GamesBeat weekly roundup: Zynga layoffs, iPad mini announcement, and Resident Evil 6 gets patched

If you follow VentureBeat but don’t regularly check our GamesBeat site, here’s a list of the best video game stories we ran over the last seven days that you may have missed.

This week, Zynga lays off 5 percent of its employees even though the company’s stock price rose, game developers think the iPad mini is promising, and German studio Bigpoint lets 120 people go.

You’ll also find a review for Just Dance 4 and an in-depth interview the developers behind one of the season’s most intriguing indie games, The Unfinished Swan.

News:

• The DeanBeat: The iPad mini brings out the imagination of game developers
• HTML5 developer Softgames looking to expand after first round of funding
• Tim Schafer to host Rock Band charity night
• 80M people play arcade bubble shooter games on Facebook
• Nintendo’s weekly download report features giant presidential robots, Professor Layton, and New Super Mario Bros. 2 DLC
• Assassin’s Creed III is the most preordered Ubisoft game ever
• Dishonored developer announces three add-on packs
• 2K Games enlists Lineage developer to design Civilization Online
• Utherverse nabs a patent on scalable virtual worlds that can host unlimited users
• Wing Commander creator’s Kickstarter reaches goal in less than a week
• Gree acquires developer Pokelabo for $173 million
• THQ releases newest Darksiders II downloadable content on October 30
• Resident Evil 6 to get improved in-game camera in mid-December patch
• Halo 4 to get 3 multiplayer map packs through April
• DICE Summit shakes up its format for game creator talks and renames industry awards
• Game ratings board creates a no-cost service for putting content labels on digital games
• Borderlands Legends is an isometric strategy game due October 31
• Final Fantasy publisher signs deal to use Gears of War developer’s latest graphics technology
• Aiming to head off Apple, Microsoft shows off Xbox SmartGlass mobile app and Xbox dashboard update
• AMD launches new set of 8-core processors for gamers
• Here’s the first Wii U commercial from Nintendo
• Fight Club, Daredevil studio to help produce Assassin’s Creed film
• GameStop to get exclusive The Walking Dead: Collector’s Edition from Telltale Games
• Shigeru Miyamoto is Nintendo’s other original intellectual property

Earnings:

• Analysts pore through Zynga’s numbers as the stock price rises
• Zynga stock surges as it slightly beats analysts’ reduced targets for third quarter
• Facebook’s Zuckerberg unhappy with Zynga’s 20% decline in payments

Mobile News:

• Founders leave DeNA’s Ngmoco mobile gaming division
• Majesco expands into mobile games with Legends of Loot
• Mobile is now 20 percent of Zynga’s business

Layoffs:

• German games maker Bigpoint lets go 120 employees
• Zynga CEO’s letter to employees: We’ve laid off 5 percent of our workforce
• Zynga lays off almost entire Austin studio

Interviews:

• The story behind the emotional center of The Unfinished Swan (in-depth interview)
• The explanation behind the ending of the Unfinished Swan (interview part 2)
• Playboy’s Miss October talks about gamer stereotypes and breaking into the game business
• Here’s how you become an app store millionaire (interview)

Tablet wars:

• Game developers say iPad mini will be good for gaming
• This week could determine the fate of the digital economy

Reviews:

• Just Dance 4 revels in absurdity even as it loses some of its mojo (review)

Pieces of flair:

• Exclusive images from The Art of Assassin’s Creed III
• GamesBeat’s massive Street Fighter tournament: The semifinals