News Mash-Up - Week # 41

Top News Items

• • EA and FIFA have officially confirmed speculation that they will end their licensing agreement. FIFA announced, "FIFA is bullish and excited about the future in gaming and esports for football, and it is clear that this needs to be a space that is occupied by more than one party controlling all rights". The license deal with EA will expire in 2022, so FIFA 23 could be the last FIFA from EA and could mark the end of three decades of the EA/FIFA partnership. EA has trademarked the name “EA Sports FC” and it is most likely it is under this new banner future football games from EA will be released.

  • A 12-month subscription for the new Nintendo Switch Online + Expansion Pack will come to $49.99 for a single Nintendo account. This is more than twice the value of the regular Nintendo Switch Online subscription of $20 per annum. The family option for the “Expansion Pack” of up to 8 Nintendo accounts will be $79.99, again more than double the price of the regular subscription for the family option of $35. The new service is an extension of the multiplayer access that comes with the Nintendo Online package, with a collection of nine N64 games and fourteen SEGA Mega Drive games to begin with. A further seven games will join the service in the future. The service will go live on 26th October 2021.

  • Microsoft shareholders have given their voice of approval for the “right to repair”. Microsoft has responded that it will run its own study on how to reduce waste and analyze the "environmental and social benefits" of making Microsoft devices easier to repair. In the week Microsoft was looking at the right to repair, Valve released a video on YouTube on how individuals can open, fix or upgrade components for the forthcoming Steam Deck.

  • Hitman developer IO Interactive released its belated annual financial report for 2021, ending in March. The company generated $78 million, a year-on-year increase of +136%. Net income increased fourfold to $42 million.

  • IGN reported that Final Fantasy XIV has become the most popular game in the franchise. The MMORPG game, initially released in 2010, has now acquired 24 million registered accounts.

  • Activision released a new anti-cheat software called “Ricochet” for the game Call of Duty: Warzone. Ricochet will roll out for the PC and will be kernel based, but according to Activision, the kernel program will only activate during gameplay.

  • Ubisoft’s new Battle Royale game, Ghost Recon Frontline, has been shelved for the time being. The beta that was scheduled to run this week has been pulled. No reason was given for the decision to shelf the game.

  • Valve has banned all games that use blockchain or NFT technologies, such as the game Age of Rust. The reasoning behind this decision is that these products retain “value” in the real world and Valve does not allow items that can have real-world value on their platform.
    

  • Best Buy in the US has been accused of scalping the PS5 and Xbox Series consoles. To buy one of these consoles’ clients must sign up for a $200 membership subscription called “Totaltech” which offers numerous warranty support and insurance for devices.
    

    
    

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Week commencing Monday 18 Oct. 2021