Month: August 2019

Recently, Ubisoft’s Chris Early spoke out against Valve’s PC digital store, Steam, saying its business model is “unrealistic.” He added, “It doesn’t reflect where the world is today in terms of game distribution.” Now, Ubisoft has further clarified its position on the matter.

A spokesperson for Ubisoft told GameSpot that the publisher elected to release The Division 2 on the Epic Games Store instead of Steam because Epic’s distribution model is, in the long-term, more beneficial to publishers.

“It was a business decision to not put new releases on Steam and focus on the Epic Store and Ubisoft Store,” the spokesperson said. “Ubisoft fully supports Epic and their third-party distribution model, which is in the long-term, beneficial for publishers both large and indie and the video games industry. We hope this partnership helps to validate and evolve the model.”

Early’s comments and this statement are likely connected to the revenue split that Epic offers relative to Steam. Typically, Steam typically keeps 30 percent of game sales, with 70 percent going to publishers. By contrast, the Epic Games Store offers much more to the people who make games; on the Epic Games Store, 88 percent of revenue goes back to developers.

Looking ahead, one of Ubisoft’s next big releases, Ghost Recon: Breakpoint, will also skip Steam in favor of launching for the Epic Games Store and Ubisoft’s own Uplay.

The Uplay part of this story is important, too. Uplay is Ubisoft’s own store, so removing Steam from the equation helps drive sales on it. For The Division 2, Ubisoft saw Uplay sales of that game grow tenfold over The Division 1.

It remains to be seen if Ubisoft will ever release another new title on Steam, but for the foreseeable future it seems the company has no intention to.

For what it’s worth, Epic has stated it will change its policy of chasing exclusives if Valve reduces the cut it takes from game sales on Steam.

Ryan and Greg break down the American Horror Story: 1984 official trailer! Find out their theories and predictions for the upcoming ninth season of AHS.

One of the biggest and most prominent eSports organizations–100 Thieves–will not have a team competing in the Call of Duty World League scheduled to begin in 2020.

In a video statement, 100 Thieves founder Matthew “Nadeshot” Haag said the decision basically came down to money. Activision charges a reported $25 million per team, and this fee was just too high for 100 Thieves, which is still operating as a start-up company with only around 30 people on staff (in addition to its paid competitors).

“Activision has decided to franchise, and obviously there are a lot of costs that come with that,” Nadeshot said. “The CDL is incredibly expensive. It’s so expensive.”

There are upfront costs related to joining the league, as well as operational costs that 100 Thieves would have to bear for “years,” Nadeshot said.

“We are just not equipped and not prepared to make that jump and to make that decision to be all-in,” he said.

Joining the Call of Duty League and putting up the money and resources is “a risk we can’t take right now,” Nadeshot said.

“We’re a start-up. We’re still a new company,” he said. “To make a financial commitment as large as this isn’t possible for us right now.”

Not only that, but because the Call of Duty World League is city-based–like the Overwatch League–100 Thieves would need to plant itself in one particular place, and it isn’t ready to do that. Nadeshot said 100 Thieves is a global brand that doesn’t want to be tied to one particular location.

Nadeshot and the other leaders of 100 Thieves debated this decision for “so long,” he said, but ultimately they decided to pass.

“It’s just a shi**y situation, man; there’s no other way to put it,” he said.

100 Thieves not competing at Call of Duty World League is a big loss for the competitive Call of Duty scene. The 100 Thieves team won twice in the Call of Duty majors competitive circuit in 2019 and came in second during August’s Call of Duty World Championship.

As ESPN reminds us, eight of the nine current members of the Call of Duty World League are financially backed by the same extremely rich groups that own Overwatch League teams.

“For those buyers, the $25 million expenditure is a way of doubling down on Activision Blizzard and trust in that company’s CEO, Bobby Kotick,” ESPN said. “If you’re Los Angeles Rams owner Stan Kroenke, Minnesota Vikings chairman Zygi Wilf or the New York Mets’ Wilpon family, $25 million is a drop in the bucket. But if you’re 100 Thieves, that’s a huge investment–one that could make or break your startup in the future–and it’s arguable if the reward outweighs the risk.”

The next Call of Duty game is the Modern Warfare reboot which launches in October for PlayStation 4, Xbox One, and PC.

Valve will be fighting EU antitrust charges over geo-blocking within the EU. Five other video game companies that were presented with similar charges will settle the case.

Reuters reports from sources familiar with the matter that six companies – Valve, Bandai Namco, Capcom, Focus Home, Koch Media, and ZeniMax – have been charged by the European Commission for antitrust practices.

Specifically, the EU claims that the six companies prevented customers in the EU from shopping for better deals on video games within the 28-country bloc. The EU alleges the six companies used geo-blocking keys, so a customer in one EU country couldn’t access another EU country’s web store which might offer the same game for less.

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SEGA threw Yakuza fans for a loop this week with the reveal of Yakuza 7 in a gorgeous new reveal trailer.  The new title, called Yakuza: Like a Dragon in the West, is due out in 2020 on PS4.

The new trailer shows off the newest protagonist Ichiban Kasuga and follows his story in Isezaki Ijin, Yokohama. In the trailer, he appears to turn himself into police, serve some time in prison, and is released 18 years later. The trailer, of course, has its emotional moments, but also shows off some of the quirkiness Yakuza is known for. Check out our favorite stills in the gallery below.

This iteration of Yakuza is a bit of an outlier, however, from what long-time fans might know the game to be. This Yakuza is steering away from its brawler roots to a turn-based combat system.

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Decades of video game tribalism, juvenile insults, and schoolyard myths about distant uncles working at certain console manufacturers can be traced back to one provenance: Super Nintendo vs. Sega Genesis. Yes, there were ancient console wars in the ’80s, and today there exists a mild chill between Sony adherents and Microsoft lifers, but the battle was never more ferocious than it was in the mid ’90s, when Sega fielded their Hedgehog against Nintendo’s plumber, and threatened a fight to the death.

Disney decided to throw gasoline on this long-dormant fire on Wednesday, when the company announced they’ll be remastering a pair of the classic platformers: The Lion King and Aladdin, to release fall 2019.

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Welcooome to Nintendo Voice Chat, IGN’s Nintendo show! This week, Seth Macy joins the NVC crew to discuss his hands-on time with the Switch Lite. Then, could an Amazon posting for an Overwatch Switch case mean that Blizzard’s popular team shooter is heading to Switch? The panel also discusses Mario Kart Tour’s upcoming release, the classic Lion King and Aladdin remasters, new Shovel Knight details, and more!

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Film director Richard Linklater is outdoing himself. The director filmed his Oscar-winning movie Boyhood over the course of 12 years, and now his next film will shoot over a span of 20 years.

According to The Hollywood Reporter, the movie is Merrily We Roll Along, and it’s based on the 1934 play of the same name. The film adaptation stars Beanie Feldstein, Blake Jenner, and Ben Platt, all of whom will be filmed over the course of two decades to tell the story is what appears to be an unprecedented manner.

The story follows a composer, Franklin Shepard (Jenner), who leaves his job making Broadway musicals to pursue a career in Hollywood. The story begins at the end, and works backwards through time to display the key moments in his life. Feldstein is set to portray the theatre critic Mary Flynn, who is also a friend of Shepard’s.

According to THR, filming on the first part of the movie is already finished.

“I first saw and fell in love with Merrily in the ’80s, and I can’t think of a better place to spend the next 20 years than in the world of a Sondheim musical,” Linklater said in a statement. “I don’t enter this multiyear experience lightly, but it seems the best, perhaps the only way, to do this story justice on film.”

Boyhood, which was released in 2014, was filmed over the course of 12 years as it chronicled the early life of actor Ellar Coltrane’s character, Mason. The actor and character grew older through the course of filming as the story reached several key moments in his adolescent life. It was a tremendous use of extended filming, and it’ll be interesting to see how it works over an even longer period of time with Merrily We Roll Along.

Boyhood was nominated for six Academy Awards, including Best Picture. The film ended up with one win, with Patricia Arquette winning for Best Actress in a Supporting Role.

Metro Exodus was among the first big-name games that skipped Steam in favor of releasing exclusively on the Epic Games Store. This announcement upset some portion of the audience, in part because the game was up for pre-order on Steam before the switch was made. Those who pre-ordered on Steam had their orders honored, but the move still caused some controversy.

In an interview with GI.biz, Koch Media CEO Klemens Kundratitz said his company’s deal with Epic did indeed cause “some ripples,” but overall he is “very happy” with how the game is performing commercially.

“Overall, I’m still of the opinion like I was at the beginning that, as an industry and as a publisher, we should welcome Epic and their business model,” he said. “We have a strong relationship with Epic and we continue to have a strong relationship with Steam as well.”

One sour spot for Kundratitz was the timing of the announcement. He said he wished his company could have revealed the news sooner. “That was not perfect,” he said.

Looking forward, Kundratitz said Koch Media–which owns Deep Silver and itself is owned by THQ Nordic AB–will continue to consider more Epic exclusivity deals in the future. The company does not have a “no Steam” policy, as it will release the game Iron Harvest on Steam in September.

Part of the reason why Koch cut a deal with Epic for Metro Exodus was because the Epic Games Store pays more to publishers. Steam typically gives 70 percent of game revenue to publishers, while the Epic Games Store pays 88 percent. “We need to embrace a digital partner that offers a much more compelling rev share model than anybody else, and I think they act as a role model for us and for other digital partners as well–a 70/30 split is quite frankly anachronistic,” he said.

Back in February, Kundratitz said much the same when it was revealed that Metro Exodus was leaving Steam for Epic. “Epic’s generous revenue terms are a game changer that will allow publishers to invest more into content creation, or pass on savings to the players,” Kundratitz said.

Metro Exodus skipping Steam did not appear to hurt the game’s sales. THQ Nordic announced in May that Metro Exodus sold 2.5 times more copies than Metro: Last Light did during its PC launch window. Exodus recouped all development and marketing costs shortly after launch.

In other news about the Epic Games Store, Ubisoft recently explained why it no longer releases games on Steam, which the company says has an “unrealistic” business model.