Business
Versus Evil Officially Shuts Down
Over the holidays some unfortunate news was shared by video game journalists as Versus Evil officially announced that it will be shutting down after 10 years, per an official announcement issued on social media.
“Today is a sad day,” the company said in the statement. “After 10 wonderful years, Versus Evil is shutting its doors. We’ve loved bringing you the best indie games we could find & sharing so many happy memories with you all, our amazing community! From the bottom of our hearts, THANK YOU for everything!”
The news rocked gamer social media and was later confirmed by Versus Evil head of production Lance James who said that the indie publisher’s entire team had been laid off.
Versus Evil was founded in 2013 and was officially acquired by TinyBuild and Red Cerebrus back in 2021.
TinyBuild announced in late 2023 that it would miss it’s revenue forecast.
Versus Evil is known for The Banner Saga, Pillars of Eternity 2: Deadfire, Mothergunship, Stray Souls, and Unmetal.
Business
Patreon Hires Twitch’s Adiya Taylor as New Corporate Communications Lead
Content creation platform Patreon has officially tabbed Adiya Taylor as their new corporate communications lead, effective in February, according to an official announcement.
Taylor worked for Amazon’s video game streaming platform Twitch for three years in a variety of roles, most recently serving as the company’s senior monetization communications manager prior to her departure.
Taylor’s hiring comes after Patreon brought on Brielle Villablanca as Vice President of communications and creator advocacy back in November 2023.
“I’m thrilled to begin crafting and implementing a communications strategy around policy, trust and safety, product and more,” Taylor said during an official post on the networking platform LinkedIn, adding that she believes Patreon is a “true advocate” for creators.
“I’m looking forward to more storytelling around how we’re fostering fandom so that creators own long-lasting businesses built around their artistry,” Taylor added.
Business
Microsoft Bringing Four Games to Rival Consoles
Microsoft has responded to recent reports that there will be changes to it’s first-party strategy and has confirmed that four game titles will be released on rival consoles.
More specifically, Xbox head Phil Spencer said that ‘Starfield’ and ‘Indiana Jones’ will not be among the four titles heading to other platforms. Both games had a number of candidate platforms, per reports, adding that this is “not a change to our fundamental exclusive strategy.”
“We don’t damage Xbox and we can grow our business using what other platforms have to help us with that,” Spencer said, according to GamesIndustry.biz. “Looking forward, I think there is an interesting story for us of introducing Xbox franchises to players on other platforms to get them more interested in Xbox. We think there’s a good brand value for Xbox there.”
Xbox president Sarah Bond announced that Activision Blizzard games would begin to be added into Game Pass offerings, starting with Diablo 4, which will be added on March 28th.
Additionally, Bond said that Microsoft is still working on hardware for the future and that their focus regarding the future is “delivering the largest technical leap you will ever have seen in a hardware generation.”
Business
Sega’s Revenue See Rise to $27 Billion
Sega Sammy has released its financial report for the nine-month period that officially concluded on December 31st, 2023, and that report that demonstrated a rise in overall sales and profit despite a decrease in sales for Sega’s new titles.
That decline was offset by growth in pachislot and pachinko machines, however Sega had lowered its sales forecasts for the full financial year.
Here is a breakdown, courtesy of GamesIndustry.biz.
- Net sales: ¥349.9 billion ($2.3 billion, up 28.7% year-on-year)
- Operating income: ¥54.4 billion ($364 million, up 42.4% year-on-year)
- Ordinary income: ¥57.2 billion ($383 million, up 42.7% year-on-year)
- Net sales were up 130.3% to ¥120.2 billion ($805 million) in this segment
- Ordinary income increased by 521.3% at ¥45.7 billion ($306 million).
- Entertainment Contents segment, which includes video games, net sales were up 4.2% at ¥219.3 billion
- Profit decreased by 52.5% to ¥19.7 billion ($131.8 million) as a result of weak game sales
You can read a breakdown of the entire report at GamesIndustry.biz here.
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