The tax reform of 2025 introduced a significant number of changes to Russian legislation, completely transforming the usual business practices. In their article for App2Top, lawyers from Prospectacy, Irma Novikova and Kristina Kurtaeva, vividly explored how the reform affected tax calculations in the IT sector.

Over the past three years, Electronic Arts (EA) has periodically conducted mass layoffs, but this has not prevented its workforce from growing. This observation was made by journalist Stephen Totilo from Game File, who examined the company’s annual reports.

Bungie studio has once again faced accusations of plagiarism. This time, it was brought forward by Scottish artist Fern Hook, who discovered that the developers used elements from her works in the extraction shooter Marathon.

The producer of the first Assassin’s Creed continues to face misfortunes.

Take-Two Interactive shared its report for the 2025 fiscal year (April 2024 — March 2025). Its revenue increased, but significant losses were unavoidable. The company also shared new data on game sales and mentioned that another delay in GTA VI is unlikely.

The release of the new update for “No Rest for the Wicked,” an ambitious action RPG from Moon Studios, did not go as planned. At first glance, what seemed like a mundane situation turned out to be much deeper, highlighting global mistakes with the early access model that could serve as an example for other studios.

On May 15, the Tagansky District Court in Moscow held the first hearing in the case of Malik Khatazhaev, the owner of the “Lesta Games” group of companies. A month ago, the top manager was accused of extremism. The hearing was conducted in a closed format, despite the request from the developer of “World of Tanks” and “World of Warships” for an open hearing.

The Chinese giant Tencent also released its report for the first quarter of 2025. We have highlighted the main points from the document.

The funding round was led by Play Ventures. Studio 42 also received investments from GEM Capital and Arcadia Gaming Partners.

The first three months of 2025 marked a period of revenue growth for NetEase. In its quarterly report, the Chinese company reported an increase in all key metrics and confirmed that its gaming division remains the most profitable.

On the night of May 15, the full release of DOOM: The Dark Ages took place. Prior to that, for two days, only owners of the premium edition were able to play the new game. The launch figures for the shooter on Steam are promising.

The mentioned amount is planned to be invested over the next 12-24 months.

On the evening of May 14, Ubisoft shared the financial results for the fiscal year that ended on March 31, 2025. Apparently, investors were not very pleased with what they heard: by the morning of the next day, the company’s stock price had dropped by 20.6% to €9.27 per share.

In June, a multiplayer third-person shooter Bullet Yeeters will be released on Steam. App2Top conducted a short interview with Alexey Doroshev, co-founder of Yeeters Team, to discuss how much the game cost the team and why Concord failed.

Anatoly Vyborny, Deputy Chairman of the State Duma Committee on Security and Anti-Corruption, believes that the Russian authorities should penalize gaming companies whose projects contain anti-Russian content. He is preparing corresponding amendments to the Code of Administrative Offenses.

The economic upheavals of recent years have not only forced top managers of gaming companies to continuously seek new ways to cut costs but have also negatively impacted regular employees. Unions are intended to protect developers’ interests, but in their current form, they are unable to make a global impact on the situation.

Over the past 10 years, Valve’s annual income from game sales commissions on Steam has almost tripled, calculated analyst Aldora Joost van Dreunen. If in 2015 the company earned $1.1 billion from this, last year it was already $3.2 billion.

One of Steam’s partners may have fallen victim to a hacker attack, according to Underdark AI, a company specializing in cybersecurity. They noticed a database containing information about more than 89 million user accounts from the store was put up for sale online.

In the report on the study of government support for the gaming industry in Russia, APRIORI, IRI, and “EBR” not only shared survey results but also their recommendations. They are confident that a comprehensive strategy needs to be developed in the country.