Sony, Vicarious Vision, CD Projekt… This week’s business news

news business Sony, Vicarious Vision, CD Projekt… This week’s business news

Sony invests again in Epic Games!

In July 2020, Sony announced in the press that it had invested 250 million Dollars to Epic Games to support the company’s technological development behind Unreal Engine 5. In April 2021 again, this time for the sum of $200 million. A new agreement celebrated by the arrival of Aloy from Horizon: Zero Dawn in id:45791 Fortnite|sponsored=false]. Finally, Sony seems to want to go much further in its idea, as Epic Games has announced this week that the Japanese firm had injected $1 billion additionally. In focus: technological development and implementation of the metaverse.

Today, Epic Games announced $2 billion in funding to advance the company’s vision to build the Metaverse and support its continued growth.

The other billion comes from KIRKBI the family holding and investment company behind the LEGO Group. These additional investments shouldn’t disrupt the established order, as the press release states Epic Games remains under the control of Tim Sweeney. Apparently, the press release leaves the floor Kenichiro YoshidaCEO and Sony Group Corporation PDG :

As a creative entertainment company, we’re excited to invest in Epic to deepen our relationship in the realm of the metaverse, a place where creators and users share their time. We are also confident that Epic’s expertise, including its powerful game engine, combined with Sony’s technologies will accelerate our diverse efforts such as the development of new digital experiences for sports fans and our virtual production initiatives.

Vicarious Visions: The studio’s disappearance is effective

We found out on January 22, 2021 Vicarious Visions, which was part of Activision Publishing, wanted to integrate Blizzardwith the mission of obtain the developments of the makers of Diablo, Overwatch, Starcraft or the Warcraft universe. We have this studio to thank for the GBA version of Tony Hawk’s Pro Skater 2, several works of the Guitar Hero licenseor the remakes of Tony Hawk’s Pro Skater 1+2 and Crash Bandicoot N. Sane Trilogy.

The studio for more than a year therefore no longer has the opportunity to control the development of a game, working on Diablo II: Resurrected and assisting in the production of Diablo IV. At the time of announcement Jen O’neal, studio manager Vicarious Visions, had been promoted to Executive Vice President of Development at Blizzard. A position she left three months later. In November, the integration of the Vicarious Vision teams was completed, but the entity still existed. A short tweet from the studio account announced this week the merger is now completewhich effectively causes Vicarious Visions to disappear

We’re officially merged with Blizzard Entertainment. Our development team will remain in Albany, NY and will be fully dedicated to Blizzard games. We invite you to follow us on @Blizzard_Ent.

It is because of that After 28 years of existence, Vicarious Visions says goodbye to become Blizzard Albany. We’ll just have to wait and see what the devs at the old studio have in store for us.

CD Projekt RED delivers sales and financial updates

If the launch of Cyberpunk was 2077 disastrous for the image from CD Projekt, the company is doing very well and is even beginning to regain recognition from its public. At the same time, the studio formalized the development of a New saga The Witcher from Unreal Engine 5, and a major reorganization of the studio has been underway for many months. CD Projekt announced this shortly after the end of the financial year has restored The Witcher 3 next-gen port projectpostponed indefinitely to assess the remaining work while the is being prepared presentation of his results for the year 2021. It is now done and we can say that the company is gooddespite a very sharp decline in earnings.

Between January and December 2020, CD Projekt had a turnover of 478 million dollars, with an operating profit of 260 and a net profit of 257 million. For the period January to December 2021, the numbers are less encouraging but remain positive. So that’s what we’re learning The turnover is 194 million dollars, the operating result is 50 million and the net profit is 45 million. This is the reason for the significant decline in sales Cyberpunk 2077 did not carry the companybut also from a Total wage increase of 23%and through the many investments made. On the other hand, GOGthe DRM-free sales platform, loses money with a Net loss of 6.4 million Euro.

When it comes to games, CD Projekt gurgles, we’ve learned that The Witcher 3 has sold over 40 million copies even ahead of the release of the next-gen, and it surpassed the franchise’s overall sales 65 million copies. We’re a lot further on the Cyberpunk 2077 side, but we are after all, more than 18 million copies sold from the exit. So we’re very far from the flop and can imagine the studio coming up with a sales boost plan when it does the arrival (undated) of the expansion. Furthermore, the balance sheet only speaks of a single extension, and Adam Kiciński, the CEO, points this out The RED Engine multiplayer support project has been abandoned.

We should also remember that CD Projekt recently bought out The Molasses Flood after making Digital Scapes CD Projekt Red Vancouver. Finally, here is an overview of the development of the staff distribution between December 2020 and February 2022. We notice that most developers are now working on it new projects (including the new The Witcher), that the Gwent team is maintaining a new single-player mode and is working on making the mode dedicated to Cyberpunk 2077’s expansion grow and making The Molasse Flood stronger.

Cloud Gaming: A new “market” that weighs heavily

Released in 2003 with OnLive, Cloud gaming will have taken almost 20 years to begin its true democratization. We had to develop technology and infrastructure and wait for Internet speeds to increase. Now with installed GeForce Now by Nvidia, xCloud (Xbox Cloud Gaming), PlayStation Now, Shadow, Amazon Luna, Stadia and many more, cloud gaming would already weigh $1.5 billion according to the latest Newzoo report. In the documentation accompanying the analysis, we learn that cloud gaming is now of concern 21.7 million users worldwide, with further growth expected.

There is even talk of an income multiplication that could do that reach $6 billion by 2024. To give an idea of ​​the development, you should know that in the previous report Newzoo indicated that this market weighed “that” $671 million. But how to explain this sudden progress and these overwhelming forecasts?

On the one hand we find them Difficulties in obtaining high-performance equipment due to costs and bottlenecks. On the other hand, we note a great ease of access on cloud gaming, the deployment of 5G and the acceleration of fiber optics and a global technological progress connected. But to continue, it will be necessary to improve the capacity of the servers, continue work on reducing latency and hope that improving the connection will attract new customers.

Briefly in the business news of the week

• Bungie has announced that it will become a “digital first” company, enabling multi-state residents to work 100% remotely. More info here.
• A DFEH lawyer resigned with these words The Democratic Governor of California, Gavin Newsom, is said to have interfered in the case of the state and Activision-Blizzard. All the details of this new development in our dedicated news.
• Nintendo paid 36.6 million dollars Buying land and building a new building across from his current headquarters. The building will be dedicated to research and development and delivery is scheduled for December 2027.
• 41% of LEGO Star Wars: The Skywalker Saga digital sales were made on Xbox consoles. On this point, the Microsoft console is ahead of the PlayStation consoles (34%), the PC (18%) and the Switch (7%).
• Embracer Group (THQ, Transmission) intends to buy other studios. Currently, the company has 62 studios and has paid a total of $8 billion.
• Epic Games invests in Brazilian studio Aquiris (Horizon Chase Turbo). The studio has signed a publishing deal and is receiving investments to develop future projects. The amount was not disclosed.
• Capcom has announced that The Great Ace Attorney Chronicles at has sold out 500,000 copies in the world
• Although Kojima Productions appears on the PlayStation Studios banner “is and will remain an independent studio”said Hideo Kojima.
• Pokémon Unite, the lightweight MOBA developed by TiMi Studios now more than 70 million downloadsall media combined.