Sherbytes: Industry News Megathread, v.1

[rikwebb]

The Division 3 announced

https://x.com/jasonschreier/status/1704890057121788037?s=20

 

[Valhoven]

Unity issues official apology for widely criticised monetisation plan change-up:

​

From the VGC report here:

“I want to start with this: I am sorry,” Whitten wrote. “We should have spoken with more of you and we should have incorporated more of your feedback before announcing our new Runtime Fee policy. Our goal with this policy is to ensure we can continue to support you today and tomorrow, and keep deeply investing in our game engine.

“You are what makes Unity great, and we know we need to listen, and work hard to earn your trust. We have heard your concerns, and we are making changes in the policy we announced to address them.”

Last week Unity closed two offices and cancelled a planned town hall meeting following what was reportedly a “credible death threat”.​

 

[Sycho Sid]

Unity issues official apology for widely criticised monetisation plan change-up:

​

From the VGC report here:

“I want to start with this: I am sorry,” Whitten wrote. “We should have spoken with more of you and we should have incorporated more of your feedback before announcing our new Runtime Fee policy. Our goal with this policy is to ensure we can continue to support you today and tomorrow, and keep deeply investing in our game engine.

“You are what makes Unity great, and we know we need to listen, and work hard to earn your trust. We have heard your concerns, and we are making changes in the policy we announced to address them.”

Last week Unity closed two offices and cancelled a planned town hall meeting following what was reportedly a “credible death threat”.​

Damage is already done. I would expect devs to slowly start trickling away as they train on other engines. It won't be overnight, but the trust is gone.

 

[GearSolidMetal]

Didn't know where else to post this, so I'm posting it here.

 

[rikwebb]

Sega have cancelled Hyenas and some other unannounced titles they were working on.

https://www.segasammy.co.jp/en/release/41070/

Cancelation of titles under development

In response to the lower profitability of the European region, we have reviewed the title portfolio of each development base in Europe and the resulting action will be to cancel “HYENAS” and some unannounced titles under development. Accordingly, we will implement a write-down of work-in-progress for titles under development.

 

[method115]

Sega have cancelled Hyenas and some other unannounced titles they were working on.

https://www.segasammy.co.jp/en/release/41070/

Anyone know how Sega is doing in general? I've been wondering how much money MS is throwing at them because they are getting a bunch of day 1 GP games. Which I'm sure MS is paying for because none of those games would go to Xbox without MS paying

 

[Sycho Sid]

 

[Valhoven]

 

[method115]

Good. They should have stopped wasting their money trying to sign exclusivity deals for their PC store. I will say funding games like Alan Wake 2 was a nice surprise and I wish they would have done more of that.

 

[Valhoven]

Rumors are Far Cry 7 has been in the works at Ubi. The plot is nonlinear, requiring you to recover kidnapped family members in any order.

Nothing confirmed.

Really disliked and quit 6 but loved 5. New Dawn was OK but had jarring fluorescent color palettes. They need shake things up either way and across flagship subsidiaries bring their AA cinematics/face capture into the modern era. Sounds like they jumped right into FC7 after 6 so I expect zero reinvestment into their dated tech and formula.

 

[rikwebb]

Looks like Ubisoft are having layoffs too

 

[Valhoven]

Devil May Cry animated series launching soon on Netflix:

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[Valhoven]

Piece of gaming history. We salute you:

Gulf War veterans have lost another comrade today, especially veterans who were gamers. The Nintendo Store in New York City has retired the iconic Game Boy that survived an explosion during the war.

Tanooki Joe, the Twitter user behind the account @VideoGameArt&Tidbits, which delivers high-resolution video game and retro gaming memorabilia, took to the social media platform and said the externally damaged Game Boy was officially retired from Nintendo NY after its exhibit was absent for some time. They said that during a recent visit to the store, an employee confirmed it was because it had been returned to Nintendo of America's headquarters in Washington State.

"The Gulf War Game Boy has officially been retired from @NintendoNYC," they said. "After not seeing it on display for a while, I asked one of the workers about it. He told me it was returned to Nintendo’s headquarters in Redmond, Washington."​

 

[Valhoven]

Tough times for Team17, pub behind popular indie properties Blasphemous, Thymesia, Hell Let Loose, and more. CEO Michael Pattison is also being let go. All firings will be complete by November, it's reported:

Team17 is reportedly planning “significant” job losses as part of a company restructure.

According to a report by Eurogamer, the Worms, Overcooked and Moving Out publisher held an emergency town hall meeting today to inform staff of its plans.

The publisher told staff that its planned company restructure would include outsourcing its QA work to an external company. This would therefore affect most of the existing Team17 internal QA department, with around 50 roles at risk.
​

Full read from VGC team here. (External)

 

[method115]

View attachment 1004646

Tough times for Team17, pub behind popular indie properties Blasphemous, Thymesia, Hell Let Loose, and more. CEO Michael Pattison is also being let go. All firings will be complete by November, it's reported:

Team17 is reportedly planning “significant” job losses as part of a company restructure.

According to a report by Eurogamer, the Worms, Overcooked and Moving Out publisher held an emergency town hall meeting today to inform staff of its plans.

The publisher told staff that its planned company restructure would include outsourcing its QA work to an external company. This would therefore affect most of the existing Team17 internal QA department, with around 50 roles at risk.
​

Full read from VGC team here. (External)

It's crazy what's happening in gaming right now. This is probably the best year in gaming that I can think of for the past decade meanwhile they are letting people go in pretty much all major companies.

 

[Valhoven]

It's crazy what's happening in gaming right now. This is probably the best year in gaming that I can think of for the past decade meanwhile they are letting people go in pretty much all major companies.

It’s been happening on the heels of successful launches too, which has been weird, IMO. QA being outsourced seems a popular strategy under ‘r€$tructuring’.

 

[avenue94]

It's crazy what's happening in gaming right now. This is probably the best year in gaming that I can think of for the past decade meanwhile they are letting people go in pretty much all major companies.

It’s been happening on the heels of successful launches too, which has been weird, IMO. QA being outsourced seems a popular strategy under ‘r€$tructuring’.

It wouldn't surprise me if some of these cuts were companies trying to pretty up their books and land a major investor or be acquired.

 

[Valhoven]

It wouldn't surprise me if some of these cuts were companies trying to pretty up their books and land a major investor or be acquired.

Ah, interesting. Remnant 2 and Blasphemous II launched to acclaim + sales for example and both pubs were like, expect layoffs amid restructuring.

 

[avenue94]

Ah, interesting. Remnant 2 and Blasphemous II launched to acclaim + sales for example and both pubs were like, expect layoffs amid restructuring.

I'll admit I'm not too familiar with their portfolio. Maybe their next project wasn't exciting investors as much or something? Then again, companies have never really needed an excuse for layoffs since investors love them even though they don't usually help a company long term.

 

[Valhoven]

Two-year cycle for Call of Duty franchise not only walked back in launch of Modern Warfare III but back on track for yearly instalments, says Activision president:

With an annual release every year for the past two decades, Call of Duty has visited a number of different time periods, with varying degrees of success.

While it initially focused on World War 2, Call of Duty really took off with the launch of the Modern Warfare sub-series. The popular Black Ops games have centred on the Cold War era as well as near future settings, while Infinite Warfare was set in the far future.

Kostich said Activision has learned from every game in the series, with titles taking place in contemporary or near future settings generally hitting the “sweet spot”.

“We’re constantly in our planning phase, our long-term planning phase,” he said. “Right now, we have games planned out all the way through ’27 for the things that we’re working on.”​