160°

Take-Two Interactive is closing two studios, including Rollerdrome developer Roll7

As part of previously-announced layoffs, Take-Two Interactive is closing Intercept Games and Roll7.

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LucasRuinedChildhood14d ago (Edited 14d ago )

I loved Rollerdrome and was looking forward to a Rollerdrome 2. 😐

Don't want to be melodramatic but as far you can be upset over video-game news ... bit heartbroken.

I feel like there's a trend of well made games like this going largely ignored by the gaming audience. It's quite frustrating. I hope the devs form a new studio but I suppose they'd have to start again from scratch.

JEECE14d ago

"I feel like there's a trend of well made games like this going largely ignored by the gaming audience."

Yep. I'd love to know how many of us actually bought this game, rather than just getting it on Gamepass or PS Plus. Probably a shockingly low number. Steam concurrents topped out at 419.

I know it's anecdotal, but when I think of my favorite indie games, I still largely think of titles that came out in the 2009-2015 range. Maybe with less competition it was easier to stand out then, but I just felt like at that time there was more recognition of the really great indie games that were worth your time.

senorfartcushion14d ago

Plus would have gotten them some extra money.

TheLigX14d ago

Olliolli 2, olliolli world and rollerdrome are some of my favorite indies of all time. This industry is disgusting lately.

solideagle14d ago (Edited 14d ago )

it's not industry's fault, it's the consumers fault. Audience just wants to play shooter/Battle Royale etc...

Christopher14d ago

No. It's the publisher's fixation on profit margins. They only want the most profitable of products. It's greed.

Inverno14d ago

I wouldn't blame consumers entirely either. If shooters and Battle Royal is all we're given then it's all we've got to buy. If the AAA industry wouldn't follow trends so obsessively it'd be better varied.

JEECE14d ago

There is fault to go around. Some of it is on consumers for sure. We whine constantly about live service games, but then we play them anyway and ignore better smaller titles.

But publishers and platform holders bear some responsibility too. You hear stories come out from indie devs who had big hits in the late PS3/360 to early PS4/XONE window who can barely move units now, and some of that is definitely failure to advertise and poor discoverability. During that era I felt like I reliably heard about the worthwhile indies, and now I don't.

Then there is the game pass effect (and PS Plus to a lesser extent). So many consumers have now been trained to expect to get indies with their subscriptions, they don't want to pay $20-$40 for them anymore.

ZeekQuattro14d ago

When voting with one's wallet goes wrong. I prsonally have no problem with AA or indie games. Often times those are some of the best experiences to be had in gaming. Unfortunately a lot of gamers thumb their noses at indies however. There are success stories but there are just as many casualties or at least it feels that way sometimes.

LordoftheCritics14d ago

It's the game.

Was fun for 10 minutes

JackBNimble14d ago

Has anyone actually taken a look at the economy? If you're really looking to blame someone for layoffs and closers, then maybe blame the people at the top making the bad decisions tanking the economies.
It's like some of you live in a little bubble oblivious to what's going on around the globe.

TheLigX13d ago

Hey there big business shilling homie… the game was very profitable.

+ Show (4) more repliesLast reply 13d ago
Gamble2014d ago

If the games made money the studios wouldn’t be closing. Blame consumers for not supporting “indies”

TheLigX13d ago

The games were profitable, you ding dong.

Killer2020UK14d ago

I've got to disagree with the comments blaming consumers. Yes that is a part of it but by and large the money men are closing studios and sacking staff to increase profitability. Let's not forget the obscene salaries they're on compared to the people who actually make the games. Take 2 are not short of cash, this didn't have to happen.

JEECE14d ago

The thing is, some of the Indie devs closing are really independent. In other words, we can blame Take 2 here, but who can we blame other than the consumers when a fully independent dev shuts down because their games aren't selling? There is an answer to that question, it just isn't greedy publishers, even if they are the most fun to blame.

CantThinkOfAUsername14d ago (Edited 14d ago )

Last year, Take-Two president and CEO both got paid 72M combined as a bonus. They could have paid the 600 employees they laid off 60K a year and still get half of that (36M). Strauss' compensation alone is 578:1 compared to a T2 employee's.

TiredGamer14d ago

We created the industry by our purchasing decisions/actions. The industry is slowly imploding. At some point we may be left only with safe mainstays (COD, Fortnite) and franchise/movie tie-ins (Indiana Jones, Spiderman, Batman, Star Wars), along with a contingent of very low budget indie stuff if it can turn a profit.

Sad.

+ Show (1) more replyLast reply 13d ago
notachance14d ago

ah damn, I loved olliolli series

monkey60214d ago

I loved Olli Olli.

I wanted to like Rollerdrome a lot more than I actually did. Shame about the studio though

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130°

Square Enix Is Going Multiplatform; The Layoffs & Its Past Don't Inspire Confidence

After its latest games didn't meet sales targets, Square Enix is going multiplatform but the company's track record isn't convincing.

Scissorman10h ago

Square Enix been multiplatform for decades, a few exclusively-deals doesn't make them any less multiplatform.

fr0sty9h ago

Nor is selling their games on a console with only 25 million install base going to bring their sales to where they hope they will be... Unless they somehow manage to dumb down FF7 trilogy to work on switch, they aren't going to have much luck. They already released it on PC, after all.

SegaSaturn6699h ago

It kind of does, giving preference to a certain platform by timed exclusivity. Console ports generally feel superior. Legend of mana PC port extremely broken

neutralgamer19928h ago

Sega

It doesn’t when square themselves didn’t want to fund the development of remake. It’s only after the success of the 1st they realized their mistake but now contract is signed. If it wasn’t for Sony there would be no FF7 remakes. Same goes for silent hill 2 with Konami. They don’t want to fund AAA budget. Companies like PlayStation and Nintendo get blamed when in reality they are saving some of these franchises

Remember sega didn’t want to fund bayonetta and epic games didn’t want to fund another gears of war. It’s easy to blame console makers but they are the ones taking the risk and paying huge upfront costs without seeing the final product. FF7 remake trilogy won’t be coming to Xbox now or in the future. PlayStation and PC is what square signed up for. Sony paid them more than they would make from Xbox sales.

ravens529h ago

I just wonder when everyone is going to demand that the Square Enix exclusives with Nintendo come to PS and Xbox. Or it's just the PS exclusives that matter lol

phoenixwing9h ago(Edited 9h ago)

I'd love for the nintendo exclusives to come to pc or ps5. They'd actually be playable then.

neutralgamer19929h ago

Raven

Exactly and that’s where square enix does more exclusive than any other platform. Gaming is square has always been very unrealistic with their sales expectations. Remember when tomb raider reboot sold 7.5 million and square said it wasn’t enough. They need to spend less on development and have more realistic expectations from sales.

And those thinking games being not on Xbox makes a difference don’t understand we have a decade plus of data showing square enix games having less than 20% of their multiplatform sales on Xbox (final fantasy series) and Nintendo consoles aren’t strong enough to run any current games. Nintendo switch should be as strong as Xbox one x atleast but we all know that’s most likely won’t happen

RoadRacer8h ago

@raven

thing is, as neutral said in their comm, the switch isn't strong enough to run flagship SE games
i think what SE does is, it makes unique games for switch only so that it has something for that console too. Thats where all the "underlined sans" rpgs go to mostly

maybe things will change when Swtich 2 drops cuz that's gonna be as strong as ps4 afaik from the rumors flying around

TheGamingHounds9h ago

@Scissorman

Your point is valid enough but when the icon of this company is limited to one console in timed-exclusivity, it means the company has crossed the line. By some degree at least

All things aside, Square itself stated "aggressive multiplatform strategies" so we all know what it's talking about

Scissorman6h ago(Edited 6h ago)

Then the headline should read "Square To Drop Exclusively Deals in Pursuit of A Sweeping Multiplatform Strategy". I don't recall this argument when Square Enix released Bravely Default, Octopath Traveler, and Triangle Strategy on one platform. And even if FF is the icon, not all of its titles have gone to one platform. We're talking about three games, one of which is already on PC. Did Square suddenly go 'multiplatform' after it released subsequent Tomb Raider sequels on more than just the Xbox? It's just a silly way of putting it.

+ Show (1) more replyLast reply 6h ago
TheGamingHounds9h ago(Edited 9h ago)

SE needs to go all in optimization. Broken PC ports won't help its case, especially with big releases like mainline Final Fantasy

Asterphoenix8h ago

It's actually simple. What doesn't inspire confidence is Square allocating their budgets on the wrong projects such as Forspoken, Avengers, Babylons Fall and Foamstars.

Square has always been multiplatform since PS3/360 days which 80 % of their games are. People kick up a fuss over PS exclusivity but not Nintendo which has more exclusive projects console exclusive from Square.

FF16 has done ok but not enough to fix the blunders that the past mistakes Square has made with some of their projects. FF7 Rebirth is unclear we'll see a PC release for sure so it's hard to say so far not as good as they would of liked.

Then again unrealistic expectations. If it weren't for Sony these games would at least had another 2 years development time. So some people need to be realistic in that regard.

Scissorman6h ago(Edited 6h ago)

It's the blunders that set those expectations so high. If you remove those from the equation, I bet the sales numbers would be more than stellar. Square believes it's okay to release a pile of risky, middling, garbage because the big boys will ultimately subsidize the cost. Don't worry if Forspoken sells poorly, FF16 will surely sell 10 million copies to balance that right out. Oh wait, it only sold like 4 million. Well that's a disaster. Meanwhile games that sell 2 million units with comparable budgets are deemed successful.

thorstein49m ago

I would also add that FFXVI, which I loved has a hint to one of their biggest problems: the number 16.

It's a great franchise, but that's all they've become known for. Dragon Quest is my favorite all time series but it's like they don't know what to do outside of those two IPs.

Valve never makes trilogies. The idea is that they don't want to become stagnant. Gabe Newell hates the number 3.

I can't imagine their talent wouldn't want to try a new RPG.

RoadRacer8h ago

Square Enix just really need to revise its expectations. Maybe consider a change in strategy on dev end as well. Multiplat will help for sure but only good games that are marketed well will sell

70°

How the names Arrowhead Game Studios and Helldivers 2 came to be

Arrowhead Game Studios CEO Johan Pilestedt explains how the studio name comes from a name translation, plus the background on the game title “Helldivers.”

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70°

Activision team is opening a new game studio in Poland 'Elsewhere Entertainment' to build new AAA IP

Microsoft's Activision subsidiary announced today that it is opening a new game development studio to take advantage of the huge talent pool growing in Poland. It'll be the second Activision studio based in the region, joining Infinity Ward Krakow, although this studio is, in fact, not working on Call of Duty.

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