Gaming - Page 391

AYANEO has just announced its next-gen handheld gaming console, with the AYANEO 2 packing AMD's latest Ryzen 7 6800U "Rembrandt" APU.

The Ryzen 7 6800U "Rembrandt" APU is based on the refreshed Zen 3+ CPU architecture with 8 cores and 16 threads that boost up to 4.7GHz, which is a 300MHz boost over the AYANEO Next system. Inside, we have RDNA 2 graphics which brings the AYANEO 2 up to the same GPU architecture as Valve's Steam Deck.

AYANEO 2's new Ryzen 7 6800U-powered APU has the Radeon 680M integrated GPU, packing 12 Compute Units: which is a 50% upgrade over the GPU inside of the Steam Deck. The GPU can boost up to 2.2GHz which is a huge 600MHz higher than the Steam Deck GPU, making its integrated GPU twice as fast: 3.38 TFLOPs versus 1.6 TFLOPs.

Square Enix has invested a record-breaking $792 million into new projects and business models, including new games, studio ramp-ups, and emerging technologies like blockchain.

Square Enix just reported its best year ever. During FY22, Square Enix hit new all-time highs across sales, operating profit, and overall profits. The company raked in $3 billion in net sales thanks to strong over-performance in the MMO segment and consistent earnings in HD Games and mobile. What's even more interesting is how much Square Enix is re-investing into new projects.

Throughout FY22, Square Enix's production account spending grew to a new high of $792 million. Every year the company invests around 26-30% of its net sales into the production account, which is a big budget that's spent across all of its upcoming projects. As net sales rise, so too does production investment.

The Switch has shipped 107.65 million units to date, solidifying it as the third best-selling Nintendo system of all time.

Even with five years on the market, the Switch family of consoles shows no signs of slowing down. Nintendo has announced that total Switch shipments (sell-in) have reached 107.65 million between launch in March 2017 to March 2022.

The Switch family of hardware is quite diverse insofar as shipments, and the base model, handheld-only Switch Lite, and premium Switch OLED have all contributing strongly to overall results. The Lite and OLED have sold less units due to being on the market for shorter periods.

The Nintendo Switch family of hardware and software has helped Nintendo earn nearly $63 billion in games revenues since 2017.

The Switch is one of the most successful systems that Nintendo has released, combining the strengths of all platform types and revenue streams in one package (handheld + console, digital + physical game sales, and online services like Switch Online).

To date, the platform has made a considerable portion of Nintendo's games revenues. According to data provided by Nintendo and compiled by us, the company has generated $62.766 billion from its dedicated video games hardware and software division since the Switch released in March 2017.

Dune is coming back to the world of gaming in a big, big way (well, besides Dune Spice Wars, that is).

Funcom, the devs behind Conan Exiles, announced a new Dune game that could scratch all the itches that sci-fi nerds have had for decades. It's been 21 years since the last Dune game and it sounds like Funcom is going to make up for the lost time with this new project.

The studio says a new Dune survival game is in development, and that it's their "most ambitious project yet." It's to be a next-gen open-world multiplayer game, so expect the typical live services, evolving world/expansions/updates, and of course deep social interactions. The Dune game is also being built in Unreal Engine for PC and consoles.

Indie horror dev Bloober Team recently signed a "significant distribution deal" with Sony Interactive Entertainment for its upcoming games, and Silent Hill may be included.

Bloober Team has secured a worldwide distributor for its new games and it's one of the best in the business: Sony Interactive Entertainment.

The developer is currently working on four projects including a new game with Konami (believed to be Silent Hill), a new Layers of Fear, a project being funded by Take-Two Interactive's Private Division label, and a project with Rogue Games. Sony may be the distributor for a handful of these games both digitally via the PlayStation Store/PS Plus and through physical retail channels.

Take-Two's mega merger with Zynga is expected to close on May 23, 2022, NASDAQ reports.

The convergence of Grand Theft Auto parent company Take-Two Interactive and mobile powerhouse Zynga may be finalized in late May. The news comes from NASDAQ Trader, who reinforces a recent definitive agreement SEC filing that assigns a May 23 closing date to the deal. Zynga's shares are anticipated to halt trading on May 20 in preparation for the closing date.

The merger is worth $12.7 billion and will combine the might of Take-Two's AAA empire with Zynga's mobile know-how. The synergies are expected to deliver hundreds of millions of dollars in net bookings growth over time, complete with significant earnings potential with Zynga's ad tech platform.

Nintendo has announced a stock split that will significantly increase the amount of shares available to investors.

Nintendo is preparing a stock split that will widen share volume to 1.29 billion outstanding shares, which will lower share prices and allow more investors to buy company stock. Nintendo shares are currently trading at 57,250 yen on the Tokyo Stock Exchange, or roughly $442.

The split will take place on September 30, 2022, and on that date common stock held by shareholders will be divided into 10 shares. Nintendo's board has authorized the company to issue a total of 4 billion shares.

Elden Ring is now the top-selling game in the United States year-to-date, the NPD Group reports.

Elden Ring is so big that it's dethroning some of gaming's biggest giants. FromSoftware's breakout RPG sensation sold 13.4 million units in little over a month, which is better than most games' lifetime sales. These massive numbers make Elden Ring the #1 game in the U.S. across multiple metrics, including trailing 12-month game sales (April 2021 - April 2022) and top 20 best-selling games of the year so far.

"Elden Ring was the 2nd best-selling title of April 2022. Elden Ring remains the best-selling game of 2022 year-to-date and has surpassed Call of Duty: Vanguard to become the best-selling premium game of the trailing 12-month period ending April 2022," NPD Group's Mat Piscatella said.

Bandai Namco had absolutely no clue that Elden Ring would be such a hit, and originally expected the game to sell less than 5 million units. FromSoftware actually smashed that target.

Elden Ring has now sold 13.4 million units worldwide and is a mega-hit franchise for Bandai Namco, FromSoftware, and the dev's parent company Kadokawa Corp. Elden Ring was able to achieve these numbers in little over a month.

The sales number was revealed as part of Bandai Namco's full-year FY2021 earnings report, where the publisher said it expected a modest 4 million sales for Elden Ring. As it turns out, the game beat that forecast by 235% and helped push the company's net digital game sales revenues to $3.1 billion.

Remedy celebrates Alan Wake's 12th anniversary with some new teases on the upcoming sequel.

Thanks to Epic's financing and Remedy's know-how, Alan Wake 2 is currently in development. Details are light, but we do know Alan Wake 2 is a psychological horror game with a new emphasis on survival. Now Remedy has dropped a few more details about the sequel and confirmed the protagonist will be "put through the ringer."

"It feels very familiar but at the same time it feels very fresh. We are breaking new ground. It's a new genre and we are pushing further into the horror aspect, but also exploring the depth of the character," Sam Lake said in the recent anniversary video.

Prey, one of the best video games to release in 2017, is now free on the Epic Games Store.

Bethesda's surreal, mind-bending masterpiece Prey is currently free on the Epic Store. If you haven't played it before, now is the perfect time to jump in especially with all the recent 2022 game delays.

Arkane's first-person shooter weaves an engaging and ultra-weird tale of supernatural sci-horror with impressive visuals, fun gunplay and abilities, and some of the best environmental storytelling in the entire games industry. You'll definitely see shades of Deathloop strewn around Talos-I, complete with that old-school 1970s retro space-age charm.

Today Electronic Arts confirmed the new Dead Space remake is coming January 27, 2023 exclusively on next-gen consoles.

EA's Motive studio is making significant headway with its new Dead Space remake, an ambitious project that completely revitalizes the original Xbox 360 horror experience for modern-day consoles. The game is being completely rebuilt with DICE's powerful Frostbite engine using the base game as a skeleton reference point.

The game is still in pre-alpha phases in development, but the team was recently able to do a full walkthrough of the game where "all content was present." Major effect breakthroughs include real-time global illumination and volumetric lighting thanks to the power upgrade from the PlayStation 5 and Xbox Series X/S consoles.

EA's Need for Speed franchise is coming back in a big way with two of gaming's best racing devs at the wheel.

Today EA's games division announced that Codemasters and Criterion Games are co-developing a new Need for Speed Game and are also laying the foundation for the franchise's future. EA has actually merged the Cheshire-based Codemasters team into Criterion for the ambitious plan. EA purchased F1 and Grid developer Codemasters in 2021 for $1.2 billion to help supercharge its racing games, and Criterion is known for its work on Need for Speed, Burnout, and vehicle production in Battlefront and Battlefield games.

Not much is known about the project(s), but they will be dedicated games that are separate from the mobile-based Need for Speed title from Tencent.

Today Bethesda delayed Starfield into the distant galaxy of 2023, and Xbox fans aren't happy.

Starfield went from a set release date of 11/11/22 to a very wide six-month release window in 2023. The delay has considerably affected the sentiment around Xbox hype (yes, the console wars are still alive, but now it's more about platform wars).

Starfield's big push back certainly didn't help dissuade the popular rhetoric that "Xbox has no games," and the delay has impacted the excitement behind Microsoft's E3-style upcoming games showcase scheduled for June 12.

Microsoft Flight Simulator is getting an update later this month, which will be something truly special for Top Gun fans -- the new Top Gun: Maverick movie tie-in expansion -- drops on May 25.

The official Xbox account tweeted: "Attention flight simmers! This is your captain speaking. The Top Gun: Maverick experience is taking off 5/25 in Microsoft Flight Simulator! Don't have your own call sign yet? Create one today!"

We don't know what to expect in the Top Gun: Maverick expansion, but I would dare say that it's going to involve aircraft from the movie... maybe some of the stars of Top Gun like Tom Cruise, and more. Microsoft and developer Asobo Studio said that gamers will be able to "experience first-hand what it's like to be a U.S. Navy Top Gun".

Sony is planning to ship more PlayStation 5 consoles this fiscal year than any other console in PlayStation history.

Sony's plans for a big PS5 sales blitz are still active. The company has announced that it expects to ship 18 million PlayStation 5 consoles through Fiscal Year 2022 (present - March 2023). Sony had originally announced this massive shipment strategy during an investor's meeting in May 2021, where it implied 20 million+ PS5 sales targets.

The PS5 has currently shipped 19.3 million units worldwide. If Sony's plan is successful, total PS5 shipments would skyrocket to 37.3 million by March 2023. This is well below Sony's original implied 45 million PS5 target.

Non-Sony published games dominate sales on the PlayStation Store and retail, with 86% of all games sold in Fiscal Year 2021 being third-party titles.

Sony's recent earnings figures reinforce some key factors of its business, including how the mighty gaming empire relies heavily on games not developed by the platform-holder.

According to the data, Sony sold a total of 303.2 million games on PlayStation 4 and PlayStation 5 across digital and and in-store channels. While Nintendo makes most of its game sales from first-party, Sony is much different; the split is significantly in favor of third-party games. In fact, 86% of games sold in Sony's FY21 period were third-party (259.3 million) and 14% were first-party (43.9 million).

Sony's latest financial report gives an update on PlayStation Plus subscriber counts, revealing a dip as network services revenues increase.

PlayStation Plus subscribers have dropped to 47.4 million as of Q4 FY21, down some 600,000 users from the all-time high of 48 million subscribers set in Q3.

Other key performance indicators from Sony's documents show that most online PlayStation gamers still are not subscribed to PlayStation Plus. Our records show that 55%, or more than half of PlayStation's total monthly active users, aren't subscribed to PS Plus.

Sony's next-gen PlayStation 5 continues being held back by supply constraints.

The PlayStation 5 has shipped a total of 19.3 million units as of March 31, 2022, Sony announced in its latest earnings report. The company shipped 11.5 million PS5s throughout Fiscal Year 2021 as compared to the 14.9 million PS4s shipped in the same launch-aligned period.

The demand for the console has skyrocketed but Sony is unable to meet demand as critical chip supplies remain scarce, however inventory is expected to improve throughout FY22 (now through March 2023).