"The sudden closure of several video-game studios at Microsoft Corp.’s Xbox division was the result of a widespread cost-cutting initiative that still isn’t finished.
This week, Xbox began offering voluntary severance agreements to producers, quality assurance testers and other staff at ZeniMax, which it purchased in 2020 for $7.5 billion, according to people familiar with the company’s plans. Others across the Xbox organization have been told that more cuts are on the way.
Speaking about the closures more broadly, Booty said that the company’s studios had been spread too thin — like “peanut butter on bread” — and that leaders across the division had felt understaffed. They decided to close these studios to free up resources elsewhere, he said.
Game Pass has not seen the massive growth that Xbox boss Phil Spencer may have been hoping for."
Embracer Group has released its latest financial statements, and while sales are up, some of the group's games haven't performed so well.
And they'll cancel 50 of them, then lay off their staff within the next couple of years. I think Embracer's new logo should be a Boa Constrictor.
Ubisoft recently shared more details about Assassin's Creed Shadows protagonists, confirming that both of them will romantically attract and be attracted to different types of people.
Feudal Japan DEI LGBTQ+ Samurai, sounds very accurate for the time period. Surely a decision made only with historical accuracy in mind.
You have no idea what you are talking about, bet you didn’t know nobunaga was bi-sexual. Or ran maru his is often depicted as androgynous was a “beautiful boy”.
So yeah, feudal Japan had tons of lgbtq and kawaii enough… A BLACK SAMURAI! All without the need of offending a Caucasian because the world is diverse.
This story has cracked me up so much! Bravo Ubisoft, bravo! 🤣. So last week everyone was upset that in the long-awaited first Assassin’s Creed: Japan game the protagonist is black. But NOW he is also LGBTQ+ ! It’s like the Ubisoft creative team sat around a table and said “How can we best impress our Kotaku/IGN/Polygon friends and antagonise gamers? Let’s make it woke x 100!’ And then they all silent clapped!
Just you wait until the Star Wars: Outlaws details come out, there better not be anybody complaining about Kay Vess’ dating preferences and the gay droid armies.
Lexreborn2 is right
Go read up on Japan's feudal era homosexuality and bisexuality was a very common thing in that time.
I just have to laugh because the same people complaining about this are the same ones crying about wanting "historical accuracy". When it's clear most of the whiners don't even know history themselves.
Facts don't care about downvotes, btw. You either claim to understand historical accuracy or you just admit you don't like the stuff people did throughout history.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wi...
Japan had no Christian stupidity about sexuality.
That's where your nonsensical puritanical view comes from: the Abraham's faiths.
It's feudal Japan, they don't believe in your religion's made up nonsense.
I mean, if you're going to embrace a particular viewpoint, you should at least be aware of where it comes from. Most of the world doesn't care about your ideals.
In those days, they certainly didn't care about your religion.
Get over yourself.
All of you guys missed the point, I even said I'm very sure they did it ONLY because they wanted to be historically accurate. Stop defending this, we all know why they did it and who they want to pander, it's not out newfound respect for history.
@RpgSama
Nobody is defending anything.
People are just pointing out the fact that after they just cried about the game not being historically accurate, when they SHOW they're accurate, they cry about it because they don't like certain parts of history
Not to mention you contradicted yourself RPGSama. You just pointed out you said they "ONLY because they wanted to be historically accurate". Then turn around and accuse them of pandering and/or having an agenda. Those two things are opposing statements
Dumbest decision ever.. always online was a pass for me but now not even for free I’ll try it..
It's made by Ubisoft Montreal.
Obviously we'll be allowed to bang anything that moves.
Oh yeah!!!! What about being inclusive???
I'm sorry
..please replace the word inclusive with stupid.
If they truly aimed for inclusivity they’d make the protagonist an Ainu tribe, this is just Ubisoft getting comfy with Sweet Baby Inc as always.
I thought you crybabies wanted "historical accuracy." Now that your going to get it, you're going to cry more.
It's past the point of retarded, everyone seems forced to do this bullshit now in games. 😑
Hell no. A good game or film is secondary now to the agenda and the 'message'.
It's not enough to be simply entertained these days, there has to be an overarching real world narrative. I mean look at Dr Who as a recent example. Disney have completely destroyed it all in the name of 'diversity'.
Thanks… I was originally going to write Samu-Bi but then I realized it was right there already so it works better
You have to understand they’re incapable of writing a good story so this is the best they could come up with
Well, after last weeks crying about historical accuracy. Now Ubi days, " Oh, okay, historical accuracy: here you go."
Now you're saying you don't want the accuracy? Can you guys just make up your minds?
Many entertainment medias do this nowadays because in an effort to boost the so called “EGS score”, investment companies such as Black Rock stipulated contracts that obligated fund recipient to conform to certain inclusivity standards, either by themselves or consulting with agencies like Sweet Baby Inc or Gaymerx.
It's a genuine click-bait snippet to rile up people like you to push traffic.
They can't help themselves. This path leads to failure. Every single time. But there's no stopping this ESG DEI train. If you don't buy it then the developers will say everyone is racist hompohobes. They will never, ever look inwards and admit that hey, we made a mistake, we gave people what we decided they wanted, not what they actually wanted. They'll blame the fans when it fails.
ESTNN writes: "A leak for Valve's 6v6 3rd-person shooter MOBA has supposedly been released ahead of time. And if the reports are true, fans of the genre have much to be excited for."
They should've had a new L4D like 10 years ago, it can be expanded upon a lot more but they just left it collecting dust.. it was a good game for its time but L4D2 doesn't have nearly enough content these days to keep players engaged, and it needs a serious graphics upgrade
Nice bend at the knee there Gabe. Seriously? A quirky character arena shooter? This late into the me-too-shooter market? I thought you guys were so much better than that crap. Gabe must need a bigger yacht.
clown comment, valve are famous for letting their devs work on whatever they want as they have no share holders to please. hence why we rarely get games from valve but when we do they generally are great.
icefrog, the original modder who created dota on warcraft 3 is working on this with some other members at valve.
We already know 😂
"Speaking about the closures more broadly, Booty said that the company’s studios had been spread too thin — like “peanut butter on bread” — and that leaders across the division had felt understaffed. They decided to close these studios to free up resources elsewhere, he said"
So what you're saying is...you bought all these studios and you guys can't run them.
Jesus.
Reports are suggesting that Game Pass will be getting a price hike soon and that Call of Duty may not be added to the day one offering. I honestly have a hard time believing this but it does beg the question why exactly did GP fail? I think the answer is that it just didn't get the growth that it anticipated. Jim was right but I wish he wasn't because at the end of the day, its gamers, devs and other front-line workers who have to absorb the blow for Spencer and team's miscalculations.
For all the armchair executives who were calling for Sony to release its big-budget AAA games on PS+, the same exact thing would have happened at PlayStation. Game Pass has killed Xbox. Congrats.