom, Crytek and Playfish speaking on social games, budget balancing, game metrics controversy and beyond.

Following the recent announcement of a keynote from browser game giant and Battlestar Galactica MMO creator Bigpoint, the new sessions reveal significant breadth to the leading European video game conference, which takes place on August 16th-18th in Cologne, Germany.

Some of the notable new speakers for the conference (which is created by the UBM Techweb Game Network, as is this website) include the following:

- In 'Intuition vs. Metrics: The Big Debate', Playfish's Jeferson Valardes will explore the controversy about the social game space's metrics-driven approach to design and development. Valardes, at the Electronic Arts-owned leading social network game firm (Restaurant City, Pet Society), promises "take this controversial subject by the neck and leave no stone unturned" in discussing it.

- Crytek producer Bernd Diemer (Crysis) is presenting a thought-provoking design lecture from the leading German firm, 'Imaginary Places, Strange Maps, and How Pop Culture Resonates Past Media Borders', discussing how inspiration for games can be taken from the strange, compelling miasma of pop culture through our earliest experiences.

- In a key production track lecture from Seb Canniff of Sony Computer Entertainment Europe, 'Budgets - The Bermudan Part of the Production Triangle', the SCEE manager will provide hands-on advice on how to build, track and stick to a video game project budget, looking at "what most often goes wrong, and providing tools and tips on how to avoid these pitfalls".

Social game developer Playdom has made yet another buy, continuing a recent string of acquisitions with the purchase of Acclaim Games.

Acclaim, developer and publisher of casual, downloadable, social and online titles including the Korea-transplanted MMOs Bots and 2Moons, has been in business since 2006, but likely attracted Playdom's attention with the success of Facebook guitar game RockFree, which it says now has more than 15 million registered users since its March 2010 launch.

Playdom also gains a foothold in Los Angeles in the studio acquisition, and says it's looking forward to accessing the region's development talent pool -- making it likely that the company is set to continue growing. The companies did not disclose the amount the company paid in the acquisition

Playdom, known for Facebook titles Mobsters and Sorority Life, has been making acquisitions since it picked up $43 million in a Series A round of funding last November. It's purchased or invested in purchased and invested in at least six studios: Merscom (The Crazies), Trippert Labs (Fighter Jets), Offbeat Creations (Super Farkle), Three Melons (Bola!), Green Patch (Lil Green Patch)and Argentinian firm MetroGames (Music Challenge).

Acclaim is currently working on a new Facbook game that will launch this summer, and the company's CEO, Howard Marks, commented that "Joining forces with Playdom is a natural fit."

Marks will continue to run the studio and serve in a senior strategic role for Playdom, while colleague Neil Malhotra will transition from Acclaim CTO to senior technical officer for the studio.

"Bringing Howard and Neil into Playdom strengthens our leadership and bolsters our position as an innovative games developer for the future," says Playdom CEO John Pleasants. "Howard and Neil have worked together building and operating games for many years, and their pipeline of new games is strong."

India-headquartered developer Swadesh Animation has licensed AI tech company Xaitment's tools for the development of a new MMO, Online Tales.

Bangalore-based Swadesh will use four of the company's tools -- XaitMap, XaitControl, XaitThink and XaitKnow -- in the development of Online Tales, on which it'll work with Goa-based co-creator RZ2 Games. The companies describe their project as an "Indian themed MMOG, with some Nordic and Anglo-Saxon influences."

Swadash will use XaitMap to develop a server navigation mesh, and to implement dynamic and static object collision server-side. It will also develop its NPC behaviors using XaitControl, which will enable it to create rulesets via a graphical interface.

The companies claim that Xaitment's XaitThink and XaitKnow will allow the developer to implement learning behaviors based on rulesets for the gameworld's NPCs. Explains Swadash president John Medhi: "An NPC merchant might simply learn from the experience of thefts from his warehouse, while a more complex NPC, such as a guild chieftain, could be made more despotic and aggressive, or timid and mild; and with various quirks, mimicking human behaviorisms as he attacks and raids other guilds."

Xaitment CEO Andreas Gerber says: "It’s an absolute pleasure working with Swadesh Animation and their co-developers RZ2 Games," said xaitment’s Group CEO, Dr. Andreas Gerber about the collaboration. “John has been an enthusiastic partner from the very beginning and we are excited to see the results coming from the development of their game."

After working in the mobile and handheld gaming space for the past six years, Scottish studio Dynamo Games announced that it's increasing its headcount significantly and incorporating social games and smartphone titles into its catalog.

Dynamo has so far increased the size of its development team by 60 percent -- with further additions possible in the next several months -- and has moved into new, dedicated offices in Dundee, Scotland to accommodate the larger group.

Founded in 2004, the BAFTA award-winning studio is mostly known as the creator of the Championship Manager series for mobile devices. The company's new "strategy for the future" is to expand its efforts to smartphones like Android and iPhone, as well as social networks such as Facebook.

Dynamo plans to release its first social gaming title, Soccer Tycoon, on Facebook this summer. You can follow updates on the soccer management sim at its dedicated official site.

With its new focus, office, and employees, the company has also rebranded itself with a new logo (pictured) and hired local PR agency Revolver. The firm says it will provide "consultancy and communications support on both corporate and consumer fronts as Dynamo plans a number of wide-ranging changes to its business."

"The games market is undergoing an incredible transformation which is changing every aspect of the business," says Dynamo's managing director Brian McNicoll. "New devices and platforms are creating and opening up markets which simply didn’t exist a few years ago.

He adds, "Developers cannot afford to ignore these new channels since the business models underpinning the ‘mainstream’ games industry simply do not work. Dynamo has repositioned itself to take advantage of these new opportunities and ensure we remain at the forefront of the games industry as it continues to evolve. It’s about being smarter, not larger."

Emergent Technologies said Wednesday that it licensed its widely-used Gamebryo engine to Korean developer Gorilla Banana Entertainment, which will use the engine in the MMORPG Red Blood.

It’s the latest Asian licensing deal Gamebryo has announced in recent weeks, as the engine provider is making an effort to significantly expand its business in the region.

Other Korean studios that recently struck Gamebryo licensing deals include Crossfire developer SmileGate and Iris Online creator Entwell.

Gorilla Banana’s MMORPG Red Blood is a futuristic action game revolving around companies that have created an improved, genetically-altered human race. Players choose to join one of four countries.

Red Blood is the first game from Seoul-based Gorilla Banana, which was founded in 2006 by former NCsoft developers who worked on the Lineage series.

Emergent’s Gamebryo has been used in games including Warhammer Online, Defense Grid: The Awakening, Divinity II, Fallout 3 and Civilization: Revolution. The engine has been used to developer over 200 games, according to Emergent.

Blizzard Entertainment has launched its beta and revealed monthly subscription details for Remote Auction House, a new service allowing World of Warcraft players to browse and manage virtual auctions in the MMORPG through their web browser or the official Mobile Armory iPhone/iPod Touch app.

The service is free during this testing period (accessible only to players on select servers) and will have a non-paid version with limited features when it formally launches, but gamers who want to take advantage of all of Remote Auction House's features will eventually need to pay $2.99 every 30 days on top of the game's monthly fee after the beta.

World of Warcraft's auction houses allow players to buy or sell virtual items to others in exchange for in-game gold. Through these hubs, users can find the best price on common goods or purchase extremely rare equipment/materials that would require a significant amount of resources, luck, or time investment to obtain.

With Remote Auction House World of Warcraft players can browse the in-game auction house, receive real-time notifications on auctions, view a record of their previous auctions, and more through their browser or the free Mobile Armory iPhone app. Once the service launches, though, only users who've paid the monthly fee can bid on, buy out, cancel, and relist auction.

Blizzard has been exploring new ways to generate revenue through the MMORPG outside of subscriptions and merchandise/authenticator sales in recent months, dabbling with microtransactions like exclusive virtual pets that players can purchase. Last month, the company introduced a new in-game mount that was very popular with players, likely earning the publisher hundreds of thousands, if not millions of dollars in the space of a few hours.

FarmVille developer Zynga announced Thursday its acquisition of Beijing-based social games studio XPD Media, marking the company's first step into the social gaming market in Asia.

With its purchase of the studio, Zynga will integrate XPD's team of 40 employees into its global workforce and task the group with focusing on engineering and product development. XPD's chief executive Robin Chan will take on the role of Zynga's GM of Asian business operations, and the Chinese firm's co-founder Andy Tian will lead Zynga's new Beijing studio.

Founded in early 2008, XPD is backed by True Ventures and Pilot Group, and is dedicated to developing social titles for both Asian and international social networks. With the acqusition, Zynga says it aims to gain a foothold in a fast-growing market, and access a new talent pool of developers.

Neither company has announced whether Zynga's new Beijing office will work specifically on games for the Asian market or for Western audiences as well, but the FarmVille developer currently has no presence on any Asian social networks such as China's RenRen, Qzone, and 51.com. Those sites, however, already have many clones of popular Western titles.

The announcement of the acquisition comes just a few days after Zynga and Facebook announced a five-year agreement on the management of virtual currency for games on the social network. The deal came only after weeks of reports about tensions between the companies and even rumors of a potential split, stemming from disagreements over Facebook's implementation of its universal virtual currency system Credits.

"As the largest Internet market in the world, China is at the vanguard for virtual goods based gaming innovation," says Zynga's Corporate Development VP Robert Goldberg. "We expect our new office in Beijing and the incredible talent in the local market to play a strategic role in our mission to create the best social gaming experiences worldwide."

Apple's mobile devices don't support Flash, but popular indie games site Kongregate still wants to make its library of Flash-based games available for mobile gamers.

Kongregate on Thursday announced a partnership with Adobe Systems on the beta launch of Flash Player 10.1, which allows for Flash-based mobile gaming on Google's Android 2.2 mobile operating system.

Kongregate CEO Jim Greer told Worlds in Motion sister site Gamasutra that Android's Flash support gives Flash game developers a viable alternative to iPhone, iPod Touch and iPad. "I think Apple's decision [to not support Flash] is ultimately about extending its lead in mobile apps by making it as hard as possible for developers to target multiple platforms," said Greer. "Flash game developers and players have gotten caught in that crossfire."

As part of the agreement with Adobe, Kongregate launched a mobile site, which currently has over 100 browser-based games optimized for mobile devices, all integrated with Kongregate's community features.

Greer co-founded privately-held Kongregate in 2006. The website hosts almost 30,000 free-to-play games and boasts community features to add "stickiness." It generates one-third of its revenue through microtransactions and virtual goods sales, with advertising and sponsorships making up the rest. Developers using microtransactions get 70 percent of revenues after they recoup their advance. Kongregate said it has over 8,000 developers making games for the site.

Palo Alto-based startup Booyah, which created popular location-based iPhone app MyTown, announced a partnership with Google to use the company's newly announced Places Web Service feature in its flagship product.

Places Web Service is a Google Maps API feature that lists the 20 most popular places near a given location, pointing out proximate businesses or other points of interest to users -- a useful feature for an app like MyTown that tracks real-world locations users visit, and rewards them with discounts to shops, the opportunity to purchase and rent out virtual versions of locations, and more.

By integrating Places Web Service into MyTown, the developer believes it will be able to provide its users with a "richer, faster, and more relevant experience". Booyah adds that search results pulled from Google Maps for MyTown will be more accurate, and load times will receive a boost, too. The studio also notes that it is the first partner to take advantage of Places Web Service.

The announcement comes several days after Booyah revealed that it raised $20 million in a new round of funding, which the developer said it will use to "ignite and accelerate" its real and digital world offerings. Though it was launched only last December, the free MyTown app already attracted more than 2 million users.

"Our collaboration with Google bridges the gap between the consumer and businesses by enabling MyTown as a vehicle for real-world benefits," says Booyah CEO Keith Lee. "The new API affords lightning fast search for local directory content both in the US and abroad, further growing MyTown’s presence and Booyah’s leadership in real-world interactive entertainment."

Habbo Hotel creator Sulake Corporation reported its best quarterly financial results in the company's history, as its revenue for the first quarter of 2010 jumped up to $20 million, more than 25 percent compared to the same period last year.

The Helsinki-based company attributes the record quarter to its 10 years of experience with "continual service improvements, attentive community nurturing, inventive virtual goods and multiple international micropayments", which it says is now paying off in its teen-targeted virtual world.

Sulake says its strong revenue growth during the January to March 2010 span, combined with its operating model improvements and cost savings in the fourth quarter of 2009, helped significantly increase its profits. The developer expects its revenue growth for the year to continue at its current rate, and believes it will maintain healthy profitability and positive cash flow.

In 2009, Sulake's revenue was $60 million, which it points out is approximately on par with its numbers for 2008 despite last year's difficult economic conditions, Habbo Hotel's technology transition from Shockwave client technology to Flash, and operating model improvements from restructuring costs.

"Habbo Hotel's solid growth this quarter has been a result of our continual new and relevant features, exciting campaigns and monetization improvements to the Habbo virtual goods economy," says Sulake CEO Timo Soininen. "Better Habbo user experience has also led to increased viral recommendations and a larger user base."

He adds, "Additionally, our activities and presence on social networking sites like Facebook, and other new acquisition partnerships have contributed to our growth. Also, the global online advertising market recovery resulted in solid growth in our ad sales business."

Redwood City-based social games and apps developer RockYou (Zoo World, Birthday Cards) announced that it's the recipient of San Francisco Business Times' Technology and Innovation Award, winning in the Social Media category -- Zynga was also a finalist for the award.

The business newspaper created the award as a way to honor what it believes to be the "Bay Area’s most innovative technology companies, led by the most enterprising entrepreneurs". Editors and reports from the San Francisco Business Times selected 25 notable companies in the region from a list of 300 nominees, then pared that list down to winners in 12 categories.

RockYou says the paper's judges were impressed by its innovation and contributions to social media, such as its social games that reach almost 280 million users across several major social networks, as well as its monetization solutions that turn up to 25 percent of its players into paying users (with an ARPU of up to 20 percent).

The developer also called attention to its branded experiences, which include "video, rich media, deal of the day, and other custom sponsored in-game solutions". RockYou says its Deal of the Day delivers targeted, user-initiated brand interactions through video views, surveys, and more. Over 50 percent of Deal of the Day gamers complete the "targeted action."

"We are pleased and honored to receive this prestigious award from the San Francisco Business Times as the most innovative Social Media Company," says RockYou's CEO Lance Tokuda. "An early pioneer in this exciting space, RockYou continues to innovate and revolutionize Social Media -- by providing a forum which allows both Brand Advertisers and Application Developers to engage millions of consumers worldwide in safe, rich, and deeply engaging social experiences."

London-based Mind Candy, the developer behind children's free-to-play online game Moshi Monsters announced its launch of membership gift cards through major retailers like Blockbuster, GameStop, Sainsbury’s, WHSmith and more.

The browser-based game allows players to adopt virtual monsters, explore a magical world with that monster, puzzles that test different skills (basic math, spatial awareness, logic, and vocabulary), earn Rox virtual currency, buy accessories for their monsters, purchase decorations for their in-game homes, play minigames, and more.

Released through a partnership with prepaid card company InComm, the cards offer one- and six-month memberships for Moshi Monsters. Though the game is free to play, users can pay $5.95 a month for a subscription that will give them access to more features, games, and content.

Mind Candy revealed two months ago that reached 15 million registered users since launching in April 2008, and is seeing rapid growth as more than 150,000 new players joining each day and over 2 million new gamers signing up for the online world each month.

Two months ago, Mind Candy announced that Moshi Monsters reached 15 million registered users since it launched in April 2008. The company also claimed to see rapid growth with more than 150,000 new players joining each day and over 2 million new gamers signing up each month -- those numbers must be holding as the developer now says its userbase is "fast approaching 20 million registered players."

"With the tremendous growth of Moshi Monsters, we want memberships to be more accessible to customers, making it easier than ever for parents and children alike to enjoy the benefits of being a Moshi Monsters member," says Mind Candy's chief marketing officer Edward Relf. "Offering memberships through retail is a convenient way for players to pay for their membership and give the gift of Moshi Monsters."

Likely spurred by the success of World of Warcraft's own experiments selling an in-game "mount" to subscribers, Sony Online Entertainment announced that it will for the first time sell three $25 Sonebrunt Prowler Mounts to EverQuest II players through its Station Cash Marketplace.

Available for at least one month in the subscription-based MMORPG, the mounts are rideable virtual animals that increase the movement speed of their owners and confer other bonuses. SOE describes its three Sonebrunt Prowler Mounts as "fearsome predator[s] with strong jaws and deadly speed," which are "known for stalking the plains of Odus".

The company adds, "Since Odus was pulled from Norrath, the prowlers have mutated, with magic infusing their bodies and improving their already powerful muscles. Recently, Erudite researchers have found ways to bend the prowlers to their service, taking control of the magic essence of each prowler and harnessing it for use as a mount of unparalleled ferocity."

The introduction of the three mounts come a month after Blizzard introduced its first purchasable in-game mount, a $25 Celestial Steed, in World of Warcraft. More than 140,000 players queued for the creature (and other virtual pets available on the company's online shop), making the company hundreds of thousands, if not millions of dollars in just a few hours.

You can find full descriptions of the three different Sonebrunt Prowler Mounts after the break:

In an exciting week for new job postings, Gamasutra's jobs board plays host to roles across the world and in every major discipline, including opportunities at Insomniac, Sledgehammer, Relic, and many more.

Each position posted by employers will appear on the main Gamasutra job board, and appear in the site's daily and weekly newsletters, reaching our readers directly.

It will also be cross-posted for free across its network of submarket sites, which includes content sites focused on online worlds, cellphone games, 'serious games', independent games and more.

Some of the notable jobs posted this week include:

Insomniac Games: SFX Artist
"Insomniac Games is an independent videogame developer with award-winning hits for the PS, PS2 and PS3. We created the first three Spyro the Dragon games, and the Ratchet and Clank franchise. We are also the team behind Resistance: Fall of Man, Ratchet and Clank Future: Tools of Destruction, Resistance 2, and most recently - Ratchet and Clank Future: A Crack in Time! If that's not enough, we've also have been named one of the Best Small Companies to work for, and have two fantastic studios - one in Burbank, CA and one in Durham, North Carolina. Come check us out!"

Relic Entertainment: Senior Artist/Lighter
"At Relic Entertainment we are developing an original game for PS3 and Xbox 360 and continue to build on our history of award winning games - games like Company of Heroes, Dawn of War, and Homeworld. Experience freedom of creativity and know your contribution is valued and recognized by the Relic team and also by gamers and industry experts around the globe.

"Life outside of Relic? You bet. We know, it's a novel idea, but one we not only embrace, we enforce. If you are going to live in Vancouver, you better have time away from work to take advantage of all this city has to offer. Vancouver is consistently ranked in the top most livable cities in the world. Where else can you get up and choose between beach volleyball, city nightlife, or boarding the glacier, all within 90 minutes? We've got mountains. We've got ocean. We've got a chill studio in the heart of downtown. And... We've got donuts every Friday. What more could you ask for?"