Weekend Highlights (May 16-17)

Konami has decided to completely exit Russia and Belarus, Xbox has undergone a minor rebranding, and Terraria's sales have surpassed 70 million copies—here's a rundown of the main events in the gaming industry over the past weekend.

The Japanese company Konami announced the cessation of its services in the Russian and Belarusian markets. Starting June 15, it will no longer provide its services there. Konami did not provide details, so it's unclear why the decision was made at this time. It’s worth noting that Konami suspended the sale of new titles in Russia and Belarus back in 2022.
Microsoft's gaming division continues to experiment with naming conventions. As spotted by The Verge, the team has decided to capitalize its name fully—it's now written as XBOX instead of Xbox. This new styling is already in use on the official account of the division on the social network X. Notably, prior to this, XBOX head Asha Sharma conducted a poll on X asking users which version they preferred: Xbox or XBOX. A total of 64.8% of voters preferred XBOX.
On May 16, the iconic sandbox game Terraria turned 15 years old. To celebrate, the studio Re-Logic shared some fresh statistics about the game. They reported that over all these years, Terraria has sold over 70 million copies: 39.6 million on PC, 19.7 million on mobile devices, and the remaining 10.7 million on consoles. Additionally, in the past year, the PC version of Terraria was played daily by an average of 461,000 people, with more than 1.4 million people playing at its peak. Despite the game's considerable age, Re-Logic has no plans to stop supporting Terraria and is currently working on the next major update.
Unity announced the winners of the Unity for Humanity 2026 contest. The competition featured unreleased games that help tackle global issues and make the world a better place. This time, ten projects received awards. Among them are Amaru Reimagined by Six Wing Studios, I NEED SPACE by Khalayan Arts, NoWay! by Patouch Association, and Monster Walk by Talofa Corporation. The creators of these winning games shared a $600,000 prize, which they can use for further development and marketing.