In The News
Weekend in Review:
Jacob Mitich, one of those shot in Jacksonville, “is suing both the venue and Madden publisher Electronic Arts for negligence, according to a complaint,” Kotaku’s Jason Schreier reports. He’s “seeking damages from eight defendants including EA, the Jacksonville Landing mall, and pizza parlor Chicago Pizza.”
Shay “Young Kiv” Kivlen is also struggling in the aftermath of the shooting, according to his interview with ESPN’s Jenna Laine. “An officer came to Kivlen’s hotel room and stayed with him for about 90 minutes until it was confirmed Katz was dead.”
JD.com CEO Richard Liu “was arrested in Minneapolis, Minnesota late Friday night on suspicion of sexual misconduct,” Dot Esports’ Malcolm Abbas writes.
Can a week really go by without PlayStation cross-play drama? Sony CEO Kenichiro Yoshida recently said this: “‘Our way of thinking is always that PlayStation is the best place to play,’” GI.biz’s Christopher Dring reports.
Microsoft corporate vice president Mike Ybarra shot back on Twitter, saying, “Still isn’t listening to gamers. All games should be cross play and progression with the right input flexibility and gamer options.” We are getting nowhere real fast.
International Olympic Committee President Thomas Bach is keyed up about promotion of “violence or discrimination” in video games. “‘Of course every combat sport has its origins in a real fight among people,” he said. “But sport is the civilized expression about this,’” he told The Associated Press’s Stephen Wade.
2K Games released a statement urging players in Belgium to “contact your local government representative” in support of bringing loot boxes back for NBA 2K.
Tetragon Works merged into Brace Yourself Games, Dring reports.
BIG Clan added Runtime as a sponsor, Esports Insider’s Lydia Mitrevski writes. “The ‘BIG Box’ includes powdered supplements, snack bars, a shaker and BIG collectables like a metal pin and stickers.”
Extra Esports News:
IN: Sam “Octane” Larew joined 100 Thieves’ Call of Duty team.
OUT: Fnatic released Jacky “EternaLEnVy” Mao, Saahil “UNiVeRsE” Arora, Johan “pieliedie” Åström, and Kurtis “Aui_2000” Ling from their Dota 2 team.
Interviews: Team Vitality’s Rocket League coach Mike “Gregan” Ellis (Dot Esports).
Happy weekend birthdays Roman “Resout1on” Fominok and Aaron “erho” Kappes, Monday birthdays Shin “RagnaroK” Hee Bum and Orie “YoDa” Guo and Tuesday birthday Vladimir “No[o]ne” Minenko!