Redfall

1 year, 2 months - Video games have never been more popular, technically impressive, easily accessible to players, but the games industry has certainly seen better days. Skyrocketing budgets of AAA projects and diminishing returns on live-service games have resulted in over 23,000 jobs in the video game industry were lost in the two years. Over 30 video game development studios have ceased operations including Arkane Austin, Volition, and most recently, Firewalk Studios. While games as a service can be extremely lucrative, some projects never see the light of day, like Naughty Dog’s cancelled The Last of Us Online. On the other hand, some games do come out in some form, only to be pulled offline, like SEGA’s Hyenas, which never made it past a public beta, or PlayStation’s massive flop, Concord, which was completely taken offline just two weeks after launch. What’s the solution? There’s no clear answer, but smaller projects could allow for more innovation - after all, look at recent indie hits, like Balatro, Animal Well, or UFO 50, which were made by small teams.

1 year, 3 months - In today's Daily Fix: Insomniac's Wolverine game has lost its Creative Director, Brian Horton, as he moves from the upcoming Marvel game to take charge of Microsoft's Perfect Dark. Not much is known of the Wolverine game, aside from a teaser several years ago. The Perfect Dark reboot was announced back in 2020, but has languished in development hell until a new gameplay teaser was revealed earlier this year. Horton's previous credits include directing 2015's Rise of the Tomb Raider, and a short stint at Infinity Ward. In other news, Arkane Austin co-founder has some harsh words for Microsoft. Raphael Colantonio, now head of WolfEye Studios, was asked by PC Gamer what his thoughts were of Arkane Austin's closure. Colantonio called the move 'stupid' and the decision was likely to appease investors and stockholders. And finally, more than 50 million mods have been downloaded by Baldur's Gate 3 players. The game has been out for more than a year, but mod support wasn't added until Patch 7 on September 5th of this year. One of the more popular mods? A mod that changes undead character Withers to 'Bone Daddy.'

1 year, 5 months - Welcom back to Next-Gen Console Watch. This week Daemon is joined by Beyond's Max Scoville and Unlocked's Destin Legarie as they discuss this gaming generation's big problem: live-service games. With Concord's unprecedented failure and subsequent shutdown this week, the crew asks themselves: what happened? And why did Concord fail harder compared to other disappointing live-service games like Suicide Squad: Kill the Justice League and Redfall?

1 year, 9 months - In today's Daily Fix: Via the Wall Street Journal, the next mainline Call of Duty game will likely launch straight to Xbox Game Pass later this year. The game, reportedly Black Ops 6, will be the first Call of Duty title to launch on Game Pass since publisher Activision was acquired by Microsoft in one of the biggest deals in video game history. Activision's previous head, Bobby Kotick, had not allowed the franchise on any subscription service, but since the acquisition things have obviously changed. In related Microsoft news, Redfall will finally get the last update that was promised. The update will include fixes to the Neighborhood and Nest systems, bug fixes, and an Offline Mode that players had been wanting since its disastrous release last year. Developer Arkane Austin was shuttered earlier this month, so it's surprising that this update will even happen. And finally, a new Total War game is in development, and if the rumors are true, it'll be set in the Star Wars universe. This won't be the first Star Wars RTS, but it will be the first in the popular Total War series that emphasizes large unit numbers. We'd gladly play through the Battle of Hoth for the umpteenth time in a Total War engine.

1 year, 9 months - In today's Daily Fix: Redfall's promised single-player update was set for sometime in May, and was being actively worked on until Microsoft closed the studio earlier this week. All development on the game has stopped, and the planned DLC set for this Halloween has been scrapped. This suggests that the studio had no prior warning that it was in danger of closing until the announcement from Xbox came. In other news, Nintendo is reviving the Nintendo World Championships with a new collection for the Switch. It's modeled after the minigame collection at the center of the legendary 1990 World Championships, and it's available for pre-order now. And finally, John Wick is back in pinball form. If you've got enough gold assassin coins—and the space—it can be yours starting at $7,000 USD.

1 year, 9 months - In today's Daily Fix: Helldivers 2 fans are up in arms, but not over the latest major order or weapon nerf—Sony is now going to require PC players to link the game to a PSN account. Don't worry, it's free (it's NOT PS Plus), but it's yet another account you'll need to sign up for if you want to keep squashing bugs and bombing 'bots. In other news, Redfall recently celebrated its one-year anniversary, and by celebrating we mean Microsoft did absolutely nothing to acknowledge that milestone. In fact, there's still no word on the previously-announced DLC. And finally, Nintendo may be adding a classic and highly sought-after game to the Switch. That's right, the Nintendo World Championship—one of gaming's Holy Grails—just might get a special version for the Switch.