News June 30 Reuters: Media conglomerate NBCUniversal is interested in purchasing gaming companies Recently, Comcast Corporation announced plans to spin off its media holding NBCUniversal into a separate publicly traded company. Amidst this, rumors have surfaced that after the business split, NBCUniversal may begin to explore new strategic directions — including entering the video game market.
News June 30 The development of main and side quests costs CD PROJEKT approximately the same amount This was shared on the social network X by Cyberpunk 2077’s quest director, Paweł Sasko.
News June 30 The co-authors of Pokémon TCG Pocket received substantial subsidies from the Japanese authorities, and players are unhappy about it The Japanese company DeNA, one of the developers of the hit mobile game Pokémon TCG Pocket, recently secured governmental support. It received 1.5 billion yen ($9.25 million) in subsidies under the IP360 program.
News June 30 The CEO of Supermassive Games has resigned Robert Henrysson will no longer lead Supermassive Games studio. He has decided to leave the team after two and a half years of work at the company.
iGaming June 30 Polysights raised $1.5 million to develop AI tools for prediction markets The Polysights platform has received significant investments in a pre-seed funding round, totaling $1.5 million.
News June 30 Media: Threat of closure looms over another Xbox “subsidiary” — this time, Undead Labs It has become known about yet another studio that may cease to exist as a result of the upcoming restructuring of XBOX. As reported by GamesBeat, this is Undead Labs — the team behind the State of Decay series.
News June 30 Griffin Gaming Partners acquired a stake in tinyBuild TinyBuild, the publisher of Hello Neighbor, Potion Craft, The King is Watching, and many other games, has gained a new shareholder. That shareholder is the venture capital firm Griffin Gaming Partners.
News June 29 How to create a good narrative for a casual game? We continue our weekly series of YouTube interviews. The guest of the new episode is Anastasia Smirnova, a narrative designer with many years of experience. She has worked on games such as Mystery Manor, Paradise Island 2, Familyscapes, and Wildscapes: New Acres.
Premium Narrative design June 29 Quick Interview: The Situation with Narrative in the Casual Sector Every week, we release interviews on YouTube with gaming experts discussing various aspects of their work. We will also now post separate text-based blitz interviews with our speakers, but these will be “locked.” For instance, today we released a one-hour conversation on YouTube with Anastasia Smirnova on the topic “How to Create a Good Narrative for a Casual Game?” The accompanying content for this video is this article where we’ve already discussed the challenges facing…
News June 29 Sales of SAND: Raiders of Sophie exceeded 200,000 copies The steampunk PvP action game about walking fortresses, SAND: Raiders of Sophie, had a strong start. It took exactly one week to reach 200,000 copies sold.
News June 29 AKI: Every 13th game in the world is developed in Russia This is reported by TASS, citing the head of the Agency for Creative Industries (ACI), Gulnara Agamova.
News June 29 Rumor: Microsoft has temporarily stopped adding new games from third-party studios to Game Pass It’s possible that Microsoft hasn’t been signing contracts with third-party developers who wish to add games to the Game Pass subscription for some time. At least, that’s what claims Fernando Rizo, former sales director at Raw Fury and now a partner at Caboodle Games.
News June 29 Microsoft: Pre-orders for GTA VI have set records for XBOX consoles How many times console owners have pre-ordered the game, the corporation did not specify.
News June 29 In Brazil, gaming companies were fined millions due to loot boxes A total of fines were issued to 11 companies, including Valve, Sony, Microsoft, Electronic Arts, Riot Games, and Ubisoft.
iGaming June 29 A Maltese politician warned about the risks that a ban on online gambling advertisements in the EU might bring Member of the European Parliament from Malta, Peter Agius, stated at recent hearings that a ban on online gambling advertising in the EU could foster the development of the black market. According to him, such measures would only weaken consumer protection rather than strengthen it.
News June 29 The kiosk seller simulator “No Change Available” has gathered over 600,000 wishlists A year and a half ago, the Russian-speaking team Studio Rassvet announced their debut game — “No Change”, about a vendor in a night kiosk engaging in philosophical conversations with customers on New Year’s Eve. Since then, the project has found its way onto several hundred wishlists on Steam.
News June 29 The main events over the weekend (June 27-28) Employees of Quantic Dream and Ubisoft Barcelona went on strike, Sony announced plans to continue working on live-service games, and The Binding of Isaac: Rebirth hit a new record peak in Steam’s concurrent users. Here’s a recap of the main events in the gaming industry over the past weekend.
News June 26 007 First Light was the highest-grossing game in May in the US Circana analyst Mat Piscatella continues to share data on the U.S. gaming market. He published detailed statistics for May, which include information on revenue and top blockbusters.
News June 26 China’s regulator received a complaint about “unfair” fees in the App Store A group of 48 Chinese developers has expressed dissatisfaction with the commission in the App Store. They submitted a complaint against Apple to the State Administration for Market Regulation in China.
News June 26 Analytics: For the first time in 17 years, annual physical game sales have increased in the US, thanks to the Nintendo Switch 2 In recent years, gamers have increasingly purchased games in digital form, leading to a decline in physical edition sales. However, there was recently a slight rise in the popularity of discs and cartridges in the U.S.