Weekend Highlights (September 28-29)

Ubisoft acknowledged that XDefiant is facing issues, Fntastic partially denied accusations of using third-party assets in its new game, and according to the media, Xbox is currently in "disaster" mode—here's what happened in the gaming industry over the weekend.

Escape Factory

• During the latest investor event, Ubisoft's CEO Yves Guillemot confirmed that the shooter XDefiant is experiencing difficulties. The top manager stated that the game showed a strong start but its subsequent performance fell below expectations. He did not provide specific numbers. As a reminder, according to insider Tom Henderson, the recent total online player count for XDefiant on all platforms dropped below 20,000, whereas in the early days it exceeded 500,000 players.
• Internet users supposedly discovered in the new game by the revived studio Fntastic—a cooperative called Escape Factory—free and paid assets sold in the Unity Asset Store. It's also claimed that developers borrowed code for matchmaking, lobby support, and the networking part of the game from Boss Room—a Unity project with open source designed to teach the basics of working with co-op games. Players shared their findings in the Escape Factory community on Steam, but Fntastic soon removed discussions about asset borrowing. Later, the studio released an official statement, admitting they indeed purchased assets for some visual effects and a small part of the code, obtaining the necessary licenses. However, Fntastic emphasized that absolutely all art and music assets were created in-house, and claims to the contrary are misinformation.
• Former Sony Computer Entertainment head Ken Kuturagi revealed at the Tokyo Game Show 2024 that no one initially believed in the success of the first PlayStation. Even Sony feared the console might fail, and many game developers with whom the corporation spoke only reinforced its doubts. "We were told: 'Don't do it. Several companies have tried, but none succeeded. You're heading for failure,'" Kuturagi recalled. Ultimately, Sony decided to take the risk and it paid off. To date, the sales of the first PlayStation exceed 102 million units.
• Bloomberg journalist Jason Schreier participated in the Spawn Wave podcast. During the conversation, he stated that he considers what's happening in Microsoft's gaming division "a real disaster." He noted that recently Xbox changes its plans every year. Currently, the corporation often talks about working on a portable console, but Schreier believes there's no guarantee that Microsoft won't change its mind about releasing it. Nonetheless, the journalist pointed out that not everything is perfect in Sony's gaming division either. According to him, at one point, Sony studios were actively working on live-service games, but subsequently, the vast majority of projects were canceled. Among the few surviving titles is a multiplayer game set in the Horizon universe, developed by Guerrilla Games.
• Last weekend marked the two-year anniversary of the pixel miner simulator Dome Keeper. In honor of this, indie studio Bippinbits announced that game sales have surpassed one million copies. The developers admitted they didn't dare to dream of this milestone. They created the first version of Dome Keeper in three days as part of the Ludum Dare game jam and did not expect their game to capture the interest of so many people.
• The publisher of the border officer simulator Contraband Police also reported the sale of its first million copies. This game reached the million mark in a year and a half, having been released on March 8, 2023.