Gaming - Page 503

EA may soon lay Anthem to rest once and for all and scrap its plans for a big revival.

EA will soon decide whether Anthem lives or dies. Sources tell Bloomberg's Jason Schreier that EA is currently weighing the decision carefully. The overall cost will be the deciding factor, both in capital spending and developer investment--the latter of which is in precious supply. The current Anthem revival team consists of roughly 30 developers, but BioWare will need at least 90 devs for Anthem Next, sources tell Bloomberg.

Right now, BioWare is working on a number of projects including Dragon Age 4, a game that's been in planning phases of development since 2016, and a new Mass Effect game. Both of these properties are guaranteed hits and take priority, whereas Anthem, a fledgling new IP, isn't as important sales-wise.

CD PROJEKT RED has been hacked with the developer confirming the news on Twitter, saying that it had "discovered that we have become a victim of a targeted cyber attack".

The Witcher and Cyberpunk 2077 developer added: "An unidentified actor gained unauthorized access to our internal network, collected certain data belonging to CD PROJEKT capital group, and left a random note the content of which we release to the public. Although some devices on our network have been encrypted, our backups remain intact. We have already secured our IT infrastructure and begun restoring the data".

The hackers have reportedly taken internal source codes for CD PROJEKT RED games like Cyberpunk 2077, The Witcher 3, Gwent, and even an unreleased version of The Witcher 3. Not only does the hacker reportedly have the source codes to those games, but also accounting, administrator, legal, and investor relations information might have been accessed as well.

Battlefield 6 is going to be a huge release for EA this year, with the latest leaks teasing next-gen destruction in Battlefield 6 with "unscripted skyscraper destruction" on the cards.

But there is another news nugget here with Battlefield 6: it might have a free-to-play mode for BF6 that will be part of the battle pass system. We don't know what type of battle royale experience to expect in Battlefield 6, but it has to be better than the dumpster fire that was the battle royale 'Firestorm' mode in Battlefield V.

We might not see this come to fruition, but I doubt EA DICE is sitting there not thinking about having a battle royale mode for Battlefield 6 when it has been so mega successful for Activision-Blizzard with Call of Duty: Modern Warfare and its battle royale mode Warzone. We already know from previous rumors that Battlefield 6 development was being influenced by Call of Duty: Warzone's success, too.

It was only just over a month ago that Steam smashed through 2021 with an insane 25 million concurrent users, and now that record has been broken with 26.3 million Steam users online at once.

The data is coming from the SteamDB tracker, which saw 26.3 million gamers online at once -- up from the 25.4 million on January 2. Valve recently hosted the Steam Game Festival where it offered PC gamers hundreds of demos of PC games from mostly indie developers.

But spin that in with the COVID-19 lockdowns across the planet and you have more people inside, playing PC games (and on consoles, tablets, and smartphones) than ever before. I wonder if we'll see Steam's concurrent user record broken again throughout the year, and if so would we breach 30 million concurrent users on Steam before the end of the year.

GTA V sales are now up to 140 million across two console generations, Take-Two CEO Strauss Zelnick confirms in a recent Q3 earnings report.

13 years after its initial release, GTA V is still a sales revenue monster. Take-Two announced the game has now shipped 140 million copies across PS4, Xbox One, PC, and older-gen hardware like the PS3 and Xbox 360. That's a +5 million sales increase over last quarter, and GTA V has now consistently sold 5 million units every quarter for three periods.

GTA V and Grand Theft Auto Online both impacted the $814 million net bookings earned in Q3'21. GTA Online helped buffer the massive $472 million in microtransactions that Take-Two earned during the period, whereas GTA V full game sales pushed the remaining $341 million from software purchases.

Final Fantasy XIV is coming to PlayStation 5 with some big optimizations and free upgrades.

Square Enix recently dropped some big Final Fantasy XIV bombshells. The company's immensely profitable MMO is coming to PlayStation 5, a free open beta for the PS5 version is dropping alongside Patch 5.5, and the new patch update adds a bunch of new quests, a new raid, tweaks for jobs, and other features. Plus there's Endwalker, a brand new expansion that closes the Hydaelyn saga and sets the stage for a new era.

As expected, Final Fantasy XIV is getting upgraded on PS5. The enhancements include boosted native 4K resolution and "significantly improved" frame rates. Sadly no exact FPS was outlined, but expect to see at least 60FPS offered. FFXIV could also get performance/quality modes in its settings menu.

Sony will introduce the PlayStation 5 to mainland China in Q2 2021, possibly coinciding with a new console stock refresh.

Today Sony Interactive Entertainment China announced it will launch the PS5 in the region sometime in the second quarter. No exact launch date was outlined, but Sony has been planning this rollout since December 2020.

Just like the Nintendo Switch, which launched in partnership with Tencent, the Chinese PS5 will be a special model made just for overseas consumers. As Niko Partners analyst Daniel Ahmad notes, the China-based PS5 should be region-locked with restrictions set in place that reflect the country's strict gaming laws. No information on launch games or services was made available by SIE China.

The ESA has cancelled its plans to hold a physical E3 2021, and will instead stream the showcase online.

Rather than cancelling E3 like it did in 2020, the ESA is pivoting and making E3 2021 an all-digital show. Exact plans haven't been confirmed, but sources say the ESA is currently pitching ideas to major publishers and developers to help fill out the event.

E3 2021 is still planned from June 15 - 17, 2021, and it should culminate in a number of special reveals and streams. However, Geoff Keighley won't be involved this time either. Keighley will instead focus on the Summer Game Fest, an event that started in 2020 to help celebrate a myriad of games. That means we won't get the excellent E3 Coliseum events where developers talk candidly about their upcoming games.

Animal Crossing New Horizons has now sold more than 30 million copies in less than 40 weeks on the market. It could soon become the top-selling game on the Switch.

Ever since we started charting Nintendo's top 10 game sales since Q4'20, we've seen multiple Switch games slowly taper off. Everything changed when Animal Crossing New Horizons exploded onto the platform in 2020. Since then, Animal Crossing has sold nearly 1 million copies every week since launch, and has slightly slowed down throughout the year.

Right now, Animal Crossing is the second best-selling game on the Switch, second only to Mario Kart 8 Deluxe. Within just 40 weeks on the market, Animal Crossing has amassed a staggering 31.18 million copies sold on the Switch. A quick bit of math shows that nearly 40% of all Switch owners have purchased Animal Crossing. For comparison's sake, it's taken Mario Kart 8 Deluxe 190 weeks to claim the Switch's software throne with 33.41 million copies.

We know that EA DICE is hard at work on Battlefield 6, which is dropping in Spring 2021 and has been designed for over 128 players with 32v32 being standard in previous leaks. Well, check out this latest leak:

Battlefield 6 will reportedly have full unscripted skyscraper destruction for the first time ever, with industry leaker Tom Henderson teasing it in a couple of tweets. You can see that the tweet has a picture of some buildings with some snipers on top of them, and then the buildings are destroyed.

The sniper is then just standing there... with no more cover -- this would be the point behind the full unscripted skyscraper destruction. I still remember hearing the first rumors of Battlefield 6 in June 2020 and said that the thing I was most excited to see in Battlefield 6 was the "return, and market domination of a next-gen Levolution technology that DICE made famous in Battlefield 4 back in 2013. The video above makes it feel like so long ago now, but it would be great to see a truly next-gen upgrade to destruction in Battlefield 6".

I still remember my parents entering a competition for me back in the 90s where I won a Game Boy on one of those live TV shows in the morning before school, and I got to school and everyone was like "whoa, Anthony you won a Game Boy today!!!" and I had no clue.

Nintendo launched its Game Boy in 1989 but it has been modded and turned into an Apple TV remote. The case that Italian YouTuber Otto Climan used was made by Retro Modding specifically for this project, and infuses the 90s look of Nintendo and Apple products.

The display is slightly better than a regular Game Boy, while the modder added in an IR blaster and custom software so that he could tweak and map the buttons of the Game Boy to the IR controls. He loaded up his custom software onto a custom ROM, programmed with IR codes and button mappings ready for Apple TV -- and thus it was born: the modded Nintendo Game Boy turned into an Apple TV remote.

The Nintendo Switch is on a roll. Not only did it break hardware sales records in the holiday Q3 period, but it shattered game purchases as well.

2020 was the best year in history for the Nintendo Switch. Hardware sales hit 24.1 million in 2020, bringing total unit sales to 79.87 million, which solidifies the Switch as the 5th best-selling Nintendo hardware of all time.

Software broke new grounds, too. In holiday 2020, the Switch sold an astronomical 75.85 million games--more than it's ever sold before in a single quarter. Total Switch game sales are now at 532.34 million since the system's launch in 2017. The Switch is now #3 in game sales, and sits behind the Wii's massive 920 million and the DS' huge 948.64 million software sales.

Call of Duty's free-to-play Warzone mode is the glue that will hold the franchise together in 2021 and beyond.

Warzone is the biggest thing Activision has ever done. The F2P game's ecosystem is so transformative that all of Activision-Blizzard's franchises will adapt its model in some form. Warzone is the connective tissue that binds mainline premium games in a monetized, accessible, and synergistic package. Activision's emphasis on cross-progression, cross-play, and cross-SKU has unlocked the full spectrum of money-making potential.

Activision knows how important Warzone is. 2020 was just the beginning. The mode isn't going anywhere, and will continue integrating all future mainline CoD games moving forward. In 2021, Warzone will tie three games together: Modern Warfare, Black Ops Cold War, and COD 2021.

Activision confirms Diablo IV and Overwatch 2 are still a ways off, but doesn't give any exact release dates for either.

Both Diablo IV and Overwatch 2 started development as early as 2016, and have seen many iterations and changes since that time. Fans will be waiting a bit longer for both games. In a recent earnings report, company CFO Dennis Durkin says that Blizzard won't have any new mainline premium releases for 2021. Blizzard will instead focus on digital content updates (and probably a Diablo II remaster).

"We expect Blizzard's net bookings to grow given the momentum in World of Warcraft and the other growth initiatives we have in the business," Durkin said.

The Nintendo Switch has now sold 79.87 million units worldwide, beating the 3DS and soon the Game Boy Advance.

2020 has been a monumental year for Nintendo. Switch sales broke records for the third straight quarter in a row, and profits and net sales have seen huge gains to $2.97 billion and $5.9 billion respectively. Gauging the Switch's current standings against other Nintendo hardware really underlines the system's remarkable performance.

According to Nintendo's sales data, the Switch is now the fifth best-selling system of all time, beating out predecessors like the 3DS and legacy hardware including the NES and SNES. In fact, the system is closing in on Game Boy Advance's 81.51 million sales mark. Nintendo expects the Switch to sell 26.5 million units throughout FY2021. It has currently sold 24.1 million consoles, leaving 2.4 million units left, which would total 82.27 million.

Diablo 2 could be revealed this month at Blizzcon 2021, and released this year alongside Diablo Immortal.

Activision-Blizzard may have teased a Diablo 2 remaster during its recent Q4 earnings report. While the game wasn't outright mentioned, we did get some clues from company executive Dennis Durkin:

"So across our three biggest franchises (Candy Crush, Call of Duty, World of Warcraft), we have great momentum. And then we have a few other things up our sleeve in terms of remastered content that will unveil in due course which should provide further opportunities for us this year."

The Division 2 has now received its next-gen console update, super-powering the PlayStation 5 and Xbox Series X/S consoles. The update runs The Division 2 through backwards compatibility, driving up to 4K 60FPS in some cases.

A comparison video was made, and shows the differences between the 3 next-gen consoles:

We know that The Division 2 runs at native the native 4K resolution on Xbox Series X, and drops down to 1080p on the Xbox Series S console. Meanwhile, Sony's next-gen PlayStation 5 console renders it at 1944p -- with the PS5 lagging behind in areas like reflections, fog, anisotropic filtering and draw distance issues in The Division 2 compared to the superior Xbox Series X.

Activision made a record-breaking $8 billion in revenues in 2020 thanks to Warzone, Call of Duty Black Ops Cold War, and World of Warcraft.

Activision did it again. The company has broken its own sales record for a second time, beating 2018's previous $7.5 billion record by over $500 million. Throughout 2020, Activision-Blizzard generated a staggering $8.086 billion in revenues (+25% year-over-year) and handily beating the original yearly sales estimate of $7.675 billion.

The company generated a new all-time profit high of $2.173 billion on the back of the huge revenue gains, alongside a new $2.7 billion operating income record. The publisher attributes these astronomical gains to its new four-part plan, which emphasizes focus on mobile games, full-priced premium games, F2P titles, and monetization. The plan sees big franchises like Call of Duty transforming into a cohesive cross-monetized ecosystem made up of F2P games like Warzone, two premium CoD releases (Modern Warfare and Cold War), and a Call of Duty mobile release.

ZeniMax co-founder Robert Altman has passed away at the age of 74, Bethesda today announced.

Industry icon Robert Altman has died, leaving behind a decades-long string of games and entertainment. A former lawyer, Altman co-founded ZeniMax in 1999 and created the Bethesda parent company alongside Bethesda Softworks founder Chris Weaver. An everlasting legacy of interactive content ensued, solidified with big-name franchises like The Elder Scrolls, eventually branching off into the multi-studio network that includes studios like MachineGames, Arkane, and id.

Altman was reportedly well-liked at Bethesda and key industry figures have chimed in to recount their experiences with the transformative CEO. Bethesda won't be the same without his guidance, and we could see the company shift after Altman's loss and the recent Microsoft acquisition.

With just 667GB of usable space, the PS5's SSD is premium real estate. But there's some good news for PS5 owners: Specific games are now becoming smaller compared to other platforms due to powerful compressing tech.

Control Ultimate Edition is one of the first games to flex the PS5's new Kraken compression tech. The game clocks in just 25GB on PS5 with 4K resolution textures and PS5 optimizations intact, a 42% reduction from the Series X/S file size of 42GB. This isn't a big reduction from the PS4 version, though, which only clocks in at 24GB.

It's worth noting the two consoles use different compression systems. PS5 uses RAD Game Tools' new Oodle Kraken, which massively improves data compression. This new toolset synergizes with the PS5's new highly customized PCIe 4.0 SSD and 12-channel memory controller that enables compressed data speeds of up to 9GB/sec.