Gaming News - Page 312

Electronic Arts condemns Russia's unprovoked invasion of Ukraine and has enacted a temporary sales ban in the region.

EA has joined Microsoft in banning the sale of its products in Russia and Belarus. The gaming giant announced the news in a recent update post where it calls the war on Ukraine "shocking" and "deeply troubling."

"We have made the decision to stop sales of our games and content, including virtual currency bundles, in Russia and Belarus while this conflict continues," the post reads.

Nintendo may have enacted a temporary sales ban of games and services in Russia following the invasion of Ukraine.

Russian gamers can no longer purchase content and services on the Nintendo eShop. The regional eShop support page confirms Nintendo's payment processor has temporary restricted the ruble, Russia's currency, as a valid form of payment.

This is likely due to economic sanctions against Russia that have blocked seven major banks from accessing SWIFT, a messaging system that instructs worldwide bank transactions (such as the digital purchases used in the eShop). Nintendo serves Russia as part of its Nintendo of Europe subsidiary.

Microsoft has temporarily suspended sales to Russia following the devastating attacks on Ukraine.

Microsoft today announced a sales ban of its products, goods, and services in Russia. Consumers in Russia will no longer be able to buy or access Microsoft services, including Xbox hardware and games.

"We are announcing today that we will suspend all new sales of Microsoft products and services in Russia," Microsoft President and Vice Chairman Brad Smith said.

Dungeon Siege is back...but many fans would prefer it stay dead.

After ten long years, Square Enix has finally resurrected Dungeon Siege. Well...sort of. Dungeon Siege will be joining metaverse platform The Sandbox complete with NFT real estate and characters.

Here's how it works: The Sandbox is basically a world complete with landmasses and countries. These regions are called LAND and can be purchased as digital NFTs--gamers can buy in-game land. Some countries are owned by, say, Atari, and others are reserved for franchises like The Walking Dead. Square Enix will have its own LAND patch where it will host Dungeon Siege-themed content, including skins, characters, and cosmetics.

Rockstar Games details the new performance modes and features coming to GTA V's next-gen version.

It looks like Rockstar is pushing the PS5 and Xbox Series X to their limits. GTA V Expanded & Enhanced will have a surprising 4K 60FPS raytracing mode on both Navi 2 GPU-powered consoles, which is no small feat. The resolution will indeed by upscaled and not native 4K, but it's still not something that most open-world games support.

GTA V E&E will have three graphics/performance modes:

Gran Turismo 7's microtransactions are up to 1233% more expensive than GT Sport.

Conveniently after reviews went live, Sony has switched on Gran Turismo 7's in-game purchases...and the prices are eye-opening. GT7 allows gamers to buy cars, parts, and accessories with premium currency. It's an online live game, after all, so monetization is a given. Currency prices look like this:

According to findings from Video Game Chronicle, some cars that used to cost £ 5 in GT Sport now cost an incredible £ 40 in GT7. That's a 700% increase (or 7x) over GT Sport for the same cars.

The Nintendo Switch has enjoyed five years of success, and here are the numbers to prove it.

The Switch is the ultimate union of handhelds and consoles, and as such, the system has generated tremendous profits for Nintendo. As the system turns five years old today we're taking a look back at some of the most important milestones the platform has achieved in half a decade.

In the last five years, the Switch has helped Nintendo generate nearly $60 billion in revenues. From March 2017 to December 2021, Nintendo made $59.8 billion in revenues. While those numbers do include 3DS hardware and software sales, the majority of those earnings were from the Switch itself.

Games titan The Pokemon Company is donating hundreds of thousands of dollars to Ukrainian relief efforts, joining other games-makers and publishers providing relief.

The Pokemon Company has publicly lamented the "heartbreaking" Russian invasion in Eastern Europe. The war sees nearly 1 million Ukranians fleeing the war-torn country as refugees, including children.

The Pocket Monster creator has responded with a $200,000 donation to the GlobalGiving foundation to provide humanitarian relief for Ukrainian families and children.

Babylon's Fall may be a flop for Square Enix, a publisher that needs more hit AAA titles.

Based on extremely lower player counts, Babylon's Fall could be the next Square Enix game to deliver "disappointing results." Babylon's Fall, the online-only hack-and-slash RPG developed by PlatinumGames, had less than 1,000 concurrent players on Steam on its launch day. Right now the game has roughly 4,000 Twitch viewers which indicates low curiosity for the game.

There's a few general reasons for this:

CD Projekt RED has cut off Russia and Belarus from its entertainment products.

Polish game developer CD Projekt RED will no longer sell its games, media, and other content to Russia and Belarus following the ongoing war against Ukraine. The sales ban includes games like The Witcher 3 and Cyberpunk 2077, and the countries are also restricted from the GOG.com game sales marketplace.

The decision will have a surprising impact on CD Projekt's sales revenues. The company warned investors that Russia and Belarus combined made roughly 9.1% of its total-year 2021 revenues. CDPR has yet to announce its Q4 earnings but based on a quick conversion, these regions may have made $12.8 million in sales--that effectively means CD Projekt will potentially lose millions of revenues a year from the ban.