News Mash-Up - Week # 48

Top News Items

• • In an article by Bloomberg, journalist Jason Schreier has revealed that Sony will look to revamp its PlayStation Plus service to include the catalogue of games from PlayStation Now and the free games from the PS Plus service. The new service, codenamed Spartacus, will launch sometime in the Spring of 2022 with 3 subscription tiers. The PS Now service will be discontinued according to the article.

  • The Battlefield franchise will now be presided over by Vince Zampella, the founder of Respawn (a studio house acquired by EA) which created the Titanfall franchise. Zampella is also heading up the DICE LA Studio and has responsibilities for the sequel of Star Wars Jedi Fallen and the Battlefront franchise. EA are also planning to expand the Battlefield franchise with a new “connected Battlefield experience”. Several studios including DICE, Ripple Effect and Halo designer Marcus Lehto’s new studio will take responsibility for this new experience.

  • It has come to light that Take Two’s legal team have been issuing take down notices and trademark claims against companies who are using the word “rockstar”, “GTA”, “social club”, “mafia” and “civilization” as part of their brands or products. Independent developer Hazelight who made It Takes Two will not fight Take Two in court and will make amendments to the claim for the title.

  • The US Federal Trade Commission has filed a lawsuit to block Nvidia's acquisition of UK-based chip designer and supplier Arm Limited on the basis Nvidia would have an unfair advantage and would "stifle innovative next-generation technologies". Nvidia has warned that it is at risk of losing a $1.25 billion down-payment for Arm if regulators persist in holding up the deal.

  • US legislators will debate a new bill to prevent scalpers from using computer generated bots from buying all stock of a highly sought after product once it becomes available on the market. The new bill is called Stopping Grinch Bots Act and has the support of three Democrat senators, but it will need cross-party support for it to become law. No specific details on how this Act could be enforced if it becomes law.

  • CD Projekt Red released its Q3’21 financials. Total revenue increased +38% v last year to reach $35 million. Net income declined -30% to $4 million. CD Projekt CFO and VP Piotr Nielubowicz attributed the narrowed profits to the expense of updating and servicing Cyberpunk 2077 as well as work on new projects and the cost of running the digital store GOG.com.

  • The Epic Game Store has included the retro streaming business, Antstream Arcade, as part of its cloud gaming service. Atari recently invested half a million dollars in Antstream. In April of this year Epic Games also facilitated the indie game store itch.io on its platform.
    

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Week commencing Monday 6 Dec. 2021