Game News Round-Up

A World Of Warcraft Plague Killed Players And Filled Inns With Nasty Contagious Goo

• The event has been dubbed "Corrupted Blood Incident 2.0"
• The glitch that caused the event was hotfixed on July 3rd

EVE Online's cross-platform game engine framework is now fully open source

Nintendo of Europe will stop selling the Nintendo Switch fom "mid-February 2027"

• Nintendo Switch, Nintendo Switch Lite and Nintendo Switch OLED models are affected
• Whilst not explictly stated, it is expected this only affects European customers at this time

<ICYMI> Microsoft is laying off 4,800 employees, and more than 30 percent of the job losses are in the company’s Xbox division

• The layoffs, which are being described as an Xbox “reset” moment, will impact around 1,600 Xbox employees, according to an internal memo from Xbox CEO Asha Sharma
• Microsoft is planning to eliminate a total of around 20 percent of Xbox jobs by the end of the financial year in July 2027
• Double Fine and Compulsion Games are going independent, and Microsoft is also selling Ninja Theory and Undead Labs
• Double Fine and Compulsion Games have been allowed to become independant along with "their IP, catalog and runway for this next games"
• Microsoft is also weighing up selling or closing another Xbox studio; Arkane Studio. “In France, Arkane’s management is beginning required consultation with its Works Council to review potential strategic options,” says Sharma
• Other Xbox studios will also be impacted by layoffs across the board with particular focus on Zenimax / Bethesda studios

Xbox wanted 77M Game Pass subscribers by 2026. Today, it has less than half that (30 million)

Ingress developer Niantic Spatial shuttering New Zealand office