Blog: Games - Page 4

Microsoft has won its case against the FTC’s motion for a preliminary injunction to halt or terminate the deal. There is still an ongoing antitrust case by the FTC against Microsoft, but now the acquisition can conclude before the antitrust case does.

Similarly to music labels, games publishers 20 years ago had a bona fide hit-making capability. For music, this was the combination of funding, marketing, and an exclusive network to ‘make things happen’ (e.

Wizards of the Coast (Wizards), the creator of the trading card game Magic: The Gathering (MTG ), have recently dropped an MTG card set partnered with The Lord of the Rings . Expanding from players to collectors The current The Lord of the Rings inspired set sees MTG for the first time in history to release a serialised 1/1 card – The One Ring.

Since the beginning of 2023, NetEase has been rapidly announcing new studios, averaging one per month. These have either been established internally, or acquired. - It acquired SkyBox Labs (Canadian games studio) in January - It announced Spliced in February (a global remote-first studio with offices in the UK, but employees in US, Canada, UK, and ‘beyond’) - It took a short break in March but announced two new studios in May - In April, it announced Anchor Point Studios (based in Spain) - In May, it announced Bad Brain Studios (based in Canada) - Most recently announced PinCool Inc (based in Japan) The cadence of these announcements has positioned NetEase as one of the world’s most active companies in terms of 2023 studio expansion.

During Sony’s Showcase event last night, Sony unveiled Project Q – a handheld gaming device. It will come to the market later this year, though Sony did not specify the exact date or price yet. Project Q will enable the user to stream the games that are installed on their PS5 device over wi-fi.

EA are heavily committed to the live service model, with their earnings release for financial year ending March 2023 putting their share of games revenues from full game purchases at just 26%, meaning that 74% came from live services and other revenue sources.

Earlier this week, Amazon announced an initiative called Amazon Anywhere . It enables mobile games to offer consumers the ability to purchase physical products (e.g., toys and merchandise) directly inside the game.

As platforms become inundated with new content, competition for attention is constantly intensifying. Many creators must keep working harder (streaming more) to maintain their current metrics. The requirement to constantly output a stream of high-quality content can limit their ability to reach new audiences and maintain engagement with existing viewers.

UK’s Competition and Markets Authority (CMA) just announced that it “ prevented Microsoft’s proposed purchase of Activision over concerns the deal would alter the future of the fast-growing cloud gaming market, leading to reduced innovation and less choice for UK gamers over the years to come .

Sega is acquiring Rovio, and from my perspective, this deal makes sense for both sides. We are experiencing another step in the games industry’s wider consolidation journey, as cross-platform (i.e., mobile, pc, console, TV, etc.

Even without the disruptive events of the Covid-19 pandemic, Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, and the cost-of-living crisis, navigating the constantly evolving business dynamics in the games industry has never been easy.

Esports are handholes for platforms looking to tap into highly engaged and above average spenders. The Call of Duty League (CDL), Overwatch League (OWL), and ESL Pro League (ESLPL) had 25.16 million, 31.

The International Olympic Committee (IOC) has announced details of the Olympic Esports Series 2023, a global virtual and simulated sports competition created by the IOC. Amateur and professional players from around the world are invited to take part in qualifying rounds, culminating in live, in-person finals at the Olympic Esports Week 2023.

“Things aren’t like they used to be”, a common refrain of anyone over the age of about 25, is a sentiment especially prevalent amongst gamers today. Is this blind nostalgia, or have games really gotten worse? To investigate this, I looked into user rating data from TrueAchievements.

This week it has been reported that the Competition and Markets Authority (CMA) report includes Microsoft sharing that its “ internal analysis shows a decline in base game sales following 12 months of their addition on Game Pass.

For most creators, there is a demand for greater remuneration for their efforts. However, one key consideration is missing from this equation – platforms are also for-profit revenue generators. The growing demand by creators for greater remuneration is something of an uphill battle and as creators have been searching for multiple revenue streams, there has been a migration of content across platforms as a form of security and discoverability.

The HBO Original production of Naughty Dog’s The Last of Us is solidifying the foundations of modern expectations for games video crossovers. With the games market increasingly saturated and seemingly dominated by a handful of games, companies that are acting on the cross-entertainment opportunity have a better chance of nurturing fandom of their IP and weather the current macroeconomic dynamics.

The metaverse transition: Fortnite Unreal Engine has been at the bleeding edge of digital development since its release, being fundamental to the development of household titles such as The Witcher , Fortnite , Disney’s The Mandalorian, and HBO’s Westworld.