🎮 Playstation 6, layoffs at Xbox and mass resignation at Annapurna...
Playstation 6 is in development, Another round of huge layoffs at Xbox, Mass resignation at Annapurna Interactive, Unity cancels runtime fee, but increases license costs and more!
Hello friends,
Today is September 17th 2024 and I hope you’ve had a great week 🙌
In today’s news:
🎮 Playstation 6 is in development
🎮 Another round of huge layoffs at Xbox
🎮 Mass resignation at Annapurna Interactive
🎮 Unity cancels runtime fee, but increases license costs
⚡ Lightning Round!
🫡 True Tribute!
😄 Personal Update
All of this is brought to you in a 5 min format ⏲️
Let’s dig in!
🎮 Playstation 6 is already in development
Well, based on numerous reports in the media, it looks like PS 6 is already in development.
So far there’s not a lot of information about the console, but it’s claimed that it will feature the AMD processor once again as Sony hasn’t reached any conclusions with their negotiations with Intel.
The main concerns are money (of course) and compatibility. Regarding the first, Intel is yet to reach a consensus with Sony on the process prices. However, even with that, Sony’s executives are hesitant to switch because the current generation of consoles use AMD. Jumping back and forth between chip manufacturers poses a very high risk when we talk about backwards compatibility with previous generations. It has always been one of the cornerstones of Sony’s products.
Regardless, it’s still too early to talk shop about the next gen only a week after the initial announcement of PS5 Pro. The PlayStation 6 is still probably years to go, but it’s still interesting how these two news aligned in a week.
🎮 Another round of huge layoffs at Xbox
At the end of last week, we heard another devastating news from Phil Spenser announcing that approximately 650 people from its gaming team will be laid off.
Classically, this news was delivered by Spenser via a company-wide email with a very vague and corporate-approved subject “Changes to Microsoft Gaming”.
The email:
For the past year, our goal has been to minimize disruption while welcoming new teams and enabling them to do their best work. As part of aligning our post-acquisition team structure and managing our business, we have made the decision to eliminate approximately 650 roles across Microsoft Gaming—mostly corporate and supporting functions—to organize our business for long term success.
No games, devices or experiences are being cancelled and no studios are being closed as part of these adjustments today.
Phil
Again, I just hate the corporate slang that reeks of lies and I sympathise with every person who had a distinct displeasure of being affected by this “change”. I hope that someday the suits will be able to look the people in eyes and tell them the truth. But until then, the video games industry struggle continues…
🎮 Mass resignation at Annapurna Interactive
After a failed negotiation to ‘spin off’ the video game branch of Annapurna into a separate entity, the entire staff of 25 people collectively resigned leaving the company’s founder, Megan Ellison, in a very peculiar position.
So far, the people who resigned are reporting that they “are 100% okay” even though “this decision was one of the hardest they have ever had to make”.
Megan Ellison, the founder of Annapurna Pictures and the daughter of Larry Ellison, said:
Our top priority is continuing to support our developer and publishing partners during this transition. We’re committed to not only our existing slate of games but also expanding our presence in the interactive space as we continue to look for opportunities to take a more integrated approach to linear and interactive storytelling across film and TV, gaming, and theater.
I applaud this step, truly. At least someone decided to go all-in with their ideas and not settle for anything but total victory. And I greatly admire the people who fight for what they believe in even if it’s end up costing them a job. I just hope that those brave souls will find their way back into the industry.
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🎮 Unity cancels runtime fee, but increases license costs
Almost a year has passed since Unity announced its controversial runtime fee requirements and now they are cancelling it.
In a statement posted on the company’s website, CEO and president Matt Bromberg said that the runtime fee went against Unity’s overall mission of “democratizing game development”.
However, we can’t pursue that mission in conflict with our customers; at its heart, it must be a partnership built on trust. I’ve been able to connect with many of you over the last three months, and I’ve heard time and time again that you want a strong Unity, and understand that price increases are a necessary part of what enables us to invest in moving gaming forward.
We want to deliver value at a fair price in the right way so that you will continue to feel comfortable building your business over the long term with Unity as your partner.
The plans and tiers are as follows:
Unity Personal License: Will remain free, and have a revenue and funding ceiling for $200,000.
Unity Pro: Starting January 1, 2025, subscription price will be $2,200 per year, per sit. Unity Pro is required of those with more than $200,000 in annual revenue and funding.
Unity Enterprise: Starting January 1, 2025, a 25% subscription price increase will go into effect. Unity Enterprise is required for customers with over $25 million of annual revenue and funding.
It’s interesting how took them a year after implementing it to “realize” that this whole idea went against their mission… Along with some of my friends in the industry, we are half-expecting Matt Bromberg to resign after all these business decisions. By some accounts, it’s claimed that in the past year, the company’s stock price declined over 60% with regards to these decisions that are now being cancelled. So, maybe these major corporations should think about the repercussions of their decisions longer than 5 minutes in the executive meetings. But hey, that’s just one man’s opinion.
⚡ Lightning Round!
1…2…3…Go!
🎮 Palworld will not be free-to-play
Recently there were a lot of discussions about Palworld switching to a free-to-play live-service model. The company itself were debating this possibility and this week they finally reached out with the official statement:
Palworld was never designed with that model in mind, and it would require too much work to adapt the game at this point. Additionally, we are very aware that this just isn’t what our players want, and we always put our players first.
🎮 Until Dawn Remake additional features
With Until Dawn release being only a few weeks away (October 4th), Insider Gaming just released a more detailed breakdown of system requirements and additional features that are going to be part of the game:
Until Dawn on PC receives full DualSense controller support (including haptic feedback and adaptive triggers)
The game supports Nvidia DLSS 3.7 and AMD FSR 3.1 upscaling technologies to improve performance while maintaining visual quality.
If your PC meets the requirements, Until Dawn has various ray-tracing features, including shadows, reflections and Ambient Occlusion. The game also supports Ultrawide Aspect Ratio, allowing players to use ratios such as 21:9, 32:9, 23.9:1 and more.
🎮 Black Myth: Wukong alleged DLC
According to Insider Gaming, the game that’s been on everybody’s minds for the past few weeks could be getting a DLC or expansion in early 2025. According to speculation that are yet to be confirmed, DLC for Black Myth: Wukong is expected to be released sometime around Chinese New Year. That would put it at, or around, the end of January. An announcement of the plans could come sometime in December.
🫡 True Tribute!
Today I wanted to salute
and the recent post about Rigging!Adam is one of the few people who talk about insights in terms of 3D and talks about it very well. Even though I work in the industry, I’ve never seen so many interesting insights. Check it out and it may be very useful to you as it was for me even if you are not a 3D Artist!
😄 Personal Update
I finally got some much-needed respite and now I’m back at it again 😅
During this weekend I got some time to think about a lot of stuff, but I hadn’t had the time to do any real research. So, this week is all about weighing the pros and cons of different approaches, getting the initial setup done (ideally) and then letting you folks know all about it!
If you don’t know what I’m talking about, you can learn all about it here:
Stay tuned!
This is all the news I have for you folks today.
Thanks for making it this far! 🙌
If you feel like supporting me and my work, consider Powering-Up GameDev Relay 🎮
Have a great week!
Alex from Gamedev Relay.
I love the Annapurna story. I heard about that and just had to applaud them for having the courage and resolve to just walk away. Pretty inspiring.
Microsoft lays off hundreds of people...
Annapurna devs: FIRST STRIKE!