>Staff who are members of ZeniMax Workers United-CWA are on a one-day strike to call out Microsoft for an alleged lack of progress at the bargaining table over remote work and for allegedly unilaterally outsourcing quality assurance work without bargaining with the union.

>In January 2023, ZeniMax Workers United-CWA formed the first video game studio union at Microsoft, representing over 300 quality assurance workers in Maryland and Texas. Today's strike takes place at four ZeniMax locations across Maryland and Texas, with workers set to return to their desks tomorrow, November 14.

>A Microsoft spokesperson told IGN, "We respect our employees’ rights to express their point of view as they have done today. We will continue to listen and address their concerns at the bargaining table."

>ZeniMax is the umbrella organization that includes The Elder Scrolls and Fallout maker Bethesda and Doom developer id Software, among other studios. It also owns Indiana Jones and the Great Circle developer MachineGames and Marvel's Blade developer Arkane Lyon.

>Last month, Communications Workers of America Union (CWA) filed an unfair labor practice charge against ZeniMax for contracting out work without notification. ZeniMax Workers United-CWA members have raised concerns that ZeniMax’s recent unilateral decision to outsource quality assurance work threatens job security amid record layoffs across the video game industry.

>The strike comes hot on the heels of Microsoft gaming boss Phil Spencer's insistence that “the Xbox business has never been more healthy.”

>After splashing out $69 billion on Call of Duty maker Activision Blizzard last year, Microsoft has cut more than 2,500 jobs from its gaming business and closed three ZeniMax studios. Sales of Xbox Series X and S continue to plummet, and Game Pass subscriber numbers are flat, although Microsoft said it enjoyed a record bump from the recent day one launch of Call of Duty: Black Ops 6.

>Speaking to Bloomberg, Spencer said 2025 is looking brighter for Microsoft’s gaming effort. “The Xbox business has never been more healthy,” he said, citing growth in cloud and PC gaming as well as console usage. “The business is performing right now, and I think that means a more healthy future for hardware and the games we build.”

>Spencer is even optimistic about the growth of mobile games, despite cutting staff from the teams behind the underperforming Call of Duty Warzone Mobile and Warcraft Rumble. “I feel pretty good about where this industry is going,’’ he said. “To reach new players, we need to be creative and adaptive of new business models, new devices, new ways of access. We’re not going to grow the market with $1,000 consoles.”

>Spencer is of course under pressure to deliver following the Activision Blizzard acquisition, and is in the middle of a big multiplatform push that may end up seeing Halo launch on PlayStation.

>“We run a business,” Spencer said in August. “It’s definitely true inside of Microsoft the bar is high for us in terms of the delivery we have to give back to the company. Because we get a level of support from the company that’s just amazing and what we’re able to go do.

>“So I look at this, how can we make our games as strong as possible? Our platform continues to grow, on console, on PC, and on cloud. It’s just going to be a strategy that works for us.”

>Update: This story has been updated with a statement from Microsoft.

>Oftentimes, video games are delayed because the project hasn't fully come together, riddled with performance issues or game-breaking bugs. But that's not the case with Avowed, according to Xbox head honcho Phil Spencer. He pushed back Obsidian's upcoming RPG because this holiday season was too crowded for the company.

>Speaking with Game File (via VGC), Spencer discussed Avowed's delay to February, noting Xbox currently has the benefit of a packed holiday season with Call of Duty: Black Ops 6, Diablo 4: Vessel of Hate, and next month's Indiana Jones and the Great Circle (not to mention Microsoft Flight Simulator 2024). This allowed Xbox to space out releases and give Avowed its own time to shine next year.

>"We didn't move it because Obsidian needed the time," Spencer said. "They'll use the time."

>Ahead of the holiday season, and presumably to help drive sign-ups to Game Pass, Microsoft has rolled out a new ad campaign called "This Is An Xbox." The basic takeaway is that, as Microsoft has been saying for years, you don't have to buy an Xbox to play Xbox. That's because Xbox games are available across a variety of devices these days as part of Microsoft's new strategy to gain marketshare. Microsoft is, of course, is in third place against PlayStation and Nintendo.

>Microsoft is going big for this ad campaign, with visuals set to appear in places like San Francisco, Atlanta, Chicago, Sydney, Melbourne, Brisbane, London, New York, and Berlin. Microsoft also commissioned a live-action trailer featuring the song "The Choice Is Yours" by Black Sheep, which is rather fitting.

>Additionally, Microsoft partnered with companies like Samsung, Crocs, Porsche, and The Happy Egg for branding takeovers. The ads first display a product, say, a pair of Crocs, with the message "This is a pair of Crocs," and the next page shows an Xbox and says, "This is an Xbox."

>Baldur’s Gate 3’s romance system is one of the game’s most famous and popular features, and while Avowed’s choice not to have a romance system of its own may raise a few eyebrows, director Carrie Patel expressed her confidence during an interview at EGX that the game is better off without one.

>The latest RPG from the storied Obsidian Entertainment, taking place in the same universe as its Pillars of Eternity series, Avowed is currently on course to release early next year. While excitement for the game is high, comparisons are already being drawn between it and Larian Studios' triumphant 2023 hit, Avowed is set to follow its own path, focusing on only four well-written companions, with the lack of romance being key to how players will experience their stories.

>“It’s a ton of work”, Patel notes, on romance systems. “You want to make sure you do it right. And part of that is also you want to make sure that a player who opts not to romance but still wants to have a very deep relationship with those companions gets to have just as thorough and meaningful an experience on a friendship or ally path as [if] they went on a romance path. And so we felt that we could best tell our companions' stories and our players' relationships with them without the romance option”

>For the Avowed team, ensuring that all of their companions are equally fleshed out, and their stories can be experienced equally by all players is key to the game’s story, and by extension, key to players’ experiences. “With the four companions we wanted them to all have key roles in the story, different party roles, different personalities, and ways that they compliment each other and let them tell the story of the Living Lands to the player”, Patel explains.

>The lack of a romance system is particularly important with regards to one companion, who Patel explains is in a relationship, something which is key to their development over the course of the game. “[It] isn't a story that I think you often get to see in a lot of games with a party member who's travelling with you”, she begins “and so one thing players will really get to explore with here is kind of how she navigates having her heart in one place, while knowing that she really needs to be here”.

>At the end of the day, Avowed and Baldur’s Gate 3 are, of course, different games, and while Patel accepts that romance “works very well in some games”, that is not necessarily the case with Avowed. Though comparisons between the RPGs are unlikely to go away anytime soon, Patel remains confident that Avowed’s quality will inevitably do the talking. “Players will always respond well to a really good character.”

>Pocketpair, the developers of the popular game Palworld have revealed the details behind the recent lawsuit filed against them by Nintendo and The Pokémon Company. The lawsuit alleges that Palworld infringes on multiple patents owned by both Nintendo and The Pokémon Company. Pals!

>Palworld rose to prominence following it’s release on Steam and Xbox Game Pass in game preview at the start of this year. It was immediately compared to the popular Pokémon games, with a focus on catching ‘pals’ and taming them for the player to enslave, do battle with and more.

>Following the lawsuit that was filed back in X, Pocketpair have now revealed via a press release that it focuses on three patents that were filed only this year by Nintendo and The Pokémon Company, listed as “Patent No. 7545191, Patent No. 7493117 and Patent No. 7528390” but that they sit under an existing ‘parent’ patent, which was actually filed back in 2021. Palworld reveals the details.

>The ‘parent’ patent in this instance is focused on the capture of creatures by throwing an item, and that once captured, would be owned by the player.

>Nintendo and The Pokémon Company are seeking an injunction against Palworld, in addition to fines and late payment damages.

>Pocketpair have once again asserted that they will fight – stating that “We will continue to assert our position in this case through future legal proceedings“.

>Do you think Pocketpair have a case? Are Nintendo being big ol’ jerks? Let us know in the comments.

>Smoking barrels.

>As we spoke about yesterday, Stalker 2 is now less than two weeks away from releasing on Xbox Game Pass - and the team has just gone into detail on the game's arsenal of weaponry ahead of its launch.

>As showcased above in the game's new 'Smoking Barrels' trailer, developer GSC Game World has detailed exactly what gear you can get yours hands on in the wastelands of Stalker 2 this month. Since its announcement, this game's gunplay has looked impressive - and we're even more excited to properly go hands on with it after this new trailer.

>Read the full article on purexbox.com

>A new report claims that Amazon is officially developing a TV show based on Bioware’s hit sci-fi franchise, Mass Effect. This follows previous reports indicating that Amazon wanted to make a Mass Effect show. Seems the retail giant is finally doing it.

Not sure how I feel about this.

>Take-Two has sold indie publisher Private Division to an unknown buyer in the wake of shuttering Roll7 and Intercept Games, saying that it wants to focus on its core and mobile businesses going forward. While virtually all of Private Division's live and unreleased games will go to the new buyer, Take-Two says it will continue to support No Rest for the Wicked, the recently-released action RPG from Moon Studios that's currently in early access.

>Take-Two announced the move during Wednesday's earnings results, saying in a statement, "We are grateful for the contributions that the Private Division team has made to our company and are confident that they will continue to achieve success in their new home."

>The Private Division sale follows Take-Two's decision to wind down indie studios Roll7 and Intercept Games, both of which operated under the label's umbrella. An IGN report at the time revealed Take-Two's plans to offload the label and that it had found interest from a private equity firm, with discussions faciliated by individuals with connnections to Moon Studios leadership. It's unclear whether that firm ultimately followed through on its interest.

>Private Division was founded in 2017 with the goal of provide funding and support to "triple-I" game such as The Outer Worlds. Its upcoming releases include Tales of the Shire, the cozy Lords of the Rings game that was recently delayed into 2025, and an untitled action-adventure game from Game Freak codenamed Project Bloom.

>Take-Two has spent much of 2024 trying to sell Private Division, telling employees in April that it would no longer support the label and laying off many of its employees. A small group has remained to continue support No Rest for the Wicked as well as Private Division's other upcoming games. Take-Two, for its part, is turning even more of its focus toward Grand Theft Auto VI, which it still expects to release in fall 2025.

>"Command your insect legions in epic battles".

>One of the games from our November 2024 Xbox releases roundup that we've been keeping an eye on, but haven't really delved into here at Pure Xbox, is Empire of the Ants. This is described as a "photorealistic, third-person real-time strategy game" in which it's your job to lead an army and compete in battles throughout a microscopic world.

>There's a lot to like about this game on paper, such as its beautiful Unreal Engine 5 graphics, its potential for epic "tactical and strategic" conquests, and the fact that it supports both solo play and online multiplayer with others.

>Microsoft's Xbox Game Pass titles for November are:

>Metal Slug Tactics (Cloud, Console, and PC) - 5th November (Game Pass Ultimate, PC Game Pass)

>Go Mecha Ball (Console) - 6th November (Now with Game Pass Standard)

>Harold Halibut (Xbox Series X S) - 6th November (Now with Game Pass Standard)

>The Rewinder (Console) - 6th November (Now with Game Pass Standard)

>Turnip Boy Robs a Bank (Console) - 6th November (Now with Game Pass Standard)

>Goat Simulator Remastered (Cloud, PC, and Xbox Series X S) - 7th November (Game Pass Ultimate, PC Game Pass)

>Microsoft Flight Simulator 2024 (Cloud, PC, and Xbox Series X S) - 19th November (Game Pass Ultimate, PC Game Pass)

____

>Xbox Game Pass games leaving on 15th November:

>Dicey Dungeons (Cloud, Console, and PC)

>Dungeons 4 (Cloud, Console, and PC)

>Goat Simulator (PC)

>Like a Dragon: Ishin! (Cloud, Console, and PC)

>Like a Dragon: The Man Who Erased His Name (Cloud, Console, and PC)

>Persona 5 Tactica (Cloud, Console, and PC)

>Somerville (Cloud, Console, and PC)

>Review aggregation site Metacritic has spoken out in response to the ongoing review bombing of Dragon Age: The Veilguard by online commenters upset at the game's inclusive characters and themes.

>BioWare's latest Dragon Age epic holds a "generally favourable" review average of 84 on Metacritic, based on a consensus of 54 critics' scores.

>But the game's Metacritic user score is listed as just 3.8 out of 10, with a majority of user opinions falling in the starkly negative range. Looking at some of the most recent reviews at the time of writing, these include numerous scores of zero out of 10 for content in the game repeatedly described as "woke".

>"Awful dialogue and obviously some woke agenda psyop," reads a zero out of 10 review from one user. "This is censorship at its worst."

>"Woke kill the game," wrote another user who rated the game with a zero. "But gameplay is nice."

>"This is what happens when you try to force push DEI [Diversity, equity, and inclusion] and sexual ideology in a fantasy game," wrote a third, who also scored the game with a zero.

>Countless other examples are also visible, some of which include slurs and abuse we won't reproduce here. A number of commenters note they are leaving repeat responses as their earlier ratings have been deleted, presumably by Metacritic moderators.

>By contrast, the 13,006 user reviews for Dragon Age: The Veilguard currently on Steam - which requires you actually play the game before leaving a review - are "Mostly Positive".

>Dragon Age: The Veilguard features a companion character who identifies as non-binary, who the game's protagonist Rook can be supportive of. Rook themselves can also identify as transgender if the player chooses.

>In a statement to Eurogamer acknowledging the backlash to Dragon Age: The Veilguard on its site, a spokesperson for Metacritic parent company Fandom said its site was a "place of belonging for all fans".

>"We take online trust and safety very seriously across all our sites including Metacritic," the spokesperson said. "Metacritic has a moderation system in place to track violations of our terms of use. Our team reviews each and every report of abuse (including but not limited to racist, sexist, homophobic, insults to other users, etc) and if violations occur, the reviews are removed."

>Last year, Fandom confirmed to Eurogamer it was "evolving [its] processes and tools to introduce stricter moderation" following similar reactions to Horizon Forbidden West's DLC, Burning Shores.

>"It is the strongest and loudest answer BioWare could have mustered for the people still doubting whether it could do it," our Bertie wrote in Eurogamer's Dragon Age: The Veilguard review. "The answer is yes, emphatically. The Veilguard is spectacular. BioWare is back."

>The decade-long wait for another game in BioWare's epic fantasy series has paid off big time as the newly released Dragon Age: The Veilguard is already breaking records.

>After its own rocky development journey, Dragon Age: The Veilguard finally released just yesterday to both solid reviews and a record number of players on Steam. According to SteamDB estimates, the fourth Dragon Age game pulled in more than 70,000 concurrent players who were fighting to protect the Veil all at the same time. The RPG has also topped the platform's 'Top Sellers' chart and even passed Call of Duty: Black Ops 6 on the list.

>Publisher EA is probably chuffed since The Veilguard is now its one of its biggest single-player launches on the platform, narrowly passing Star Wars Jedi Survivor's peak concurrent numbers, which were already impressive a year ago, but not quite reaching The Sims 4's 96,000 peak record - and who can blame 'em? It's The Sims.

>Developer BioWare can still throw a party and call the game a record-breaker since it did set a new record for the studio itself. The Veilguard overtook Mass Effect: Legendary Edition's 59,000-player peak to become the company's biggest Steam release of all time.

>We don't fully know how The Veilguard is stacking up alongside BioWare's biggest hits, however. EA famously stopped releasing games on Steam in 2011, and only began again in 2019, so we don't actually have a concrete idea of how big the crowds were for Mass Effect 3 or Dragon Age: Inquisition on launch day. Either way, after a decade of low points from Anthem and Mass Effect: Andromeda to internal troubles and layoffs, it's good to see the storied studio find success doing what it does best.

I haven't personally played it yet but I'm hearing a lot of mixed reactions. Mostly about inclusion and diversity related things. Anyone play? What are your thoughts?

>After a year on sale, Alan Wake 2 is finally close to recouping the money Remedy spent on developing and marketing the game...

>Assassin's Creed franchise boss Marc-Alexis Coté has addressed the online backlash which has swirled around the main characters of Assassin's Creed Shadows, the subsequent impact it has had on the game's development staff, and the attempts by bad faith commenters to disrupt and dissuade creative teams from telling stories featuring diverse and inclusive characters in general...

>Ubisoft has released its first-ever blockchain game, the tactical NFT battler Champions Tactics: Grimoria Chronicles.

>The company announced the game last June after years of dabbling in blockchain, but has only now quietly launched it.

>The game is on PC and free to start, though players can purchase figurines with which to battle using either in-game gold or cryptocurrency. These figurines are NFTs and can be bought on the game's marketplace from anywhere between $7 to $64,000 (almost £50k).

>It appears to be possible to play the game without purchasing figurines, though those willing to pay the extortionate prices will surely have more success in battles.

>Battles themselves are turn-based affairs against other players with squads of three figurines.

>Francois Bodson, studio director at Ubisoft Paris, told IGN the game "offers deep strategic gameplay featuring unique in-game assets and several exciting innovations", comparing it to a physical trading card game.

>Here's the statement in full: "The team inside the Ubisoft Paris studio developing Champions Tactics: Grimoria Chronicles partnered with Ubisoft’s Strategic Innovation Lab and Oasys to ensure that our use of blockchain was done in service of delivering new and innovative gaming experiences for our players. Our shared goal is to explore new ways to play alongside bringing more value to players based on empowerment and ownership. Champions Tactics offers deep strategic gameplay featuring unique in-game assets and several exciting innovations. These include millions of procedurally generated figurines, each with distinct stats, assets shaped directly by players' choices, and an open marketplace letting players compose their teams on a peer-to-peer basis - much like a physical trading card game. For months, we have collaborated closely with our community through events and beta phases to build and refine Champions Tactics. We’re excited to keep expanding and enhancing the experience together."

>Ubisoft did not comment on the game's Adults Only rating, presumably for its blockchain basis and use of cryptocurrency.

>Back in December 2021, Ubisoft launched its own NFT platform called Quartz, with Tom Clancy's Ghost Recon Breakpoint as the first game to offer a beta trial. It did not fare well, appearing to have initially only sold 15 NFTs.

>Still, Ubisoft's NFT bosses stated in an interview afterwards that players just "don't get it".

>It's interesting, therefore, for Ubisoft to have still released this project, considering other developers have slowly backpedalled on their enthusiasm for cryptocurrency.

>That includes EA boss Andrew Wilson, after describing NFTs as "an important part of… the future of our industry".

>"I believe that collectability will continue to be an important part of our industry and the games and experiences that we offer our players," he later said during an earnings call in February 2022.

>"Whether that's part of the NFT and the blockchain? Well, that remains to be seen. And I think the way we think about it, is we want to deliver the best possible player experience we can. And so we're going to - we will evaluate that over time. But right now, it's not something that we're driving audience."

I'm a huge fan of the series so I'm glad to see if is getting some good reviews. I just wish the combat was more like Origins. Most seem to love it though.

>Starbound, originally releasing on Steam in 2016, launches for the first time on Xbox with full controller support, and a toggleable auto-aim accessibility feature. Players can explore the universe of Starbound with a crew of up to 4 friends. Futhermore, Starbound will also contain all the free content updates which are carried over from the …

>The post Starbound launches for the first time on Xbox appeared first on XboxEra.

>The launch trailer has arrived.

>Yep, after a decade of waiting, Dragon Age: The Veilguard is almost here - BioWare's latest epic is coming to Xbox Series X|S on October 31st. As expected then, the team has just dropped the game's final launch trailer ahead of next week's release, and it's getting us well and truly hyped for the full thing.

>We've thrown that pre-launch trailer up above for you to all enjoy - with the team's upcoming RPG looking and sounding pretty bloody good so far. Here's how EA and BioWare are setting up the next instalment in this now age-old franchise:

>Read the full article on purexbox.com

>Yep, it's still planned for this year!

>It was back in June that The Thing: Remastered was first announced for Xbox One, Xbox Series X and Xbox Series S, and although we hadn't heard much since, Nightdive Studios has treated us to a brand-new trailer this week!

>You can check out that trailer up above, which includes snippets of cutscenes and raw gameplay. Nightdive is the studio behind many incredible remasters (Quake 2, Dark Forces, etc.), and apparently The Thing: Remastered features some of the company's "most impressive visual upgrades to date". Here's a bit more about what to expect:

>Read the full article on purexbox.com

>Microsoft laid off more than 2,500 people working in its games division this year, but the trillion dollar company still scrounged together enough spare change under the couch to give its CEO an even bigger bonus.

>In its most recent regulatory filing from last week, Microsoft revealed that CEO Satya Nadella's total compensation for the 2024 fiscal year amounted to $79.1 million. Most of that money comes from performance-based stock awards, however, as the executive's base salary stayed the same, sitting at $2.5 million, and his cash bonus came to a still-whopping $5.2 million.

>What's more surprising, at least in these gamified lands, is that Nadella's compensation is actually 62% higher than last year's $48.5 million package. For a company that laid off 1,900 Xbox and Activision Blizzard employees, then shut down a handful of beloved, seemingly successful game studios without any clear reason, and then laid off a further 650 workers in its games division - you'd be forgiven for thinking Microsoft was implementing cost-cutting measures because it absolutely needed to.

>Where's all this extra money coming from then? Well, Microsoft just reached an eye-watering market cap of $3 trillion for the first time this year, mainly due to its investments in AI and how it continues to dominate workplace software. The people love Excel, I guess. Of course, Nadella's bonus wouldn't have funded those laid off employee's salaries for too long, and some layoffs are to be expected after an acquisition as beefy as the Activision Blizzard deal, but it's still frustrating that Microsoft won't use some of its new AI money for good - to keep people employed and create interesting art, say.

>Alan Wake 2’s 2nd expansion, The Lake House, is here and I did not enjoy any part of it. As one of the base game and first expansion, Night Springs, biggest supporters it pains me. The Lake House takes place shortly before Janina Gavankar’s character shows up in the main campaign. A Federal Bureau of …

>"So long and thanks for all the brains!".

>Undead Labs has announced that, with the help of support team Wushu Studios, Legacy Awaits will be the final major content update for State of Decay 2. Launching as a free patch across PC and Xbox — including Game Pass — the title's 38th update brings a collection of new and returning outfits, vehicles and weapons, some big quality-of-life improvements, a selection of 'game adjustments' and some major bug fixes to the zombie-slayer.

>The team's list of changes has been fully explained in a detailed Steam blog post, where we get early looks at some of the big updates being made in State of Decay 2's final patch. Here's how Undead Labs introduces its Legacy Awaits update:

It only took me two weekends to get through the whole thing, and now that it's over. Wow!

It resembles Slay the Spire, where you choose your path, and collect cards and powers, but the matches are more like puzzles. Your opponent creates scenarios and how you pay your cards determines if you move on or perish.

Now a big reason why I loved this game is the weird shit that happens, and weird shit isn't fun when you know it's coming, so that's all I'm going to say about that.

If you like puzzles or cards games or a story that makes you say WHAT THE FUCK?!? start downloading it now, it's free on Gamepass!

>The spooky season is finally here, and to celebrate, Microsoft has slashed the prices of hundreds of Xbox games, DLC expansions, and more in the huge Xbox Shocktober Sale 2024. Microsoft has discounted some games by as much as 90%, so make sure you have a good look through everything on offer and pick up a bargain before the sale ends on October 31.

>For those looking forward to heading back into the rather surreal and twisted world of Alan Wake 2, you will soon be able to do just that, thanks to the imminent arrival of its Lake House DLC.

>Presented amusingly by YouTuber ‘Dunkey’ of videogamedunkey fame, Animal Well is making the move over to Xbox, and in even better news, it’s available today for you to pick up and play. Animal Well was developed by Billy Basso and is published by Bigmode. In Animal Well, you’ll “explore a dense, interconnected labyrinth, and unravel …

>Alan Wake and Control developer Remedy has revealed FBC: Firebreak, a three-player co-op multiplayer spin-off set in the same universe.

>Check out the updates from the event!

>It's been a very long wait for the arrival of Stalker 2 on Xbox Game Pass, but we're in the final stretch now, which is very exciting indeed. The open world shooter is about a month away from launching, and today, a bunch of early previews have dropped - with the game sounding like a real treat to play.

>We'll round up a bunch of these early impressions down below, so you can get a flavour of what's being said about the upcoming Game Pass title ahead of its November 2024 launch.

>Microsoft’s determination to destroy the great reputation of Game Pass continues apace, with the news that the corporation has suddenly pulled its years-long offer of a two-week trial subscription for a dollar, just a week before it adds Call of Duty: Black Ops 6 to the subscription.

Dick move.