Tag Archives: Media

Humble Games reportedly lays off its entire staff

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Humble Games has reportedly laid off all 36 of its staff. Former employees posted about the layoffs on social media. Humble Games is owned by media conglomerate Ziff Davis, which counts IGN, Eurogamer and GamesIndustry.biz among its gaming portfolio. Humble Games confirmed in a LinkedIn post that there had been a "restructure" at the company, but did not reveal the number of jobs lost.

A PR rep for Humble Games also confirmed to Engadget that the company would not be shutting its doors as a result of today's restructuring. He added that both ongoing and upcoming projects would continue to be supported and published by the studio.

The layoffs at Humble Bundle are the latest in a sweep across the gaming business. Last year saw a shocking number of cuts across studios of all sizes, and the trend has sadly continued into 2024.

"The games industry is volatile, it's been inundated by people who only want exponential growth at the expense of making great games with great teams," Emilee Kieffer, a former lead quality assurance analyst with Humble Games, wrote on LinkedIn following the layoffs.

The indie publisher helped bring almost 50 video games to market, including notable hits such as Slay the Spire, Unpacking, Wandersong and Coral Island. Humble Games also had several upcoming games slated for release, such as Never Alone 2, a second delve into mythology and stories from the indigenous Iñupiat people in Alaska. 

"This decision was not made lightly; it involved much deliberation and careful thought, with the goal of ensuring the stability and support of our developers and ongoing projects," Humble's statement said. 

This business is a separate operation from the charity storefront Humble Bundle, which is also part of Ziff Davis but does not appear to be impacted by today's news. We've reached out to Ziff Davis and Humble Games for more information and will update if we hear back.

Update, July 23, 2024, 5:35 ET: Article has been updated to include a response from Humble Games' PR team.

This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/humble-games-reportedly-lays-off-its-entire-staff-201923446.html?src=rss

Warner Bros. has bought the developer behind its MultiVersus brawler

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Warner Bros. just announced the acquisition of Player First Games, the developer behind the popular free-to-play platform fighter MultiVersus. This makes a whole lot of sense as the hit Smash Bros-esque brawler pulls its entire roster from WB properties. The game includes characters like Batman, Bugs Bunny, Agent Smith from The Matrix and, of course, both Rick and Morty.

It doesn’t look like much will change with regard to the day-to-day workings of Player First Games. Co-founders Tony Huynh and Chris White will still lead the company, though the pair will report to Carlos Barbosa, Vice President and Studio Head of Warner Bros. Games.

Huynh says the team is excited about the acquisition and that it should “be great for MultiVersus overall.” There has been no announcement as to what comes next for the fighting game. However, Player First regularly drops new characters into the roster, so this will likely continue. I for one would like to beat up Tom and Jerry as Tony Soprano. Make it happen WB.

MultiVersus is available now on just about every platform out there, including PS5, PS4, Xbox One, Xbox Series X/S and PC. Even better? There’s crossplay between platforms. The game isn’t available for the Nintendo Switch just yet, but maybe that’ll change whenever the Switch 2 makes its grand entrance.

This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/warner-bros-has-bought-the-developer-behind-its-multiversus-brawler-180355445.html?src=rss

Echoes of the Emergent, a hauntingly beautiful Playdate exclusive, sold me on visual novels

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Somehow in all these years, I’ve never gotten into visual novels, despite being a person who loves both reading and video games. The idea has always intrigued me in some way, but I’ve never really felt compelled to actually pick one up. That changed when I first saw the announcement for Echoes of the Emergent a few months ago. Described as “a personal journey through a shattered post-apocalyptic world,” all it took was a glimpse of Echoes of the Emergent’s gritty aesthetic and melancholic atmosphere to get me to preorder it. And now that I’ve finally gotten around to playing (reading? experiencing?) it, I’m kind of blown away.

Echoes of the Emergent is a Playdate-exclusive title from RNG Party Games, the same team that made Bloom. It opens with its main character, Ayumi, on a tense scavenging trip to find any food she can in a ruined city. She’s alone, afraid and increasingly concerned about her dwindling resources. As the story progresses, it bounces between Ayumi’s bleak new reality and flashbacks to a time when things were normal. Her panicked efforts to stay alive, to keep going, are interwoven with memories of her family and friends — some of them happy, some painful. And there’s a cat.

A still from Echoes of the Emergent showing a girl (viewed from behind) looking out at dilapidated buildings. The text reads: It was all gone
RNG Party Games

The narrative is illustrated with haunting backgrounds of Ayumi’s dilapidated surroundings, and these move ever so slightly to create a really unsettling effect. If you press the down arrow on the D-pad, you can collapse the text box to get a full view of the backgrounds. It takes a few hours to get through the entire story, but it’s definitely worth carving out some time for. You can save your place by pressing ‘B’ to pull up the menu.

Echoes of the Emergent is the kind of experience that will stick with you for a little while even after it’s over. It’s available on the Playdate Catalog for $8, but you can also get it — and its captivating soundtrack — on itch.io.

This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/echoes-of-the-emergent-a-hauntingly-beautiful-playdate-exclusive-sold-me-on-visual-novels-222033336.html?src=rss

.45 PARABELLUM BLOODHOUND is a cyberpunk RPG by the developer of VA-11 HALL-A

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Sukeban Games is working on what it describes as a "cyberpunk active time action" game with a battle system that's similar to Parasite Eve. In a blog post, Chris of Sukeban has officially announced .45 PARABELLUM BLOODHOUND, featuring a mercenary named Reila Mikazuchi as its protagonist. Enemies can attack you from anywhere while you're exploring environments in the game, and you'll have to dodge and wait for an action bar to fill before you can launch a counterattack. The action bar fills at a speed based on your character and weapon stats, so the stronger you get, the faster you can fight back. 

While the announcement doesn't have a in-depth explanation of the game's plot, Chris describes its story as follows: "You play as Reila Mikazuchi; a washed out mercenary whose glory days are long gone. In a last attempt at grabbing life by the horns she decides to go back to the life, only to realize the real enemy isn’t in front of her gun."

The indie developer is planning to make seven chapters for the game, and five are already done and playable. It has yet to announce a release date, though, so as not to repeat its "N1RV ANN-A situation." Sukeban is the developer behind the cyberpunk bartending "booze-em-up" game VA-11 HALL-A, which is set in a post-dystopian world with a corporate-controlled society. 

VA-11 HALL-A was wildly successful for an indie title, and Sukeban announced a sequel called N1RV ANN-A: Cyberpunk Bartender Action back in 2018 after it hit 200,000 copies sold. The developer hasn't released N1RV ANN-A yet despite announcing a 2020 launch date, and it doesn't look like we're seeing it anytime soon. Chris said .45 PARABELLUM BLOODHOUND is "significantly ahead in development" and that the developer is dedicating its "full attention to it for the foreseeable future."

Sukeban has also released the first trailer for .45 PARABELLUM BLOODHOUND, and you can watch it below.

This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/45-parabellum-bloodhound-is-a-cyberpunk-rpg-by-the-developer-of-va-11-hall-a-180043556.html?src=rss

The live-action Halo show has been canceled at Paramount+

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Many moons ago, back in 2013, we learned that Hollywood royalty Steven Spielberg had teamed up with Microsoft to create a live-action Halo television series. It took about ten years for the vision to finally come to fruition, but the show has now been canceled by the Paramount+ streaming service after a mere seventeen episodes. The first season aired in 2022 and the second earlier this year. We had mixed feelings about the show's debut, but it's still a sad conclusion for the big-budget project.

According to an unnamed Variety source, the show creators plan to shop the project around and search for a new home for the chronicles of Master Chief and Cortana. "We deeply appreciate the millions of fans who propelled the Halo series to be a global success and we remain committed to broadening the Halo universe in different ways in the future," 343 Industries said. "We are grateful to Amblin and Paramount for their partnership in bringing our expansive sci-fi universe to viewers around the world."

This is the latest hurdle for fans of the UNSC to get more Halo action. Not only is the TV show gone, but last year's rounds of layoffs at Microsoft didn't leave 343 Industries unscathed. The studio reportedly had to restart its development of the series' next chapter, and we haven't heard much about the games since.

This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/the-live-action-halo-show-has-been-canceled-at-paramount-230612472.html?src=rss

Netflix will drop a new multiplayer game when Squid Game season 2 premieres this year

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Netflix is expanding its games roster with an intriguing (and probably gruesome) new tie-in. During the company's quarterly earnings announcement, Netflix shared that it plans to launch a multiplayer game inspired by Squid Game. Its release date will be timed to coincide with the second season of the South Korean TV sensation. We have no other information about what style of game it will be, but we can guess that it will echo the children's games contestants play for survival on the series.

The program has already spawned several spinoffs for the streaming service. After season 1 became an international sensation in 2021, Netflix created a virtual reality version as well as an in-person pop-up experience in Los Angeles based on the fictional reality show. The company also teamed with a British production company to create Squid Game: The Challenge, an actual reality TV show that is fortunately a lot less lethal than its source material.

Another insight from the quarterly report is how much advertisements have grown in importance for Netflix. The ad-supported tier is responsible for 45 percent of new sign-ups in markets where the subscription option is available. The plan has only been available for about 18 months, and its audience has already grown 34 percent sequentially in the second quarter of 2024. Part of that shift is happening because the basic plan option is being phased out; it left Canada and the UK already, and the US and France are next up.

This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/netflix-will-drop-a-new-multiplayer-game-when-squid-game-season-2-premieres-this-year-220338938.html?src=rss

Fandango co-founder J. Michael Cline dead at 64

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One of the founders of the movie ticketing service Fandango has died following an apparent suicide in New York City.

J. Michael Cline, the co-founder of the movie ticket website and service Fandango, died Tuesday after falling from the balcony of a Manhattan hotel in what the medical examiner’s office ruled as a suicide, according to The New York Times.

Cline co-founded Fandango in 2000 with former chief operating officer Art Levitt during the dot-com boom and became one of the biggest online retailers. Fandango launched with seven movie theater chains, according to Variety.

Fandango found success by completely changing the way people went to the movies. Moviegoers didn’t have to wait in long ticket lines only to find out that the 6 PM showing of Battlefield Earth was already sold out. They could purchase their tickets before they even left home and still have time to buy an overpriced box of Milk Duds and a watered down Shasta.

The company’s flashy orange “F” logo also made it one of the most recognizable online brands in the industry. Cline described his company's whimsical sounding name to Variety as “fast and fun” and a “perfect match to a service designed to make going to the movies easier and more enjoyable than ever before.”

Five years after its launch, online movie ticket sites like Fandango and its competitor Movietickets.com sold tickets worth over $30 million in one year. Comcast bought the Fandango brand in 2007 for an undisclosed sum. Fandango also bought some of the Internet’s hottest movie properties such as the aggregated movie review website Rotten Tomatoes in 2017. The movie ticket brand went through subsequent parent sales until it landed with its current owners NBCUniveral and Warner Bros., which expanded the Fandango brand to a streaming service called Fandango at Home as a replacement for Vudu.

Fandango continues to thrive as an online ticket retailer even at a time when movie theaters are seeing a huge slump in sales. During the Barbenheimer craze last summer, Fandango sold 3.5 million tickets alone just to the Oscar nominated and winning films Barbie and Oppenheimer.

Cline left Fandango in 2011 and went on to become the executive chairman of the tech investment firm Juxtapose that helped launch health and wellness companies like Care/of and Corduroy, according to the firm’s website.

Levitt described his former business partner to the New York Times as a formidable entrepreneur who was “a bit of an adventurer” and someone who “saw an opportunity in the market” with Fandango.

In the US, the National Suicide Prevention Lifeline is 1-800-273-8255 or you can simply dial 988. Crisis Text Line can be reached by texting HOME to 741741 (US), 686868 (Canada), or 85258 (UK). Wikipedia maintains a list of crisis lines for people outside of those countries.

This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/fandango-co-founder-j-michael-cline-dead-at-64-214725046.html?src=rss

The final trailer for Alien: Romulus looks tense, bloody and awesome

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The last couple of Alien movies have been good for the most part but it feels like they’ve been missing the raw, skin-shredding tension of the first few films. The latest trailer for Alien: Romulus looks like the series is headed back to its dark, claustrophobic roots.

Alien: Romulus features a whole new crew of doomed space-trekking souls who encounter the deadly Xenomorph on a derelict spacecraft. This time, it’s a crew of space colonizers who are scavenging for resources from abandoned ships and stations.

This Alien film was co-written and directed by Fede Alvarez, the filmmaker behind cult horror flicks such as the two Don’t Breathe movies and the Evil Dead remake. So, yes, Alien: Romulus is gonna be very tense and very, very bloody. Where the original Alien merely strapped a parasitoid xenomorph to a crew member's face, the trailer for Romulus is willing to show a facehugger penetrating some poor guy's head. Yikes.

Alien: Romulus hits theaters on Friday, Aug. 16.

This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/the-final-trailer-for-alien-romulus-looks-tense-bloody-and-awesome-191908758.html?src=rss

US college students can take half off a Max subscription

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US college students can shave half off a Max subscription. As long as you can confirm your active student status, you’ll get a 50 percent discount on the Max With Ads monthly plan. Usually $10, you’ll only pay $5 each month to stream classic and current HBO series (and more).

The promotion is through a partnership with UNiDAYS, a (strangely capitalized) service that verifies college and university student status. The company has also partnered with Apple, Microsoft, Samsung, Uber Eats, Nike and more.

After successfully verifying your status, the promotion will last for 12 months. But you’ll have the chance to re-verify your student status every year as long as you’re eligible to keep the discount. Once you’re in your last year with no plans to head to another school, you’ll graduate to the hard-knock life of $10 ad-supported streaming plans.

Max lets you stream classic HBO series like The Sopranos, The Wire, Sex and The City, Game Of Thrones, Six Feet Under and more. You also get current-run content from HBO, Warner Bros., DC, HGTV and Food Network. These include series and films like The Last of Us, Dune: Part Two, House of the Dragon, Barbie and Euphoria. You’ll also be able to stream the upcoming The Batman spinoff The Penguin, costarring Colin Farrell with his fat suit and a bunch of prosthetics.

Once you’re verified through UNiDAYS, you’ll receive a promotional code. Just follow the instructions you get with the code to begin your subscription.

This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/us-college-students-can-take-half-off-a-max-subscription-163906242.html?src=rss

Splitgate 2 is coming to PC and consoles in 2025

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It was a shame to see 1047 Games putting Splitgate on ice back in 2022. The studio did a great job of freshening up the competitive arena shooter genre by adding portals (think: Quake meets Portal), but it moved on to a new project. We now know that’s going to be Splitgate 2, a free-to-play sequel that’s coming to PC, PS4, PS5, Xbox One and Xbox Series X/S next year.

1047 Games is going bigger in all kinds of ways this time around, including with a much larger development team. A group of 20 first-time game developers created Splitgate, which started as a school project. The team is now more than 150 strong and features devs with experience on the likes of Call of Duty, Overwatch, Halo, Valorant and League of Legends.

The sequel is being built from the ground up in Unreal Engine 5. It will have three factions you can pick from based on your preferred play style and tactics. The Aeros are agile, Sabrasks are all about power and Meridians can manipulate time. 

There will be many areas, weapons and modes to check out, though the bulk of the action will be in four versus four combat. A debut trailer gives some idea of what to expect and more details will be revealed in August. Fans can check out a free comic series and unlock in-game collectibles through the Splitgate 2 companion app for iOS and Android.

1047 Games has a tough act to follow since Splitgate was very well received and it proved popular — it had more than 22 million downloads. It’s a strong foundation to build on, though, and the Splitgate 2 trailer (despite being a cinematic rather than gameplay-focused one) looks very promising.

This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/splitgate-2-is-coming-to-pc-and-consoles-in-2025-144400499.html?src=rss