TGO Daily | October 30, 2020 | More On CD Projekt Crunch
Halloween is almost upon us! So exciting :D I hope you’re doing something spooky to celebrate! We probably won’t be doing anything all that big, not just because of the pandemic, but my partner and I will both be working. Also, we have very little time to do anything that isn’t school, work, or things like TGO.
Over on the podcast side, I like to run a mailbag segment every now and then. If I get the chance, I’ll send it out as a newsletter weekend special. Regardless, if you’d like to share a fun Halloween gaming-related anecdote (favourite game? first scare? funny moment?), feel free to share it on our Discord server!
In The News
CD Projekt On Crunch (…Again)
While I didn’t want to cover this again, it’s unavoidable at this point: CD Projekt continues to be in the spotlight for its practice of crunch culture. Speaking at an investor call, CEO Adam Kiciński said that crunch was:
“not that bad — and never was. Of course it’s a story that has been picked up by the media, and some people have been crunching heavily, but a large part of the team is not crunching at all since they have finished their work.”
The public-facing comments that are made repeatedly contradict the internal messaging at the studio. After the investor call, Kiciński sent an email to staff saying “I had not wanted to comment on crunch, yet I still did, and I did it in a demeaning and harmful way…What I said was not even unfortunate, it was utterly bad” (from Jason Schreier). Not to mention in June, he sent an email to staff apologizing to their spouses because of how little time they spend at home. So much for crunch being “not that bad.”
The primary focus of the investor call was to discuss the delay of Cyberpunk 2077, which is now releasing on December 10th. To that, they reassured investors that this was purely a tech-driven decision, and they could have shipped on their original date if they only had to launch on next-gen and PC.
Game Delays
A number of games have been delayed. First, Path of Exile had an expansion due for release on December 11th, just one day after the new release date of Cyberpunk. As a result, they’ve pushed version 3.13 into January, with the intent of completing it as originally scheduled, and starting work on 3.14.
More significantly, Ubisoft’s Far Cry 6 and Rainbow 6 Quarantine have both been delayed into the period between April and September of 2021. The announcement was made as part of their Q2 financial report, which was largely uneventful for our purposes. They have a strong holiday lineup though, with Assassin’s Creed Valhalla, Watch Dogs: Legion, and Immortals Fenyx Rising.
Activision Blizzard Q3
It’s financials season, and Activison Blizzard is showing everybody up with a dominant third quarter. Their revenues are up 52% year-over-year, with net income almost tripling to $604 million.
Call of Duty was largely responsible for driving those y-o-y numbers, with the launch of both Call of Duty Mobile and Call of Duty Warzone happening in the last 12 months. The premium title, Modern Warfare, did well in its own right, with it now being the highest first-year sales in franchise history. Though, putting Call of Duty on mobile and in a battle royale, through a free-to-play monetization model, did a lot for them. Activision alone is now up to 111 million monthly active users - more than triple last year.
The other two branches of the company, Blizzard and King, reported numbers consistent with the past year.
Source: gamesindustry.biz
Final Fantasy XIV
If you’re dedicated to following Final Fantasy XVI, Sony just released a blog post detailing some of the lore. I’ll let you peruse it at your interest, but I do want to point out that the protagonist’s name is Clive Rosfield.
His name is Clive.
After legendary fantastical names like Noctus, Lightning, and Zidane, they came up with…Clive. I’m simultaneously flabbergasted and impressed with how perfectly average it is. He’s also got a brother named Joshua and a friend named Jill. I love it.
Also In The News
EA fined €10 million in Dutch court for violating gambling laws
“Phil Spencer: ‘Our motivation is not to turn everybody into a subscriber’”
Sony giving away adapters that allow PSVR to work on PS5 for free
Say Hello!
That’s all for today :) If you want to get in touch, you can always reply to this email. You can also DM me on Twitter, or come join the community on Discord (it’s awesome)!
This newsletter is a companion/alternative to a mini-podcast I produce. The show is archived on YouTube, with most people listening on Amazon Alexa devices — but it’s also available on all podcast hosts.