1）据gamasutra报道，Zynga纽约工作室总经理Dan Porter（他是OMGPOP首席执行官，该工作室于去年被Zynga收购）日前也已离职，据Zynga所称，Porter离职是他与Zynga达成的“双方决定”，但并没有透露更多详情。

另一名前OMGPOP成员Wilson Kriegel已在去年9月离开Zynga。Porter离职前所监管开发的项目是《Draw Something》，现在已由Zynga移动开发副总裁Sean Uberoi Kelly取代其职位。

dan-porter(from businessinsider)

2）据Techcrunch报道，Zynga日前宣布将于明天在英国发行首批真钱博彩游戏的消息之后，其股票上涨了5%左右。

这两款Zynga真钱博彩游戏分别是《ZyngaPlusPoker》和《ZyngaPlusCasino》将通过bwin.party（全球最大的赌博游戏运营商之一）渠道发布，支持下载或在网页上运行，但Zynga计划在今年内将其推向Facebook和移动平台（但仅面向英国用户开放服务）。

chips(from thenextweb.com)

Zynga在iOS和Facebook上已推出了一些极为成功的扑克游戏，《Zynga Poker》是2012年iOS平台收益最高的应用，也是仅次于《FarmVille》的Zynga第二大高盈收游戏。据Zynga年度报告显示，《Zynga Poker》去年创造了19%的Zynga在线游戏收益（2.174亿美元）。

3）据《华尔街日报》报道，苹果下一代iPhone可能将在今年夏季问世，这款所谓的“iPhone 5S”的基本设计与iPhone 5相同。

报道还指出苹果还计划在今年底推出更为平价的iPhone；之前传闻有称苹果将为这款平价iPhone推出多种色彩选择，《华尔街日报》报道称苹果在研发额外的颜色，但并不确定苹果是否将推出更多颜色方案的iPhone。

iPhone 5S(from appspost.net)

4）据venturebeat报道，EA前首席执行官John Riccitiello于3月30日离任之后，由该公司执行主席Larry Probst临时填补这一空缺，负责主持大局（游戏邦注：Probst曾于1991年至2007年任EA首席执行官，自1994年以来一直担任该公司董事长，目前还是美国奥委会成员）。

根据美国证券交易委员会文件显示，EA董事会同意向Probst支付103万美元的年薪（假如Probst接替这一职位满一年），在EA最终找到新首席执行官之后，公司董事会还将为Probst提供一笔奖金。

larry-probst(from venturebeat)

据称EA会同时从内部和外部物色新任CEO人选，行业分析师Colin Sebastian认为现任EA首席运营官Peter Moore和EA Labels总裁Frank Gibeau是最有潜力的内部人选。

5）据insidesocialgames报道，前Zynga Austin工作室副总裁及总经理Andrew Busey最近与Chaotic Moon Studios合作组建 了Team Chaos这家新手机游戏工作室。该工作室首款游戏是iOS免费卡牌游戏《Elements:Broken Lands》。

Elements-Broken-Lands(from gamingbolt.com)

Busey曾是社交游戏开发商Challenge Games首席执行官及创始人，Zynga于2010年1月收购了这家公司，Busey及其工作室的35名成员就是Zynga Austin工作室的元老。但在2012年10月，Zynga Austin工作室裁员超过100人，数月后Zynga又关闭了该工作室，将剩余员工分配到了Zynga Dallas和North Austin工作室。（本文为游戏邦/gamerboom.com编译，拒绝任何不保留版权的转载，如需转载请联系：游戏邦）

1）Omgpop founder Dan Porter walks away from Zynga

By Frank Cifaldi

Zynga lost yet another high-ranking executive Tuesday when Dan Porter, GM of its New York studio, left the company.

Porter was the CEO of OMGPOP, the Draw Something developer that Zynga acquired last year for a rather contentious $180 million.

Zynga tells us that Porter’s departure was a “mutual decision,” implying that the company may have wanted him out. Zynga would not clarify any further.

Another Omgpop executive, Wilson Kriegel, left Zynga in September.

Zynga New York is putting the finishing touches on Draw Something 2, which Porter led the development of. He is being replaced as GM by Sean Uberoi Kelly, the company’s VP of mobile
development.

Draw Something…please?

Omgpop’s acquisition came at the height of Draw Something’s popularity. From the outside it seemed to many that Zynga paid $180 million just to have the game in its portfolio, leading analysts to question whether Zynga’s spending was out of control.

The game was a rising star with growth that seemed limitless — there was even a deal for a network TV show — but even the most popular games must plateau at some point. And Draw Something plateaued fast.

The fad seems to have gone away, with Draw Something players abandoning ship so fast that Zynga blamed them for being a major contributor in two consecutive quarterly losses. （source：gamasutra）

2）Zynga Shares Rise 5% In After-Hours On Real-Money Games Launch Tomorrow

Kim-Mai Cutler

Zynga’s shares are up by 5 percent in after-hours trading on news that the company is launching its first real-money games in the U.K. tomorrow.

The company is bringing ZyngaPlusPoker and ZyngaPlusCasino to U.K. players tomorrow through a partnership with bwin.party, one of the world’s biggest real-money gaming operators. At first, the games will be downloadable or on the web, but Zynga plans to bring them to Facebook and mobile platforms later in the year.

They could come to U.S. players later, but only as state or federal laws will allow. A handful of states, including Nevada and New Jersey, have passed legislation to allow online gambling.

Under financial pressures from a long period of slow economic growth, about a dozen or more states are also considering pushing legal online gambling forward.

But many of these laws favor existing land-based casinos ahead of companies that are purely online. Zynga might be pressured to partner with a casino there to make it work, even though they filed an Application for a Preliminary Finding of Suitability from the Nevada Gaming Control Board last December.

As for the launch tomororw, Zynga’s U.K. arm and bwin.party plan to launch games that could include as many as 180 other casino titles like roulette and blackjack over the year. The poker title is basically an online poker room, while the casino title has about 160 familiar betting games.

Zynga already has a very successful Poker title on iOS and Facebook that uses virtual currency. Zynga Poker was the company’s very first social game, the highest grossing app of 2012 on
the iOS app store chart, and Zynga’s second-highest grossing title last year behind FarmVille. The Zynga Poker title generated 19 percent of Zynga’s online game revenue last year, or
$217.4 million alone, according to its annual report.

So if the company were able to add real-money gaming, which would increase average revenues per user substantially, it could change the character of Zynga’s business fundamentally.

The thing is that real-money gaming is incredibly competitive in the U.K. Even though revenues rise per user, so do marketing costs as real-money gaming companies are pressured to spend an order of magnitude more to lure the most lucrative players. Total revenues may rise, but it doesn’t mean profits increase proportionally.（source：techcrunch）

3）WSJ: Apple to start building the next iPhone in Q2; cheap iPhone may land late 2013

Devindra Hardawar

Apple’s next iPhone could land as soon as this summer, judging from a Wall Street Journal report today.

Sources tell the paper that Apple plans to start production of its latest iPhone during this quarter, which means it could be ready for the third quarter in the summer. Much like the iPhone 4S and 3GS, Apple will likely debut a slightly revamped “iPhone 5S” this year, which will share the same basic design of the iPhone 5.

Intriguingly, the WSJ’s report also notes that Apple is still planning to launch a cheaper iPhone later this year. It would be unusual for Apple to announce two new iPhone models in a
single year, but given the increasingly strong competition from cheap Android phones and Samsung’s wide variety of handset choices, Apple certainly has to step up its game.

The WSJ’s report also corroborates iMore’s iPhone 5S prediction from a month ago, which pointed to an August launch for the new phone. That would give Apple a new device to compete with
the upcoming Galaxy S IV and HTC One much sooner than the October launch dates we’ve seen over the past two years, and it also leaves room for Apple to announce a cheaper lineup before the holiday season.

As for more iPhone color options, the WSJ notes that Apple has been developing additional colors, but right now it’s unclear how it’ll release them. Previous rumors suggested that
different colors could be a big selling point for Apple’s cheaper iPhone.（source：venturebeat）

4）Electronic Arts board agrees to $1M salary for executive chairman Larry Probst

Jeffrey Grubb

Electronic Arts is without a chief executive officer since John Riccitiello officially resigned the position on March 30. While the publisher searches for a replacement, executive chairman

Larry Probst is guiding the company — and EA is paying him a handsome fee for those services.

In a U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission filing (originally reported by GameSpot), EA’s board agreed to compensate Probst with an annualized salary of $1.03 million. That is the amount
he would earn if he held the position for an entire year.

The board also left room open to award Probst a one-time bonus for his work once EA finally appoints a new CEO. That search is ongoing with the publisher considering potential successors
from within EA as well as externally.

Industry analyst Colin Sebastian told investors in a letter that he believes current EA chief operating officer Peter Moore and president of EA Labels Frank Gibeau are the leading internal
candidates.

Probst was EA’s CEO from 1991 to 2007. Since 1994, he has served as chairman of the board at the publisher.

He also currently chairs the U.S. Olympic Committee.（source：venturebeat）

5）Former Zynga Austin employee creates mobile studio Team Chaos

Scott Reyburn

Former Zynga Austin vice president and general manager Andrew Busey is partnering up with mobile developer Chaotic Moon Studios to create Team Chaos, a new mobile gaming startup. The first game from the freshly minted studio is Elements: Broken Lands, a free-to-play collectible card game (CCG) for iOS.

“The rise of CCGs on mobile has been incredible,” Busey tells GameIndustry.biz. “One of our objectives in crafting Elements has been evolving the ease of use and raising the quality level of this genre on mobile. Our past experience building these types of games combined with the amazing advancement in mobile technology has allowed us to build a visually stunning game that is both accessible and deeply strategic.

“I had not planned to do another start-up, but conversations with Chaotic Moon and the pace of mobile gaming advancement got me super excited. This is about passion. We are truly making games that we want to play. And we believe our passion and enthusiasm will result in games that other gamers are going to love playing, too.”

Busey is no stranger to the CCG genre. He was the founder and CEO of social gaming developer Challenge Games, which had previously developed fantasy-themed CCG Duels for Facebook and another game of the same type, Warstorm for Facebook. Zynga acquired Austin-based Challenge Games back in January 2010 for an undisclosed sum of money. Busey and the studio’s 35 employees were the genesis of Zynga’s Austin studio. In October 2012, the Austin studio, which was the studio behind The Ville, saw staff cuts upward of more than 100 employees. Months later, Zynga closed its downtown Austin office, but the remaining employees were relocated to Zynga’s Dallas and North Austin offices.

Chaotic Moon Studios is known for developing apps for clients like Fox, Disney and Marvel. For example, the studio helped Marvel develop its most recent mobile release Marvel Unlimited, a comic subscription service.

Elements: Broken Lands, which features an in-game marketplace for players to buy and sell cards, launched yesterday for iOS, but there’s no mention for release on other platforms yet.（source：insidesocialgames）