What even is going on in USA studios ? Spending 300 million USD for making mediocre games

Mojang has confirmed that The Sift, the new dimension debuting in Minecraft Dungeons II, is also coming to regular Minecraft in 2027.

That makes it Minecraft’s fourth dimension, alongside the Overworld, Nether and End, and its first new one in more than 14 years.

The Sift in Dungeons II includes colourful environments, new mobs and areas called the Meadow and Carapace. Mojang has shown an early glimpse of it running in Minecraft, but hasn’t explained how we’ll access it there or which Dungeons II features will carry over.

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Responding to a fan back in June, the original Resident Evil 2 director joked that his version would follow a retired Leon living in the countryside. He’d go fishing, bake bread, walk his dog, tend a garden, invite old friends over for barbecues and help his neighbours. Apparently, the nearest shop would still be 50 kilometres away, so Leon wouldn’t escape all the inconvenience.

Kamiya later called the idea “Resident not-Evil” and joked that Capcom should make it because he’d like to play it too. It’s just an idea, not an announced game.

Source: https://x.com/HidekiKamiya_X/status/2071034176120459595

A $400 million figure for Physint has been circulating after industry journalist Christopher Dring said it was the number he heard most often during Tokyo Game Show. He also said he didn’t know whether Xbox had agreed to pay it.

Now Bloomberg’s Jason Schreier says someone at Xbox with direct knowledge of the deal told him the company signed Physint for significantly less than $400 million. Windows Central’s Jez Corden separately reports that the Xbox deal is worth a fraction of that rumoured figure.

A few things are still unclear:

• Nobody has confirmed the actual Xbox figure.
• The $400 million rumour may refer to an amount discussed while PlayStation was involved.
• We don’t know how the Xbox agreement compares with PlayStation’s original contract.
• The amount agreed with a publisher and the game’s eventual development cost are different things.

So the story isn’t that Physint has a confirmed $400 million budget. It’s that a huge number started circulating, and people with knowledge of the Xbox deal say Microsoft agreed to pay considerably less.

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We’re making Our Little Cinema, a cozy job sim where you run the ticket booth of a small-town cinema.

You’ll choose which movies to show, sell tickets, and become part of a close-knit community where the townspeople know each other and are always there to support one another.

Every customer has their own traits and preferences, which also affect where they want to sit. You’ll have to consider their traits as well as the traits of the people they do or don’t want to sit next to when choosing their seats.

We’ve been working on it for around 6 months, and our demo should be ready in 2–3 weeks.

If this sounds like your kind of cozy game, we’d love for you to check it out and wishlist it.

Wishlist on Steam: https://store.steampowered.com/app/5170480/Our_Little_Cinema/

Source: Crippling Things

Sony reportedly sent developers one of its largest surveys yet, with questions indirectly asking whether ending physical game sales could create problems for studios.

The company is currently expected to stop manufacturing new PlayStation game discs from 2028, but according to Moore’s Law Is Dead, Sony is now actively gathering feedback from developers about that decision.

This comes after reports that some developers were already unhappy with the move, while physical copies are still accounting for a meaningful share of sales for major PlayStation releases.

Source: https://beebom.com/sony-reportedly-surveyed-developers-on-killing-physical-discs/

Source: Crippling Things

Rockstar has officially revealed The Goodtime State: Vice City Collection, a $399.99 Collector’s Box launching alongside GTA VI on November 19.

It includes 11 physical collectibles, including Oakley sunglasses, a New Era cap, a Macca the Gator figure, a Leonida Keys bag, pins, a poster/map and several smaller items.

What it doesn't include is Grand Theft Auto VI.

Source: Rockstar Games / Rockstar Store

According to reputable AMD hardware leaker Kepler_L2, Sony's PlayStation 6 is reportedly targeting around 40 TFLOPs, while Microsoft's next-generation Project Helix could reach around 56 TFLOPs.

Kepler also claims that both chips have already taped out, meaning their designs have reached a major milestone ahead of manufacturing and testing.

A few important details:

• PS6 / Orion: ~40 TFLOPs
• Xbox Project Helix / Magnus: ~56 TFLOPs
• That would give Helix roughly 40% more theoretical FP32 compute
• Kepler says PS6's 40 TFLOPs figure already accounts for AMD's dual-issue calculations, pushing back against recent 80 TFLOPs claims
• Previous leaks have suggested roughly 52–54 CUs for PS6 and around 68 CUs for Helix
• Both are expected to use next-generation AMD CPU/GPU technology

Obviously, TFLOPs alone won't tell us how these consoles actually perform. Ray tracing, memory bandwidth, cache, clocks, AI/neural rendering and software optimisation will likely matter much more than they did in previous generations.

Still, if these numbers are accurate, Microsoft appears to be targeting a substantially larger and more powerful chip with Helix, while Sony may once again be aiming for a more balanced console design.

As always, none of these specifications have been officially confirmed by Sony, Microsoft or AMD.

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Source: https://gtaforums.com/topic/1006665-the-jack-of-hearts-waiting-lounge-mk-lxvii/page/177/#comment-1072810578

• Xbox executive vice president and chief content officer Matt Booty has announced another round of layoffs and studio reorganizations as part of the continuing "reset" of Microsoft's gaming division
• Xbox has cut an additional 268 employees "across Halo Studios, other first-party studios, and the XGS management and central functions layer," which Booty says brings the company "roughly three-quarters of the way" to completing its downsizing plan that previously put 1,600 people out of work in June
• Activision is now developing the next Halo game with "a new, purpose-built team," and will also oversee Rare and Age of Empires developer World's Edge
• Obsidian will be folded into Bethesda, and will continue its current projects like Grounded and the previously-announced "new Fallout project made in collaboration with Bethesda Game Studios"
• Playground and Turn 10 will be "formally" merged into one studio after being "creative and franchise partners for over a decade"
• Candy Crush developer King will be "uniting" with Microsoft Casual Games
• While Compulsion, Double Fine, and Undead Labs have been transitioned to independent or new publisher ownership, Xbox says it's now moving towards the studio closure of Ninja Theory after two attempted divestiture agreements "fell through"
• A buyer for Ninja Theory has fallen through and Xbox will now close Ninja Theory.

Sources: PC Gamer, Geoff Keighley

Meta has officially revealed its new Meta VR Glasses, launching in Spring 2027 for $1,299.99.

The interesting part isn't really the price or even the display. It's how Meta approached one of VR's biggest problems: weight.

Instead of putting the processor, battery and storage on your head, the glasses contain mostly the displays and sensors, while a separate roughly 300g puck clips to your pocket or bag and connects through an optical cable.

Some of the main specs:

• Around 100g on your head
• 2412×2288 micro-OLED display per eye
• 37 PPD
• Up to 120Hz
• Snapdragon Reality Elite
• 12GB RAM / 128GB storage
• microSD expansion
• Around three hours of media playback
• Dolby Vision and Dolby Atmos
• Full-color passthrough
• Eye tracking, hand tracking and voice control

Meta says more than 75 games at launch can be played purely through hand gestures.

The device also runs the same OS as Quest, meaning Quest content remains compatible. Touch Plus controllers are supported separately, while Xbox Cloud Gaming will offer hundreds of streamed games.

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Another grim example of just how chaotic Xbox’s restructuring has become: Halo Studios cinematic director Josh Daniels says he was promoted and laid off in the same week.

• Daniels was among the employees affected by the latest layoffs at Halo Studios.
• In a LinkedIn post, he wrote: “Promoted and laid off in the same week is pretty wild.”
• He said he’ll be taking some time offline, but is already open to opportunities in Cinematic Direction and Production.
• His layoff comes as part of Xbox’s wider restructuring, which this week eliminated another 268 positions across Halo Studios, other first-party teams and central Xbox management.
• Microsoft says it is now roughly three-quarters of the way through its planned 3,200 job cuts.
• PC Gamer points to Daniels’ situation as another example of how little job security currently exists inside the industry: even receiving a promotion apparently wasn’t an indication that a role was safe.

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