Microsoft debuted the Xbox Series X/S during its fiscal Q2, and that pushed the company’s gaming revenue up 51% year-over-year. But the tech behemoth’s strength is not only in the console hardware — it’s also seeing continued gains in software and services. Xbox hardware sales were up, of course. The Xbox Series X/S drove hardware […]
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Major events like the Electronic Entertainment Expo, Gamescom, and the Tokyo Game Show have played a significant role in creating excitement in the games industry, even when the pandemic forced organizers to host events online. Marketers have still found that engagement goes “through the roof” when multiple studios and publishers come together to make announcements. […]
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The game industry isn’t done breaking down barriers to make games more accessible. That’s the view of Jason Rubin, vice president of play at Facebook, as expressed in a fireside chat at the GamesBeat/Facebook: Driving Game Growth event. By knocking down these barriers, companies like Facebook can help create a “post-app store” world where it’s […]
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2020 needs no introduction. While it was a horror show for many people all over the world. The world stood still and suddenly there weren’t any concerts to go to, any movies to watch at the theater, no Broadway, no live performance at all … instead, we were tucked away in our homes in an […]
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How do you become one of the big winners in the booming games industry? The first day of the all-digital GamesBeat Summit, Driving Game Growth, hosted in partnership between GamesBeat and Facebook, tackled that exact question. During the session “Winning with Rewarded Video Across Genres,” two leaders in the space, Rose Agozzino from Ludia and […]
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Monetization in free-to-play (F2P) and freemium games is in constant flux as the technology around it changes and evolves to better serve an increasingly sophisticated audience. Some things that developers thought they knew about monetization no longer are true and other things have changed beyond recognition. In “Common Monetization Myths Debunked,” moderator Rina Hahm, the […]
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On Friday morning, Microsoft announced it was increasing the price of its Xbox Live Gold subscription service. By Friday evening, it reversed that decision and then some. In an update to its news post about the price change, the company explained that it had “messed up.” And according to sources familiar with the matter, Xbox […]
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Investment firm The Carlyle Group has acquired RuneScape publisher Jagex for at least $530 million. Terms of the deal were not disclosed. The Daily Telegraph reported the deal was worth at least $530 million, which was the price paid in the previous transaction in 2020. It’s another sign of the biggest investors taking a new […]
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JetPlay has launched Ludo, a game creation platform that leverages artificial intelligence to accelerate the creative process. Seattle-based JetPlay has launched the open beta of Ludo, following a successful closed beta with participation from independent studios around the world. It will be a big test about whether automation can be useful in the domain of […]
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IMVU has relaunched itself as Together Labs and raised $35 million from Structural Capital, NetEase, and other investors. And Together Labs, which is the parent company, has also launched a new division called WithMe Entertainment with a focus on user-generated content. Together Labs will continue to operate IMVU, the social platform where young folks create […]
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PlayStation has continued its domination of gaming industry TV advertising into the new year, racking up over 425.7 million ad impressions from mid-December to mid-January — 44% of the industry’s total. Overall, 16 brands aired 51 spots more than 4,000 times during our measurement window, resulting in 962.7 million TV ad impressions. Once again, sports […]
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Today, Activision announced that it is merging Vicarious Visions with Blizzard Entertainment. Vicarious, a studio that had found a niche creating superb remake compilations like Crash Bandicoot N. Sane Trilogy and Tony Hawk’s Pro Skater 1+2, will no longer work on its projects. Instead, it will be a support studio dedicated to helping Blizzard. This […]
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I was a fanboy for Ernest Cline’s Ready Player One book and the 2018 Steven Spielberg movie based on it. And so when the sequel novel Ready Player Two came out in December, I was all over it. The critics panned it, and I understood why as it was a sequel that wasn’t as innovative […]
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Presented by Xsolla Taking your mobile game to new platforms can improve the discoverability of your game, help you create a community with your players, and scale your mobile business. Learn how to develop a multi-platform launch in this VB Live event. Register here for free. The pandemic has highlighted how important a cross-platform strategy […]
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Path of Exile continues to grind out success more than seven years after its launch. Grinding Gear Games announced today that Echoes of Atlas is its most downloaded expansion. Echoes of Atlas is Path of Exile’s 35th expansion or update. The free-to-play online action-RPG (think Diablo) launched January 16 on PC and January 20 on […]
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Resident Evil: Village is heading to PC and consoles on May 7. Publisher Capcom also revealed for the first time that it will release the survival-horror adventure for PlayStation 4 and Xbox One in addition to PS5 and Xbox Series X/S. This game picks up the story of Resident Evil VII, with players once again […]
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I consider my first time through a Hitman stage to be the canonical run. That’s the real thing. Discovering a location and all of its mysteries and possibilities is a great way to spend a couple of hours. But if you replay a destination enough times in a game like Hitman 3, you can discover […]
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No one has a bird’s eye view of the game industry like Amazon. The company’s Amazon Web Services division provides online services for 90% of the industry. AWS provides services that include Amazon GameLift for dedicated server hosting and FleetIQ to support multiplayer games. The company has its own app store and the Amazon Lumberyard […]
Read More505 Games has announced Puzzle Quest 3 today, a new installment in the franchise that combines match-3 puzzle mechanics with RPG-inspired progression and story and elements. Just last week, 505 Games acquired Puzzle Quest developer Infinity Plus Two. Puzzle Quest 3 will be the studio’s first project as an official part of 505. The game […]
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The game-like interactive reality show Rival Peak has turned into a hit on Facebook, with more than 22 million views of the first six episodes of the weekly show. Genvid Technologies and Pipeworks Studios created Rival Peak, a new kind of interactive experience that is partly a game and partly a reality show. The audience […]
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Hitman 3 is the excellent culmination of developer IO Interactive’s modern trilogy of assassination simulators, but fans should probably hold off on playing it for now. That’s because IO’s website that carries the data over from the previous games is crashing due to a crunch of players. This prevents anyone with Hitman 1 or 2 […]
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Web browser maker Opera has acquired YoYo Games, maker of the GameMaker Studio 2 game engine, for $10 million, and it has also launched its Opera Gaming division. The deal underscores Opera‘s efforts to differentiate its web browser, Opera GX, through a gaming community. Opera itself has more than 380 million people using its web […]
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Join the all-digital event that’s giving game publishers an edge in an uncertain ecosystem. From January 26-28, GamesBeat is bringing together today’s industry leaders for three days of content and networking focused on game growth and the Metaverse. Of course the industry keeps growing, boosted by the pandemic and next-gen console releases, and reaching $139.9 […]
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Blizzard Entertainment announced today that a new miniset of 35 cards, called Darkmoon Races, is coming to Hearthstone on January. Hearthstone is the most popular digital card game in the world. It usually gets three big updates a year, but Blizzard has been trying to add more content to the game more frequently in recent […]
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Presented by Xsolla To successfully launch a mobile game in an increasingly crowded market, you need to think beyond the app store. Learn how to go beyond traditional avenues to create community, improve discoverability, and scale your business in this VB Live event. Register here for free. The gaming industry has surged over the course […]
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Hitman works because developer IO Interactive builds the games as predictable and rigid machines. And as players, we control the key to this machine in Agent 47. IO’s job is to make sure that when players insert 47 into this mess of cogs and moving parts, that other parts of the machine awaken and present […]
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I find it amusing that a the resurrection of a beloved retro game is itself retro now. I’m talking about King’s Bounty: The Legend, which came to PC in 2008. It’s a rebirth of the original 1990 game from New World Computer (made by the same folks behind the Might and Magic series, and it’s […]
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We had so much fun making a tier list of Nintendo’s consoles last week that Jeff Grubb and I are back at it again with a topic that’s a bit more silly. We’re ranking Sonic the Hedgehog’s friends. Yup, we go through all of the notable anthropomorphic characters that have showed up in the Sega […]
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I enjoyed my holiday break because it gave me time to play a lot more games than normal. And after spending about 20 hours diving into Dragon Quest VII, a JRPG notorious for its slow pace, I needed something that’s a bit more exciting. So I jumped on my Xbox Series X and started browsing […]
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During CES 2021, Advanced Micro Devices CEO Lisa Su spoke with a group of journalists about a wide range of issues, including AMD’s product road map, the core counts for its processors, launches of the PlayStation 5 and Xbox Series X/S, and the company’s relationships with Apple. I was part of the group Q&A that […]
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Blizzard Entertainment has released the biggest update to its online platform, Battle.net, “in years.” Battle.net has been Blizzard’s internet portal for its games since the 1996 launch of Diablo. Since then, it has also become a launcher for every modern Blizzard game. It’s also home to a select few other Activision Blizzard games, including the […]
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