I believe its production budget was pegged at between $250m and $350m.

So this particular item in the marketing budget is less than 1% of the development costs.

Weird sales pitch. I’m not sure who he is trying to appeal to here?

If they stole the code that would be copyright infringement.

Wait… How do Trade Secrets work?

I thought that the individuals might be in legal trouble if they violate NDAs or No Compete clauses but that once the “secret” was out it was fair game.

“That being said, I want to call out the way Unity chose to communicate these layoffs. Receiving a 5am email from ‘noreply@unity’ informing me that my role was being ‘eliminated’ and that I’d lose system access by the end of the day felt completely abrupt and impersonal. Unity must do better in how they treat their workers in hard times like this.”

Ouch

Thanks

Availability of Video Games (originally released before 2010) is approximately 13 percent, slightly above pre-World War II audio recordings (10 percent or less) and below the survival rate of American silent films (14 percent).

These are fascinating numbers, do you have a source?

I think you forgot the link text?!

“detachable metal shrapnel”?

There is an interesting list here;

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_best-selling_Nintendo_Switch_video_games

Nintendo includes sales numbers for their successful games in their financial reports so they are well represented but wikipedia also includes 3rd party figures when the publisher has released the numbers.

The top 5 3rd party titles*:

• Monster Hunter Rise
• Starview Valley
• Sulka Game
• Minecraft
• Momotaro Dentetsu: Showa, Heisei, Reiwa Mo Teiban!

* I have overlooked titles like Pokemon and Hyrule Warriors as they are published by Nintendo in some regions.

Its just a warning, if the game is still active people can still access it.

They are just joking about not having friends but the “in the manner it was originally intended” is particularly relevant for dedicated co-op titles.

There a more games released now than ever, there are also more coop campaigns than ever.

https://www.co-optimus.com/games.php?campaign=true&playerCount=2

This site doesn’t seem to let me link to more specific filters but if you set release year to 2024 and choose a specific platform they list 214 PC titles, 128 Switch titles, 124 PS5 titles, and 97 Xbox Series titles from last year !

Edit: its a weird site, it wasn’t applying all the filters in the link it generated. So I’ve simplified the link and summarised the numbers.

Title is accurate!

Nintendo has a lot of active “super mario” trademarks with the USPTO, 79259975 includes the following:

G & S: IC 030: Tea; tea-based beverages; coffee; coffee-based beverages; cocoa; cocoa-based beverages; pastries; candy; ice cream; cookies; chocolate; popcorn; chewing gum; bread; buns; sandwiches; pizzas; pies; cakes; frozen yogurt confections; pancakes; crackers; mints for breath freshening; seasonings; ketchup; dressings for salad; cereal bars; oatmeal; corn flakes; noodles; pasta sauce.

https://www.uspto.gov/trademarks/search

This would limit the supermarket from carrying their own store brand product lines for these product types.

Off the top of my head I can confirm my supermarket stocks their own brand of :

Tea; coffee; cocoa; pastries; candy; ice cream; cookies; chocolate; bread; buns; pies; cakes; seasonings; dressings for salad; cereal bars; oatmeal; corn flakes; pasta sauce.

Admittedly my local is part of a large chain so this may not be typical but even independent supermarkets in my area tend to repackage bulk candies and chocolate under their own label.

An account for PlayStation Network will become optional for these titles on PC.

https://blog.playstation.com/2025/01/29/new-in-game-content-incentives-coming-to-playstation-games-on-pc/

This is very explicitly not making any promises beyond these 4 titles. :\

I’ve lost track, is Helldiver’s 2 still PSN optional but still unavailable in non-PSN regions?

I think Sims 1 was physical only.

As a digital product EA halted distribution of the Sims 2 with very little notice:

On July 16, 2014, Electronic Arts announced the end of support for The Sims 2. As a response, The Sims 2: Ultimate Collection was released at the same time as a limited time offer. The game became available for free download from Origin exclusively following an announcement by EA that they would no longer be supporting the game. This offer ended at 10:00 PDT July 31, 2014.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Sim_2

Oddly it looks like Mac got a version via another distributor not long after ?!

It looks like Rolling Stone included Baulders Gate 3.

That game is recent enough that it hasn’t qualified for Wikipedia’s List of video games considered the best yet.

Wikipedia’s list requires an entry feature on 6 different publications’ “best of” lists so that implies RS may have applied some and haven’t just cribbed directly.

Edit:

For anyone else interested it looks like RS was the 6th list including these three titles so they have now been added over on Wikipedia:

• Tony Hawk’s Pro Skater
• Celeste
• Animal Crossing: New Horizons

I’m a little shocked THPS wasn’t already there.

Tablet as a display and a controller sounds like a workable solution.

I feel like I’ve been hearing this since odyssey.

It sounds dangerous.

Don’t you need the playerbase to attract and retain the whales?

I don’t like the idea of it needing to be patched in.

At launch advanced graphics mode settings could be something that is disabled by default but unlockable (via config.ini setting, console command, cheat code, whatever). Really the implementation isn’t what’s important, just that it is opt-in and the user knows that are leaving the normal settings and entering something that may not work as expected.

Then if they are still supporting the game later the defaults can be changed with a patch but if the devs don’t have that opportunity the community can still document this behaviour on sites like www.pcgamingwiki.com.

It would instantly break compatibility with >99% of windows software.

They are trying with Windows S but i don’t think it has much of a market.

This gamesindustry.biz article is offering less info and context than the press release it is cribbed from.

https://gog.prowly.com/375292-gog-joins-european-federation-of-game-archives-museums-and-preservation-projects-efgamp-expanding-its-game-preservation-efforts

I’ve never heard of EFGAMP, have they weighed in on the Stop Killing Games campaign?

If two platforms share compatibility then developers can choose to target the weaker system and release on both.

For some games this might involve a bit of compromise and cause resentment with the owners of the more powerful system, but for other (simple) games it might not involve any compromise at all.

Either way there are a lot of Switch consoles in the wild and there will be some publisher support for the Switch for a few years yet.

As an example from the other side of the fence ps4 is still getting titles:

https://opencritic.com/browse/ps4/last90

It seems SKG = Stop Killing Games.

I hadn’t seen the acronym before.

The adguard DNS is pretty alright.

https://adguard-dns.io/en/public-dns.html

Skip the app and expand option 2 for instructions for configuring most major platforms.

unless they have a real reason for this new one lol

If they spin this so gen10 Xbox games don’t have to offer feature parity on Series S that will please a few people.

Crazy talk!

It offered some navigational choices within each level from the Medical Pavilion on.

Looks like there has been an update

TLDW?

Stanley is great!

Simulated Gambling: 
Interactive activity within a game that:
a)     resembles or functions like a real world age restricted betting or gambling service; and
b)     does not provide rewards that can be redeemed for real world currency or traded to other players in-game for real world currency.

Note: For example, interactive activity within games that resembles or functions like real world commercial casinos, slot machines, lotteries, sports betting services or other betting services will be simulated gambling.

https://www.legislation.gov.au/F2023L01424/asmade/text

As far as Australia is concerned the mere appearance of a slot machine is enough, it doesn’t need to function like one.

Its a themed slot machine with fictionalised in game currency.

Defeat your landlord in this slot machine roguelike deckbuilder!

If rated today Australia would give it R18+, but it was reviewed before last years changes so it has been grandfathered in at M with the description “Simulated Gambling”.

https://www.classification.gov.au/about-us/media-and-news/news/new-classifications-for-gambling-content-video-games

Simulated gambling seems to have been grouped in as an adjacent issue as some jurisdictions regulate loot boxes.

Balatro is in a similar position in Australia where it is PG on the play store, M on switch and would be R18+ if reviewed today.

Epic needs to pump their MAU stats to look like a legitimate platform. They know what’s going on and are happy to pay.

What I don’t know is what they actually pay the publishers.

Of the OP list astro bot is ps5 only, final fantasy has a PC release scheduled for january and the rest are currently available on steam.

astro bot (4 titles over 11 years), dragon quest (11 titles over 38 years), ace attorney (11 titles over 23 years), or balatro (winning best indie game at both the game awards and the golden joysticks this year)?

It must be a big rock?!

Thanks for presenting your rational, its well reasoned within the definitions you give.

However the definitions might not be as universality accepted as we might like, for example this presents CRPG as synonymous with “role-playing video game” with ARPGs, TRPGs, MMORPGs, etc as subgenres.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Role-playing_video_game

We’re going back to what made those early Diablo games feel so awesome but taking them in some cool, fresh directions

And also, you should win things by watching!