Bungie Announces Massive Layoffs

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<v Speaker 1>Bungee announces mass layoffs less than two months after Destiny
<v Speaker 1>to the Final Shapes launch. This comes from Eddie mccuitt
<v Speaker 1>game Spot. We talked about this a little bit yesterday,
<v Speaker 1>but let's get into it and kind of try to
<v Speaker 1>answer as many questions as we possibly can. But let's
<v Speaker 1>recap first here from Eddie. Destiny developer Bungee has announced
<v Speaker 1>a significant round of layoffs and what is just the
<v Speaker 1>latest example of a major studio cutting hundreds of jobs.
<v Speaker 1>The company also revealed a brand new game, but it
<v Speaker 1>will no longer be developed internally and is shifting to
<v Speaker 1>a new internal studio at PlayStation. In a blog post,
<v Speaker 1>Bungee executive Pete Parsons confirm the company as cutting about
<v Speaker 1>seventeen percent of its workforce, or around two hundred and
<v Speaker 1>twenty people. Late last year, Bungie had a round of
<v Speaker 1>layoffs affecting more than one hundred people due to rising
<v Speaker 1>costs of development and industry shifts, as well as enduring
<v Speaker 1>economic conditions. It has become clear that we need to
<v Speaker 1>make substantial changes to our cost structure, and folks development
<v Speaker 1>efforts entirely on Destiny and Marathon a key one there.
<v Speaker 1>Everybody will talk about that here in a second, the
<v Speaker 1>executive said, layoffs are happening at every level of Bungie.
<v Speaker 1>And if you go on Twitter and you see people
<v Speaker 1>from Bunge's talking about getting laid off, it's from every
<v Speaker 1>studio across the board. No one was spared. Basically, it's
<v Speaker 1>that rough. And that's seventeen percent numbers. Gen Like, when
<v Speaker 1>we talk about these layoffs throughout this year, it's been
<v Speaker 1>five to eight percent. Bungee already had around a layoffs
<v Speaker 1>last October, so to have another seventeen percent cut, they
<v Speaker 1>are making deep cuts at Bungie. It is going to
<v Speaker 1>be a completely different company after all is said and done.
<v Speaker 1>But let's get into some of these details. Pete Parsons
<v Speaker 1>was talking there because Pete Parsons is not leaving. That
<v Speaker 1>is the CEO of Bungie, and to say he's disliked
<v Speaker 1>seems like at this point a little bit of an understatement.
<v Speaker 1>The response to him on Twitter from former Bungie employees,
<v Speaker 1>people who had already left and people who were likely
<v Speaker 1>laid off in the last round. They mostly hate this
<v Speaker 1>guy and they blame him, and they think it's mostly
<v Speaker 1>his fault. Do you think that a new Bungee can
<v Speaker 1>emerge while still under Pete Parsons in any way wholeheartedly?
<v Speaker 2>No, nothing with confidence or any sense of longevity to
<v Speaker 2>the team. I would feel, you know, I think as
<v Speaker 2>a fledgling new developer breaking into the scene, having Bungee
<v Speaker 2>on your resume is going to be incredibly impressive. I
<v Speaker 2>just don't know how long that sentence would be honestly
<v Speaker 2>under Pete Parsons, because you know, I feel like Destiny
<v Speaker 2>too made him massive swing back into the audience's like
<v Speaker 2>positive side and the good side. And only to hear
<v Speaker 2>this immediate, not immediately, but like a couple of weeks
<v Speaker 2>after that DLC dropped has got to be gutting. Especially
<v Speaker 2>it's hard to be a Destiny fan on top of
<v Speaker 2>staying on top of all the lore and whatever is
<v Speaker 2>happening constantly in that game. Content lately far and few between,
<v Speaker 2>especially substantial content that hits with majority of the audience
<v Speaker 2>and brings any laps players back into Destiny. Have you
<v Speaker 2>seen grub the I think I saw this posted by
<v Speaker 2>some ex bungee folk. The car auctions I.
<v Speaker 1>Saw, I saw a little bit of this. The number
<v Speaker 1>I saw it was like potentially up to two point
<v Speaker 1>three billion or millions. You'd be million dollars in classic
<v Speaker 1>car auction wins just by Pete Parsons.
<v Speaker 2>Just by Pete Parsons. Yes, Yeah, And if a CEO
<v Speaker 2>is I don't know parsons other investments, if he has
<v Speaker 2>any or his other projects, or is what his bank account,
<v Speaker 2>But if a CEO is making that much money to
<v Speaker 2>be participating in fancy used old car auctions, I think
<v Speaker 2>the problem doesn't lie at the bottom line that he
<v Speaker 2>is cutting and cutting lies at the top. And this
<v Speaker 2>is the pattern we've seen, like across the board with
<v Speaker 2>majority of these layoffs right grub Like the people at
<v Speaker 2>the top, the CEOs whatever, sweet people don't want to
<v Speaker 2>take the accountability that any of anything underperforming or being
<v Speaker 2>too costly is on their part. It's always the problem
<v Speaker 2>is always the people that are actually making the games,
<v Speaker 2>which does not make sense.
<v Speaker 1>Yeah, especially in this case where you know a lot
<v Speaker 1>of that money for Pete Parsons likely came from selling
<v Speaker 1>to Sony in the first place, where you know he
<v Speaker 1>had a huge steak in Bungee likely and was able
<v Speaker 1>to get. I don't know. It would have surprised me
<v Speaker 1>if his compensation alone was five hundred million dollars or
<v Speaker 1>something like that. As part of that deal or something
<v Speaker 1>like that could be that high. So he's got a
<v Speaker 1>lot of money sitting around that he's going to spend
<v Speaker 1>on and that stuff whatever. But when he made that deal,
<v Speaker 1>he was making promises on behalf of all of Bungie
<v Speaker 1>and put them in a situation that led to this.
<v Speaker 1>This is all due to him being like, we can
<v Speaker 1>meet these demands from Sony that we need to make
<v Speaker 1>in order to maintain our independence, which was not just
<v Speaker 1>important to him, it was important to ever win at Bungee.
<v Speaker 1>That's why everyone kind of went along with it, because
<v Speaker 1>they were going to be able to maintain their independence,
<v Speaker 1>and the only way they wouldn't be able to do
<v Speaker 1>that is if they had some sort of catastropticostrophic failure
<v Speaker 1>or the numbers the initial numbers were too high, and frankly,
<v Speaker 1>they just they promised too much. Because Destiny too was
<v Speaker 1>in a situation where it can have success. It had success,
<v Speaker 1>Lightfall did pretty well, and then the final shit is
<v Speaker 1>critically beloved. People thought this is the best Destiny two's
<v Speaker 1>ever been. But if you look at the numbers, like
<v Speaker 1>I put a chart here at the bottom of this
<v Speaker 1>story jam from steam dB, which is you could see
<v Speaker 1>that Lightfall came out in like what was that's around
<v Speaker 1>early twenty twenty three, and the number of concurrent users
<v Speaker 1>on Steam peaked and then we see just now at
<v Speaker 1>this d mark here either the one the image you're
<v Speaker 1>looking at jen is when the final shape came out,
<v Speaker 1>and it's about as high as Lightfall. It's basically right
<v Speaker 1>in line they got. They had the same performance in
<v Speaker 1>the market as Lightfall, and it's like, yeah, they have
<v Speaker 1>the players that are playing are playing Destiny now and
<v Speaker 1>they did not shape this game in anything in any
<v Speaker 1>real way to be like, this is a relaunch, This
<v Speaker 1>is going to be an onboarding event for new people
<v Speaker 1>to come in. This is paying off a year's long event.
<v Speaker 1>This is the culmination of ten years of storytelling and
<v Speaker 1>all that stuff. It is going to be very hard
<v Speaker 1>to attract new players at that time. And this is
<v Speaker 1>when they needed to be growing to be able to
<v Speaker 1>keep up with their with the deal that they made
<v Speaker 1>with Sony. So when you have six hundred people, and
<v Speaker 1>you know, once you did have pretty decent compensation, like
<v Speaker 1>pretty generous compensation packages relatively compared to the rest of
<v Speaker 1>the industry. And then you spend four more months on
<v Speaker 1>the final shape compared to what you spend on Lightfall,
<v Speaker 1>and then you get the same performance, and really it's
<v Speaker 1>kind of a little bit worse because it is declining
<v Speaker 1>faster than what Life Ball did in terms of concurrent players.
<v Speaker 1>You could see that. It's like it's a recipe for
<v Speaker 1>this sort of thing. And after you know, keeping the
<v Speaker 1>right people, which is something that Pete Parsons said to
<v Speaker 1>employees last time during the last round of layoffs, and
<v Speaker 1>then they come out and make a great game and
<v Speaker 1>it performs in line with what the expectations should have been,
<v Speaker 1>and then everyone gets laid off because they didn't do
<v Speaker 1>something magical. That is clearly mismanagement by Pete Parsons and
<v Speaker 1>the whole executive leadership team. So and now, to be fair,
<v Speaker 1>people on the leadership team are getting laid off. There
<v Speaker 1>are like the chief business officer, there's a handful of
<v Speaker 1>people from the c suite level that are getting laid off.
<v Speaker 1>It's just not Pete Parsons, and that's why people are like,
<v Speaker 1>step down, Pete, you should just resign. And I don't
<v Speaker 1>think it's out of the question because BUNGHI is moving
<v Speaker 1>under PlayStation Studios and maybe once that transition happens, Sony
<v Speaker 1>will cut him. I don't know.
<v Speaker 2>I either way, if when Pete Parsons leaves, the sore
<v Speaker 2>spot for me is that he's going to get a
<v Speaker 2>generous package as he exits the company. Either way, whether
<v Speaker 2>he gets cut from Sony or PlayStation from a top
<v Speaker 2>level or he decides to leave on his own accord,
<v Speaker 2>he's going to have a generous compensation package as he exits,
<v Speaker 2>despite gutting the company and like you know, displacing hundreds
<v Speaker 2>of people and now especially across the board in different
<v Speaker 2>levels of Bungee, right, Like I hate whenever we have
<v Speaker 2>a massive round of layoffs, just seeing people pop up
<v Speaker 2>on Twitter saying like I've been at this company for
<v Speaker 2>X amount of years and you see like the loyalty
<v Speaker 2>from like those employees. You see how much working at Bungee,
<v Speaker 2>working at X Studio meant to them, only for the
<v Speaker 2>rugs to get pulled underneath them, like and it absolutely stinks.
<v Speaker 1>Grub Yep.
<v Speaker 2>It's great to see that Destiny Too is able to
<v Speaker 2>like reach that same number of players, but like the
<v Speaker 2>drop off is so immediate, and you know, like maybe
<v Speaker 2>pouring those same people if you didn't let them go,
<v Speaker 2>could sustain that player count for an extended period of time.
<v Speaker 2>But I feel like the Destiny Too audience is just
<v Speaker 2>going to keep coming back for like maybe a big
<v Speaker 2>event like this, and then drop off immediately. And I
<v Speaker 2>don't know if like those spikes are going to keep
<v Speaker 2>Destiny Too healthy or even if that playership there is
<v Speaker 2>to translate eventually to Marathon. And now I worry about
<v Speaker 2>Marathon's launch as a whole.
<v Speaker 1>Yep. And uh, you know, clearly we like the thing
<v Speaker 1>that can get new players in is something like a
<v Speaker 1>Destiny three. But let's let's talk about that that quote
<v Speaker 1>from Pete Parsons where it's let's see what at the
<v Speaker 1>end there, we need to focus development efforts entirely on
<v Speaker 1>Destiny and Marathon. So what does that mean? Well, basically,
<v Speaker 1>they are going to continue working on Marathon and Destiny Too.
<v Speaker 1>They're going to keep making new content for Destiny Too.
<v Speaker 1>Now when it comes to Destiny to the expectation, uh,
<v Speaker 1>I believe internally is that the future content will be lighter, smaller,
<v Speaker 1>to take less time than what the final shape did,
<v Speaker 1>require fewer people, so there will be expansions and updates,
<v Speaker 1>but they will be sort of not a shell of
<v Speaker 1>their former selves, but they could. They'll definitely have that
<v Speaker 1>vibe about them. And then Marathon, Yeah, yeah, go ahead.
<v Speaker 2>That's definitely not what the any two audience wants. There
<v Speaker 2>has been conditioned to expect. Do they know, are they
<v Speaker 2>waiting for things to blow up in their face?
<v Speaker 1>Scrub it? I mean, I don't know. I feel like
<v Speaker 1>they're in that one of those rocks and hard places
<v Speaker 1>where they feel like they don't have enough to like
<v Speaker 1>start something new and to and they feel like they
<v Speaker 1>have to make money now and to like shift like
<v Speaker 1>they are not ready to go to Destiny three. We'll
<v Speaker 1>talk about it more here in a second, but they
<v Speaker 1>are not ready to do that. And so it's like
<v Speaker 1>it's got to be on Marathon. That's still years away,
<v Speaker 1>but they are gonna get working on that. That's the
<v Speaker 1>next big release that they're hoping will hit. So got
<v Speaker 1>a lot's riding on that, and you feel like things
<v Speaker 1>could blow up in their face when it comes to
<v Speaker 1>that if it doesn't go the right way. Now, Bunch's
<v Speaker 1>still a very talented team. They still will have a
<v Speaker 1>lot of talented people there, but morale's got to be low.
<v Speaker 1>And believing that Marathon is the answer to all their
<v Speaker 1>problems is likely something that no one there actually believed.
<v Speaker 1>So yeah, destiny to continuing to go, probably starting up
<v Speaker 1>some some new seasons or whatever, and and and being
<v Speaker 1>being the primary going concern is is going to be
<v Speaker 1>number one? And then Marathon being right there having a
<v Speaker 1>lot of people working on that now, uh there. It
<v Speaker 1>was that third game, Gummy Bears, which did leak a
<v Speaker 1>while ago. Uh it is it was when it leaked,
<v Speaker 1>it was a mobile mobile like game. And that is
<v Speaker 1>spinning out onto onto a a new team that will
<v Speaker 1>be under PlayStation Sony Interactive for entertainment, but they will
<v Speaker 1>be in a an office that's still in like Bunchie's office.
<v Speaker 1>Is that sort of thing that also doesn't feel like
<v Speaker 1>an answer, But that's not under Bungee anymore. Right, that's
<v Speaker 1>under PlayStation Studios. It's outside of Bunge, but they are
<v Speaker 1>not closing that down. Now. What is going on the
<v Speaker 1>shelf is payback. This is what was also leaked and
<v Speaker 1>reported to be maybe Destiny three technically not Destiny three.
<v Speaker 1>They internally they would refer to it as the next Destiny.
<v Speaker 1>I don't know necessarily what the distinction is there, Jam,
<v Speaker 1>but they think there's a distinction there. But that is
<v Speaker 1>going on the shelf indefinitely, according to the people I've
<v Speaker 1>talked to. And so either way, like, let's be clear,
<v Speaker 1>a Destiny three or Next Destiny is just not the
<v Speaker 1>thing that they are going to be coming out of
<v Speaker 1>this looking toward, let alone working on in any real way.
<v Speaker 1>And next Toy is a very good one, chat, thank
<v Speaker 1>you very much. I don't to me, it sounds like
<v Speaker 1>a mess. I don't know, it sounds like a huge mess.
<v Speaker 2>And like these messes start from the top crub right,
<v Speaker 2>like they come from mismanagement across the board, and especially
<v Speaker 2>like you are screwing with a developer that has a
<v Speaker 2>deep roster of very talented devs and then like how
<v Speaker 2>do you expect any of them to work at full
<v Speaker 2>capacity when most of their teams that they've worked with
<v Speaker 2>for years and years developed deep bonds and like just
<v Speaker 2>like workflows together are are now gone suddenly from the company,
<v Speaker 2>like Morales like you said, it's got to be at
<v Speaker 2>an all time low, and especially when you are trying
<v Speaker 2>to solve the problem of Destiny to retention and then
<v Speaker 2>trying to lure new players laps players back into Destiny three.
<v Speaker 2>That is like the that isn't an uphill climb at
<v Speaker 2>this point, Greb, you were climbing up a greasy, oily
<v Speaker 2>ladder at this point. And I don't know about you,
<v Speaker 2>but I don't normally like to do that.
<v Speaker 1>Yeah, I try to avoid that wherever possible. We just
<v Speaker 1>clarify a few things here from my notes and from
<v Speaker 1>some stuff let's here. Yeah, those expansions for Destiny too, expansions,
<v Speaker 1>they're not even using that term internally anymore. They're calling
<v Speaker 1>them content packs. So like what that should put it
<v Speaker 1>into perspective, Like what you should expect from Destiny to
<v Speaker 1>going forward. They want Destiny to to keep being a thing,
<v Speaker 1>but the investment level is going to pair back in
<v Speaker 1>a significant, significant way. Meanwhile, they still think Marathon is
<v Speaker 1>actually coming out in twenty twenty five, So I'm correcting that, right,
<v Speaker 1>I said years away twenty twenty five, and I'm told
<v Speaker 1>that expectations are sky high. They are enormous for that game.
<v Speaker 1>So that goes back to that leadership of what are
<v Speaker 1>you telling PlayStation and then what are you putting on
<v Speaker 1>the line. What's the collateral that you are putting that
<v Speaker 1>you are betting and putting on the table that that
<v Speaker 1>gets lost if you don't hit those expectations. And based
<v Speaker 1>on what's happened time and time again now with with
<v Speaker 1>Bungie under under PlayStation, probably a.
<v Speaker 2>Lot I would have to imagine there are rumblings within PlayStation.
<v Speaker 2>They made this huge investment in buying an acquiring Bungee
<v Speaker 2>because they knew how much of an asset it could be,
<v Speaker 2>only to see you know, player account dwind and then
<v Speaker 2>now all of this like negative buzz about the company
<v Speaker 2>prior to even to this round of layoffs, Like still
<v Speaker 2>I feel like we were feeling the effects of the
<v Speaker 2>last round of layoffs and the only thing to kind
<v Speaker 2>of like put that to bed was the positive reception
<v Speaker 2>to the last DLC that came out for Destiny Too.
<v Speaker 2>And now this happens again. I got to feel that
<v Speaker 2>people at PlayStation they have to be upset at this mismanagement, right,
<v Speaker 2>like they have to step in at some point, and
<v Speaker 2>maybe they're stepping in ever so slightly with like the
<v Speaker 2>Little Gummy Bear team. I hate that. That is the
<v Speaker 2>most intriguing thing from this.
<v Speaker 1>They're stepping in in a big way though. I mean
<v Speaker 1>by shifting Bungee under PlayStation, that's something we talked a
<v Speaker 1>little bit more about yesterday and that I talked about
<v Speaker 1>on Twitter. Yeah, Herman Holt now fully is, like I say,
<v Speaker 1>runs Bungie. He's not like taking over Pete Parson's role.
<v Speaker 1>He's not the CEO of Bungie or something like that.
<v Speaker 1>But like any other studio, Bungee now exist under Sony
<v Speaker 1>Interactive Entertainment's PlayStation Worldwide Studios banner, and that that clearly
<v Speaker 1>is going to be very different. It means they have
<v Speaker 1>to answer to to PlayStation in a way that like
<v Speaker 1>just a little bit ago, every PlayStation studio was answering
<v Speaker 1>to Bungee, like and if they had a live service thing,
<v Speaker 1>it's like, hey, is your life service thing good enough? Well,
<v Speaker 1>here's Bunchie to tell you no or yes? Oh my lord.
<v Speaker 2>Is Pete Parson's response single handly responsible for the Last
<v Speaker 2>of Us project being shelved in Concord making the green light.
<v Speaker 1>I mean, it definitely seems like that's a big part
<v Speaker 1>of it. Now, whether that's like Pete Parson's showing up
<v Speaker 1>or not, I have no idea.
<v Speaker 2>I'm a blame them, Yeah, I'm a blame them.
<v Speaker 1>Yeah, that's that seems fair. But yeah, I meaning Goober.
<v Speaker 1>We do know the last of Us Factions game was
<v Speaker 1>like big part of that was was a Bungie showed up.
<v Speaker 1>It was like this, there's some issues and there almost
<v Speaker 1>certainly were there almost certainly weren't going to be problems
<v Speaker 1>with that game running it's a live service, but they
<v Speaker 1>showed up and highlighted them. And Sony I don't know
<v Speaker 1>if they panicked or something, but they definitely pulled back
<v Speaker 1>from that game because of that. So, yeah, it is.
<v Speaker 1>It's it's a mess, is what it is. And I
<v Speaker 1>feel for everyone that is going to have to like
<v Speaker 1>try to like push through this. There's that the two
<v Speaker 1>hundred and twenty people who are just cut. There's one
<v Speaker 1>hundred and fifty ish people that are being moved from
<v Speaker 1>Bungee over to Sony Interactive Entertainment, And I bet a
<v Speaker 1>lot of those people are like, wait, what does that
<v Speaker 1>look like? What am I doing? What job do I? Like?
<v Speaker 1>What do you am? I? Really going to be protected here.
<v Speaker 1>It's yes, what does that mean? It's got to be
<v Speaker 1>very confusing, and again having just you know, a couple
<v Speaker 1>of mistakes made by people at the top who are
<v Speaker 1>too busy buying cars instead and having like rip apart
<v Speaker 1>so many people's lives one way or the other, either
<v Speaker 1>losing their jobs or being shifted around and whipped around
<v Speaker 1>to some other department. That is rough stuff. And I
<v Speaker 1>just don't know how. I mean, I think part of
<v Speaker 1>like when I look at the player numbers of Destiny
<v Speaker 1>on on Steam, I get people are like just the
<v Speaker 1>morale of the community seems low. They're like, wow, oh,
<v Speaker 1>I don't want to all play that God, and then
<v Speaker 1>like but I'm gonna invest my time in that, and
<v Speaker 1>they're just gonna give me content packs going forward. It
<v Speaker 1>feels like a death spiral.
<v Speaker 2>It feels like a death spiral, especially when you know
<v Speaker 2>there are other games as a service live service games
<v Speaker 2>out there that are I don't want to say, taking
<v Speaker 2>care of their community where at least addressing the needs
<v Speaker 2>in a more dynamic way than Bunge has been able
<v Speaker 2>to because of all of the shit happening there. Grub
<v Speaker 2>uh refresh my memory please, What is Marathon supposed to be.
<v Speaker 1>An extraction shooter? Why? Yeah, because that's the buzzword. Yeah,
<v Speaker 1>I don't know. I think I listen Marathon originally on
<v Speaker 1>mac a game. I think I played when it got
<v Speaker 1>ported to something once. You know, it was a first
<v Speaker 1>person shooter, an early first person shooter. And now when yes,
<v Speaker 1>and then two years ago when they were starting to
<v Speaker 1>talk about this, I bet a lot of people from
<v Speaker 1>the Bungee team were playing Tarkoff and they're like, we
<v Speaker 1>could do the Bungie version of this, and that's still
<v Speaker 1>there's still some promise there. I feel like, you know,
<v Speaker 1>like Call of Duty war Zone was like clearly yeah,
<v Speaker 1>there was Fortnite, clearly Fortnite right away crack the nut
<v Speaker 1>on having a very broadly appealing battle rayale game. But
<v Speaker 1>Call of Duty war Zone was the one that's like,
<v Speaker 1>and here's like, it's just like Arcadie and uh, and
<v Speaker 1>it's for that Call of Duty audience and all that stuff.
<v Speaker 1>There is a world in which Bungie could be the
<v Speaker 1>one that like cracked that nut on extraction shooters for
<v Speaker 1>that audience as well, but who knows. It's It's expectations
<v Speaker 1>seem like they're even higher than like what it would
<v Speaker 1>look like if they did that. You know, you just
<v Speaker 1>turning on the volume on that. It seems pretty loud.
<v Speaker 1>All right, Jan, let's move along here. I'm gonna go
<v Speaker 1>to this next story down here. Dragon Age the Veilguard
<v Speaker 1>will reveal its release date in August. This is from
<v Speaker 1>air hittlback Fruru at Game Reactor. Last week, byowhere reiterated
<v Speaker 1>that dragon Age the Veilguard is still set to come
<v Speaker 1>out in twenty twenty four and that we'll get the
<v Speaker 1>release date later this summer. We now something more specific
<v Speaker 1>about that last part and more. BioWare confirms that dragon
<v Speaker 1>Age the Veilguard's release date will be announced in August,
<v Speaker 1>and that's now. That's this month. It doesn't stop there either,
<v Speaker 1>as the Blood and Studio will also share details about
<v Speaker 1>its plans for expansions, DLC and more at the same time.
<v Speaker 1>Last I heard is it's going to be October. Jan. Oh, yeah,
<v Speaker 1>I think that's that was like weeks ago. That could
<v Speaker 1>have changed. Obviously, they didn't give a date for a reason.
<v Speaker 1>I'm gonna deal with this, TV. So are you looking
<v Speaker 1>forward to Dragon Age the Veilguard?
<v Speaker 2>Yes, I am looking forward to Dragon Age the Veil Guard.
<v Speaker 2>I know that there was some odd reception when they
<v Speaker 2>had Bethesa had announced the name change from Dreadwolf to
<v Speaker 2>the rail Guard. BioWare It's all the bees, man.
<v Speaker 1>I get them mixed up to conflate them all the time.
<v Speaker 2>I'm trying to protect the hive, but these different b
<v Speaker 2>companies keep messing with me. But hearing Lucy James talk
<v Speaker 2>about her time revisiting Dragon Age, the twenty fourteen game
<v Speaker 2>a couple bombcasts ago had me intrigued because I never
<v Speaker 2>checked out the original Dragon Age. I kind of just
<v Speaker 2>appreciate it from the periphery. But now I'm thinking, you
<v Speaker 2>boy might try and dig in. We also had the
<v Speaker 2>Veilguard parts of the Vailguard team in the fandom comic
<v Speaker 2>con stew To interview during a comic con. And I
<v Speaker 2>love it when I'm convinced to play a game based
<v Speaker 2>off of the enthusiasm of the folks making the game.
<v Speaker 2>Party scenes like there's pr and marketing talk going on
<v Speaker 2>all the time, and like trailers, they can wow you,
<v Speaker 2>they can assuay you. But seeing a passionate dev that
<v Speaker 2>has devoted years of their life to a game, it's infectious,
<v Speaker 2>and I want to see the game that they are
<v Speaker 2>waxing so poetically about, so I think I'm also excited. Also,
<v Speaker 2>I need to fill out and pad my roster for
<v Speaker 2>Fantasy Critic.
<v Speaker 1>Yes, absolutely, uh uh yeah, I agree with you one
<v Speaker 1>on that because every time I hear anything from this
<v Speaker 1>game about this game, or we hear publicly about this game,
<v Speaker 1>people seem pretty confident about it behind the scenes, and
<v Speaker 1>it's that that is infectious, as you said. And yeah, yeah,
<v Speaker 1>I'm looking here. It's still October. Late October though, so
<v Speaker 1>that you know, again, that could shift between now when
<v Speaker 1>they actually announced the date, but I expect that probably
<v Speaker 1>to be the time because it's been the time for
<v Speaker 1>like what they've been naming for for a while now
<v Speaker 1>for the last few months. So late October for Dragon
<v Speaker 1>Age the Veil Guard that feels like a really good
<v Speaker 1>holiday game, feels like exactly the kind of RPG people
<v Speaker 1>will be wanting at that at that time.
<v Speaker 2>So yeah, October not only the month that I and
<v Speaker 2>Alex Bonyela were born in, it's also it's also gonna
<v Speaker 2>seems like it might be a month of the Dragons,
<v Speaker 2>because not only Dragon Age the Veiled Guard, but dragon
<v Speaker 2>ball z sparking zero right, also dropping.
<v Speaker 1>It's dragon mont everybody here on giant bottom. I'm back,
<v Speaker 1>watch out.
<v Speaker 2>I was gonna, oh but that's not the sound dragon snake.
<v Speaker 1>Also, I just said, I got a little text here
<v Speaker 1>says I can't answer chance question why is Marathon an
<v Speaker 1>extraction shooter? So I like, then the people, the people
<v Speaker 1>in the know don't really know the answer to that. Hey, hey,
<v Speaker 1>who knows?
<v Speaker 2>Uh? I this makes this terrifies me, grou Like, how
<v Speaker 2>many times do I pop up on a fucking text
<v Speaker 2>chain to someone?
<v Speaker 1>Yeah? Right? Yeah, that the ears are burning or the
<v Speaker 1>nose itches? Which one's that you sneeze? See it makes
<v Speaker 1>you sneeze? Yeah, like looking at the sun, or when
<v Speaker 1>people text about you. All right, let's uh, let's say.
<v Speaker 2>You slide into people's d MS about me. You can't
<v Speaker 2>do whatever you want? Yeah with my nudes? Oh sorry
<v Speaker 2>they're out there anyhow. Yeah, listen, everybody stand back.
<v Speaker 1>Yeah. I'm looking forward to this game now more and more.
<v Speaker 1>I think that the game will have another chance here
<v Speaker 1>to make that new first impression because that souber game
<v Speaker 1>Fest trailer I think confused a lot of people. The
<v Speaker 1>cinematic trailer, and I think that they will recognize that
<v Speaker 1>and whatever they come with for this next sort of
<v Speaker 1>marketing beat, they will hit hit people with exactly like
<v Speaker 1>here's the game, and here's what's going to feel like
<v Speaker 1>to play the game. And I think that'll be a
<v Speaker 1>big win for that.
<v Speaker 2>I would love a more focused showcase of the game
<v Speaker 2>like that. Also, I'm pitching this now. Maybe we play
<v Speaker 2>through some of the original dragon Age dragen Age, dragan Age.
<v Speaker 1>Oh hell yeah, that would rule. Okay, let's do it,
<v Speaker 1>all right, Well, let's take a quick break when we
<v Speaker 1>get back. There's plenty more headlines to get into, including
<v Speaker 1>a little teas about the next Battlefield. I think we
<v Speaker 1>take your nap. All right, We are back and the
<v Speaker 1>kids are watching Bluey everybody so stand back. Oh no, no,
<v Speaker 1>look that's inside out to YouTube videos. Never mind eats's
<v Speaker 1>next Battlefield game, saying it's among company's most ambitious projects ever.
<v Speaker 1>This is from Eddie mccoough at GameSpot. EA's Battlefield twenty
<v Speaker 1>forty two was something of a disappointment for the company,
<v Speaker 1>but the franchise remains popular and is set to expand
<v Speaker 1>with a major new installment. During EA's earnings briefing, CEO
<v Speaker 1>Andrew Wilson said making the new Battlefield game is a
<v Speaker 1>top priority for EA right now, adding that the company
<v Speaker 1>has high hopes for the project. The community is energized
<v Speaker 1>by what our teams are doing and excited for what
<v Speaker 1>comes next. This is not just one of our top priorities,
<v Speaker 1>it is also one of the most ambitious projects in
<v Speaker 1>our history. We have brought together the very best team
<v Speaker 1>coupled with the resources and technology they need to deliver
<v Speaker 1>an epic battlefield experience. Yeah, then they are using the
<v Speaker 1>word experience, jan do you think this is something that
<v Speaker 1>will be set up as a platform and also them
<v Speaker 1>calling the most ambitious thing ever? Can this be like
<v Speaker 1>free to play or does it have to be another massive,
<v Speaker 1>seventy dollars game.
<v Speaker 2>I' just trying to be a big tria, a first
<v Speaker 2>person shooter and how you exist in the lives of gamers,
<v Speaker 2>because you know, we see Call of Duty making odd pivots,
<v Speaker 2>but Call of Duty is definitely transitioned to be a
<v Speaker 2>platform where you have a campaign, you have the multiplayer,
<v Speaker 2>you have the battle Royale mode. I think if they
<v Speaker 2>want to make a big, big swing making Battlefield free
<v Speaker 2>to play and attaching like a decent battle pass or
<v Speaker 2>parks if you are paying for whatever in Battlefield could
<v Speaker 2>be good. God, I remember the launch of twenty forty
<v Speaker 2>two KRUP that was absolutely abysmal.
<v Speaker 1>Yeah, it felt like it had such a chance. I
<v Speaker 1>remember being excited about like tornadoes in the middle of
<v Speaker 1>combat and stuff, be like, man, that seems like anything
<v Speaker 1>could happen. That's great, and then it's just something. It
<v Speaker 1>just was such a dud or and it was like
<v Speaker 1>so hard to convince people to play or buy the
<v Speaker 1>game in the first place and things like that. So, yeah,
<v Speaker 1>it just had so many disadvantages.
<v Speaker 2>Yeah, and missing a lot of features at launch as well,
<v Speaker 2>if I remember right. So I hope at least whenever
<v Speaker 2>this next Battlefield game comes out, it feels more like
<v Speaker 2>a fuller package rather than you know, like I'm being
<v Speaker 2>scammed out of my money here, missing a lot of
<v Speaker 2>base things that I've quality of life things for the player.
<v Speaker 1>I don't know.
<v Speaker 2>I feel like maybe going free to play, especially with
<v Speaker 2>a scale that Battlefield plays at, could be interesting. At
<v Speaker 2>least you could lead to a very good positive boom
<v Speaker 2>at launch, and maybe Battlefield doesn't take itself so seriously.
<v Speaker 2>It already doesn't based off of like the clips I've seen,
<v Speaker 2>they just lean all the way in. Just just give
<v Speaker 2>me a g They're not gonna have a Captain toadskin.
<v Speaker 2>What am I thinking?
<v Speaker 1>Give me a rule though?
<v Speaker 2>Uh? Throwing the rabbits, No, that's U be soft throwing
<v Speaker 2>the rabbits anyway?
<v Speaker 1>Yeah, why not? Yeah, they're done with Mario for now,
<v Speaker 1>so yeah, go back, give the rabbits the battlefield. So
<v Speaker 1>I think when they talk about like experience, I think
<v Speaker 1>they are saying without saying that they see what Cold
<v Speaker 1>Duty does with its launcher and having all the different
<v Speaker 1>options for people in there, and they will approach something
<v Speaker 1>like that with Battlefield. So I bet there will be both, right.
<v Speaker 1>There will be the seventy dollars Battlefield game that has
<v Speaker 1>the traditional multiplayer that has a campaign that has all
<v Speaker 1>kinds of other stuff in there and probably gets you
<v Speaker 1>extra stuff in the rest of the launcher. But then
<v Speaker 1>there will be that there's that Ripple effect you know
<v Speaker 1>right here from Eddie. Let's just read this earlier. Earlier
<v Speaker 1>this year, it was reported to the next Battlefield will
<v Speaker 1>have a free to play battle reale mode created by
<v Speaker 1>Ripple Effect. The next game in the first person a
<v Speaker 1>shooter franchise won't arrive until twenty twenty five at the earliest,
<v Speaker 1>and still doesn't have an official name, So you have
<v Speaker 1>the ripple effect battle Royale mode over here, whatever ends
<v Speaker 1>up turning into maybe Batterley I won't be the thing
<v Speaker 1>at that point, but probably And that's free to play
<v Speaker 1>over here, just like war Zone. And then Battlefield Traditional
<v Speaker 1>is over here, just like Call of Duty. And now
<v Speaker 1>I think the problem with that is Battlefield is always
<v Speaker 1>chasing call of Duty and never matches call of Duty,
<v Speaker 1>and sometimes and then when it fails to match call
<v Speaker 1>of Duty time after time, it gets knocked down much
<v Speaker 1>harder than Call of Duty ever gets knocked down. But
<v Speaker 1>what I mean, do they have any other options here?
<v Speaker 1>I don't know. I don't know.
<v Speaker 2>I feel like the Battlefield team is also kind of
<v Speaker 2>in a good spot because of how much the last
<v Speaker 2>really soured public opinion, that like, well, anything must be
<v Speaker 2>a step up from here.
<v Speaker 1>And I don't know.
<v Speaker 2>I've always been Battlefield curious grub, but it's also felt
<v Speaker 2>super intimidating. Anytime we've checked out a Battlefield clone on
<v Speaker 2>the website, it has given me the hankering to check
<v Speaker 2>out Battlefield proper, but knowing that it is not in
<v Speaker 2>like a U, you know, the best state right now
<v Speaker 2>Bad Bad Company. I keep seeing people throw around. I
<v Speaker 2>feel like that would be a big swing, that could
<v Speaker 2>potentially be a big experience for folk, But I don't
<v Speaker 2>know if that is the appetite of folks at the
<v Speaker 2>top making the decisions.
<v Speaker 1>Yeah. I remember this is from years ago that there
<v Speaker 1>was a Bad Company one and or two remaster slash
<v Speaker 1>like remake that they were, that they were like kind
<v Speaker 1>of starting up. And then when Vince Sampella took the
<v Speaker 1>lead of Battlefield, he was Vince Sampella from Respond. Previously
<v Speaker 1>from Call of Duty. He was in charge of Infinity
<v Speaker 1>Ward when they made Call of Duty four and all
<v Speaker 1>that stuff, and then when they left and started that
<v Speaker 1>new studio Respond, and then now he's in charge of
<v Speaker 1>basically a lot of EA's traditional games. He was like,
<v Speaker 1>look that that is we need that to be bigger
<v Speaker 1>than what you all are planning to do right now.
<v Speaker 1>And so what we're gonna kind of shelf this and
<v Speaker 1>we're gonna put it back behind the break glass in
<v Speaker 1>case of emergency situation, and we'll go back to Bad
<v Speaker 1>Company in a different way at some point. Now, who knows.
<v Speaker 1>I mean, it feels like I don't know. Honestly, this
<v Speaker 1>feels like maybe the right time, right like coming off
<v Speaker 1>of twenty forty two, which felt like it should have
<v Speaker 1>hit and didn't, which is maybe the worst thing you
<v Speaker 1>could say about that. It's like it felt like it
<v Speaker 1>should have worked and it still didn't. Uh. Oh, Now
<v Speaker 1>you're going to be going into this experience where they're
<v Speaker 1>gonna have a ripple effect. You're gonna have a ripple
<v Speaker 1>effect free to play battle Royale game, You're going to
<v Speaker 1>have the traditional multiplayer Is that gonna be behind the
<v Speaker 1>pay well probably? And then you're gonna have a campaign?
<v Speaker 1>What kind of campaign? At that point? Why not maybe
<v Speaker 1>do bad Company and have some co op and stuff
<v Speaker 1>in there, and then you could start justifying having a
<v Speaker 1>seventy dollars price behind that content.
<v Speaker 2>I don't know. Twenty forty two is twenty issuyears away
<v Speaker 2>from us. We could develop Titans by then. It's true,
<v Speaker 2>that's right. I went to Titen. Oh my god, grub,
<v Speaker 2>I would dig the crap out of a battlefield game
<v Speaker 2>with not like the good Titans we're conditioned to expect
<v Speaker 2>in Titan Fall two, but like a haphazard, shodily built Titan.
<v Speaker 1>Yeah, like a maybe like a post apocalyptic games and
<v Speaker 1>people are like piecing together titans and it's more like
<v Speaker 1>suits of armor, like Knight's armor, that sort of thing,
<v Speaker 1>or bad forklyfts bad yes, right right, it's just pieced together. Right,
<v Speaker 1>But it's like it's it's like you have ownership of it,
<v Speaker 1>and it becomes like a like a ritualistic thing, a
<v Speaker 1>religious thing in some ways. Yeah.
<v Speaker 2>Do we just talk about the movie Hugh Jackman hit
<v Speaker 2>Real Steel?
<v Speaker 1>But I'm always talking about Real Steel. Real Steel is
<v Speaker 1>top tier dad movie.
<v Speaker 2>Bullshit. I love that movie so much. It's so good.
<v Speaker 2>I can't wait to revisit that when I'm a father. Yeah,
<v Speaker 2>it's real good. It's that and Interstellar. Those are the
<v Speaker 2>two that, like you have to rewatch Susan Become a Dad.
<v Speaker 2>That's a double feature.
<v Speaker 1>Grub. Absolutely, that's a good night right there. All right,
<v Speaker 1>let's see here. I got the more headlines, including Xbox
<v Speaker 1>announces twenty twenty four plans for games Com, including over
<v Speaker 1>fifty playable games. This is from Jordan Miller at VGC.
<v Speaker 1>Microsoft has announced its plans for Games comp twenty twenty four.
<v Speaker 1>The Xbox Booth will feature over fifty playable games split
<v Speaker 1>across first party Xbox Game Studio releases and third party
<v Speaker 1>Xbox titles. They include Age of Mythology, Retold Ara History,
<v Speaker 1>I'm Told Man, a Lot of Tellings of History, Diablo four,
<v Speaker 1>Vessel of Hatred, Fallout, seventy six, Mile Post Zero, the
<v Speaker 1>new expansion Elder Scrolls Online, Gold Gold Road, and Towerborn
<v Speaker 1>and Tower Born is that kind of beat them up
<v Speaker 1>game from the people that did the Banner Saga. Xbox
<v Speaker 1>will also host exclusive theatrical presentations of Avowed Indiana, Jones
<v Speaker 1>and the Great Circle and Starfield Shattered Space. Blizzard's Gamescom
<v Speaker 1>twenty twenty four presence will also be a part of
<v Speaker 1>the Xbox Booth. The booth will feature a public hans
<v Speaker 1>on gameplay demo of the Diablo four Spirit Born Class,
<v Speaker 1>with a Diablo Immortal hellicoury Boss tournament taking place as well.
<v Speaker 1>A special immersive World of Warcraft experience will also be
<v Speaker 1>president at the show, giving games comontendants the chance to
<v Speaker 1>feel the thrill of skydiving in Asaroth. The Xbox Booth
<v Speaker 1>will also have playable titles from third party publishers like
<v Speaker 1>Stalker to Heart of Chernobyl Rebellion's Adam Fall, Space Marine two,
<v Speaker 1>Arc two, Star Wars Outlaws, man Ark two is still real.
<v Speaker 1>So they're going all out for games Cone. They're going
<v Speaker 1>way more all out for games come than they even
<v Speaker 1>came close to for Summer Game Fest now and then
<v Speaker 1>the Summer Game Pest did it. They had their own
<v Speaker 1>Xbox mixer and they had stuff there. But I don't
<v Speaker 1>know if they have fifty games. I should didn't go
<v Speaker 1>to their thing. But that's not what it seemed like
<v Speaker 1>when people relate it to me. Yeah, I mean the
<v Speaker 1>effort behind xboxes or Microsoft and Xbox like saying, hey,
<v Speaker 1>here are the games, here's what's going on. Be excited.
<v Speaker 1>Feels mismatched with like where Xbox is at in the
<v Speaker 1>marketplace right now, yesterday's story of like yet again another
<v Speaker 1>quarter down forty percent or more for hardware sales year
<v Speaker 1>over year. But what are the choices they have? They
<v Speaker 1>got to come out there and be like, we do
<v Speaker 1>have exciting stuff. You should be excited, and I think
<v Speaker 1>people be like, yes, and I'm gonna play it on
<v Speaker 1>my PC. And I think Microsoft this points that's just fine.
<v Speaker 1>But I don't know. I'm I'm glad that they're like
<v Speaker 1>showing up like this. This feels like, no, there's still
<v Speaker 1>plenty of momentum behind the other company making video games
<v Speaker 1>as a first party.
<v Speaker 2>Yeah, one hundred percent guarantee, are not guaranteed, agreed. I
<v Speaker 2>want to see what Microsoft is doing, and seeing this
<v Speaker 2>huge turnout for games Com makes it definitely makes it
<v Speaker 2>feel like games Com is like a tour stop for
<v Speaker 2>Microsoft as they make the rounds until the end of
<v Speaker 2>the year, until like a lot of these games pop out.
<v Speaker 2>I'm very curious about Tower Born may feel like the.
<v Speaker 1>God Greb.
<v Speaker 2>What was that other months or Hunter like game that
<v Speaker 2>we checked out that we had a decent time with
<v Speaker 2>wild I put.
<v Speaker 1>This Melbourne or something like that. Uh god, yeah, I
<v Speaker 1>can't I can't remember Wild Wildhearts. Yes, thank you, Yes,
<v Speaker 1>I mean I enjoyed that. That was fun. Yeah.
<v Speaker 2>So I'd like to see like another take on the
<v Speaker 2>Monster Hunter formula because, like you know, there are parts
<v Speaker 2>of that experience that I love Capcom, but Capcom still
<v Speaker 2>hasn't completely nailed from like quality of life perspective. But
<v Speaker 2>I want to see what more of that could look like. Gosh,
<v Speaker 2>if only we're sending a team to games Calm to
<v Speaker 2>check out all these neat things, to like seeing what
<v Speaker 2>it'd been a parachute through Ezra.
<v Speaker 1>An impossible dream jan Quit saying things you know can't happen.
<v Speaker 2>Ah, gosh, I'm just such a dreamer grub.
<v Speaker 1>Yeah, I uh Talerborne's when I've been excited about for
<v Speaker 1>a while. It's uh, it's yeah. It's that like side
<v Speaker 1>scrolling beat them up sort of thing. I'm gonna I
<v Speaker 1>have the video right here. I'll bring it up. Let
<v Speaker 1>me just if I gotta frame it up here. But
<v Speaker 1>it's like, looks beautiful and very cool, and I think
<v Speaker 1>it should be something worth checking out. And then it
<v Speaker 1>has so many other elements going on there that I'll
<v Speaker 1>have to play to fully understand. But god, yeah it
<v Speaker 1>looks amazing. Yeah, it's like so yeah, we'll get some
<v Speaker 1>hands on reports from that game and more and just overall,
<v Speaker 1>this is Game's com the heart of Europe. Like they're
<v Speaker 1>right there showing up being like, hey, we want to
<v Speaker 1>win over this audience. Europe has mostly overlooked Xbox this generation,
<v Speaker 1>as it has through most generations in the past, but
<v Speaker 1>especially this generation. And I think that they're just like, look, yeah,
<v Speaker 1>we maybe we're not going to get you to buy
<v Speaker 1>an Xbox, but we could still get you to buy
<v Speaker 1>our games. And I think that's probably the right move
<v Speaker 1>for them on the long scale, the grand scale of time.
<v Speaker 1>Jan if we're talking like one hundred years from now,
<v Speaker 1>I think PC gaming will still be here, probably, I
<v Speaker 1>don't know about consoles, Like, like you know, all it
<v Speaker 1>takes is one generation for one of these companies to
<v Speaker 1>get like to either take it on the chin, or
<v Speaker 1>to like really to to bone things up, or to
<v Speaker 1>lose interest, to be like it's not growing fast enough,
<v Speaker 1>we should just sell it off to some other company
<v Speaker 1>or something like that that's not out of the realm
<v Speaker 1>of possibility in the next twenty five years or something
<v Speaker 1>like this. So when I think about, like, if I'm
<v Speaker 1>in charge one of these companies and I have to
<v Speaker 1>like place my chips down somewhere, I also would be
<v Speaker 1>putting my chips down on PC and open platforms as
<v Speaker 1>opposed to just trying to grow my walled garden again.
<v Speaker 1>So I think Xbox has positioning themselves to do that.
<v Speaker 1>Whether or not they're going to be able to pull
<v Speaker 1>it off, who knows, But it starts with stuff like this,
<v Speaker 1>like fifty games at games come.
<v Speaker 2>Oddly enough, I feel like piece one hundred years from now,
<v Speaker 2>who knows where will be I'll be in the dirt.
<v Speaker 1>Or long, yes, long over here.
<v Speaker 2>But I do see PC games sustaining and lasting, but
<v Speaker 2>also perhaps handheld games, not mobile games, but handheld games.
<v Speaker 2>Like I don't know, I could definitely see a revision
<v Speaker 2>of the game Boy coming out in a couple of years.
<v Speaker 1>Yeah, if Nintendo ever does like that move, I think
<v Speaker 1>it would do very well for them. I don't know
<v Speaker 1>what it would be a sign of, like from the company,
<v Speaker 1>if like there's other troubles or whatever, they're like, we
<v Speaker 1>gotta go back to the game Boy. But in the
<v Speaker 1>next like ten to fifteen years, there is still gonna
<v Speaker 1>be a butter zone where like multiple generations have grown
<v Speaker 1>up like remembering the game Boy. Like I'll like I
<v Speaker 1>was I got the original game Boy when I was
<v Speaker 1>just a kid, and then but like several generations of
<v Speaker 1>kids behind me got game Boys, like two generations basically
<v Speaker 1>to play Pokemon games, and they are all gonna be like, hey,
<v Speaker 1>that name means a lot to me. So yeah, stuff
<v Speaker 1>like that could happen You're right though, handout games will
<v Speaker 1>still be a major thing, and I think that'll be
<v Speaker 1>like the primary way honestly personalized gaming experiences right there
<v Speaker 1>in front of you. That's always been it for me.
<v Speaker 2>It's just so funny seeing like a couple of years
<v Speaker 2>ago the major focus on what the console is right,
<v Speaker 2>what the console looks like, how it fits into your
<v Speaker 2>home entertainment ecosystem only for the Nintendo Switch, and subsequently
<v Speaker 2>the theme deck to kind of reinfluence of people and
<v Speaker 2>like kind of like having this thing in my hands.
<v Speaker 1>Yep, that's for me. That's always been it, like just
<v Speaker 1>a link's awakening on the game Boy in the backseat
<v Speaker 1>of the car on road trips as a ten or
<v Speaker 1>eleven year old. I mean, that's just like when it's like, oh,
<v Speaker 1>gaming's just going to be everything to me from now on.
<v Speaker 1>At that's when that happened. I like playing games on
<v Speaker 1>the TV too, sure, but it's just something so intimate
<v Speaker 1>to have the games right there in front of you.
<v Speaker 1>All right, let's hit these last few stories. Dev say
<v Speaker 1>that working with Apple Arcade is frustrating and like an
<v Speaker 1>abusive relationship. Zax Wisen from Kotaku writes a new report
<v Speaker 1>featuring quotes from anonymous developers who have worked with Apple
<v Speaker 1>Arcade claimed the subscriptions subscription gaming service has no real goals,
<v Speaker 1>barely communicates with studios. It treats teams poorly, making them
<v Speaker 1>jump through hoops and wait for months just to get paid.
<v Speaker 1>One developer even claimed that working with Apple Arcade was
<v Speaker 1>like being in an abusive relationship. One big problem is
<v Speaker 1>that some devs have to spend months chasing Apple down
<v Speaker 1>for their money. The way Apple Arcade works is to
<v Speaker 1>devs get a large amount of money upfront to make
<v Speaker 1>the game and then collect royalties from Apple. And I
<v Speaker 1>just started playing a in the sixty four jungle mix
<v Speaker 1>in the background. I i't mean to do that. We
<v Speaker 1>can go weeks without hearing from Apple at all, and
<v Speaker 1>their general response to time to emails is three weeks
<v Speaker 1>if they reply at all. Set a developer speaking to
<v Speaker 1>Mobile gamer Dot is We're supposed to be able to
<v Speaker 1>ask product technical and commercial questions, but often half the
<v Speaker 1>Apple team won't turn up, and when they do, they
<v Speaker 1>have no idea what's going on and can't answer our questions,
<v Speaker 1>either because they don't have any knowledge on how to
<v Speaker 1>answer it or not able to share that info for
<v Speaker 1>confidentiality reasons. Yeah, that sounds like it sucks. That's insane, grub,
<v Speaker 1>that's insane. That like, and I get that, like gaming
<v Speaker 1>is not Apple's thing. That's like, maybe that's not stating
<v Speaker 1>it strongly enough. Well, you do have gaming subscription service
<v Speaker 1>that you are charging people for, and the whole idea
<v Speaker 1>is you pay developers to make games that are better
<v Speaker 1>than the free to play shlock they get from the
<v Speaker 1>rest of the store. You should probably pay those people
<v Speaker 1>that have made those games for you. What are you
<v Speaker 1>talking about. That's crazy.
<v Speaker 2>I know you have the money, Tim, You definitely have
<v Speaker 2>the money. God, that feels insane hearing that these indie
<v Speaker 2>devs that you know haven't some type of exclusive contract
<v Speaker 2>to remain on Apple Arcade for X amount of time.
<v Speaker 2>I have to hunt Apple for their money.
<v Speaker 1>Yeah, jump through hoops. Like it should just be like
<v Speaker 1>the second the game launches, it should just like automatically
<v Speaker 1>transfer to their bank account. It should just be automated.
<v Speaker 1>That's crazy.
<v Speaker 2>And I give you my routing number. Yeah, Jim, you
<v Speaker 2>just Apple pay me this ship?
<v Speaker 1>Yeah? What the hell? Oh God, Plaid like won't let
<v Speaker 1>them like sign up their bank account or whatever connected
<v Speaker 1>or whatever. Yeah, and that seems so insane because we
<v Speaker 1>have seen a steady trickle of.
<v Speaker 2>It feels weird to say this, but big Apple Arcade
<v Speaker 2>games finally make the jump to other platforms. We're seeing
<v Speaker 2>it with Fantasian, the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles game, even
<v Speaker 2>the gosh, the not Match three, but the puzzle game
<v Speaker 2>that was pretty big, and it was a big heater
<v Speaker 2>for Apple Arcades release. Oh gosh, it was like Dungeon
<v Speaker 2>themed folks at home.
<v Speaker 1>Grindstone, Yeah, there it is, yeah, Grindstone. Yeah. People try
<v Speaker 1>to say this is normal for a lot of businesses
<v Speaker 1>that that that work this way, and it's like, ah,
<v Speaker 1>I think the reason developers are saying this is because
<v Speaker 1>it's not normal for the space that they're in. I
<v Speaker 1>think Microsoft and Sony and Nintendo have a pretty well
<v Speaker 1>understood process for getting paid. The timeline is very well understood,
<v Speaker 1>and I think the problem here is not like that
<v Speaker 1>the people just have to wait. It is that they
<v Speaker 1>have to hunt down on Apple and make it happen,
<v Speaker 1>which is not normal in this space. I mean, especially
<v Speaker 1>not with Steam right over there, just making it like
<v Speaker 1>the most automated basic thing in the world where it's
<v Speaker 1>just going to happen in the background and you don't
<v Speaker 1>have to do much to make it happen. That's the norm,
<v Speaker 1>and you kind of can't be like, well, I mean,
<v Speaker 1>you know, this is the way things are so well
<v Speaker 1>they it could be better. We see it right there,
<v Speaker 1>and it's better for the vast majority of gaming purchases
<v Speaker 1>in the world when you look at Steam and the
<v Speaker 1>Xbox Store and the PlayStation store and Nintendo You Shop
<v Speaker 1>all put together.
<v Speaker 2>So yeah, Also, wouldn't it continue to build a positive
<v Speaker 2>relationship between dev's and Apple if they were being paid
<v Speaker 2>on time? Yeah, where like, hey, we'll continue to keep
<v Speaker 2>making games for you guys, or we'll tell our other
<v Speaker 2>indie friends to Well, that.
<v Speaker 1>Seems like that's the underlying thing here, right jan that
<v Speaker 1>Apple doesn't care about that anymore. They don't care about
<v Speaker 1>Apple Arcade. It was an initiation. It's a year's old initiative,
<v Speaker 1>is more and off, they're not gonna they're not reinvesting
<v Speaker 1>in that. Then they're not thinking about it actively. That
<v Speaker 1>is that is old news, and so all the developers
<v Speaker 1>are unhappy and that's going to sort of slightly poison
<v Speaker 1>that audience. Against us or that you know that industry
<v Speaker 1>against us. We don't care. And that's just Apple with
<v Speaker 1>gaming every generation from the beginning of time. Yeah, PlayStation
<v Speaker 1>Plus free games for August twenty twenty four. Uh, let
<v Speaker 1>see your Lego Star Wars the Skywalker Saga for five
<v Speaker 1>nights at Freddy's Security Breach and Inder Lily's Quietest of
<v Speaker 1>the Nights. Yeah. These are all coming starting August sixth
<v Speaker 1>and will be available through August second or September second,
<v Speaker 1>I should say. And those are the PlayStation Plus free
<v Speaker 1>games for August.
<v Speaker 2>Uh.
<v Speaker 1>Lego Star Wars the Skywalker Saga is a massive, solid game, yes,
<v Speaker 1>and one that's good for families and good for kind
<v Speaker 1>of any fan of Star Wars. It's really well done.
<v Speaker 2>It's so funny that when Dan and I checked out
<v Speaker 2>the old LED Steam deck at Valve, the first game
<v Speaker 2>that they show us today the capabilities and like, how
<v Speaker 2>great the screen is on the Steam deck O led
<v Speaker 2>was Lego Star Wars the Skywalker Saga.
<v Speaker 1>Yep. I mean you know that's the materials they use
<v Speaker 1>in that stuff that make it look like real Legos,
<v Speaker 1>and then combining that with that OLED screen, yep, that's
<v Speaker 1>very good stuff. All right, let's sa hit this last one.
<v Speaker 1>AMD reports positive financial results, but gaming business slumps. This
<v Speaker 1>is from Alberto Garrito at Game Reactor. The crisis at
<v Speaker 1>the world's leading ship makers is shaking the entire technology sphere.
<v Speaker 1>First the in with Intel's flawed thirteenth and fourteenth generation,
<v Speaker 1>followed by the announcement of thousands of layoffs at the company,
<v Speaker 1>and now AMD is releasing troubling data on its custom
<v Speaker 1>gaming chip division. As you probably know, AMD chips are
<v Speaker 1>used in game consoles and the Xbox series, PS five
<v Speaker 1>and Steam Deck all feature them. Now, with the release
<v Speaker 1>of financial results from Q two twenty twenty four, we
<v Speaker 1>see a fifty nine percent drop in gaming revenue, down
<v Speaker 1>more than six hundred and forty eight million dollars. And
<v Speaker 1>this is almost mostly attributable to the decline in sales
<v Speaker 1>of Xbox, but we've also seen declines in sales of
<v Speaker 1>PlayStation five year over year quarter to quarter, or at
<v Speaker 1>least the United States according to a Circana and Napis
<v Speaker 1>Catella over there. But yeah, when fewer consoles are selling,
<v Speaker 1>Microsoft and Sony to a lesser extent, are going to
<v Speaker 1>be ordering fewer chips, and that is going to hurt
<v Speaker 1>AMD's revenue. Yeah, did you think. I mean, it's that
<v Speaker 1>same old story, right jam, we're waiting for GTA six
<v Speaker 1>or some other game, kind of like that right to
<v Speaker 1>have the whole industry bounce back. Is that a healthy
<v Speaker 1>place for the industry to be in. No, it's not a.
<v Speaker 2>Healthy place to put all our eggs in the GTA
<v Speaker 2>six basket. I don't care for GTA six, but I
<v Speaker 2>feel like I've we forced the care.
<v Speaker 1>It's we have to care. We have no choice here.
<v Speaker 2>It's like I'm gonna be like the guy in the
<v Speaker 2>fifteenth row in like the Dune Cave, going like, I
<v Speaker 2>guess we'll get go with this guy LUs and old gaib.
<v Speaker 2>Everyone else is doing it. I guess I'll also go
<v Speaker 2>with it.
<v Speaker 1>Yeah, you don't have Yeah, we don't have a choice. Yeah,
<v Speaker 1>it's uh. I mean the whole idea is like this
<v Speaker 1>will be the thing that gets people. I mean, did
<v Speaker 1>you see the numbers earlier this week that like a
<v Speaker 1>significant majority of people are still playing GTA online on
<v Speaker 1>PS four, Like you can play that on PS five,
<v Speaker 1>Xbox Series, x PC and all the stuff, but the
<v Speaker 1>majority are playing on PS four, And so that's that
<v Speaker 1>like that. They're saying like that, right there is the
<v Speaker 1>thing that highlights what is going on in the industry
<v Speaker 1>is that the people that that have found their game,
<v Speaker 1>they found it last generation and they're still playing that
<v Speaker 1>game on that system and they have not felt they've
<v Speaker 1>not been given the compelling argument to upgrade because the
<v Speaker 1>game is still the same game. Yeah, it's gonna run better.
<v Speaker 1>It's the same game. People, while we talk about it,
<v Speaker 1>while I gobble up Digital Foundery, give it to me,
<v Speaker 1>num numb, numb, numb, the wide, vast broad audience is saying, no,
<v Speaker 1>that's the same game. And my understanding is when I
<v Speaker 1>get a new system, I get new games, and that's
<v Speaker 1>it's it's it's that simple for them. And so they're
<v Speaker 1>gonna need to wait until that new game comes along
<v Speaker 1>and it will be g t A six for most
<v Speaker 1>of them. People point out Elder Scroll six. Obviously, there
<v Speaker 1>is like eight list of games that are in that
<v Speaker 1>tier below g T A six.
<v Speaker 2>But yeah, no, I I I'd agree GTA six will
<v Speaker 2>save the gaming industry. It's gonna gonna undo all of
<v Speaker 2>these layoffs. New company. We're gonna be swimming in money, grub.
<v Speaker 1>It's gonna be it's gonna be awesome. It's gonna be.
<v Speaker 2>Great, like anecdotally, anecdotally like catching up with our other
<v Speaker 2>fandom homies that aren't as plugged into games and just
<v Speaker 2>asking them like, hey, what do you know? What? What
<v Speaker 2>type of gaming content do you consume? Uh? And then
<v Speaker 2>oddly enough the answer is people uh streaming or on
<v Speaker 2>YouTube doing rp GTA online content. Yep.
<v Speaker 1>It's still huge still, and I had there was a
<v Speaker 1>lot of content creators I would were like variety streamers
<v Speaker 1>and started doing that and that's where they like, well,
<v Speaker 1>this is where the money is. People. I got more
<v Speaker 1>people watching than ever. I'm gonna keep doing that. All right.
<v Speaker 1>That does it for the headlines? Does it for the news?
<v Speaker 1>I have a poll question from yesterday. I think I
<v Speaker 1>have it right here. Let me just get it right there,
<v Speaker 1>bang bang boom the news assets. There we go. I'm
<v Speaker 1>gonna have to answer this. Have you ever played Killer seven?
<v Speaker 1>I'm gonna I like, touch it, but I'm gonna say no.
<v Speaker 1>And that's what seventy percent of the audience said. Out
<v Speaker 1>of the two point five thousand votes, seventy percent said
<v Speaker 1>no they have not played Killer seven. Thirty percent have
<v Speaker 1>I think a remaster would go over real nice, swimmingly,
<v Speaker 1>and I'm gonna I'm gonna go well, he said, a
<v Speaker 1>complete edition. He's already done a remaster in twenty eighteen
<v Speaker 1>for PC or whatever, and I got that on my
<v Speaker 1>Steam deck and I am going to go play that.
<v Speaker 1>But he wants to suit if it do one, wants
<v Speaker 1>to re release that and and as a complete edition.
<v Speaker 1>And again, I think that would go over well at
<v Speaker 1>this moment in time, better than the twenty eight edition,
<v Speaker 1>twenty eighteen edition. I should say. I got a new
<v Speaker 1>poll question. We'll get to that here in a second.
<v Speaker 1>Before we do, though, Jan, what do we have happening
<v Speaker 1>on Giant Bomb today?
<v Speaker 2>We have voicemail dump truck popping off. Tomorrow is going
<v Speaker 2>to be a little bit of an odd day. You
<v Speaker 2>Dan Manati are out, so I will raise the troops,
<v Speaker 2>the troops being politely, asking Nicky and Sean if they're free,
<v Speaker 2>and maybe some other miscreants for unprofessional Fridays, I'd like
<v Speaker 2>to have a PCR if possible. I'm taking suggestions folks
<v Speaker 2>for upf tomorrow. GMM, maybe I'll do something in place
<v Speaker 2>of gmm. Maybe that's when I'll have my vacation slide show.
<v Speaker 1>Hey there you go.
<v Speaker 2>Oh god, I don't want to show off my popcorn
<v Speaker 2>buckets from Japan. It makes me sad inside it to
<v Speaker 2>own it. But anyway, Yeah, the UPF tomorrow. Hey, maybe
<v Speaker 2>we'll bust out gt on wine.
<v Speaker 1>Can I throw a suggestion out for UPF that I
<v Speaker 1>would like to watch? Shit? No, I'm gonna do it
<v Speaker 1>any you can't stop me. Uh that new Noman's Sky content.
<v Speaker 1>I would I'm like interested in, like what that because
<v Speaker 1>you could play that multiplayer now, there's so much going
<v Speaker 1>on in there. I think I would like to see
<v Speaker 1>what's going on there? Oh yeah? Or Killer seven? There
<v Speaker 1>you go.
<v Speaker 2>I gotta play Killer seven with you. Grub you gotta.
<v Speaker 2>I have learn set together.
<v Speaker 1>Let's let's play some Killer seven. That would be awesome. Yes,
<v Speaker 1>uh yeah, no, Jance Sky it's right there. Okay, and
<v Speaker 1>then always be closince. I left a voicemail for that
<v Speaker 1>Grub country song stuff. Very fun. All right, Well that'll
<v Speaker 1>be a fun voicemail dump truck. Then later today anything else. Yeah, well,
<v Speaker 1>do you know you'll try to put together tomorrow. It's
<v Speaker 1>going to be a mess, like you said, But yeah, people.
<v Speaker 2>It's a fun mess indeed. Oh also, folks, if you
<v Speaker 2>are hankering for Lego Star Wars content other than the games,
<v Speaker 2>one of the best interviews Comic Con was interviewing the
<v Speaker 2>dudes behind Lego Star Wars Rebuild a Galaxy and Bobby
<v Speaker 2>moynahan is a part of.
<v Speaker 1>That last fun.
<v Speaker 2>And they're doing some funky multivers kind of stuff, but
<v Speaker 2>it's all in the form of Lego Star Wars. So
<v Speaker 2>I'm pray excited for that joint.
<v Speaker 1>That sounds great. Bobby moynahan really won me over in Ducktails.
<v Speaker 1>He's really good in that. All right. The next poll question,
<v Speaker 1>do you think the next battlefield should be free to play?
<v Speaker 1>Yes or no? We will talk about that on the
<v Speaker 1>next Game Mass Mornings. We'll get the results of that
<v Speaker 1>and talk about that there. Jen, thank you so much
<v Speaker 1>for hanging out with me today and talking about video games. Man,
<v Speaker 1>I really appreciate it.
<v Speaker 2>It's the only way I want to start a Thursday.
<v Speaker 1>Greb, thank you all for listening and watching. You are
<v Speaker 1>the best audience in gaming. Until next time, have a
<v Speaker 1>good one, take care of yourself and goodbye.