Destiny developer Bungie has today announced significant cuts at the studio that have seen 220 people, or 17% of the studio’s workforce, let go.
The cuts affect every level of the company, including most of the Sony-owned studio’s executive and senior leader roles, Bungie boss Pete Parsons said in a post on Bungie.net. "Today is a difficult and painful day," Parsons added.
Departing staff will be offered "a generous exit package" that includes severance, bonus, and health coverage, Bungie promised.
Parsons blamed the cuts on the rising costs of development, "industry shifts," and "enduring economic conditions." Because of this, Parsons insistsed, Bungie has had to make "substantial changes" to its cost structure and focus...
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Braid developer Jonathan Blow has said the recently released anniversary edition of the indie puzzle platformer has sold “horribly,” and indicated he is now struggling to employ staff full-time.
Blow, who also created The Witness, catapulted into the upper echelons of indie video game development after Braid enjoyed enormous success on Xbox Live Arcade in 2008. It’s since become known as one of the greatest indie games of all time, with a number of perfect review scores under its belt.
16 years later, in May 2024, Blow released a remaster with fully repainted artwork, new puzzles, and in-depth commentary, across PC via Steam, Nintendo Switch, PlayStation 4 and 5, Xbox One and Xbox Series X/S, Android, and iOS, with the mobile version...
Our obsession with the concept of the “dead game” and player counts is unhealthy for the video game industry and gamers, one of the developers behind Palworld has said.
Palworld, dubbed “Pokémon with guns,” launched in early access form to record-breaking success. It is the second most-played game ever on Steam, with an incredible concurrent player count of 2,101,867 on Valve’s platform. Only battle royale PUBG is ahead of Palworld in Steam’s all-time peak concurrents chart.
Palworld’s Steam concurrents have fallen since that explosive launch earlier this year, and now usually hit a peak in the tens of thousands rather than millions. The decline has caused some to call Palworld a “dead game,” but it is far from the only game to be...
Star Wars Outlaws has an Explorer Mode that lets players turn off all "guiding color on core navigational elements" in the world.
PC Gamer reports that Explorer Mode strips Ubisoft’s open-world Star Wars game of the “yellow paint” that has become a hot topic once again in recent months.
While the rights and wrongs of colored guides that point players in the right direction have been debated for years, Square Enix’s Final Fantasy 7 Rebirth reignited the debate earlier this year with its color-coded paint that signals the parts of the environment that can be used for platforming. That followed a similar debate sparked by the Resident Evil 4 remake in 2023.
The debate in summary: some people don’t like how in-your-face this...
Steam hit Once Human is set to go offline today, July 31, in order to release a significant update that makes a number of key changes to the game.
Once Human is a free-to-play multiplayer open-world survival game from Starry Studio, a developer owned by Chinese games company NetEase. It launched on PC on July 9 and quickly found an audience, with a huge peak concurrent player count of 231,668 on Steam, where it remains one of the most-played games.
IGN’s Once Human review returned an 8/10. We said: “Once Human combines simple but solid building and upgrading with some of the best, and weirdest, creature designs of the year to create a very enjoyable survival-crafting experience.”
While you're out collecting rare Deviations or...
Nexon has released the 1.0.5 update for looter shooter The First Descendant alongside the extensive patch notes.
The 1.0.5 update, out now across PC via Steam, Xbox Series X and S, Xbox One, PlayStation 4, and PlayStation 5, makes a long list of changes to the game.
The highlights include the addition of two new playable characters (Luna and Ultimate Valby), a new hard Void Intercept battle (Gluttony), a new Ultimate weapon (Peace Maker), and a new module (Arche Concretion).
There are various changes to the way the game works, too. For example, Nexon has blocked equipping and removing modules, changing presets, and changing loadouts to prevent module swapping from becoming a strategy in Intercept Battles and Infiltration...
A long time ago, in a galaxy far, far away, there was 1313, a Star War I desperately wanted to play. Tonally, it was pitched to be darker than the inside of a tauntaun tent, and grittier than a Sand Person’s underpants. Better yet, it took an original Dark Forces approach—nary a laser sword nor space wizard in sight.
Sadly, that sci-fi spaghetti Western couldn’t exit the hangar before LucasArts took a proton torpedo to the exhaust port. Our dreams of inelegant weaponry, disintegrations for all, and skullduggery on Coruscant went the way of Padme. Just a pointless, unfair demise.
I’m therefore over the small moon/space station to say I have a new hope for a spiritual successor in Star Wars Outlaws. Ubisoft Massive, a dev that’s been...
Video game actors are currently on strike, in hopes that withholding their work from video game companies will push those companies to agree to better actor protections around the use of AI. However, at least one video game CEO — Andrew Wilson of Electronic Arts — doesn't think the strike is going to impact his company, at least in the short-term.
In today's EA earnings call, Wilson answered a question from an investor about the impact of the strike on the business. Put simply, he's not worried for now. Here's the full quote:
Wilson's confidence likely comes from the fact that EA's portfolio is almost entirely live service games right now, and games whose development began prior to September 2023 (so, basically every live service...
Mafia: Definitive Edition is headed to Xbox Game Pass on August 13, Microsoft announced today.
In a post on X/Twitter, Microsoft confirmed that the 2020 remaster will be available on the console version of Game Pass, in addition to PC Game Pass and Xbox Cloud Gaming. The news was first reported a few days ago by YouTuber eXtas1s, who previously reported that Crash Bandicoot N. Sane Trilogy, Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 3, and Valorant were arriving on Microisoft's gaming subscription service.
Mafia: Definitive Edition was originally released in 2020 for PC, PS4, and Xbox One. Developed by Hangar 13, it is a remake of the 2002 game Mafia. The premise focuses on Tommy Angelo, a former cab driver turned gangster for a crime family in...
A few days ago, a frankly bizarre internet mystery took root: Garry’s Mod creator Garry Newman revealed that the “Skibidi Toilet guys” had hit him with a DMCA in a wild bit of litigious irony. But since then, an account purporting to be Skibidi Toilet creator Alexey Gerasimov (DaFuq!?Boom) has said he wasn’t behind the claim, and Newman has told IGN that the manner has been “resolved,” so… all’s well that ends well?
It all began on Sunday, when Newman posted in the S&Box Discord server, “you know what's worse than the nintendo dmca?” He then shared the news about the Skibidi Toilet DMCA, including pasting a screenshot of the letter that he was sent. Interestingly, the copyright holder that the letter is attributed to is Invisible...
Some studios will spend years of development time and hundreds of millions of dollars chasing emotional, Hollywood-quality stories and realistic graphics, but the Earth Defense Force series proudly prefers to remain the most pure video game nonsense ever conceived. Don’t be fooled by the PS3-era graphics, atrocious voice acting, absurd story, and uneven technical performance of Earth Defense Force 6 – developer Sandlot knows exactly what it’s doing with this over-the-top satire that makes Helldivers 2 look highbrow by comparison. Like its predecessors, EDF6 leans into its rough edges and silly cooperative mayhem, prioritizing mindless fun above all else, and the result is yet another wonderfully amusing entry in the ongoing saga. But...
There’s a lot riding on Dragon Age: The Veilguard for BioWare, and it sounds like the upcoming fantasy RPG has a colossal script to match the pressure.
In a recent interview with GamesRadar, creative director John Epler and creative performance director Ashley Barlow explained why it’s taken so long to get the fourth Dragon Age game, as it’s been ten years since Dragon Age: Inquisition. Barlow revealed that casting on The Veilguard started five years ago, and there’s been a lot of work done since then.
“It takes a long time to record 700 characters, you know - 80,000 lines or 140,000 lines with all the Rooks,” Barlow said. “It just takes time to make good."
It's worth highlighting the caveat that Barlow makes within that figure...
It seems impossible that Star Wars Outlaws is the first-ever open-world Star Wars game, but indeed it’s true. With that first comes plenty of expectation, but also lots of excitement – particularly when the studio handling the effort is Massive Entertainment, the talented developers of The Division. Speaking personally, I confess that I don’t often get hyped up for too many open-world games these days outside of those made by Rockstar – as those can be counted on to raise the bar every single time – but I have been plenty hyped for Outlaws. After all, it’s set after Empire Strikes Back, you play as a Han Solo-caliber scoundrel instead of yet another Jedi, and you’ve got an awesome alien creature pet named Nix by your side at all times...
If you're a Mortal Kombat fan who's been hoping to pick up some new collectibles, today's your lucky day! There are some brand new Mortal Kombat 1 Funko Pop figures available to preorder - Scorpion, Sub-Zero, and Liu Kang. They cost $13 a piece and are set to release on November 22, so you can have them in your hands just before the holidays. Preorder your favorite, or favorites, at the links below.
Mortal Kombat 1 Funko Pops Are Up For Preorder
These new Funko Pop figures follow quite a few exciting Mortal Kombat 1 announcements that came straight out of San Diego Comic-Con this year. This included reveals from the upcoming Khaos Reigns DLC - which is gearing up to launch on September 24 across PlayStation 5, Xbox Series X|S...
The developers of Deadrop, the first-person shooter Dr Disrespect helped to promote, have insisted it remains on-track for release later in 2024 despite the streamer’s high-profile exit from the studio.
Guy Beahm, better known as Dr Disrespect, was banned from Twitch in 2020 without explanation. In June 2024, following a number of reports, Beahm admitted he exchanged messages in 2017 with a minor via Twitch's now-defunct Whispers feature that "sometimes leaned too much in the direction of being inappropriate." Subsequent reports alleged the minor had informed Beahm they were underage, and Beahm continued to send "sexually graphic" messages to them regardless.
Twitch and Beahm have so far failed to respond to IGN's requests for...
After Sony itself accidentally revealed the premium warbond Freedom’s Flame for Helldivers 2, it has now made it official alongside an August 8 release date.
The theme for Freedom’s Flame is, predictably, burn damage and survivability, with new weapons, armor, emotes, capes, and skins all set to hit the game next week, Mitch Ayre, Junior Community Manager at developer Arrowhead Games Studios, said in a post on the PlayStation Blog.
As with previous Premium Warbonds, expect Freedom’s Flame to cost 1,000 Super Credits. While you can earn Super Credits from gameplay and the warbond itself, you can also buy them for real-world money. Via the in-game shop, 1,000 Super Credits costs $9.99. Premium warbonds do not expire, so you can work...
Elden Ring developer FromSoftware has released update 1.13 for the game following a period of server maintenance across all platforms.
This second post-Shadow of the Erdtree patch, live now on PlayStation 4, PlayStation 5, PC, Xbox One, and Xbox Series X and S, follows early July’s 1.12.3 update, which tweaked the Golden Hippopotamus fight, among other things.
Publisher Bandia Namco released the 1.13 patch notes, and there are a few changes worth highlighting. For example, fans are getting excited about this quality-of-life change:
"Changed the default selection of the OK / CANCEL prompt that shows up when using the 'Spectral Steed Whistle' while the spectral steed is dead. The default selection position is now OK."
However...
Pop into the Call of Duty subreddit on any given day, and you're almost certainly going to trip over a few people complaining about SBMM, or skill-based matchmaking, and how it's ruining Call of Duty. But according to a recent study by developer Activision, getting rid of SBMM would be far, far worse for the game as a whole, and it's got the data to prove it.
In a 25-page white paper published last week, Activision reveals that it actually conducted an experiment in 2023's Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 3 where it reduced SBMM for some of its players, resulting in more players quitting games or not coming back to the game for more sessions.
Matches Made in...Heaven?
Currently, Activision says the way matchmaking works in Call of Duty...
Forgotten Gems is a regular column about notable games that have moved out of the public eye and may not be easily accessible anymore. To see all the other games I've covered so far, be sure to check out the 13 previous issues of Forgotten Gems in our Columns section.
First-person shooters. Roleplaying games. Action adventures. Even though they’ve evolved significantly alongside the gaming hardware they run on, some of today’s most-popular genres are multiple decades old and are likely here to stay for good. It’s hard to imagine people not playing a Call of Duty game in 2030, just as it’s unlikely that fighting games like Street Fighter and Tekken will just be over and done with in the foreseeable future.
But some some genres have...
Welcome back, my friends, to an icy-winded winter week of red hot deals. Keep warm with some video game bargains, like wheely cheap Xbox accessories, cut-price keyboards, and, of course, something to play. That could be a preorder for a Kojima all-timer reimagined, or a LEGO jaunt that's fun for the whole family. Lots to choose from; all of it actually worth buying.
In retro news, I'm remembering the 15th birthday of Fat Princess, a PS3 multi-fest I spent many a hard day's knight dying in. Built for 32-player mayhem, the core gameplay revolves around kidnapping the titular monarchs in a never-ending war between the red and blue kingdoms. How was that battle waged? Hat's where it got interesting, because the capabilities of every...
I’ve done my time in major MMOs like Final Fantasy 14 and World of Warcraft, but outside of that I’ve only dabbled in the various other forms this subgenre can take. So when I say that Throne and Liberty isn’t quite rising to my past experiences with massively multiplayer dungeon-diving, loot-grinding, and boss-slaying, it’s an opinion coming largely from a “normie.” That said, both FF14 and WoW have big expansions launching the same year as this, NCSOFTs Guild Wars 2 follow up, and though its world is beautiful and its combat grows into a compelling and active ballet of skill interactions, the largely boring story and repetitive quest design I experienced in my 10 or so hours with the Open Beta makes me worried for Throne and Liberty’s...
Tony Pankhurst, the UK actor who became a recognizable face in Supermassive's horror series The Dark Pictures Anthology, has passed away aged 67.
Supermassive's X/Twitter account revealed that Pankhurst had passed away. In a tribute page published by his family (spotted by GameSpot), it was revealed that Pankhurst had passed away on May 9, with Supermassive Games learning of the news today and providing a recent donation to the family. As the tribute page reveals, any donations would be provided to "Hospice in the World," as the organization "provided such love and support to [Pankhurst] in his final weeks."
"We are all saddened to hear of Tony Pankhurst's passing. He was the face of The Curator, and we loved working with him,"...
Warner Bros. Games has revealed a first look at gameplay of the upcoming Harry Potter: Quidditch Champions.
The ‘Welcome Students’ pre-order trailer, below, reveals the gameplay fans can expect from Unbroken Studios' game, which is based on the magical sport of Quidditch made famous by the Harry Potter series.
The video highlights the game’s single-player Career Mode and Online Competitive Mode, and offers a glimpse at the character creator. We see many familiar characters, including Harry Potter himself, Ron Weasley, and Draco Malfoy.
There’s also a look at the Quidditch World Cup Stadium, as well as some of the arenas set in familiar wizarding world locations. Here’s the official blurb:
Warner Bros. Games has an interesting...
Bethesda has trademarked ‘Starborn,’ a clear reference to its recently released Starfield.
The trademark, spotted by X/Twitter user @bogorad222, was submitted by Bethesda owner ZeniMax Media Inc., which itself is owned by Microsoft. The trademark has already sparked speculation about whether it relates to an expansion-sized DLC that might follow the upcoming Shattered Space, or a smaller-scale DLC, perhaps focused on the player character.
Warning! Spoilers for Starfield follow.
The word Starborn in the context of Starfield relates to the beings revealed after the player character collects enough artifacts for Constellation. During the course of the Starfield story, the beings are confirmed to be humans who have passed through a...
A new Suicide Squad: Kill The Justice League cutscene has sparked a debate about the direction the story is going in, as the latest season teases the next playable character.
Mrs. Freeze was added to Rocksteady’s controversial live service shooter last week as part of the launch of Season 2, and with it came a cutscene that’s set tongues wagging within the game’s small but loyal community.
Warning! Suicide Squad Kill The Justice League Season 2 spoilers follow:
The new cutscene shows the return of The Flash after the Suicide Squad save him from captivity by killing yet another post-launch Brainiac as part of Season 2. The Suicide Squad had killed The Flash alongside other corrupted members of the Justice League in a bid to save...
The main Assassin’s Creed subreddit has warned users against debating the historical accuracy of the upcoming video game Assassin’s Creed Shadows, specifically protagonist Yasuke's status as a samurai.
Moderators of r/assassinscreed, which has over 700,000 members, locked down a post titled “There is no ‘debate’ - Yasuke was a Samurai. If you disagree, you can do that somewhere else,” due to “brigading” in the comments.
The post followed a controversial statement issued by Ubisoft to Japanese fans in which the company apologized for promotion materials it said “have caused concern” among the community.
The four-page message, posted in both English and Japanese, explained that Assassin’s Creed Shadows is not intended to be a factual...
Welcome to the last gasp of July 2024, and your first inhale of a week full of pine-fresh bargains. If I didn't already own several, the top of my To Buy list would be that 83 buck 1TB MicroSD. It's a pretty perfect storage solution for both Switch and Steam Deck users. Oh, and you can also zip down to the Top 10 games of last week and get decent coins off a thing that everybody seems to want right now.
In retro news, I'm marking the 20th birthday of Sid Meier's Pirates!, an arrr-rated remake of an '87 classic I smashed repeatedly on PC. Think: a 2.5D, top-down Sea of Thieves, and you're not far off the mizzenmast—fencing, naval battles, sniffing out treasure, and harnessing winds/avoiding reefs are your bread and butter gameplay. The...
After a long week, the weekend is finally here, and we're rounding up some of the best deals you can find. This weekend, you can expect to save on new video games, accessories, and monitors. The best deals for Saturday, July 27, include the Kingdom Hearts All-in-One package, Final Fantasy XVI, the Sony 27" INZONE M9 Monitor, and more.
Kingdom Hearts All-in-One Package for $39.13
If you're itching to start a new series, Kingdom Hearts is one of the best out there to jump into. From Tetsuya Nomura, Kingdom Hearts mashes together the worlds of Disney and Square Enix to tell the tale of light and darkness. This All-in-One package contains a total of ten games, with everything up to Kingdom Hearts III included. Now is the perfect time to...
Editor's Note: Alongside the release of The Sims 4’s Lovestruck Expansion Pack, we are taking a fresh look at the base game in 2024, replacing our original review from 2014. You can read more about our review policies and philosophy here.
In 2014, while wearing a cardboard plumbob headband I’d hastily made the night before, I lined up at a local game store to pick up my pre-ordered copy of The Sims 4. With a create-a-sim wardrobe full of Pinterest-friendly fashion items and a host of then-modern appliances, The Sims 4 felt like a cutting-edge sequel at launch, one that reflected those simpler times. But what’s even more impressive is that now, almost a decade of updates later, it’s still the benchmark life simulator, offering a...
NetherRealm has revealed animalities for Mortal Kombat 1 in what marks a return of the fatality variant after a 29-year absence.
Animalities, which made their debut in 1995’s Mortal Kombat 3, let the victorious character turn into an animal before tearing their victim apart in typically gory fashion.
During a panel at San Diego Comic-Con 2024 attended by IGN, NetherRealm showed off Mortal Kombat 1’s animalities with teaser footage. Rain, for example, turns into a puffer fish who explodes from the inside of his opponent.
A new trailer, below, showed off more animalities, including hyena, hippo, gorilla, t-rex skeleton, and wolf finishers. Of course, Scorpion turns into a scorpion. Mileena turns into a preying mantis.
The...