Gaming - Page 216

AMD Software: Adrenalin Edition 24.9.1 is here. Although it adds new game support for Frostpunk 2, God of War Ragnarok, Warhammer 40,000: Space Marine 2, and The Sims 4 DirectX 11 Update, the big story is that AMD Fluid Motion Frames 2, or AFMF 2, is now out of technical preview.

AMD's updated driver-based frame generation solution works for thousands of games with lower latency, faster performance, and better motion optimization than the original. It also now supports the OpenGL and Vulkan APIs, so you'd be hard-pressed to find a PC game that it doesn't work with.

This is even more notable because AMD Fluid Motion Frames 2 has been optimized to work with the new AMD Ryzen AI 300 Series processors for laptops and upcoming portable PC gaming handhelds. It's also supported by AMD Radeon 700M integrated graphics, which can be found on devices like the ROG Ally from ASUS.

The Norwegian Consumer Council has teamed up with nearly two dozen other consumer protection agencies to call for mass regulation of the billion-dollar virtual currency market.

Gaming currently is, and has been for quite some time, ruled by microtransactions. Sony makes more money from microtransactions than it does actual game sales. The same may be true for Xbox. Publishers like Electronic Arts, Take-Two Interactive, and Activision-Blizzard all make most of their earnings from in-game spending. And most of--if not all--these games have their own virtual currencies that've been carved up deliberately to maximize spending.

Publishers have employed tactics in order to create the illusion of bonus value when it comes to virtual currencies, often pricing alluring in-game items such as weapons and cosmetic skins in such a way that it requires consumers to make multiple purchases of virtual currencies. Alongside 17 other countries, the Norwegian Consumer Council has created an illuminating 55-page report that delves into the specifics of virtual currencies, and alleges that the practice may be illegal in its current form.

Final Fantasy 16 will probably come to Xbox at some point, but there's no telling exactly when that will be.

Square Enix wants to bring Final Fantasy 16 to Xbox. It behooves the publisher to release its games on as many platforms as possible in an effort to maximize sales, but the timed exclusivity deal with Sony did help accelerate development of the game. If it weren't for the PlayStation agreement, Final Fantasy 16 may have taken longer to develop and release.

But that's not to say there's no interest in Xbox. Despite Xbox having an "extremely low" userbase in Japan, FF16 game producer Naoki "Yoshi-P" Yoshida expresses interest in launching the game on Microsoft's machine.

Following the landmark 88-12 revenue split, Epic Games has kicked off yet another initiative in a bid to win over developers

Epic wants more developers to launch their games on the Epic Store, and to make that happen, the company has announced a new robust program called Launch Everywhere that can reduce royalty rates from 5% to 3.5%.

There's some criteria, though, and we've included tons of info about the new incentive.

Electronic Arts and BioWare have released Dragon Age: The Veilguard's main theme, revealing more details about the full soundtrack.

Hans Zimmer, the legendary composer behind the music of iconic films like Interstellar, Dune, and Inception, has co-composed the score for Bioware's next big Dragon Age game alongside Lorne Balfe, who has composed multiple game scores including Assassin's Creed III and Beyond: Two Souls.

Veilguard's audio director Cody Behiel says that the overall themes of the game's musical score are centered around emotion and impact, from the peaks of resolute and triumphant heroism to the valleys of villainy--and everything in between.

Epic Games, the company that created a game that's made $20 billion in less than a decade, operates its own storefront and games engine platform, and that has spent hundreds of millions of dollars in its costly legal battles, is now "financially sound."

In 2023, Epic Games laid off over 800 workers as it tried to get its spending under control. The Fortnite-maker had spent quite a bit throughout the year across all accounts, from nabbing Epic Store freebies and developing new Fortnite content to a hefty $520 million to settle an FTC case, and even more millions of dollars on its lawsuit against Google and Apple (Epic recently announced that it's once again suing Google, as well as Samsung, in a new lawsuit).

Read Also: Analysis: How Epic Games' grandiose ambitions led to mass layoffs

Sony's upcoming PlayStation 5 Pro console won't have any AI-powered frame generation technology because of a few reasons: one of those being timing.

In their recent podcast, Digital Foundry talked about the lack of any AI-powered frame generation technology on the PS5 Pro, and that it's not there because of a lack of timing. Sony started working on the chip (co-developed by AMD, fabbed by TSMC) before NVIDIA's kick-ass DLSS 3 Frame Generation technology was born.

Not just that, but machine learning hardware inside of the PS5 Pro was co-developed by AMD, and while it's not amazing on its own -- so Sony leads into the image quality enhancements of the machine learning hardware inside of the PS5 Pro.

Some time ago, Blizzard was working on its own take on Minecraft...and it would've been set in the Warcraft universe.

The games industries' collective graveyard is filled with interesting skeletons. Hundreds of games get cancelled and scrapped throughout the years, and Activision-Blizzard has its own collective pile of would-be ideas. One of these games sounds like it could've given Minecraft a run for its money...if it were actually executed, that is.

In his new book Play Nice: The Rise, Fall, and Future Of Blizzard Entertainment, games reporter Jason Schreier delved into the secrets of one of the most iconic brands in gaming history. One snippet highlights one of the more impressive ideas that Blizzard had at one time: Project Avalon, which would've essentially been a mashup of Minecraft and Blizzard's own billion-dollar Warcraft franchise.

Epic Games' costly lawsuit spree continues, and this time they're suing both Samsung and Google.

Today, billion-dollar Fortnite-maker Epic Games announced a new lawsuit against Samsung and Google, alleging that the two mega-corporations are colluding and conspiring to prevent third-party storefronts from running on Samsung devices.

Epic alleges that Samsung's Auto Blocker feature, which does exactly what it says, blocking apps from unauthorized sources by default, "cements the Google Play Store as the only viable way to get apps on Samsung devices, blocking every other store from competing on a level playing field."

Ubisoft's stock value has dropped considerably on the Euronext Paris Exchange.

On the heels of major setbacks and forecast adjustments, Ubisoft has taken a big hit on its share value throughout 2024. In the span of just two-and-a-half months, Ubisoft's stock has been more than halved, dropping by over 55% in the time span.

Ubisoft's Euronext Paris Exchange listing shows that the company's shares were at their highest point in February 15, 2024 at €24.47, shortly after Ubisoft issued its Q3'24 earnings report and investors update. The second-highest point was on May 15 with €23.33 in share value, which was shortly after Ubisoft released its full-year FY24 earnings figures.

Sony's upcoming PlayStation 5 Pro console "absolutely rocks" says No Man's Sky developer Martin Griffiths, with the Engine Programmer for Hello Games taking to X sharing his excitement about the PS5 Pro. Check it out:

Personally, I love that Martin admitted he had "never lost that child-like excitement I get when coding on a new dev kit". Martin shared a "beautifully staged" screenshot inside of No Man's Sky, ponting out that the game is now marked as a PS5 Pro Enhanced title on the PlayStation Store.

He said: "This beautifully staged screenshot is a fair summary of how I feel tonight. Many of you have noticed that #NoMansSky is now marked as a #PS5Pro enhanced title on the PlayStation store - the only thing I'd like to say as an engine programmer who has been through all the PS iterations since PS1, is that this console absolutely rocks".

Star Wars Outlaws isn't the only game that has missed Ubisoft's revenue expectations.

A few days ago, Ubisoft issued a new report that adjusted its forecast for FY25's earnings. The company dropped its revenue and net bookings expectations for two big reasons: First, Star Wars Outlaws, the new AAA game released by Massive Entertainment, had softer sales that Ubisoft would've liked. The second is that Ubisoft decided to delay Assassin's Creed Shadows outside of its planned holiday 2024 release window, which will ultimately impact sales of the game.

In a conference call with analysts and investors, Ubisoft CEO Yves Guillemot also confirmed that Star Wars Outlaw wasn't the only recent game that hasn't lived up to the company's targets. XDefiant, the anarchic free-to-play shooter that launched in May of this year, also missed the mark.

After decades of iconic games and beloved characters, Tetsuya Nomura is thinking about retiring from the games industry.

There are few people more instrumental in gaming than Square Enix's Tetsuya Nomura. Throughout his current 33-year run in the games industry, Nomura has done it all: director, producer, designer, artist, storywriter, etc. His artwork has been responsible for shaping some of the most well-known and recognizable video game characters of all time, and he helped mold the visuals in best-selling franchises from Final Fantasy to Kingdom Hearts.

Now after all this time, Nomura has recently expressed that he could retire soon. After all, he is 53 years old, and the typical age of retirement in Japan is 60.

Xbox's mixed messaging is apparently causing tumult both internally with game developers and teams, and externally with long-time fans of the brand.

Microsoft's games division has changed considerably over the last few years. In 2023, Microsoft bought Activision Blizzard King for $70 billion, and the merger added tremendous weight to Xbox as a whole. Xbox was already pressured to deliver growth, but post-merger, those margins are more challenging, with Microsoft's board and top C-suite scrutinizing the games unit more closely than ever before.

This need to hit specific revenue and profit margins has forced disruption within Xbox. Microsoft broke exclusivity in first-party games, bringing hits like Hi-Fi Rush, Pentiment, Grounded, and Sea of Thieves to PlayStation. Then Indiana Jones and the Great Circle was also confirmed for a PS5 release. The dam has broken, and Xbox's consistency is more so aimed at disruption than it is, well, building a walled garden.

While Sony has cancelled Naughty Dog's planned Last of Us online game, Horizon's live service project is still happening and a lot of developers are reportedly working on the project.

Rising costs and high risks have forced Sony to re-think its original live service plan. The company wanted to have 12 live games on the market by FY25, but this number was cut in half, with six projects on the slate and the other six being delayed indefinitely. Sony has already released three of these games, including the mega-hit Helldivers 2, MLB The Show 24, and the failed shooter Concord. So what will the remaining 3 projects be?

According to Bloomberg reporter Jason Schreier, one of these games is the often-rumored co-op game set in Guerrilla's best-selling Horizon universe.

Recently, we reported that Ubisoft's Star Wars Outlaws failed to meet initial expectations for the publisher, with the company citing '"softer than expected' sales. The open-world Star Wars game from the studio behind The Division was met with a mixed response from fans and critics alike. However, Ubisoft was okay with the game's Metacritic score of 76.

The publisher describes Star Wars Outlaws as the first 'open-world' single-player game set in the iconic universe. However, its mix of stealth and simple arcade-style action didn't gel with many players. It didn't help that the game launched poorly, and in some cases, it had broken enemy AI, animation bugs, and a general sense that it was unfinished or lacked polish.

With the game set to make its Steam debut on November 21, the development team has released an updated roadmap and promised to fix its many issues before this date.

Sony's next-generation PlayStation 6 console is going to be a monster, with its backwards compatibility amplified by the release of the impending PlayStation 5 Pro.

In their weekly podcast, the folks at Digital Foundry talked about the PS5 Pro being a victory, even if gamers don't buy it. Just like the standard PS4 which benefitted from the release of the PS4 Pro, where games that have questionable performance on the PS4 Pro run beautifully on the standard PS5, while games using dynamic resolution scaling benefit from the boosted power inside of the PS5.

However, the same will apply to the PS6 which will benefit from the improved PS5 Pro console. Why? Because if the better-looking games run at 30FPS on the faster PS5 Pro, that means that when they're run through backwards compatibility on the next-gen PS6, they'll look (and run) even better: most likely hitting 60FPS.

Sony's new PlayStation 5 Pro console features "dedicated custom hardware" that was co-developed with AMD that is in the GPU block, revealed by a new interview by IGN.

The site sat down with PlayStation Senior Principal Product Manager Toshi Aoki, when he started talking about the new PS5 Pro and its 8K gaming support, adding "but that's not our headline". He continued, adding: "It's more of the cherry on the cake...if you are one of the small percentage of people who have an 8K TV, you could get that from supported games. It is something that we have to work together with developers and also the TV manufacturers in the future....But right now we are really focused on the main use cases, which is 4K TV owners having that high-level visual fidelity and playing at [60 FPS]".

In the meantime, the new beefed-up PS5 Pro console will favor improvements to the GPU over the CPU, with Aoki saying that the PS5 Pro packs "dedicated custom hardware" that was co-developed with AMD that resides in the GPU block, and that games will be patched to use that part of the block.

I've got to admit, I was surprised to see Sony's new PlayStation 5 Pro console capable of running games at 8K -- even if it's with AI-powered PSSR upscaling -- but the company is making sure our expectations aren't too high. Gran Turismo 7 will run at 8K on the PS5 Pro, which is exciting... but it won't be every game.

This is just a $699 console after all, and not some $6000+ gaming PC with a $2500+ graphics card that is magnitudes faster than the PS5 Pro. Anyway, in a new interview with IGN, PlayStation Senior Principal Product Manager, Toshi Aoki said that while the PS5 Pro has 8K gaming support, "that's not our headline".

Aoki explained: "So even with the PS5 Pro, we do have 8K games support, but that's not our headline. It's more of the cherry on the cake...if you are one of the small percentage of people who have an 8K TV, you could get that from supported games. It is something that we have to work together with developers and also the TV manufacturers in the future....But right now we are really focused on the main use cases, which is 4K TV owners having that high-level visual fidelity and playing at [60 FPS]".

Sony announced its PlayStation 5 Pro console not too long ago, with beefed-up internal hardware and a higher $699 price that has gamers divided.

Well, the company itself has started talking about the pricing of its new PS5 Pro, as well as the decision-making process behind leaving the disc drive out of the package. In a new interview with IGN, PlayStation Senior Principal Product Manager, Toshi Aoki, explained: "Well, the technologies that I just mentioned that we are putting in to deliver new experiences for game players, and also not just the technological differences, but the SSD, the Wi-Fi 7, and the new technologies that surround the gameplay as well. So it's more of a full package that will give that exceptional value to the players... the most engaged players that we're targeting".

He continued: "With the PS5 Pro, we are offering all these new tech innovations, and we added the two terabyte SSD, as well as the Wi-Fi 7. We believe as a full package that it offers for the most players. For the disc drive, it is an option for players. Not all players have discs, even though most players may...but we have the option for being able to add that for those players. So I think it's more of the balance of the value proposition that we're giving".