In The News
Bungie is parting ways with Activision and a partnership the two held for 9 years, according to an announcement. “Looking ahead, we’re excited to announce plans for Activision to transfer publishing rights for Destiny to Bungie. With our remarkable Destiny community, we are ready to publish on our own, while Activision will increase their focus on owned IP projects.”
Usually school yard fights don’t involve 3 companies, but here we are. The children: Unity, Improbable and Epic Games.
It started when Improbable posted a blog titled “Unity’s block of SpatialOS.” Unity contacted other concerned developers to reassure them, while Improbable co-founder Herman Narula quipped to The Guardian that they’re waiting on “ransom demands.” Then, Epic’s Tim Sweeney tweeted the question, “Did Unity just prohibit all cloud-hosted multiplayer games?” Unity, feeling compelled to respond, posts “Our response to Improbable’s blog post (and why you can keep working on your SpatialOS game).” Improbable then responded with another blog post and a box of mom’s favorite chocolate chip cookies, “An Update on Today’s Events.” Epic took one of those cookies, slung an arm around Improbable’s shoulder and said “I gotchu fam” in a blog post found here.
It remains to be seen if Improbable and Epic will share any of those cookies with Unity.
Blizzard:
Mike Morhaime is exiting his position as a special adviser April 7, according to Activision Blizzard’s SEC filing.
Blizzard and NetEase extended their “publishing agreement … until January 2023. The agreement covers all active Blizzard franchises including World of Warcraft, StarCraft, Hearthstone, and Overwatch,” TEO’s Trent Murray writes.
ESA and WHO met to discuss WHO’s “gaming disorder” in early December, according to a press release. “The meeting’s purpose was to discuss the WHO’s activities with respect to video games, provide information on the video game industry, and exchange views on the role that the video games and related industries may play in contributing to public health objectives.”
What’s Amazon up to? It is reportedly “developing a service for streaming videogames over the internet,” The Information’s Jessica Toonkel and Kevin McLaughlin report.
THQ Nordic acquired “the 1999 action-adventure ‘Outcast’ from its three original creators, it announced on Thursday,” Variety’s Stefanie Fogel writes.
D.I.C.E. Awards nominees can be found here.
Interviews: FanAI’s Jordan Fragen (SYFY).
Players’ Lounge – Sponsored News:
Players’ Lounge redesigned its product, resulting in a 25% increase in week-over-week matches played for four weeks running.
Investors continue to assault our inboxes. Including a few billionaires. We’re holding strong.
Players’ Lounge is hiring a Senior Vice President of Engineering! Know a brilliant, competitive senior developer with PHP and AAA/F2P development experience? Slide into our DMs.
Extra Esports News:
ESC posted infographics detailing “The most popular tournaments of December.”
The United Kingdom awarded “a two-year grant to the Weavr Consortium, a broadcast technology project led by ESL UK,” TEO’s Graham Ashton reports.
Fnatic and WAX are partnering “to create digital collectibles using WAX’s blockchain technology,” VentureBeat’s Dean Takahashi reports.
IN: Pittsburgh Knights unveiled their Smite roster.