Opinion
Upcoming Games: Splendid September
An overstuffed and super-sized edition of Upcoming Games! Over 20+ games for you to peruse in nearly every genre. Hopefully you'll find something to tickle your fancy.
Conor Caulfield
I cover everything Not Warcraft - Expect wider games industry coverage, analysis, and as much commentary as I can get away with
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Loading Screen: The Indie Game Death Cycle
Are we about to enter a new golden age for indie games? Or are we just in a death cycle that will leave great games lost in the wreckage?
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Loading Screen: How Much Is DLC Worth Anyway?
How much do you feel DLC should be worth? $1? $5? $10? Most times for devs, it feels like trying to hit a moving target - and if you miss or hit you're going to just annoy your audience regardless.
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Loading Screen: Exclusive Games Will Not Survive
A deep dive today to start the week! Exclusive games just simply aren't feasible anymore. As we see more and more games become multi-platform or cross ported, can any hold on to singular platform status?
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Loading Screen: Amazon Games "Don't Really Have Acting" and Ubisoft Is Letting Indies Play With Their Toys
According to Amazon Games boss Christoph Hartmann, their games don't have acting! Someone should tell them their credits are full of voice actors and mocap artists. Elsewhere, Ubisoft seems to be trying something new with old IP, handing it to proven indies and letting them cook.
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Loading Screen: 8 Years Of "Development" For Concord and Arc Raiders Goes Pay To Play
As Concord prepares for launch, the developers reflect on 8 years of development which is especially impressive considering the studio has only existed for 6. Elsewhere, Embark Studios aren't doubling down - with The Finals player numbers dropping, their next game Arc Raiders won't be Free to Play.
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Loading Screen: Paradox Delays Vampire: The Masquerade (Again) and The End Of Epic Exclusivity?
Vampire: The Masquerade Bloodlines 2 is being delayed (yet again) as Paradox refuse to gamble on any release going wrong - while Epic's gamble might not be paying off as they no longer have Borderlands as an Epic Games Store exclusive.
Reports
The Indie Dev Who Couldn't Release on Xbox
How bad does something have to go for you to walk away after months of work? This is the story of an already successful indie game, Haak. And how 14 months of work went down the drain, and a game is now denied to Xbox players because of corporate oversights.
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Loading Screen: Mechanized AI Voice Work and Ninja Theory's Surprising Success
Generative AI Voice Acting is a controversial topic but Nvidia are implementing the first iteration of the tech in the upcoming game Mecha Break. Elsewhere, despite public questions around whether Hellblade II was a success or failure, new documents show that Ninja Theory is doing pretty well!
Reports
The Most Played Single Player Game On Steam... Ever
Black Myth: Wukong is now the most played single player game on Steam ever, but what's driving this success - and why does it matter so much to the games industry at large? Let's break it down.
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Loading Screen: Black Myth: Wukong's Unbelievable Coverage Guidelines
Sometimes a story crosses our desk that simply seems unbelievable when we dig into it. And then it turns out to be true. So let's break down Black Myth: Wukong's leaked streamer guidelines and try to work out why they even exist.
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Loading Screen: Epic's Billion Dollar Store Victory and Activision Profits From Cancelled Mod
Today we learned Epic spent $1bn fighting Apple and Google - but they finally have their store on Mobile. Now they just need to actually do something with it. Activision though could do less - killing a Call of Duty Mod before release but after they've extracted as much value as possible from it.