News Mash-Up - Week # 46

• • The Xbox team released a 30-minute video to celebrate Xbox’s 20th anniversary. The celebratory video replayed some of the highlights of the Xbox console history. Microsoft also announced an additional 76 Xbox 360/One games have been added to backward compatibility. Microsoft stated these will be the final games added to backward compatibility.

  • Xbox Cloud Gaming is now available for GamePass Ultimate subscribers to use on their Xbox One and Xbox Series consoles.

  • Phil Spencer, president of Xbox, expressed concern that NFTs currently do not fit in the video game strategy that he envisions. In an interview with online news site Axios, Spencer said the current situation with NFTs in games is a lot of "speculation and experimentation" and added that “exploitative” games are not the kind of content he wants on Xbox's storefront.

• • A Halo live-action TV series will be coming out in 2022. Coming to Paramount+ subscription the show has an estimated budget of $200 million.

  • Microsoft announced Forza Horizon 5 had the best launch in the franchise’s history. The game has seen over 10 million players in its first two weeks in the market.

  • Battlefield 2047 has released with mixed reviews. At the time of writing, on Metacritic, the game sits with an average user score of 3.2 (out of 10) and a Metacritic score of 68 (out of 100). Steam is no better with over 31,000 reviews of which 75% have awarded it a negative score and the game now ranks as one of the lowest rating games on Steam.

  • The forever beta game, Star Citizen has crossed the $400 million mark in raised funds with 3.3 million backers.

  • When Grand Theft Auto: The Definitive Edition launched the original versions of GTA III, Vice City and San Andreas were delisted from online stores. Rockstar have temporarily put these versions back for sale following the disappointing reviews from consumers. Purchasers of the Definitive edition will also get a copy of the original games for free (the offer ends on 30th June 2022). Rockstar have released a patch that addresses many of the grievances in the three games and future patches are promised.

  • Warner Bros announced a free-to-play game Multiversus, a Super Smash Bros-like platform fighter featuring WB licenses such as DC characters, Bugs Bunny and Tom & Jerry to name a few. Expected in 2022 for the PC, PlayStation and Xbox consoles.

  • Following statements from Intel, Nintendo and Sony that supply chain constraints will postpone the delivery of products, Nvidia’s CEO, Jensen Huang, stated that the company may not be able to meet demand until 2023.

  • Two allegations printed in the Wall Street Journal came out that Bobby Kotick, CEO of Activision Blizzard, behavior is not becoming of a CEO in charge of thousands of employees. Following these allegations, there has been a growing call for his resignation from a group of employees and investors. The CEOs of Xbox, PlayStation and Nintendo of America have commented on the allegations made to Bobby Kotick.

  • The judge presiding over Wolfire Games' lawsuit against Steam for monopolistic practice has thrown out the case. Wolfire Games brought the lawsuit in April on the grounds the 30% commission from Valve was anti-competitive. The Judge cited that Steam did have competitors in the PC store space and so no monopoly of sales was credible.

  
  
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Week commencing Monday 22 Nov. 2021