Update Patch | April 2021
We’re back once again with another month in the slow crawl through a never-ending hell that is 2021. Whilst there haven’t been a lot of major game releases this year, May is shaping up to be an exciting time for gamers with a new sexy vampire simulator that happens to be a new Resident Evil game and Biomutant actually releasing. However, plenty of things also happened over the 30 days of April. Fair warning, there’s a lot of legislation to discuss.
1. What’s in the (Loot) Box?
With the continued debate in the UK and other European countries around legislation to regulate loot boxes in video games under gambling related-legislation, a new report has emerged which has called for regulation by the UK government.
The 50+ page report, which can be found in full here, has been commissioned by the GambleAware charity and conducted by researchers from the University of Plymouth and the University of Wolverhampton.
In the full report, the discussion focuses on the financial impacts of loot boxes finds that whilst the average spend on loot boxes per month is “typically less than £20”, around 5% of purchasers generate half of industry revenue from loot boxes. Conclusions are made in the form of recommendations for UK policy to make provisions for age ratings, odds disclosure, spending limits and information as well as provisions for “oversight and enforcement” to account for the larger scale of the video game industry which is currently difficult for gambling bodies to regulate.
The report was released with an upcoming review of the UK Gambling Act by the UK government and also comes after the House of Lords Gambling Committee called for regulation on loot boxes by the UK government last year. Whether the legislation changes going forward to include loot boxes will be up to the current UK government to decide.
WHAT DID WE GET?
Oh… Government regulations of media… Its an uncommon, I guess.
2. The Artist Formerly Known as E3 Returns
Following the cancellation of last year’s event due to the COVID-19 pandemic, the ESA has announced that E3 2021 will go ahead as a fully digital event from 12-15th June. And for this year the show has rebranded to the Electronic Entertainment Experience.
Ah, remember the good ole’ days? Back when we thought there wouldn’t be an E3 2020 because of the ESA’s incompetence…
The event is being held in partnership with Nintendo, Xbox, Ubisoft, Take-Two Interactive, Capcom, Konami, WB Games and Koch Media this year. While the media partners include publications like IGN, GamesRadar and PCGamer. Notably absent from this lineup is Sony, SEGA, EA and Activision Blizzard who, likely with the EA Play and Blizzcon events, will presumably be running their events around the time.
Ubisoft has confirmed it will be bringing back the Ubisoft Forward showcase. While Square Enix has confirmed it will have announcements at the show. Furthermore, GamesRadar will be hosting the Future Games Show on June 13th as part of the event also.
Questions have been raised as to how E3 would continue following the cancellation of the event last year. It remains to be seen if the ESA will make the show worthwhile for exhibitors given the rise to independent presentations produced by Sony, Xbox, EA, Square Enix and Ubisoft over the previous year and the continued popularity of Nindtend’s Directs.
3. Fearless’ Statement on Racism
As the US continues to recover from the COVID-19 pandemic and the January 6th Capitol Riots, one of the most concerning trends is the rise in hate crimes against Asian Americans. Worrying statistics include 81% of Asian Americans saying violence against them in the US is increasing, according to a new survey from the Pew Research Centre.
Fearless was recently announced as the main tank in new-look Dallas Fuel rooster for the fourth season of OWL.
Before the start of this season’s Overwatch League, Dallas Fuel tank player Eui-Seok ‘Fearless’ Lee spoke out on a Twitch stream detailing harassment he and fellow Asian teammates had received after the full team was relocated to Dallas ahead of the season.
The clip was translated on Twitter by Florida Mayhem manager Jade Kim, with Fearless stating the following:
“Being Asian here is terrifying. Seriously. People keep trying to pick fights with us… They’ll deliberately cough on us, they cuss us the f*** out, while laughing, It’s really serious… The racism here is no joke. They’ll walk up to us, we don’t do anything, they’re walking by with their masks on, they’ll walk up, take off their masks, then pretend to f***ing cough on us, and they’re mocking us. How do I say this? Saying things like ‘f***ing Chinese’ at us… The racism here is unspeakable.”
Sen. Josh Hawley (R-MO)
The statement has seen the League taking a hardline stance against the rising discrimination with statements and a video posted over the opening weekend of the league. The growing racist sentiment in the US is not new and a bipartisan hate crimes bill was passed through the US senate to set up new positions to allow for quicker hate crime reporting as well as provide additional support to states tackling the problem. Only Missouri Republican Josh Hawley voted against this bill.
Gaming companies have since come out with statements supporting the Asian American community. PlayStation released a statement on Twitter along with information to support the AAPI. Head of Xbox Phil Spencer tweeted “For all Asian players and peers, I want you to know that we see you, we hear you, and we will and must do more”. While publisher Ubisoft also condemned the discrimination stating “We stand in solidarity with our teams, community and players”.
4. What the Hell is Sony First-Party up to?
Sony has been busy over the last month managing an ever-growing number of PR fires, with numerous reports coming out about first-party studios’ various cancelled and underway projects.
Sony taking Days Gone outback before sending it “up-state”.
Most surprisingly is the news of a remake of Naughty Dog’s 2013 hit, The Last of Us. The idea has, according to Bloomberg’s Jason Schreier, been floated to a new small studio before going back to Naughty Dog after Sony changed course. Additionally, a sequel to 2019’s Days Gone will not be happening as it wasn’t “a viable option”.
The news has also seen insight into the relationships between studios, with Sony Bend fearing being “absorbed by Naughty Dog” after they were assigned to work on a new Uncharted game as well as helping the studio with a multiplayer game. As a result, some top figures left Bend with Sony now reportedly giving the studio space to make their own project for now.
This image is from a 2019 tweet. Anyway I’m super bummed now.
There is a rising concern as to the current trajectory of Sony’s internal studio following the closure of Japan Studio and Sony’s seemingly waiting interest in the indie and Japanese development scene. Having been a hub of weird and risky experiments for years Sony is now reportedly focusing on blockbuster studios to the detriment of smaller studios. Hopefully, the recent release of time-looping, bullet-hell shooter Returnal is the first of many unique first-party entries.
5. Indie World announces OlliOlli Oxenfree II (GET IT?)
Nintendo held another Indie World event this month with a number of interesting announcements.
Most surprisingly was the headline sequel to Night School Studio’s 2016 hit Oxenfree, entitled Oxenfree 2: Lost Signals. The game is due out later this year and it takes place five years following the first game with a new protagonist. Currently, the game is scheduled for a Switch and PC release.
I just glad the official press release actually said it.
Additionally, the next title in the skateboarding series OlliOlli was announced with OlliOlli World, out on all platforms digitally from Winter 2021. The title will continue the series’ traditional stylish side-scrolling skateboarding action but now with the surprising addition of NPCs, side quests and gorgeous explorable environments aplenty.
Beyond those big announcements, there were plenty of smaller titles that flew a bit under the radar but looked massively promising. One of these games included Road 96 from French studio DigixArt, a procedural narrative game in which you play as various teenagers on road trips, with generated NPCs and storylines as a result of player decisions. On top of that is the exquisitely stunning JRPG-inspired Cris Tales which continues to look excellent with its three timeline mechanic and the angular but radiant art style.
Check out the full conference here but don’t bother searching for any Hollow Knight: Silksong teasers. Trust us we looked.
6. PlayStation Drops a C-bomb and Xbox Returns DRM
With games preservation an increasingly important topic, questions have been raised regarding both the PS5 and Xbox Series X|S consoles having technical issues that could result in a long-term lack of preservation for games on the console.
When it comes to the PS5, concerns have been raised around how the console could potentially be affected by a malfunctioning CMOS battery, resulting in the console not accessing Sony servers and all digital games becoming unplayable. Additionally, some physical titles were affected to varying degrees by the C-bomb issue but would work at points. These findings were released by the volunteer group Does it play? on Twitter and the full findings can be read here.
No backwards compatibility? No problem!
WAIT NO, MASSIVE PROBLEM!
This Sonyended up stoking the flames of displeasure surrounding Microsoft’s invasive DRM policies with the Xbox Series X|S and stirred a fresh batch of upset among preservationists. Both SKUs require an internet connection during their initial setup and while the consoles can be set to go offline, they aren’t without preservation issues as a result. Crucially, Xbox One discs inserted into the Xbox Series X|S require an internet connection to finish updating as displayed in this video by YouTube user Voxelsaurus Vex.
Sony and Microsoft have been light on responses, although emails with customers who have raised the issue seem to indicate Sony are aware of the C-bomb issue and are looking into solutions. Disappointingly, Microsoft has said nothing on the subject in recent months and it looks like little will change given the infrastructure of services like xCloud and Xbox Game Pass. Of course, Microsoft was derided during the launch of the Xbox One in 2013 for its invasive DRM policy which it then reversed course on.
7. Storm’s a Brewing at Blizzard
In Activision Blizzard news, Overwatch Game Director Jeff Kaplan has left the company and has been replaced in the role by Assistant Game director Aaron Keller.
Kaplan had a 19-year career at the company and was the public face of the developers of the FPS multiplayer game since launch. The news was announced on the Overwatch website, with Kaplan posting the following statement:
“it was truly the honor of a lifetime to have the opportunity to create worlds and heroes for such a passionate audience. i want to express my deep appreciation to everyone at blizzard who supported our games, our game teams and our players. but i want to say a special thanks to the wonderful game developers that shared in the journey of creation with me.”
Honestly, this may as well be the only image of Kaplan.
With Kaplan’s departure, questions were quickly raised as to the state of development of the upcoming Overwatch 2. Keller has stated “development is continuing at a good pace. We have an exceptional vision we’re executing on, the reaction from many of you to the updates we shared at BlizzConline thrilled us, and we have exciting reveals planned for this year and beyond as we ramp to launch.”
Tributes have been paid by many Overwatch fans and people, including tributes from Twitch streamer Timthetatman calling him an “absolute legend”, Overwatch League host Soe Gschwind tweeted her “gratitude for everything Papa Jeff and his team have given us”. Overwatch League commentator Brennon Hook also commented on Twitter saying “The man had passion and an aura of charisma around him that was so apparent whenever I visited the office, always made me feel welcome despite coming from a different side of gaming.”
8: I WANT TO GET OFF JIM RYAN’S WILD RIDE NOW!
Following last month’s report and Sony’s announcement that it was planning to close the PS3, PS Vita and PSP storefronts (which you can read up on in last month’s Update Patch here) Sony have reversed its course on closing the PS3 and PS Vita stores after a huge pubic backlash.
The decision was revealed in a statement from SIE President & CEO Jim Ryan, stating “Upon further reflection, however, it’s clear that we made the wrong decision here. So today I’m happy to say that we will be keeping the PlayStation Store operational for PS3 and PS Vita devices. PSP commerce functionality will retire on July 2, 2021 as planned.”
Absolute units.
The U-turn is an unsurprising one given the concerns raised about the preservation, or lack thereof, for games on the storefronts and the outrage expressed by many consumers. VGC did the legwork to find that 138 PlayStation games would become completely unavailable to purchase anywhere as a result of the store closure.
Developers of PS Vita games will be encouraged by this news, with ScourgeBringer’s PS Vita release is no longer said to be the last game added to the store. This comes are numerous development studios were put in difficult positions when they were given no warning about the announcement of the closure of the store whilst they were still developing for the system.
It is also worth noting that the PSP Store is still going offline which, to put it bluntly, is a huge blow for presevation.
Please be good. Please be good. Please be good. Please be good. Please be good. Please be good.
Patch Notes:
505 Games have fully acquired the licenses for cyberpunk ninja adventure Ghostrunner, spending €5 million for the license from All In Games, the co-publisher. All In Games will continue to receive profits from the game and all planned content will continue as usual.
Arkane Studios’ highly anticipated shooter Deathloop has been delayed with a new release date of 14th September 2021, one of many games delayed due to the effects of the COVID-19 pandemic.
Amazon Game Studios have cancelled their Lord of The Rings MMORPG owing to a dispute between the company and Tencent, leading to a breakdown in contract negotiations.
Bandai Namco’s Tales of Arise has received a confirmed release date on all platforms of 10th September with a lengthy gameplay trailer and confirmation of no multiplayer mode, owing to a creative focus on a singleplayer experience.
Life Is Strange and Vampyr developer, Dontnod, have announced they will be moving into third-party publishing, beginning with a game in development from small Danish studio PortaPlay. They have also clarified that they were remaining in game development as well.
EA and Codemasters’ F1 2021, will be released on the 16th of July on all platforms, with a brand-new story mode to boot and an expanded career mode. This will be the first racing game from EA following its acquisition of the historic developer.
Sony has announced a new first-person horror IP coming out later this year named Abandoned. The game is developed by Blue Box Game Studios, will run at 4k at 60fps and will be supporting Haptic Feedback on the DualSense controller. The developers also made clear not a new Silent Hill game, despite some initial fan speculation to the contrary.
Sony and Microsoft have both reported positive financial earnings in investors calls, with Sony reporting 7.8m PS5 units shipped and Microsoft reporting a 50% jump in revenue year-on-year for their previous quarter.
The Epic Games V Apple lawsuit continues on, with respective CEOs Tim Sweeney and Tim Cook set to be examined in court and the trial being temporarily suspended in Australia to allow the companies to present the cases in US court.
