
Amazon to rescind its publisher role on Lost Ark and Throne and Liberty by early 2027
Amazon Games is returning the MMOs to their respective developers.

Amazon Games is returning the MMOs to their respective developers.

Update: August 12, 7.15pm: CD Projekt has now confirmed that 18 developers previously working on Project Sirius have either been made redundant or "invited" to apply for redeployment oppportunities. R...

Saber Interactive has denied replacing a writer with ChatGPT on its upcoming driving game Rideshare Stimulator. Read more

A survey taken by 100 speakers at this year's Gamescom Dev Conference showcases hesitation and mixed feelings on generative AI use.

The hide-and-seek sensation continues to surpass milestones.

CodeDev Group, also known as The Unreal Guys, has launched a new studio called Full Spectrum Interactive. Read more

The Fortnite maker purchased both platforms in 2021.

Throne and Liberty's global publishing service will transfer from Amazon Game Studios to NC (formerly NCSoft). Read more

The story of Planet of Lana is the story of triumph over adversity. But it's also one of naivety. The developers themselves admit they had no clue what they were doing at first. Read more

Entries for the 2027 BAFTA Games Awards are now open, alongside updates to its entry requirements, fee structure, and AI policy. Read more

Pearl Abyss reported a weaker second quarter as the initial impact of Crimson Desert's March launch tapered off. Read more

UKIE-backed educational non-profit Digital Schoolhouse has partnered with Roblox to develop a suite of free tools designed to teach children how to create Roblox games as part of in-classroom educatio...

It would be difficult to ignore the giant inflatable rat on the lawn.
Last November, close to 500 people joined us in Munich for the first GodotFest. We had 34 speakers, two stages, a workshop room, and two busy days of Godot. For a first edition, it was quite a turnout...

Crossfire was revealed in June of this year with Smilegate and Tencent subsidiary Team K1 acting as publishers.

We have opinions on that. Also: lots of discovery news & the latest GDCo Show...

Update: 'If no one protects indie developers or calls out bad behavior... who is going to save the indies?'

When the 2020 pandemic hit and game conferences and trade shows went online only, developers quickly learned that online-only festivals became one of the most potent forms of marketing. Coincidentally...

The news comes after Ubisoft moved to lay off of 51 employees at its Barcelona office.

Remedy is placing its bets on Control Resonant being priced at $60 and garnering positive preview coverage over concerns of self-publishing risks.
GameFromScratch.com August 2026 FREE GameDev Asset Round-Up #2 It’s time for the 2nd August Epic Games bi-monthly asset giveaway on the Fab marketplace, with 3 free assets from August 11th – Aug...

Gamescom Dev has released its annual speaker survey results, revealing that 83% of respondents expect AI to impact team structure or productivity. Read more

The UK studio plans to eliminate up to 75 roles.

Supermassive Games has announced a third round of layoffs in three years, potentially impacting up to 75 positions. Read more

Reforj developer 4J Studios has debuted a technology called Rixels that offer an alternative way to provide textures using a fraction of the memory requirements. The Dundee-based studio has applied to...

'These changes could discourage investment in subscription products and create financial exposure for businesses.'

Remedy reported revenue declines in the first half and second quarter of 2026 while increasing marketing efforts for Control Resonant. Read more

All walk. All talk.

GamesAid has appointed six new trustees to its board and raised £82,000 for four charities in 2025/26. Read more

Square Enix reported strong first-quarter growth, with profit rising 175.5% to ¥13.2 billion ($82.9 million). Read more

IllFonic's asymmetric horror title Halloween: The Game has been refused classification by the Australian Classifications Board, barring its sale in both Australia and New Zealand. Read more

Valve has begun notifying European customers who ordered Steam hardware that their personal information may have been exposed following a cyberattack on CEVA Logistics, the company that handles Steam...

HandyGames has rebranded as THQ Nordic Mobile, with the publisher shifting its focus toward bringing premium PC and console titles to mobile platforms. Read more

Restart launched in December 2024 and had a five-person editorial team.

Blizzard closed Microsoft's 2026 fiscal year as the best-performing studio within Xbox Game Studios, according to internal emails obtained and verified by Windows Central. Read more

Andreas Firnigl started his career as a tester on Big Mutha Truckers, way back on Gamecube. He founded Nosebleed Interactive almost 15 years ago as CEO and creative director. Read more
GameFromScratch.com Godot 4.8 Dev2 and Dev3 Releases The Godot game engine got two steps closer to the Godot 4.8 release with the releases of Godot 4.8 Dev2 and Dev3. We took an earlier sneak peek at...

Fenris Creations (formerly known as CCP Games) went independent earlier this year and secured a minority investment from Google.

Xbox will begin rolling out age verification for users in Australia later this month. Read more

Unity's revenue grew 24 percent year-over-year thanks to revenue from Unity Vector AI.

Emmanuel De Maistre on AI adoption in gaming and what AI actually means for creative teams

After launching Assassin's Creed Black Flag Resynced in June, Ubisoft eliminated 51 positions at its Barcelona studio. Now, a group of former employees, led by Myles Kerwin, has established Dark Ritu...

Bandai Namco reported record first-quarter results overall. Read more

Sega Sammy reported a 17.3% increase in net sales for its first quarter. The Entertainment Contents segment, which includes games, exceeded expectations at ¥68.4 billion ($432 million). Read more

Says... me, on an anniversary. Also: lots of news & this week on Steam.

In which famed designer Stone Librande chronicles the design process of SimCity (2013) and the one-page design paradigm.

Take-Two CEO Strauss Zelnick tells GamesIndustry.biz that the forthcoming Netflix gameplay premiere of GTA 6, which will air on August 27th, is merely "one of the hors d'oeuvres," for the game's marke...

Those sales were delivered across three console generations.

When Epic Games announced major layoffs back in March, it become clear that Fortnite – once regarded as holding a near-unassailable market position – was facing a serious slump, if not a l...

We're breaking down what developers need to know about working with localizers to bring their games to different languages.

A new M&A report from analyst S&P has indicated a weakening investment environment for games, with available funding increasingly going to businesse models relying on recurring engagement, platform le...

Fenris Creations has appointed former Icelandic minister Áslaug Arna Sigurbjörnsdóttir as senior director for AI partnerships. Read more

Take-Two's Q1 results came in slightly ahead of guidance thanks to strong performance of NBA 2K6 and GTA supported by the Zynga mobile portfolio, with the firm maintaining its previous projection of $...

With GodotCon Boston now behind us, our contributors have had nothing but time and energy to get their most-wanted features over the finish line. While feature freeze still isn’t for at least another...

An Itch.io charity bundle supporting industry workers affected by layoffs in the US and Canada is close to reaching its $200,000 goal. Read more

Plus: You need to listen to the new single from The Avalanches.

Tripledot Studios has acquired mobile publisher Supersonic from Unity for $40 million. Read more

Unity CEO Matt Bromberg described the company's latest financial results as the "best quarter in its history as a public company." Read more

The company's annual hardware forecast remains unchanged despite that downturn.

Tripledot says the acquisition will better position it in 'the age of AI in gaming' and give it access to talent in Israel.
GameFromScratch.com Esoterica Game Engine The Esoterica game engine isn’t for everyone… it says it right there in the name: It is a C++ based based free and open source game engine by Stea...

Some of those departing worked at the Washington studio for multiple years.

Roblox shares have declined 70% after second quarter results showed monetisation was 2% below company guidance, which impacted overall bookings. Read more

The 'extended preview' will be available exclusively on Netflix for six hours before heading to YouTube.

The indie publisher claims public trading has created a 'valuation disconnect that does not take account of the lifetime and long-tail revenue delivery inherent in the video games business.'

This is the second article in our series analysing the potential impact of the new Employment Rights Act (ERA) 2025 on games businesses operating within the UK. Read more

Kudos Games Services has expanded its senior leadership team by appointing Michael Hanna as chief operating officer and Ann Hurley as board advisor. Read more

Indie publisher Devolver Digital is looking to once again become a private company later this year. Read more

Nintendo reported a 9.5% decrease in first-quarter net sales, but operating profit rose 150.5% due to higher software revenue and $300 million in US tariff refunds. Read more

Candy Crush developer King has rejected a collective bargaining agreement (CBA) with Swedish trade unions Unionen and Sveriges Ingenjörer. Read more

The news comes a year after Secret Mode laid off a 'small number' of staff when it went independent.

We're putting this front and center, in case you missed it...

The Microsoft-owned studio says its current benefits are 'in line with, or exceed' what the agreement would offer.

Kinetic Publishing, the publishing label founded by Phasmophobia developer Kinetic Games, will reveal the first games signed to the label at a showcase on August 12. Read more

'The productive capacity and exceptional dynamics of the games industry are indispensable, and it is high time they were put to greater use.'

Indie games publisher Silver Lining Interactive has revealed the first title from its internal IP development label, Silver Bullet. Read more

Meanwhile, the company's popular Roblox title, Welcome to Bloxburg, generated $2.1 million during Q1.

It can be difficult keeping track of the various comings and goings in the games industry, which is why we compile them in semi-regular round-ups. Read more

Electronic Arts has completed its $55 billion leveraged buyout, with Saudi Arabia's Public Investment Fund (PIF) now the majority owner. Read more

Raptor PR has launched Early Gaming Growth (EGG), a communications platform designed for gaming startups. Read more

Indie publisher Secret Mode has set up a new internal development studio in Sheffield to support the label's line-up of games, starting with recent hit Escape the Backrooms and Chained Together, which...

The U.S. publisher has been taken private in a deal worth $55 billion.

Also: a whole bunch of game discovery news, inc. trending unreleased Steam games.

The game industry hardship fund bundle, meant to support game workers during ongoing mass layoffs, is over halfway through its goal of 200,000 USD.

Roblox Corp is defending its ability to set the 'global standard' for healthy, safe, and age-appropriate digital engagement—all against the backdrop of multiple lawsuits accusing the company of endang...
GameFromScratch.com CNA – It’s C++ XNA XNA is still one of the most popular indie game development frameworks years after being abandoned by Microsoft. The popular C# gamedev project has b...

The Last Sentinel developer attributes the job cuts to a shift in creative and development direction for the project.

Co-development studio Vertpaint has appointed former Sumo Group co-founder and CEO Carl Cavers OBE as non-executive director and shareholder. Read more

Player relationship and marketing platform FirstLook has launched Creators.gg to connect studios with creators of any size, rather than limiting opportunities to those with the largest audiences. Read...

At the Madeira Games Summit in May, Michal Bujko, senior business development manager at Modma Studios, asked a question: If we were looking back at 2026 five years from now, what should we have fixed...

The company's take-private deal with a consortium led by Saudi Arabia's sovereign wealth fund is expected to conclude later today.

Roblox could become the first game to be classified as a very large online platform (VLOP) under European legislation. Read more

UPDATE Aug 4th: studio owner Nathan Burba confirmed to Gamesbeat that the studio had laid off 85% of its staff. This story has been updated to reflect this information. Read more

Atari has released its consolidated financial results for the full 2025-26 fiscal year, reporting revenue growth of 66% year-on-year to $65 million (€56.0 million), its highest level in more than...

We spoke with Silent Hill series producer Motoi Okamoto and game director Jon McKellan about embracing analog horror and fully immersing players in a new perspective.

The international soccer simulator only launched onto Netflix in June.

Razer has acquired the assets of the cloud-based live streaming platform, StreamElements. Read more
GameFromScratch.com Sedulous Engine Powered by Beef A very long time ago we first discovered the Beef Programming language (and recently revisited) an excellent new game programming focus programming...

Ustwo Games has always been synonymous with tactile mobile game experiences, chiefly their breakout hit Monument Valley and subsequent releases Assemble With Care and Desta: The Memories Between. Earl...

Consumers will be expected to pay up to 50 percent more for some console hardware.

Generative AI platform Reforged Labs is shutting down after three years due to challenges scaling beyond the gaming sector. Read more

Game distributor Rokky has partnered with Revolution Software to co-publish its Broken Sword franchise in China. Read more

A month and a half has passed since our initial release of Godot 4.7, which was then followed up with the Godot 4.7.1 maintenance release nearly three weeks ago. While we stand by the stable foundatio...

Sony has also secured over $510 million in U.S. tariff refunds.

5 Key Numbers from The State of Mobile Gaming Ad Monetization Report and What It Tells Us

Tencent-owned Lightspeed LA has undergone layoffs as it "shifts the creative and development direction" of its debut title, Last Sentinel. Read more

Xbox consoles in the UK and Europe will increase from between £130/€150 and £170/€200 following worldwide price hikes announced in late June. Read more

A Texture Lookup Approach to Bézier Curve Evaluation on the GPU presents a texture-based method for evaluating Bezier curves by leveraging hardware samplers extends the idea beyond...
Some new research! Also: this week's Steam newbies & lots of news.

Saudi Arabia's divisive EA buyout looks set to go through next week.

Xbox CEO Asha Sharma lays out a plan to get Xbox back on track after the latest round of layoffs.

Edit: We pushed out a hotfix v26.18.0 to address a MacOS crashing issue. You may need to reinstall the app from the setup program if your installation is stuck in a crash loop. The itch.io app got two...

For much of this year, each new week has brought with it a new impetus for a rash of articles on Microsoft’s Xbox misfortunes. From deep wounds like layoffs and project cancellations, to stingin...

Acclaimed actor Samantha Beart joins us for this month's edition of GDC Side Quest on the Game Developer Podcast.

Asha Sharma has outlined key priorities to help Xbox recover after it reported a $1.7 billion decline in revenue last year. Read more

Plus: The developer of Buckshot Roulette launches a horror subversion of Mario Party.

Unity has launched dedicated engine support for Netflix platforms, making it easier for developers to ship titles on the streaming platform's ecosystem. Read more

Sony reported flat sales in its Games & Network Services (G&NS) segment for its first quarter, but operating income rose 37%, primarily due to US tariff refunds. Read more

The $55 billion acquisition of Electronic Arts is set to close on August 4 following approval from all required regulatory bodies. Read more

Roblox has announced its second-quarter financial results, highlighting substantial year-over-year revenue growth, despite a minor shortfall in net bookings. Read more
GameFromScratch.com Doriax Game Engine Hands-On The Doriax Game engine is a shockingly robust 2D/3D game engine available for Windows, Mac and Linux. The entire project is open source under the MIT li...

'Music doesn't make us feel things. Music IS feeling. Art IS feeling.'

Following the release of Christopher Nolan's Odyssey film on July 17, daily active users of Assassin's Creed Odyssey increased significantly across all platforms. Read more

Back from the dead and better than ever.

So, is Friendslop Saturated? No it is not. Look at this chart which includes most of the major Friendslop titles released since the birth of the genre: Friendslop is getting even more popular Here is...

The engine maker said it wants to help developers produce titles for Netflix's multi-platform ecosystem.

Pokémon Go generated over $48.5 million in in-app purchase revenue during its 10th anniversary week, according to AppMagic data. Read more

The number of active creators and streamers after launch is the clearest predictor of success for player-versus-player first-person shooter games, rather than the total hours watched, according to new...

Since the indie boom of the 2010s, one piece of advice commonly given to smaller studios has been the value of merchandise. Read more

I wonder who knows the answer to that finicky production question? Let's hope they weren't just laid off.

Grand Theft Auto 6 download codes will expire in Japan on May 8, 2027. Read more

Flagging Xbox sales have become the new normal for Microsoft.

Microsoft has published its latest financial results, with Xbox revenue down 7% for the full year and 10% in the fourth quarter. Read more

The company reports revenue up 94.9 percent to $889.1 million.

When we last heard from Fiona Sperry in December, she had just put the entire team at Three Fields Entertainment on notice of redundancy. Read more

Martin Keely is now vice president and general manager of Epic Games Store and Epic Online Services.

Capcom's strategy of remaking classic Resident Evil titles is generating the financial resources needed to develop new games and IP, according to producer Masachika Kawata. Read more

Krafton experienced record second-quarter growth, with revenue rising 94.9% to ₩1.29 trillion ($889.1 million), while operating profit also rose 67% to ₩410.9 billion ($283.1 million). Read more

Long-serving CEO Andrew Wilson has held the role since 2013.

'Only the survival of our studio would ever make us consider such a painful action.'

The UK Games Fund has announced its largest group of funded companies since its launch in 2015. Read more

Double Fine Productions has reduced its workforce by 25% following its full separation from Xbox earlier this week. Read more

Also: more from the GameDiscoverCo Show, and a whole bunch of notable news.
GameFromScratch.com August 2026 FREE GameDev Asset Round-Up It’s time for the August Epic Games bi-monthly asset giveaway on the Fab marketplace, with 3 free assets from July 28th – August 11th....

New data from the ASGC Games Industry Layoffs Tracker predicts job losses will reach 14,259 by the end of 2026, representing a 78% increase over an initial forecast for the year. Read more

2025 was a very bad year for Mike Bithell. In August, he announced that the majority of full-time staff were being let go from Bithell Games, with 11 jobs being made redundant. Read more

Capcom has released its Q1 financial results, reporting significant growth in net and ordinary profit driven by strong sales of Pragmata and catalogue titles – particularly its Resident Evil fra...

Atari has partnered with Twin Galaxies to launch the Atari World Championships. Read more

John Hight, the president of Wizards of the Coast, will be stepping down on September 1. The news was given through a US Securities and Exchange Commission filing on July 27. Read more

Games for Change (G4C) has announced that its annual festival will be hosted in a new city during odd-numbered years, starting with Arizona in 2027. Read more

Xbox has provided an explanation for yesterday's hours-long outage, which prevented players from signing in, accessing their libraries, and playing games. Read more

The Video Game History Foundation (VGHF) has published new collections documenting the history of E3, the industry trade show that ran from 1995 to 2021. Read more
Atari has signed a deal with Universal Pictures to develop 10 of its game IPs into feature films. Read more

Cyan Worlds has confirmed a new title in the Myst franchise is now in early development. Read more

UK co-development house CodeDev, also known as The Unreal Guys, has launched a specialist optimisation division called The Performance Guys, built explicitly to tackle project-critical optimisation wo...

How did Toon Blast grow its ARPDAU while every other blast game was falling off a cliff?
GameFromScratch.com GodotHub – Awesome New Launcher for Godot GodotHub is a free and open source, cross platform (with binaries for Windows, Mac and Linux) hub or launcher for the Godot game eng...

Last month, London hosted the Valorant Masters, one of the biggest dates in the calendar for Riot Games' tactical shooter. Read more
Gamescom Asia x Thailand Game Show has announced that id Software co-founder John Romero will headline the business area conference of this year's event in Bangkok, with a keynote entitled "Why We Sti...

The EU AI Act's deepfake transparency rules present an interesting challenge for game studios. The obligation is broader than the popular understanding of a deepfake, extending beyond fake videos of p...

How to Read Mathematics? - A study guide provides a guide on how to independently work through mathematical papers, textbooks, and lecture notes emphasizes that reading mathematics...

The past five years of writing about the games business has come with a helping of cognitive dissonance so severe that it often felt like whiplash. Record success one week; record layoffs the next. St...

The games industry is stifled by a culture of fear that prioritises algorithmic trends and market research over the creative conviction and personal taste required to produce genuine hits. Read more

Once again, we asked a lot of fans! Also: the latest news & this week in Steam.

Ubisoft CFO Frédérick Duguet said it expects Assassin's Creed: Black Flag Resynced to "deliver superior financial performance" due to lower production costs. Read more

Indie hit Meccha Chameleon was a breakout success in June, ranking as the second-highest PC title in revenue behind Fortnite, according to Newzoo. Read more

Ubisoft has published its first quarter financials, with net bookings reaching €255.8 million. Read more

The EU Commission has cleared the $55 billion acquisition of Electronic Arts led by Saudi Arabia's Public Investment Fund. Read more

Microsoft has begun testing ad-supported game streaming on Xbox. Read more

Bethesda union OneBGS has said it has filed a legal complaint against the developer "for continuing to violate labour laws in Canada." Read more
GameFromScratch.com Unity Getting Real-Time Global Illumination Real-time Global Illumination, a more accurate lighting model that captures secondary bounces of surfaces instead of just the direct eff...

Jeff Gattis, general manager for Amazon Luna and Amazon Game Studios, has clarified his earlier comments that sequels to 007: First Light will be "done by MGM and, theoretically, by Amazon Game Studio...

The ESA Foundation has provided 31 university students with scholarships worth $5,000 to $10,000 to support careers in game development and esports. Read more

Amazon's cloud gaming service Luna is now available for Prime Video subscribers with Fire TV in the US and UK. Read more

Amazon has announced that its Luna video game streaming service will be incorporated into Prime Video, allowing Prime subscribers to play games directly through the video app. It follows similar moves...

Delphi Interactive's success with FIFA World Cup: Launch Edition and 007 First Light has created new opportunities with major brands, according to CEO Casper Daugaard. Read more

The UK government's £30 million Games Growth Package "is already making an impact" a year on from its launch, according to UK Creative Industries Minister Ian Murray. Read more

We crunched 'too much data'. Also: new GDCo show, news and lots more...
GameFromScratch.com Unity 7 is Back In September of 2024 at the Unite developer conference, Unity announced that Unity Next (Unity 7 basically) was in development. It was going to be a clean break fro...

Happy GodotCon Boston for those who celebrate! While many key contributors are already at this event as we speak, that doesn’t mean that development snapshots are slowing down anytime soon. We hope an...

Thomas Lehr walks through how InnoGames kept Sunrise Village alive with AI

Shipping Godot VR and Porting to PSVR2: A Partial Post Mortem a detailed write-up of a talk at Develop Brighton 2026 about Godot VR development discusses rebuilding major engine par...
Also: Steam debuts this week & lotsa news.
We want to learn more about the Godot community, understand who the users of the engine are, and find out how we can better support you. To achieve that, we have a short set of questions and hope you...

Also: lots of game discovery news, innit?

SUMMER SALE BLOG MARATHON: This is the last week of my course summer sale. To celebrate this deal, I am writing a blog post every day in countdown. I have never discounted my everything bundle this lo...
h4 {margin-bottom:0} Our second annual GodotCon in North America is right around the corner and it is full steam ahead for the Godot community in Boston. The schedule has been announced so we thought...

It’s been nearly four weeks since we saw the release of Godot 4.7, which has given our team ample time to prepare for its first maintenance release. This progress was made in tandem with Godot 4.8, wh...

SUMMER SALE BLOG MARATHON: This is the last week of my course summer sale. To celebrate this deal, I am writing a blog post every day in countdown. I have never discounted my everything bundle this lo...

A build-vs-buy breakdown for game studios, showing why internal engineering builds almost always cost more.

Half-Edge Data Structure. Part 2 deep dive into the inner workings of the OpenMesh mesh creation logic explains the process of adding new faces to an existing mesh details the algor...

One of the most common questions I get is along the lines of “I don’t want to put my Steam page up too early because I don’t want to overexpose my game before launch” Or “I don’t want to reach out to...