Game Design

Krafton has decided to acquire a 10% stake in People Can Fly. The deal will also help the Polish developer finance its updated business strategy.

It is difficult for smaller mobile devs to avoid problems that can affect the development and lifecycle of their games. ZiMAD M&A manager Yana Vesnina discusses the key challenges and shares some professional tips in an article for Game World Observer.

CD Projekt has released its financial report for the full year ended December 31, 2022. Thanks to strong sales of Cyberpunk 2077, the company recorded its second-best year in terms of both revenue and net profit.

Yana Vesnina, M&A Manager at ZiMAD, told about the challenges facing young mobile game developers in her column.

We are publishing a new list with gaming vacancies. This week they are wanted: a middle-level product analyst at Azur Games, a game producer at Playkot and a game designer at Airicore.

On March 12, the Sensor Tower analytical company published a large-scale study on the situation in mobile gaming by the end of 2022. We have already written about him briefly. Time for detailed material with key calculations from the study.

Debbie Bestwick, an experienced gaming executive, has decided to step down as CEO of Team17. But first she will find herself a suitable successor.

New game development studio, Lighthouse Games, has been formed by Playground co-founder Gavin Raeburn. The team is now working on their debut AAA title.

Independent game designer Sam Barlow has commented on the upcoming remake of Silent Hill 2. He also expressed optimism about the direction Konami is taking the series in.

Game designer Sam Barlow, who once worked on Silent Hill: Origins and Silent Hill: Shattered Memories, said in an interview with PCGamesN portal that he does not envy the position of the Bloober Team. In his opinion, developing a remake of Silent Hill 2 is a very difficult task.

Resident Evil 4 remake has just been released to universal acclaim. Let’s dive into some launch numbers and brush up on how the original game has changed the genre and influenced game developers across the globe for generations to come.

The third material, completing a series of articles about the monetization strategy of Belka Games. It is dedicated to the company’s work with advertising, the cultivation of personnel and trends in the niche.

We are publishing a new list with gaming vacancies. This week they are wanted: a game analyst at ZiMAD, a chief accountant at WN Media Group and a leading game designer at SVMD.The selection was prepared by Marina Lopatina, Director of Business Development of Talents In Games.

Epic Games has released a preview of Unreal Engine 5.2 and detailed its key features at the GDC 2023. Here are the main new tools and improvements that could change the way developers and artists create worlds and materials.

More game companies are trying to incorporate AI technologies into their development processes. Ubisoft has introduced Ghostwriter, its own machine learning tool that should make it easier for writers to create interactions and dialogues with NPC.

CD PROJEKT Group of Companies announced the cancellation of expenses incurred while working on Project Sirius, a multiplayer game in the Witcher universe. They amounted to 42.9 million zlotys or $9.76 million.

In the era of ever-evolving language models and chatbots, many are wondering how AI technologies will influence various areas, including game development. Here is an example of a possible use case for ChatGPT in Unity.

Kepler Interactive called the releases of Scorn and Sifu very successful, Ubisoft closed its division in Italy, and Team17 announced layoffs — we tell you what happened in the gaming industry this weekend.

The second material by Evgeny Gilmanov, head of monetization at Belka Games, is about the principles that guide the development and implementation of a monetization strategy in the company.

Robert Kurvitz and Aleksander Rostov, original creators of Disco Elysium, have shared an update on their legal dispute with ZA/UM. Both stated that they didn’t drop their unfair dismissal claims.

Epic Games is now one step closer to realizing its metaverse ambitions. The company will release the Unreal Editor for Fortnite, so players can release their own experiences directly into the world-famous battle royale game.

Perhaps Roblox and Unity will soon be “covered”. The announcement of UEFN (Unreal Editor for Fortnite), “a new computer application for designing, developing and publishing games and content directly in Fortnite,” took place.

The UK’s Competition and Markets Authority (CMA) has posted responses to its provisional findings from six game companies. They shared their thoughts on Microsoft’s proposed acquisition of Activision Blizzard, seeing no reason for this deal to be blocked.

We are publishing a new list with gaming vacancies. Wanted this week: technical artist at Lesta Games, game producer at Craft Games and senior designer at WN Media Group.

Unity has released its annual report on the state of the games industry. Here are the key trends and insights regarding indie developers and larger studios using the engine and its tools.

Gas Giant Games is a new studio opened by former Blizzard Entertainment employees. One of its founders was Jay Wilson, who at one time led the work on Diablo III.

The legal fight between ZA/UM and Disco Elysium original developers has taken a new turn. It appears that the game’s co-creators Robert Kurvitz and Aleksander Rostov have dropped their claims to the studio.

At the end of last year, AST Publishing house published a book by indie developer Slava Gris, “Make a video game alone and Don’t Go Crazy.” We liked the book so much that we decided to write about it, and at the same time share one of its chapters on our pages.

Dynasty Loop, an independent game development studio based in Montreal, is going through turbulent times. Dozens of workers haven’t been paid since the end of 2022, with some of them even locked out of the office.

On March 2, a chamber event for WN Connect gaming companies took place in the capital of Georgia. It was attended by 180 people, including representatives of companies such as Playrix, Plarium and Unity. The event was sponsored by TapClap, AppsFlyer and Xsolla. We share the results and photos from the event.

The head of monetization at Belka Games, Evgeny Gilmanov, opens a series of materials about the principles that guide the company in developing and implementing a monetization strategy.

We are publishing a new list with gaming vacancies. This week they are wanted: QA-team leader at Playkot, event coordinator at WN Media Group and VFX-artist at ExoGenesis.

Poland-based studio Bloober Team has announced its expansion plans. This year, Layers of Fear and The Medium developer will open new offices and move to a larger stock exchange.

Tales of Syn is an isometric RPG in the style of classic Fallout titles. The twist is how it uses the power of Stable Diffusion and ChatGPT to create game assets, backgrounds, character models, and dialogues.

Today, March 3, the global launch of Wo Long: Fallen Dynasty took place. The game was warmly received by critics, but PC users were very dissatisfied with it. We tell you how organically the latest Team Ninja game looks in the Koei Tecmo portfolio and how much, according to the developers, it has gone away from the Nioh dilogy.

Wo Long: Fallen Dynasty has just launched globally to generally great reviews from critics, but clearly negative reviews from PC players. Here is how Team Ninja’s latest game fits into Koei Tecmo’s portfolio and what sets it apart from the Nioh series.

We are publishing a new list with gaming vacancies. This week they are wanted: a product analyst at Dankolab, a game producer at Craft Games and a VFX artist at ExoGenesis.

A court session was held in Tokyo, where the case of Yuji Naka, a game designer accused of insider trading in shares of Final Fantasy VII developers, was examined: The First Soldier. The former head of Sonic Team pleaded guilty.

Valve has introduced several updates to its guidelines for Steam game keys. Although the rules generally remain the same, there are some nuances that developers should be aware of.

In September 2022, Japanese game designer Toshimichi Mori left Arc System Works after 19 years of work, promising to continue developing games. He intends to keep his promise. Together with Toshinori Aoki, the former vice president of Marvelous, Mori opened a studio called Studio Flare.

Angry Birds 2 remains the highest-grossing game in Rovio’s portfolio. It has just hit a new milestone, surpassing $500 million in lifetime revenue.

The use of Midjourney allowed the Lost Lore game studio to significantly optimize the costs of creating art. How exactly, — Evgeny Kitkin, the founder and CEO of the studio, told in his column.

Belka Games development director Vitaliy Kuzmin has opened up about how the team restructuring helped the company increase the frequence of update releases and set two records for daily revenue.

We are publishing a new list with gaming vacancies. This week they are wanted: a game engine developer at MYTONA, a leading UA manager at Dankolab and a game designer at ZiMAD.

Finnish Rovio announced that it will soon remove the first Angry Birds from access again. On February 23, it will remove the game from Google Play. The game will remain in the App Store for now, but will be renamed Red’s First Flight.

DStars, Italy’s biggest event for game developers, will be back next month. Here are the first details about the upcoming conference.

There's plenty of interesting stuff in the documents released by the UK's Competition and Markets Authority (CMA) about its investigation into Microsoft's attempt to acquire Activision Blizzard, but the titbit that has perhaps attracted most attention is Microsoft's admission that a game appearing on Game Pass negatively affects its sales for at least a year. That's relevant to the investigations underway at the CMA and elsewhere because understanding Game Pass and how it is reshaping the industry's commercial landscape is crucial to understanding the actual impact of this $70 billion proposed deal. Read more

A group of former Respawn Entertainment devs has created a new remote studio, Wildlight Entertainment. The studio was co-founded by CEO Dusty Welch (formerly COO and GM of Apex Legends) and design director Jason McCord (previously design director on Apex).Former Respawn game director Chad Grenier is also part of the team, as studio head and game director. They are also joined by Mohammad Alavi, previously creative director at Respawn, who said on Linkedin that he's been at the studio for the past 13 months. Read more

How, during the change in the structure of the Belka Games teams, it was possible to increase the frequency of the release of updates and set two records for daily revenue, — said Vitaly Kuzmin, director of development of the company.

We are publishing a new list with gaming vacancies. Wanted this week: delivery director at Playkot, game designer at JustMoby and financial manager at Fun to Mass Games.