Update Patch | June 2021
Well, June is in the books and as a result, we’re all a little older, greyer and deserve a medal for reaching the halfway point of 2021. Of course, a certain event with three Es in the title has a tendency to dominate most of the gaming landscape in June. That means that pretty much everything else usually gets buried. But I’m here to be your Basil Brown or Alan Grant, and dig out the hidden news gems in this month’s Update Patch.
E3 may have been a bit quiet this year but it also gave us this image, so I’m pretty happy overall.
1. E3 2021 Was a Thing
Yes, now that we’ve all agreed that there was plenty of news this month outside of E3 let’s talk about E3 for a while. Kicking off with Geoff Keighley’s Summer Games Fest live stream on the 10th June, over the following week-and-a-bit numerous AAA publishers, indie companies and everything in between showcased their titles. Given the amount shown, we won’t be able to cover everything here. However, the fine folks here at startmenu have assembled roundups for most of the major events which can be read below:
Summer Games Fest Kickoff Live
We also broke down the Elden Ring trailer and speculated wildly about the game, so check that out.
Additionally, a number of conferences were dedicated to the indies, with the Day of the Devs and Wholesome Games shows demonstrating a number of fantastic looking titles which we recommend checking out.
2. The Continued Cyberpunk Funk
Cyberpunk 2077 resurfaced after years in development at E3 2019 with a release date of April 16th 2020, it was then delayed to the 17th of September, then the 19th of November and finally launched on the 10th of December last year. However the release itself was disastrous; the PC version was terribly optimised, the PS4 and Xbox One versions were riddled with performance problems and bugs and the game had been very clearly downgraded for the pre-release builds shown to the press and public. This culminated with CD Projekt Red urging unsatisfied customers to go to Sony and Microsoft if they wanted to refund the game. As a result Sony delisted the game from the PlayStation Store, not wanting to introduce a refund system to their storefront, while Microsoft introduced a no questions asked refund system for just 2077.
Now, six months later, the game has returned to the PlayStation storefront alongside a massive patch. With this new release, Microsoft have announced an end to their unprecedented digital refunds for the title on July 6th on Xbox.
This official Cyberpunk 2077 artwork probably does a better job at summarising the games launch than the previous two paragraphs to be honest…
This news comes following CD Projekt Red CEO, Adam Kiciński, telling attendees at the WSE Innovation Day event that the game was at a “satisfactory level” of stability. However, Sony has confirmed that the digital version on sale would “continue to experience performance issues with the PS4 edition… [and] SIE recommends playing the title on PS4 Pro or PS5 for the best experience.”
This comes amidst numerous worries for the Polish studio. Its Q1 earnings call from earlier this year indicated profits being down 65% year-on-year and there was a recent spread of private data and even The Witcher III’s source code surfacing as a result of the major data hack earlier in the year.
3: Near Passes Away
(Content Warning: Suicide)
Near, one of the most talented developers in the world, famous for their work on massively popular homebrew SNES emulators like the BSNES or Higan, has died this month, after taking their own life.
Concerns spread after Near posted on social media detailing numerous harassment issues by groups targeting them for their non-binary status. After people reached out, it was confirmed by security consultant Hector Martin, a friend of Near, that they had passed away on June 27th.
Tributes have poured in from numerous corners of the emulation video game and tech industry, including former Vlambeer developer Rami Ismail who said it was “heartbreaking” and a “tremendous loss”. Project lead of the Libretro and Retroarch emulation software Daniel De Matteis released a statement saying, “This situation can and should not ever happen again. Developers on the Internet working on opensource code should be able to operate in peace without having to fear cyberstalking and doxxing like this. Let us mourn Near, but let us at the same time reflect on our own conduct and apply lessons to ensure situations like this cannot happen easily again.”
Near, AKA Byuu, was a hugely respected emulator who loved their craft (even buying a package of rare SNES cartridges worth $10,000 in order to preserve them and share them publicly) studying SNES chips and famously producing a localised version of the Japan-only JRPG Bahamut Lagoon which can be read about here. Further to that, you can read their own recent thoughts on SNES emulation from an article republished by ArsTechnica here.
Thank you Near. Your incredible work will live on in history.
We at startmenu want to send our condolences to the family and friends of Near. For those affected by issues raised in this article, Samaritans UK are available to call 24 hours a day on 116 123 for free and in the US, the National Suicide Prevention Hotline is available to call 24//7 on 1-800-273-8255.
4. FUT THIS EA
For years, EA has been heavily criticised for its FIFA Ultimate Team packs, which have seen many FIFA players including children spending real-world money on microtransactions. Various governments have kicked legislation into law around the world to class loot boxes as gambling and regulate them as such, EA has introduced FUT Preview packs in the hopes of sidestepping some of this legislation and its stigma by allowing players to view the contents of packs before opening them.
The way it works is that when someone looks up any pack in the FUT shop, there’s an eye-icon giving users the opportunity to preview the pack. If the player wishes to not purchase that pack, they can do so. However, players can then not preview another pack for 24 hours. Nice to see EA solving a problem caused by shady business practices by adopting timers from mobile games.
I’m going to go ahead and say it. If you’re community is making gifs like this, it may be time to re-evaluate your business practices… LOL EA will never do that.
EA started revealing the odds players had of finding items of specific rarities in 2018. However, these moves are unlikely to fully prevent continued wider legislation on loot boxes. The Netherlands and Belgium remain two of the most ardent supporters of new legislation, with various games having to remove loot box components in order to continue sale in the regions. This even led to Netherlands’ Gaming Authority fining EA €500,000 A WEEK for selling FUT packs as the Authority ruled the packs violated Dutch gambling law (which as far as we can tell is still ongoing). While this certainly puts into perspective how much money companies like EA must be making on these in-game purchases, it appears to be doing little to deter larger games from implementing these elements.
The UK government has recently reiterated its interest in regulating loot boxes as part of its review of the 2005 Gambling Act.
5. PlayStation Makes it Official With Some Companies That are “Just Really Good Friends”
Sony has announced a number of acquisitions in recent days to add to their portfolio of studios, bringing the number of internal studios under the SIE umbrella to 17.
Sony Japan’s Twitter account accidentally posted this image alongside the Housemarque announcement. Judging by the response from fans we’re willing to bet the Bluepoint are now in an excellent bargaining position for its potential aquisition.
Firstly, Sony announced the acquisition of Finnish developer Housemarque, the team behind this year’s PS5 exclusive Returnal. Whilst business details as to the acquisition haven’t been revealed, co-founder and Managing Director of Housemarque, Ilari Kuttinen, released a statement on the Playstation Blog, stating “This gives our studio a clear future and a stable opportunity to continue delivering on gameplay centric approaches, while still experimenting with new methods of narrative delivery and pushing the boundaries of this modern artform.”
Additionally, Sony has also acquired another European studio in Dutch developer Nixxes. Based in Utrecht, Nixxes has worked with Crystal Dynamics on Marvel’s Avengers and have also worked on all three of the last Tomb Raider instalments. The studio has recently been known for specialising in “video game design, development and porting”.
The safe money is on Sony deciding that instead of paying outside studios to work on its evermore persistent PC ports, it would be cheaper, in the long run, to bring the process entirely in-house.
This comes a few months after Sony’s surprise co-acquisition of Fighting Game tournament franchise, EVO, and a strategic partnership with the massively popular messaging platform, Discord.
Yuji Naka, seen here on the right, living the dream.
Patch Notes:
Overwatch has introduced cross-play across platforms for quick play, arcade and custom game modes.
Yuji Naka has resigned from Square Enix following the disappointment around his latest title Balan Wonderworld and has hinted at retiring from the games industry.
Bloober Team’s latest horror The Medium has been confirmed for PS5 and will release on 3rd September this year.
Sony has shifted its official stance on crossplay with Sony IE president and CEO Jim Ryan stating to Axios that “we support and encourage cross-play.” This comes following the news that Sony demands a fee from companies wanting to include the feature in their games and a percentage cut of microtransactions from items not bought on PSN.
The showrunner of Season 1 of the Halo TV series, Steven Kane, will not return as showrunner for any future seasons if they are to be made.
