In The News
The top 25 biggest games companies are seeing their lowest growth rate in 4 years, NewZoo’s Michiel Buijsman reports. They “generated a combined $50.0 billion in H1 2018, an increase of +12% compared to H1 2017. This is the lowest year-on-year growth of the first half of the year since 2014.”
YouTube for Nintendo Switch has arrived. How ’bout that Bluetooth headphone sync, tho?
Skillz did a breakdown of where the best competitive mobile players live across the country. Top cities include Jacksonville, Florida and Chicago.
Activision Blizzard:
Call of Duty: Black Ops 4 “has sold through more copies than Black Ops III through their first three weeks. A big chunk of those sales comes from PC and Blizzard’s Battle.net service. According to Activision, Black Ops 4’s PC sales are three-times higher than Black Ops III,” VentureBeat’s Jeff Grubb reports.
But, shares “plunged 10 percent in after-hours trading after reporting its third straight quarterly decline in monthly active users,” CNBC’s Waverly Colville writes. “The company predicts its fourth quarter revenue to be $3.05 billion, missing estimates of $3.06 billion.”
Destiny 2’s player count is up this quarter, yet Activision said in its earnings call that Destiny isn’t “performing as well as it hoped,” Game Informer’s Kimberley Wallace writes.
Tencent’s trimming its marketing budget due to China’s “restrictions” (as we’ll call them) on gaming, Bloomberg’s Lulu Yilun Chen reports. “China’s largest gaming company is asking marketing executives to control their cash flow and curtail spending to ‘endure the hard times together.’”
Streamlabs “has announced the launch of its native app store, featuring a growing collection of apps built entirely within Streamlabs OBS,” Gamasutra’s Emma Kidwell reports.
Red Bull and Bandai Namco are partnering for “a joint Pac-Man campaign … The partnership includes limited-edition cans, branded mazes and other collaborations designed for cross-promotion,” AListDaily’s H.B. Duran reports.
BigBox VR pulled in “$5 million in seed funding to help develop its upcoming battle royale VR game, Population: One,” GI.biz’s Rebekah Valentine reports.
Players’ Lounge – Sponsored News:
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Venture Capitalists and Angel Investors of all shapes and sizes have been launching “pick your brain” intro emails at Players’ Lounge. Our seed round is just about full and we’ll be announcing our dance card later this year. Think you can dance?
Extra Esports News:
One Championship is organizing “an effort to pump up to $50 million into the launch of the One eSports championship series next year,” CNET’s Zoey Chong writes.
RFRSH Entertainment added $10 million in funding, TEO’s Jack Stewart reports. “RFRSH is expanding its CS:GO competition, the BLAST Pro Series, to three new international locations in 2019.”
Launching:
EA Sports and UEFA are launching “the eChampions League, a version of the popular UEFA Champions League football tournament that will be played on FIFA 19,” Esports Insider’s Adam Fitch writes.
B/HI is starting “GG, a full-service division dedicated to the explosive esports industry,” a press release reads.
Partnerships:
Cheddar Sports added Logitech G as its “official hardware sponsor,” TEO’s Max Miceli reports.
Dignitas and Raynor Gaming are partnering, Fitch reports. “Raynor Gaming will equip Dignitas’ players and streamers with branded gaming chairs.”
Apparently, Ninja, Logic, Rick & Morty played Fallout 76 together and it was not so great.
Harrisburg University’s varsity esports practice facility is open.
Happy birthday David “Moo” Hull, Théo “PtitDrogo” Freydière and Ethan “iaguz” Zugai!