In The News
Starbreeze can’t catch a break. GI.biz’s James Batchelor writes that “Swedish authorities have mounted a surprise raid on Starbreeze’s headquarters, leading to at least one arrest … Authorities are also said to have seized computers and documents from the premises. But despite the publisher’s well-publicised financial troubles, the incident appears to be centred around the arrested individual.”
Bethesda has just solved its canvas player frustration, and now something worse a has happened. “Thanks to a support snafu, customers unwittingly exposed their private data, including credit card info, home address and more, to other users,” Engadget’s Steve Dent writes.
Mike Laidlaw, formerly of BioWare, is Ubisoft Quebec’s new creative director.
Reports:
Playgroundz is out with a report that “found that while women still make up about half of the industry (and are predicted to surpass the number of men as gamers by 2020), only 30% of gamers on YouTube, 22% of esports team members, and 19.5% of gamers on Twitch were women,” GI.biz’s Rebekah Valentine reports.
Spending on AR/VR “are poised to grow at a surprisingly steady pace over the next four years,” IDC reports via GI.biz’s Brendan Sinclair. “Worldwide spending on AR and VR products and services will be up 69% next year, and will sport a five-year compound annual growth rate inching closer to 70% from 2017 through 2022.”
Xbox’s Phil Spencer expects to see Game Pass on “‘every device,’” GameSpot’s Eddie Makuch reports. “‘But as somebody sitting back and taking a longer-term view of where our business is going, you should look at that as a business model that we think scales to billions of people not hundreds of millions of people like retail does.’”
The United Kingdom’s Gambling Commission is having a little chat with Twitch “after a Eurogamer investigation confirmed two sites played by streamers were unlicensed,” Eurogamer’s Emma Kent reports.
Dragalia Lost has raked in $50 million since its mobile launch in September, Variety’s Stefanie Fogel reports.
Supercell’s opening “Hive Helsinki, a new higher education level coding school — but there will be no classes, teachers, textbooks or tuition fees,” Batchelor reports.
Interviews: THQ Nordic CEO Lars Wingefors (GI.biz), The Game Awards’ Geoff Keighley (Game Informer) and InXile CEO Brian Fargo (GI.biz).
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:
A report by Newzoo shows “the top four esports events accumulated 190.1M hours watched live across Twitch and YouTube Gaming,” TEO’s Max Miceli reports. “The most-watched LoL, CS:GO, and Dota 2 events saw a 6.9% increase in viewership over last year.”
Matcherino raised $2.7 million in an investment round “led by Seven Peaks Ventures, investors include Team Liquid parent company aXiomatic, and existing backers Madrona Venture Group and Vulcan Capital,” TEO’s Graham Ashton writes.
Partnerships:
Mountain Dew and CWL are partnering, with Mountain Dew providing a new drink called Game Fuel, Esports Insider’s Adam Fitch reports.
Li-Ning and Edward Gaming partnered for a clothing line, TEO’s Hongyu Chen reports. “Li-Ning will start selling the new line on Dec. 8 at its retail store in Shanghai’s Daning shopping complex.”
We Are Nations is partnering with “OpTic Gaming, Method, and RFRSH Entertainment‘s BLAST Pro Series. We Are Nations will handle the production of apparel and merchandise for its new partners,” Fitch writes.
Quake is moving from loot boxes to a battle pass system, Eurogamer’s Robert Purchese reports.
Interviews: Team Queso CEO Alvaro “Alvaro845” Gonzalez (TEO).