News of the Year – 28 December 2020

2020 has certainly been a year. Many people considered it to be the worst year ever and there may be some truth in that for some people, but what was it like in the gaming world? Well, there was the coronavirus pandemic that hit absolutely everyone and so for a few months, the earlier months, there was hardly any news at all as things got cancelled or postponed, but that dried up soon enough.

The pandemic did lead to some big changes in the way companies did things though, such as developing a more online method of information delivery rather than focusing on things like E3, which is set to come back next year but in a different, more consumer-oriented rather than media-oriented fashion, and the pandemic also led to some companies realising that they could just allow people to work from home rather than having them always come into the office. So, there may be a few changes in the months and years to come because of that.

This was also the year of a new console launch, but it’s still early days and so there isn’t much on said consoles just yet and so there isn’t much of a need to upgrade unless you want to be an early adopter, but early adopters have to deal with all the problems of new hardware and software. So waiting a bit is a great strategy for those who don’t want to just leap into things.

A lot of bad stuff happened in the rest of the world, but game companies mainly kept their heads down and allowed people to just play games to escape the realities of the pandemic. It was clearly a great year to just sell games because people were playing them like never before. Now, while some companies kept their heads down, there were a few that certainly didn’t, and we’ll get to them soon enough.

But first things first, we have a few rapid-fire news stories this year that we should go through:

• Horizon: Zero Dawn made its way to the PC market, and thus marked the beginning of Sony releasing some of its games to the PC (20 January 2020 & 16 March 2020).
• Half-Life: Alyx came out and made VR something worth getting (3 February 2020).
• Warcraft 3 Reforged came out and angered a whole lot of fans because it was not what was promised (10 February 2020).
• News of S.T.A.L.K.E.R. 2 has appeared with the original studio behind it (30 March 2020).
• The ESRB finally acknowledged loot boxes and made them part of its classification system (20 April 2020).
• Frog Fractions 3 came out and it was inside a hat (10 August 2020).
• Microsoft bought Bethesda and that will probably cause some exclusivity in the future (28 September 2020).
• Twitch got rid of the “blind playthrough” tag on its service to make things a bit less ableist (14 December 2020).

And now that the rapid-fire stories are out of the way, what about the bigger stories that happened this year:

 

Black Lives Matter:

The devastating murder of George Floyd, and many others, in the United States led to mass protests around the world for racial equality. This may not have had anything to do with video games, technically, but the event saw the widespread adoption of ”Black Lives Matter” as a slogan on practically every game news media outlet (8 June 2020) and various devs came out in support of it too, and there were even efforts by groups like Itch.io with its Bundle for Racial Justice that saw hundreds of devs giving away their games for the cause (22 June 2020). This news story hit both gamers and the wider world and it continues to this day.

 

Sexism, assault and harassment continued in the industry:

While racial disparity was still an issue in 2020, so was sexual disparity. This year saw a sweeping round of #MeToo accusations against devs like Chris Avellone and Ashraf Ismael, as well as against various Twitch streamers (29 June 2020), but it was especially the year of Ubisoft. Ubisoft has never really faced much public ire about sexism, but that all changed in 2020 as various devs came forward about numerous executives and Ubisoft big shots (27 July 2020 & 10 August 2020).

And while many Ubisoft executives got the boot and ended up leaving the company, Ubisoft did whatever it could to distance itself from the whole debacle, such as filming an apology video but not including it with the rest of its Ubisoft Forward event. It essentially felt like sweeping things under the rug rather than addressing it directly, and it’s something Ubisoft still hasn’t adequately apologised for.

 

Unionisation ramped up:

Workers rights have never been that great a priority in the games industry, but this was the year for increased unionisation and employee dissatisfaction in the industry. The dissatisfaction came as a result of stories about how companies like Activision-Blizzard made loads of cash and hardly paid its employees (10 August 2020) or how Paradox Interactive underpaid its QA testers and then laid them off (14 September 2020). This led to things like Activision-Blizzard employees striking (19 October 2020) and the unionisation of companies like Paradox Interactive (8 June 2020), Kickstarter (24 February 2020) and workers at Cards Against Humanity (6 July 2020).

Full widespread unionisation is still a long way off, but developments like these are good signs of worker rights taking a stronger stance. Various companies’ employees have started work on increased calls for collective action, strikes and unionisation, and this will likely continue into 2021 as it very much should. However, crunch continued to be a problem in the industry.

 

Crunch continued in the industry:

Many in the industry have been quick to criticise the reliance on crunch, but that has not stopped it from happening, and this year was an especially painful one with regards to crunch because we collectively learned something: delays just extend crunch. When Doom Eternal was delayed, it was believed that this would have stopped the “need” for crunch, but it instead just increased the duration of that crunch (27 January 2020).

And that doesn’t even take into account one of the biggest launches of the year, The Last of Us Part II, which was noted for it’s incredible use of crunch to a devastating mental and physical degree on the workers at Naughty Dog (23 March 2020). However, some strides were made towards improving things, such as Rockstar’s attempts to reduce its crunch culture (20 April 2020), and that’s nice. But this article can’t go on without one of the worst cases of crunch (and many other things): Cyberpunk 2077.

 

Cyberpunk 2077 came out:

One of the most anticipated games of a generation finally came out. And the response was… underwhelming to say the least. It was loved by many, but it also had a rather heated response from fans (14 December 2020), including some of those fans attempting to cause a reviewer to have epileptic fits by sending her flashing light videos, and all because she dared state that the game can cause epileptic fits. So it’s a great group of people out there.

Then of course there were all the other screw ups, the game being buggy, getting pulled off PSN (21 December 2020), all the fun stuff. But the biggest problem with the game wasn’t the technical stuff but rather the fact that the devs at the company were forced into excessive crunch by a management that believed itself to be above reproach. The game got delayed till September (20 January 2020), and then till November (22 June 2020) and finally till December (2 November 2020), but despite all those delays and a promise that there would be no crunch, there was (5 October 2020).

And isn’t that just the perfect way to cap off 2020, a year many believed to be the worst year ever. A game everyone was excited about, harming its devs, having a toxic fanbase and then underdelivering on everything. Truly a wonderful year.

The wonderful year that was 2020 is finally at an end, and it was a rather uneventful year in gaming, for the most part. There were some good games, but the coronavirus kind of stole the thunder and made most people forget about pretty much everything else. This year will likely be remembered alongside 2016 as one of the worst years ever, and it probably deserves that title.

News of the Week – 23 March 2020

Netflix pauses filming of The Witcher:

In more COVID-19 news, Netflix has decided to pause production on the anticipated season two of The Witcher. This announcement comes amidst a long list of other things that have been cancelled or postponed (as you’ll see next), and this means that we may need to wait a bit longer to get our eyes on some more Witcher action. Sadly.

The production was being shot in the UK, but because of the virus concerns, things are going into quarantine and no one is gonna get to work on it. You can’t exactly shoot television remotely after all. So this is just going to have to be some of the non-human casualties of the virus. The economy isn’t loving it, and it’s doubtful that companies like Netflix, that are now forced to make expensive pauses and postponements, are enjoying this at all.

Sources:

• Eurogamer – Netflix pauses production of The Witcher season two over coronavirus outbreak
• IGN – The Witcher season 2 production paused in response to coronavirus
• VG247 – Netflix halts production of The Witcher amid coronavirus outbreak

More things are getting cancelled:

So while The Witcher is getting postponed, a bunch of other things are becoming affected by the far-reaching consequences of COVID-19. The Matrix 4 has been indefinitely postponed, EA’s esports and League of Legends uh… leagues are being cancelled, Rockstar devs are being told to work from home (along with many other developers, and the list is constantly growing), Reboot Develop Blue in Croatia has been cancelled (and that’s now come after even more events, such as E3 and GDC, were cancelled), but throughout all that GAME, the gaming retail franchise in the UK, is staying open and employees are worried.

Thanks to all this though, people are just staying home. This has even led to the Steam concurrent player count being beaten once again, because on the weekend nearly 20 million people were all playing simultaneously on the platform. When you can’t go out it’s time to play a few games, after all. I mean, what else do you have to do? Well unless of course you still have to go out and work like most people…

This will likely continue, and it’s good to see things cancelled, because people can stand to wait little longer if we can manage to beat this virus back enough where we can flatten the curve a bit. Until then people are just gonna have to make sacrifices, and for all those people who get to work from home, it could always be a lot worse. Anyway! Now for some non-coronews.

Sources:

• Eurogamer – GAME staff face a worrying week as store stay open amid coronavirus outbreak
• Gamasutra – Reboot Develop Blue is the latest game event rescheduled due to coronavirus
• IGN – The Matrix 4 production reportedly shuts down due to coronavirus
• Polygon – League of Legends, EA suspend all esports due to coronavirus
• Rock, Paper, Shotgun – Golly, everyone’s on Steam right now for some reason
• VG247 – Rockstar devs begin working from home to self-isolate from coronavirus

Crunch at Naughty Dog:

Oh and woe another tale of crunch from the desk of the writers at Kotaku. This time it’s all about that Naughty Dog. The acclaimed developer behind classics such as Crash Bandicoot and Jak and Daxter (and I suppose also Uncharted and The Last of Us) is known for its perfectionism. Known for stunning visuals, polished design and set pieces, this dev has consistently pushed the bar in terms of the capabilities of gaming. Here’s the thing: that kinda came at a human cost.

The developers at the company are unhappy about a pervasive and unending culture of crunch at the studio. The studio is even upfront with potential new hires that the job requires hardcore crunch. You don’t get to work there unless you’re willing to sacrifice your personal life to produce the best work you can possibly produce. For this reason, the studio has managed to pump out one acclaimed success after another. However, it has come at the cost of constant departures from the company. People leave because they can’t handle it anymore.

This studio, much like CD Projekt Red, is a beloved company and so people have come out in support of crunch for this one. I mean, how else could you create something so good after all? I mean… it’s not like other devs have been creating quality without crunch, but whatevs! Possibly thanks to this love, the news doesn’t appear to have reached all that far. Other crunch stories often get way more press from my usual sources, and when the usual sources are quiet about something it’s often because they don’t want to face it. You don’t want to have to cast Naughty Dog as a bad guy, now do you? After all, it’s much easier to be angry at Epic Games for its culture of crunch than it is to be angry at Naughty Dog.

Sources:

• Eurogamer – Crunch once again in the spotlight after damning report on The Last of Us 2 developer Naughty Dog
• Gamasutra – Crunching devs share the human cost of development at Naughty Dog
• Kotaku – As Naughty Dog crunches on The Last of Us II, developers wonder how much longer this approach can last

 

PlayStation 5 specs revealed:

In a rather dry and dull “deep dive”, Sony has revealed the specs for the PlayStation 5. It’s pretty much just an advancement in all the areas you’d expect. It’s got an eight core x86-64 AMD Ryzen Zen 2 processor, pretty great 16gb DDR6 RAM, a SSD rather than the old HDD, a 4K ultra HD Blu-ray player, a custom rig for the audio and a bunch of other things.

Some of the highlights include that sound system and the SSD, because it’s allowing for more flexible development. On top of that it’ll have expandable storage and real-time ray tracing. Some of these things have been expected, but now they’re official.

In addition, Sony has announced that “almost all” of the top 100 most popular PS4 games will be backwards compatible at launch. However, this the other 4000+ games on the platform are planned to be on a slower roll-out rather than something that just comes with the launch. Speaking of the launch, it’s going to be arriving sometime in the 2020 holiday season. This means it’ll be released at around the same time as the Xbox Series X. The two consoles will likely duke it out in the coming months.

Sources:

• Eurogamer – Inside PlayStation 5: the specs and the tech that deliver Soy’s next-gen vision
• Eurogamer – Sony clarifies “overwhelming majority” of PS4 games will be backward compatible on PS5
• Gamasutra – Sony details PlayStation 5 tech specs in extensive ‘deep dive’
• Gamasutra – 5 highlights from PlayStation’s big PS5 system architecture deep dive
• IGN – PlayStation 5 full specs revealed
• IGN – PS5: “Majority of the 4,000+ PS4 titles” will be backwards compatible, Sony says
• Kotaku – Here are the PlayStation 5’s technical specs
• Kotaku – PlayStation 5’s backward compatibility won’t arrive all at once
• Polygon – PlayStation 5 hardware specifications revealed
• Polygon – PS5 will be backward-compatible with ‘almost all’ top 100 PS4 games at launch
• Polygon – Most PS4 games will run on PlayStation 5, Sony clarifies
• VG247 – PS5 will support top 100 PS4 games at launch
• VG247 – PS5’s Tempest Engine audio chip is a revolutionary addition to bring 3D audio to everyone
• VG247 – Here’s how expandable storage works on the PS5
• VG247 – The “overwhelming majority” of PS4 titles will be playable on PS5

Call of Duty: Modern  Warfare 2 remaster may have been leaked:

On 26 February 2020 a submission was made to the South Korean video games ratings board, and that submission had been leaked. Blizzard Entertainment made a submission for Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2 Campaign Remaster, which is presumably exactly what it sounds like, a remaster of the Modern Warfare 2 campaign. This will likely get quite a few people excited, but after the remaster of the first game well… what did anyone really expect?

Sources:

• Eurogamer – Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2 campaign remaster spotted on Korea rating board
• IGN – Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2 Campaign Remastered seemingly confirmed

News of the Week – 27 January 2020

Doom Eternal’s delay just brought more crunch:

So just last week we received the lovely news that CD Projekt Red’s Cyberpunk 2077 will be delayed and that crunch will resume regardless; the delay hasn’t stopped the crunch at all. Which is just wonderful, isn’t it? Well this week we learned something even more wonderful! You see, Doom Eternal, which is currently in development over at id Software, has been doing exactly the same thing!

The company was supposed to release the game back in November 2019, and when the company announced its delay many people came out to be all angry about it while other people, who are a bit less whiny and realise that they can wait for their games, were completely fine with it. However, it now seems that the company was “crunching pretty hard most of last year”, according to the game’s director Marty Stratton.

The company, rather than letting people calm down a bit and work reasonable hours now that a delay had come around, were instead pushed into going hard on development time. The employees were forced into a lengthier period of crunch and this executive doesn’t really seem to care all that much about that either.

It’s now gotten to the point where we should no longer praise devs for announcing that its games will be delayed because that quite possibly means that the employees, who are afraid of being let go in an incredibly volatile industry if they don’t conform to what they’re “encouraged” to conform to, don’t obey.

Whenever a game is delayed this question needs to be re-examined. Is it being done so that the workers can be forced into further hard work that immensely damages their mental wellbeing, or is the delay being made in good faith and it’s to stop anything like this from happening. However, we can no longer take these devs at face value and should be willing to question them and to hold them accountable. And it should be noted that when the word “devs” is used in this instance, it means the executives and managers at these companies. Those people are the ones responsible for this. Poor management is what gets games pushed into crunch, it isn’t a “natural” part of the development process.

So remember to always question what these companies are trying to pull and always remember that age-old mantra that brands are not your friends, because they aren’t. They do not care about you as an individual, and they will be more than willing to lie if it gets them the PR they want. However, the increased visibility of crunch has forced them to acknowledge it, and maybe the lies behind the delay will now also force them to address these issues.

Sources:

• Eurogamer – id Software crunched “most of last year” to hit delayed Doom Eternal date
• Gamasutra – Doom Eternal dev team were ‘crunching pretty hard’ during 2019
• VG247 – “We were crunch pretty hard most of last year” – Marty Stratton unapologetic over Doom Eternity’s delay

A tax watchdog went after Rockstar:

Rockstar has been called out by a tax watchdog group in the UK called Taxwatch UK, and this watchdog group decided to just check out some of Rockstar’s publicly published financials and revealed something rather fun. You see, Rockstar, despite being a multi-billion dollar company, likes to make use of tax relief incentives in the UK that are actually kinda intended for… small businesses so they can get their break in the industry.

However, not to pass up on free money, Rockstar has gotten about £80 million in tax relief from this programme. The company claimed a nice percentage of the overall fund for 2018/2019 by claiming an amount that was 37% of the total! Rockstar took 37% of the entire UK’s Video Game Tax Relief (VGTR) fund. Which is a rather insane figure for a company that makes more money than many others combined.

In addition, to qualify for this tax relief fund you have to produce something that is “culturally British”, but that’s intentionally vague and so a game of theirs like Grand Theft Auto V, which is set in a recreation of Los Angeles that features many aspects of American life, is clearly culturally British because it has a more British sense of humour and some of it was developed by British people, I guess?

Rockstar was quick to respond, and it did the usual PR thing you’re meant to do. You know, the company spoke about how that money went to hire over a thousand people throughout the British Isles in places like London, Lincoln, Yorkshire and Scotland and so that makes it perfectly fine. The company was using this tax relief fund to get itself some additional funding, and that is completely legal. But you do need to maybe think of the morality behind it. It’s kinda iffy, ain’t it?

The Association for UK Interactive Entertainment (UKIE), which is essentially the UK’s version of the ESA (a lobbying group meant to stick up for the game devs and publishers against whatever backlash they get from… anyone), also came out to criticise Taxwatch UK for the report because it’s pretty hostile towards Rockstar and Rockstar just like can’t handle that kind of bullying. Bullying coming from a small tax watchdog group with no actual power. Terrifying.

It’s worth remembering that tax relief schemes like these are meant to be for smaller companies, and when they’re used like this they’re pretty much being abused. Tax relief can be a godsend to smaller companies that are just starting out, but when the money is being thrown at a billionaire company it kind of starts weakening what that tax relief was intended for in the first place.

Sources:

• Taxwatch UK – Rockstar takes the pot – 2019 accounts show huge increase in Grand Theft Auto tax claim
• Eurogamer – Rockstar responds to report it claimed £6m in UK tax relief
• Gamasutra – GTA developer Rockstar pushes back against UK tax abuse allegations
• VG247 – Rockstar and UKIE respond to Taxwatch UK’s £6 million tax relief report

Original Half-Life ­games are free on Steam for a while:

In a rather surprising, yet also unsurprising, development, Valve has decided to release its entire Half-Life collection for free on Steam for a few months in the lead-up to the release of its upcoming VR-exclusive Half-Life: Alyx (which the team has stated, in a recent AMA, is pretty much done). The game is effectively free to download and install until the new game releases in March.

Valve announced the news in a Steam blog post and stated that the whole story is available for people to check out. This is, obviously, a marketing thing intended to get you excited about a prequel to a game that people have wanted a sequel to since 2007. The company wants you excited about jumping into the boots of one of the best characters in gaming history, but this time as the protagonist and in a VR environment that can effectively stop a whole load of people from playing it because of the cost.

But let’s not get cynical here. Or at least not too cynical. So if you’ve never played the Half-Life games before then grab them. The first game is quite different from the rest but worth a play, but I would say that most of your enjoyment may come from the sequel and the episodes. Just keep in mind that there is no conclusion to the Episodes. They just end on a cliffhanger and that cliffhanger was never addressed. Never.

So go grab them if you haven’t played them, and if you have played them but haven’t on Steam somehow then go grab them. If you’re interested in picking up Half-Life: Alyx and haven’t played any of the games then definitely grab em. Otherwise just… do what you want. They’re good games! Okay, this post is deteriorating. On to the next one!

Sources:

• Steam – Pay now for free – Half-Life series
• Eurogamer – All previous Half-Life games are now free on Steam in the run-up to Alyx’s release
• Eurogamer – Valve says Half-Life: Alyx is “done” so you probably don’t need to worry about delays
• IGN – Every Half-Life game is free to play until April 21^st
• IGN – Half-Life: Alyx devs confirm ‘game is done’
• Kotaku – Valve is ‘confident’ Half-Life: Alyx won’t be delayed
• Polygon – The Half-Life games are free to play on Steam through March
• Polygon – The 7 big things we just learned about Half-Life: Alyx
• Rock, Paper, Shotgun – The whole Half-Life story is free to play on Steam right now
• Rock, Paper, Shotgun – Valve are confident Half-Life: Alyx won’t be delayed
• VG247 – Half-Life series is free-to-play until Half-Life: Alyx releases
• VG247 – Half-Life: Alyx will be around the same size as Half-Life 2, delay not expected

Ninja Theory has a new game in the works:

Ninja Theory, the devs that put out the superb and well-received exploration of mental health Hellblade: Senua’s Sacrifice, have put out a statement to announce its new game. The company has been working on a sequel to Hellblade since at least last year (when the company announced it), but this is a completely new thing.

The new game has been called Project: Mara and will be a more grounded experimental horror game about “mental terror”. This sounds a lot like the company is exploring similar themes to Hellblade, and I think a whole load of people will be quite happy if that’s the case. However, other than knowing the game exists and that it’ll be an exploration into new ideas for storytelling and such, we know nothing. We don’t know when it’s coming, we don’t know what the gameplay is going to be like. We pretty much know nothing at all.

The only reason this can really be called news at all is because Ninja Theory has prestige now. The company did a good job with the first Hellblade and so the company is worth a shot. If this new games shakes things up like Hellblade did then lightning may have struck twice. Let’s cross our fingers and hope that that’s exactly what happens.

Sources:

• Blogpost – Ninja Theory Announces Project: Mara
• Eurogamer – Hellblade developer Ninja Theory announces Project: Mara
• IGN – Hellblade developer Ninja Theory announces Project: Mara
• Polygon – Ninja Theory teases new ‘experimental’ horror game Project: Mara
• Rock, Paper, Shotgun – Hellblade developers Ninja Theory announce Project: Mara
• VG247 – Ninja Theory’s Project: Mara is a “real-world and grounded representation of mental terror”

TikTok’s owners are getting into gaming:

ByteDance, the Chinese conglomerate behind TikTok, the video sharing app that I don’t really understand but that all my students use on a daily basis, has decided that it’s time for its business fingers to spread out a bit and start getting into the mobile gaming market. Because, you know, mobile gaming makes a hell of a lot of money and with the name “TikTok” behind you you’ll likely make something young people will want.

The decision appears to be aimed at a more “hardcore” subdivision of the mobile market. A decision that appears a bit strange at first glance seeing as the casual mobile market makes such a killing, but the company is planning on going after the high-spenders, and so it needs to bring in some “whales” (for those who don’t know, this is the dehumanising way in which customers who spend a lot of cash in games are labelled).

This new division has been quietly building for a while, but the company has now gone public with its plans. These plans are going to put it in direct competition with another, and more well-known (in gaming circles) Chinese conglomerate, Tencent. So a battle between these two rich companies as each tries to outdo the other in the hardcore mobile market is soon to ensue. Should be fun to watch.

Sources:

• Gamasutra – Report: TikTok owner ByteDance planning big push into mobile games
• VG247 – TikTok maker is getting into “hardcore” mobile games

News of the Week – 20 January 2020

Cyberpunk 2077 delayed till September:

Many people with disposable income will likely be getting quite angry about a game that’s been delayed, because that game is CD Projekt Red’s Cyberpunk 2077 and people couldn’t possibly wait just a few months longer for their cyberpunk Witcher 3 follow-up.

CD Projekt announced that the game would be delayed from April, which then frees up that time slot and allows some much needed breathing room for the multitude of other games that are releasing around that time, to September, specifically 17 September. This date is, coincidentally, the same date that GTA V was released back in 2013. A fact I know off-hand because it’s two days after my birthday and I took that week off from work back in 2013 so I could finish a damn GTA game in three days. Anyway… that was probably unnecessary information.

The game is, according to CD Projekt, done and playable, but the developers will be spending the last few months making sure that it’s the best it can be. Hopefully, this means that CD Projekt won’t get caught into more crunch time like it’s known to do. You see, it’s kinda nice when developers allow its staff to like… not be overworked and immensely stressed for months on end. Oh but uh, despite all that extra time to work on development of the game, the devs are still planning on forcing crunch on their employees. So that’s just awesome.

It would seem that regardless of an additional five months of development time, CD Projekt is still planning on overworking its employees to get them to the finish line in time. In a better world, like the kind we don’t get to have, the game would be delayed for an extra year to negate all that crunch time. Hell, why not two years? There are endless games coming out every day and people can wait for a while to get this one. It’s unnecessary to treat staff terribly just so that a game can be pushed through the door. It’s an indication of poor management and terrible allotment of human resources. This should never be seen as developers just being so passionate about the game they’re making. This should be seen as exploitation of workers who are too afraid to say no because then they’ll be out of a job. It’s a disgusting environment to work in and one that does not produce better work, and even if it did would it be worth it? Would it be worth the human cost to create something that abused those who created it? Do we really need a new CD Projekt game this soon if this is what it means? Do we?

Sources:

• Eurogamer – Cyberpunk 2077 delayed to September
• Eurogamer – Cyberpunk 2077 dev will continue crunch “to some degree” through five month delay
• Gamasutra – CD Projekt Red delays Cyberpunk 2077 from April to September
• Gamasutra – Following Cyberpunk delay, CD Projek Red expects dev team crunch
• IGN – Cyberpunk 2077 release date delayed to September, needs more time for polish
• IGN – Cyberpunk 2077 developers will crunch “to some degree” despite delay
• Kotaku – Cyberpunk 2077 delayed to September
• Kotaku – Video game delays cause more crunch
• Polygon – Cyberpunk 2077 delayed to September
• Rock, Paper, Shotgun – Cyberpunk 2077 delayed into September
• VG247 – Cyberpunk 2077 release delayed to September 17
• VG247 – CD Projekt admits that devs will crunch to get Cyberpunk 2077 to the finish line

Horizon: Zero Dawn may be coming to PC:

Kotaku has rounded up their sources as per usual, but this time it’s not about how terrible the games industry is to its people (and yes, I’m talking about CD Projekt Red and every other company that treats its people like trash), and is instead about how a previously PS4-exclusive game may be heading to the PC. The game in question is the critically acclaimed Guerrilla Games production Horizon: Zero Dawn.

The robo-dino hunting game has been beloved ever since it released, but it’s only ever been available to PS4 users, and that kinda sucks for PC gamers (like myself). Now this is not an official announcement, but it does come from sources who are familiar with Sony’s plans going forward, and so hopefully this is the case.

Exclusivity is a tricky thing to overcome because it sells consoles, but it’s long been known that those in the PC sphere are not the type to choose a console at all, and so PC manufacturers are not direct competition. This is probably why Microsoft has often put their games on both Xbox and PC. The PC people ain’t gonna get that Xbox, so you might as well sell to them on their own turf. And it’s possible that this is Sony’s plan too: making some extra cash from the people who will adamantly refuse to buy its consoles.

If this does turn out to be true it’ll be great news because then maybe we can start getting PS4 exclusives on PC. I for one want my God of War, Bloodbourne and Spider-Man. So come on, Sony! You can do this!

Sources:

• Eurogamer – Horizon Zero Dawn is reportedly coming to PC later this year
• Gamasutra – Report: PS4 exclusive Horizon Zero Dawn could come to PC
• IGN – Horizon Zero Dawn is coming to PC, reports say
• Kotaku – Sources: Horizon: Zero Dawn is coming to PC
• Polygon – Report: PS4 exclusive Horizon Zero Dawn coming to PC
• VG247 – PS4 exclusive Horizon: Zero Dawn coming to PC – report

Sony’s still staying out of E3 and Microsoft’s still in:

E3 isn’t what it used to be. The show, which was once integral to video game marketing, has really gone down considering all the people who will no longer be there, such as Nintendo’s years-long trend of just sending a video for its presentation, and it seems that another publisher’s lack of involvement is set to continue. Sony, much like last year, is skipping E3.

Sony has been doing its own Nintendo Direct-style thing with State of Play and so has removed the need for the heavy marketing push behind E3. It’s just unnecessary for Sony these days, even when it has a new console on the way. In response to Sony stating that it isn’t coming, the Electronic Entertainment Association (ESA) put out a statement to say that E3 is like so still fine, man, because it’ll be like an even better consumer trade show with new experiences and partners and stuff. We like so don’t need Sony!

So that’s the ESA’s response; it’ll just make the show more of a consumer show rather than one tailored for journalists and retailers. However, another publisher has come out to reaffirm that it’ll definitely be in attendance: Microsoft. Phil Spencer, the head of Xbox, stated that Microsoft will be focusing on E3 this year so some people can look forward to the barrage of advertising that Microsoft will spew upon the world when E3 comes around. Fun!

Sources:

• Eurogamer – Sony to skip E3 for second year running, despite PlayStation 5’s imminent arrival
• Eurogamer – Xbox “hard at work on E3” following PlayStation pull-out
• Gamasutra – Sony’s skipping E3 again in 2020
• IGN – PlayStation will not be at E3 2020, Sony says
• IGN – Phil Spencer confirms Xbox will be at E3 2020
• Kotaku – With PS5 on the way, Sony will skip E3 again
• Polygon – PlayStation is skipping E3 2020
• VG247 – Sony confirms it is skipping E3 for a second year in a row
• VG247 – Microsoft will return to E3 in “milestone year” for Xbox

Rockstar works towards getting GTA IV back on Steam:

Rockstar’s 2008 Grand Theft Auto IV mysteriously vanished from Steam and left a few people rather confused, but then Rockstar leaped in to settle things for us. Their answer: blame Microsoft. So I guess we should all jump on board the Microsoft hate train. Well maybe not, but it kinda is their fault that this mega-successful title was delisted.

So back in the late 2000s, Rockstar teamed up with Microsoft to release GTA IV with the Games for Windows Live service. If you’ve played GTA IV on PC in recent years you’d know that whenever you try to play the game you’d be prompted for a login to that incredibly annoying Microsoft service. You could, thankfully, just get around it but it was still irritating and quite pervasive. However, Games for Windows Live shut down in 2014, and a few years later that caused GTA IV to face a difficult situation that led to the delisting.

This was all explained by a Rockstar spokesman speaking to USGamer, and they stated that Rockstar is currently working on a workaround fix for the issue so that it can bring the game back to digital store shelves. There’s no news on when that’ll happen though. So for now you’ll just have to wait around if you want to buy that decade plus old game. Many apologies.

Sources:

• Eurogamer – Rockstar explains Grand Theft Auto 4’s sudden delisting from Steam
• Gamasutra – Rockstar says defunct Games for Windows Live to blame for GTA IV delisting
• IGN – GTA 4 disappeared from Steam, and here’s why
• Polygon – Grand Theft Auto 4 no longer being sold on Steam
• Rock, Paper, Shotgun – Grand Theft Auto IV is missing from Steam, for now, anyways
• USGamer – Rockstar explains why Grand Theft Auto 4 was suddenly delisted from Steam
• VG247 – Rockstar explains why Grand Theft Auto 4 is no longer available on Steam

The Epic Games Store did well in 2019:

The Epic Games Store had a strategy throughout 2019, and that strategy involved grabbing as many exclusives as it could, giving away free games to incentivise people to stick around and using their more generous revenue split with developers to entice a few more onto the platform. It was, overall, a strategy that served Epic rather well.

The company’s aim is to become a main contender against Steam, because Steam has held the title of PC sales kingpin for far too long, and now that it’s 2020, Epic has released its numbers. The company’s storefront generated over $670m, and $215m of that went to third-party developers (such as the exclusives). The store also increased in size with at least 108 million people using the store (either to purchase a game or download a free game).

Speaking of free games, those freebies that Epic put out constantly were enough of a success for Epic that it’ll be continuing the practice in 2020. The company provided 73 games over the course of the year and they were downloaded 200 million times. So the policy of giving people free stuff was clearly utilised, and for poorer gamers this is a great thing to take advantage of. So I know I’m personally quite happy that the free games pipeline is still flowing. Free games! Yay.

All of this should still come with the knowledge that there are problems with just using your near infinite supply of cash to force your way into a competitive sphere. For those who believe in capitalism’s rule and the right of pure competition and the free market and all that jazz should maybe be worried about the way Epic is doing this. This isn’t genuine competition; it’s using your money to undermine the competition unfairly, but we all get free games, I suppose, so it probably isn’t that important…

Sources:

• Epic Games – Epic Games Store Weekly Free Games in 2020
• Eurogamer – Epic Games Store tops 100m customer milestone
• Gamasutra – Exclusives helped the Epic Games Store earn $680 million during 2019
• IGN – Epic Games Store exclusives “critical” to $680m earned so far
• Polygon – Epic Games Store to continue giving away games weekly in 2020
• Rock, Paper, Shotgun – Epic Games Store will continue free game giveaways all 2020

News of the Week – 1 July 2019

Call of Duty also uses crunch:

Kotaku has done it yet again. They’ve released an article that takes aim at horrible business practices within the industry, and this time they’re aiming their sights at Treyarch, the developers behind Call of Duty: Black Ops 3. The company is not depicted particularly nicely and it would appear that there is a culture of abuse at the company.

There is a distinct divide between full-time employees and contract workers, who are forced to work on a separate floor, are not invited to parties or lunches, are not allowed to speak to the developers and are essentially relegated to minimum wage. None of this is particularly surprising as the industry has something of a history when it comes to being terrible to their contract workers. And at Treyarch, contractors are consistently treated like second class citizens, especially QA testers.

Contractors, aside from being treated poorly, are also strung along for ages without getting full-time gigs, they get hit with crunch periods (obviously) and they don’t qualify for any of the benefits of being a full-time employee. To make matters worse, Activision refused to allow Kotaku the right to speak to Treyarch’s management, which is not a particularly good sign. However, the last big story about a company being terrible, which came from Jim Sterling a few weeks ago, was largely ignored. So let’s hope this doesn’t also just get ignored.

Sources:

• Gamasutra – QA bears the brunt of Treyarch’s crunch and culture issues, say staff
• Kotaku – The Human Cost Of Call of Duty: Black Ops 4

Console manufacturers are unhappy with Trump’s tariffs:

It would seem that tech companies, and in this case specifically console manufacturers, are banding together once more to try and speak to the administration that is currently within the White House. At present, for those unaware, there are ongoing trade disputes between the U.S. and China, and Trump’s administration is proposing something that has not been particularly effective from a historical perspective: tariffs.

These tariffs could result in as much as a 25% markup for certain goods that are imported from China into America. This means that the American consumer may end up paying up to 25% more for their PlayStation, Switch or Xbox in the coming months. This will put strain on the industry, and will force these companies to shift their manufacturing to another country and this will hurt the industry immensely.

So Sony, Microsoft and Nintendo decided to pen an open letter to Trump’s administration, and this open letter outlines all the issues with these tariffs; that they will not work, that they will hurt the industry, and it also outlines all the stats about consumer numbers, revenues made, et cetera. Essentially, this document, which has been linked below, is the gaming industry’s attempt to get Trump to see that tariffs with China are not a good thing. They will affect the economy, they will damage jobs, they will not be the saviour that they are being portrayed as.

And as much as non-American gamers, like myself, may wish that what happens to America does not affect us, it does. The United States is the second largest gaming economy in the world, and a market that big will dictate what happens to this industry. If consoles and games get expensive for America, they will get expensive for the rest of us. So let’s hope that this document, which is signed by three rival multi-billion dollar companies, manages to get through to a few of those White House higher-ups.

Sources:

• The Open Letter
• Gamasutra – Microsoft, Nintendo, and Sony pen letter against Trump’s game console tariff
• Kotaku – Sony, Microsoft, And Nintendo Come Out Against Trump’s Tariffs On Gaming Consoles
• Polygon – Microsoft, Nintendo, and Sony say Trump’s tariffs on China will hurt the game industry
• VG247 – Nintendo, Sony, and Microsoft issue joint statement against tariff proposed by Trump

Stadia will kinda protect your games:

Preservation is becoming an increasing worry in an industry that is moving further and further towards pure digitisation over physical copies. The gaming industry is becoming less and less reliant on retail outlets and are moving towards digital storefronts with direct downloads of games. This does make things a lot easier and cheaper for them, but it also presents something of a problem when a company decides that they will no longer offer a game for sale. When this happens in the digital age, the game simply disappears. It might be salvaged one day in the future, but it’s far more likely that it will never reappear. This is especially prevalent in online games, because once the servers go down that game is simply gone forever.

However, there has been a slight shred of good news in this area of concern. The new Google thing, Stadia, which is a streaming service for games (for those who are unaware), and this service seems like the perfect festering ground for this preservation problem. Stadia is essentially pegging itself as a Netflix for games. No downloads, no loading times, no updates. You just play the games you want to whenever you want to (provided you have a good internet connection). However, what happens when a company decides their game is no longer available? Well Google has an answer for that.

If a publisher decides that they no longer want their game to be up for sale, then that game is no longer for sale. There is very little Google can do there, but those games will still be available to those who have purchased them. The publisher cannot pull them from Stadia and refuse to allow consumers to play them. This may not seem like much, but just last week a few Telltale games were delisted and people were no longer able to download them. This is a very real problem, and while this doesn’t help the longevity of these games seeing as they can no longer be purchased, at least they can be preserved somewhere, and that’s better than nothing.

Sources:

• Gamasutra – Stadia purchases and saves will remain accessible, even if a publisher pulls support
• IGN – Google will not remove games from your Stadia library if they are removed from sale

Twitch adds subscription streams:

Twitch is doing something kind of controversial at the moment; they are launching gated streams for people who pay for them. Twitch, for those who don’t know, is a bit different to YouTube. It is a video streaming service that allows anyone to watch gaming live streams, but if you want to subscribe to someone, which gets you access to a special subscriber-only chat, badges and emotes, et cetera, you need to pay about $5.

This means that subscriptions are not like they are on YouTube. Someone like me, for instance, has over 70 subscriptions on YouTube, but it’s doubtful that anyone would ever have so many on Twitch. This makes subscribers a lot more valuable on that service, and it also means that there is a marketable group of people that can be used to exploit less marketable people.

Twitch is rolling out a beta version of a subscriber-only streaming feature. This means that people who are not subscribed will simply not be able to watch. This is a rather wonderful way to ensure that people with less money get a good ole does of the fear of missing out and so fork over their well-earned cash to watch the streamers they love. The new feature is entirely opt-in, and many streamers have already stated that they will not be using subscriber-only streams because it would divide the community, but there will obviously be people who do decide to make use of this new feature to reward the people who do pay for their role as an entertainer.

This new feature can easily leave one torn, because on one hand it allows streamers to get a bit closer to the people who are big enough fans to pay for their services, but it also divides communities. It depends on you whether you think this is a good or bad thing, but for now we’ll just have to see how the new move fares in the real world.

Sources:

• Kotaku – Twitch Launches Subscriber-Only Streaming Feature

Humble Bundle has raised a lot of money:

Humble Bundle, the service that allows you to purchase digital bundles of games, books and software for whatever price you so choose, has announced that since they launched back in 2010 they’ve done quite a bit of good. The whole idea behind Humble Bundle is that you can pay as low as $1 for a game bundle (but you could also give $1000 if you wanted to) and a portion of that will go to charity (other portions going to Humble Bundle themselves and to the developers of the games being sold). Which means that it’s pretty great that they’ve managed to raise $150 million for charity!

The company has supported many charities over the last few years, such as the Red Cross, the WWF, Make a Wish, et cetera, and they will obviously keep doing this. Hopefully they will manage to raise another $150 million in even less time than it took this time around, and that shouldn’t be so difficult seeing as they have made quite a name for themselves thus far. The service is great for consumers, especially those with weaker wallets, and it’s great for charity. So go toss them a couple coins every now and then!

Sources:

• Gamasutra – Humble has raised $150M for charity through bundles and storefront

 

News of the Week – 6 May 2019

NetherRealm gets caught in hot water too:

NetherRealm, the company that’s been bringing us Mortal Kombat for years, was the subject of an investigation by US Gamer, and they found some absolutely lovely things! After a brief social media outcry about unhealthy working conditions at the studio, US Gamer found themselves some employees to anonymously interview and… well they found some truly horrifying stuff.

The company has a history of terrible working conditions that involve crunch and abuse. The group that appears to suffer this abuse? Contractors. Contractors are, according to the report, given a lower status than their full-time co-workers. They are frequently overworked, exploited (such as one example of a contractor who designed a fatality and never received credit for it) and verbally abused. Negative nicknames float around about the contractors, especially the women, and the contractors are blamed for problems, such as one incident involving a leak.

To make matters worse, NetherRealm’s management dangles promotions and promised positions in front of contractors. They encourage the crunch and the acceptance of toxicity because the contractors are led to believe that they might just get full-time jobs at the company if they do. Although, of course, they seldom actually get those promised jobs. It’s really not a week in the gaming industry without some company being exposed for some horrible things they’ve done/do.

Sources:

• Gamasutra – Former temps claim NetherRealm has long history of exploitation and abuse
• US Gamer – “This Is How They Get Away With It:” Former NetherRealm Studios Contract Devs Reveal a Troubling Studio Culture

 

Rocket League now belongs to Epic Games:

What makes money? Well lots of things; that was a stupid question. But one of the things that makes a whole load of cash is Epic Games. They’ve made serious bank with their mega-popular battle-royale game Fortnite, and they’ve invested their massive earnings from that game into acquiring exclusives for their PC gaming store and, now, it appears that they will also be spending that cash on buying up studios. The first of which is Psyonix.

Psyonix, the people that brought the world the massively popular football-car game Rocket League, were bought up for an undisclosed amount and now belong to good ole Epic Games. This means that Rocket League, which supports cross-platform play (like Fortnite) and has a huge audience that doesn’t seem to want to leave (much like Fortnite once again), will now bring even more profits to the behemoth of modern gaming that is Epic Games.

At first there were mixed reports on whether or not this meant the game would still be purchasable on Steam, but Epic Games has since announced that they did not say anything about removing the game from Steam… which isn’t the same as saying it will remain on Steam forever. However, even if the game does get pulled from sale off Valve’s storefront, those who already own the game will still be supported in their enjoyment of the game.

Ultimately though, we need to wait and see what Epic’s plans are for this hugely profitable multiplayer phenomenon they’ve just acquired. The face of gaming is changing thanks to games like Fortnite, and thanks to Epic Games, the face of PC gaming is being shook up and rattled too.

Sources:

• Eurogamer – Epic acquires Psyonix, will remove Rocket League from sale on Steam later this year
• Gamasutra – Epic Games acquires Rocket League dev Psyonix
• IGN – Epic Games acquires Rocket League studio Psyonix
• Kotaku – Epic Acquires Rocket League Developer Psyonix
• Polygon – Epic Games to acquire Rocket League studio Psyonix
• Rock, Paper, Shotgun – Rocket League studio Psyonix acquired by Epic Games

Borderlands 3 was shown off:

The folks over at Gearbox decided that it was about time for them to show off the third installment of their flagship series, and if you’re a fan of the series you’ll very likely be quite happy with what was on offer. Lots of guns, new environments (it’s moving off Pandora and its surroundings for once), an updated upgrade system, alt fire stuff for guns; it’s basically just refinement to an existing formula. But the groundwork formula is mostly unchanged, and if that’s what you want then that’s what you’re gonna get! However, if you never enjoyed the Borderlands games, it’s very unlikely that you’ll care for this one either.

The only other thing that came out of the Borderlands 3 livestream was that Randy Pitchford claimed there would be no microtransactions, and that was something that other people on the team later denied. There will be microtransactions  but they will only be “cosmetic”, but that’s something that has been claimed before so it’s best to believe that when we see it. So all in all: if you liked the previous Borderlands games you’ll most likely enjoy the new one.

Sources:

• IGN – 50 Borderlands 3 details revealed
• IGN – Borderlands 3 gameplay reveal: video details new planet, co-op, returning characters
• Kotaku – Everything We Learned Today About Borderlands 3
• Rock, Paper, Shotgun – An hour of Borderlands 3 looting, shooting and interstellar travelling 

Sonic the Hedgehog has come to terrify us all:

The end of days has come upon us at last. It was a sad day indeed when they decided to release a trailer for the new Sonic the Hedgehog movie. The trailer is a work of the-opposite-of-art and features a terrifying Sonic, complete with a human-like body, beady little eyes and infant teeth. It’s one of the most horrifying spectacles that has ever been unleashed upon the internet, and for some reason it has Jim Carrey playing Dr. Robotnik. He also looks ridiculous.

The movie itself is, by all indications, an attempt to do what Detective Pikachu is doing but without the voice of Deadpool. It looks like it’s trying to appeal to the young people, such as through an extremely lame joke involving the labelling of a soldier as “basic”. It’s painful to watch, and the internet appears to be in complete agreement over this. The damn thing is scary and needs to be burned! With fire! With anything and everything flammable! Quickly, before it has a chance to somehow make money even though the general consensus on Sonic is that there hasn’t been a properly good one in years!

However, thankfully, even though the proposed fires have not yet been set, the film’s director has come out to say something good. He’s heard the criticisms, the company’s seen the memes, and they have decided that Sonic’s character model will receive a redesign. Public backlash actually managed to make its way all the way to the top. Which is amazing. There are no details yet on what that redesign will actually be, but it should be interesting to see how they decide to handle this situation.

Sources:

• Eurogamer – The first Sonic the Hedgehog movie trailer is even worse than you expected
• Eurogamer – Sonic movie director says studio hears criticism and character redesign is “going to happen”
• IGN – Sonic the Hedgehog movie to ‘fix’ design after fan outcry, says director
• Kotaku – The Internet Is Having A Hard Time With The Sonic The Hedgehog Trailer
• Kotaku – Sonic the Hedgehog Movie Design To Be Changed Following Criticism
• Rock, Paper, Shotgun – Sonic the Hedgehog movie trailer reveals his horrible human teeth
• VG247 – The Sonic the Hedgehog movie trailer is getting roasted on Twitter
• VG247 – After his terrifying teeth became a meme, movie Sonic the Hedgehog is getting redesigned

Pewdiepie calls for end to that meme:

“Subscribe to Pewdiepie” has become a meme that’s stuck around long enough that it’s become the calling card of terrible people. Perhaps typified by its usage as graffiti on a Holocaust memorial and as a slogan used by the Christchurch shooter before he opened fire on people. It’s gotten to the point where Pewdiepie has officially called for it to be stopped.

The meme isn’t some fun little thing anymore, and Pewdiepie, an entertainer who has seen his own fair share of controversy, has decided to distance himself from the whole thing and that is probably the best thing he could have done. The meme will likely continue though because what an audience wants an audience gets. Regardless of what the creator wants or needs.

Source:

• Kotaku – Pewdiepie Calls For End To The ‘Subscribe to Pewdiepie’ Meme