Welcome back to another quick roundup of MMO and MMO-adjacent business news! Business business business and all that.
EngineOwning got owned – File this one under “the worst person you know just made a great point,” as Activision triumphed in its lawsuit against German cheat maker EngineOwning. The US-based court hearing the case awarded Activision over $14M in damages and effectively shut down the cheat site, which focused on on Call of Duty and other multiplayer shooters.
Unionization – The CWA union announced this week that the ZeniMax Workers United union is now fully covered by the same labor neutrality agreement that Microsoft promised to Activision-Blizzard staff in 2022, ahead of its acquisition last year.
Valorant – Riot Games announced a fresh initiative to crack down on toxicity in the shooter, promising to revise its policies over the next month to provide “stronger, faster penalties for severe behavior” and increase support for actual humans to review complaints, alongside “voice evaluation” and even a retroactive review of major offenders. Riot means it this time, for sure.
TLDR: we are taking actions to improve the state of player behavior in the game. If you want to make evil statements under the guise of "shit talk", you aren't welcome here.
Specific actions we're taking 👇🏽 pic.twitter.com/l5Um40Q7KR
— VALORANT (@VALORANT) May 30, 2024
Amazon Games – Amazon announced a new publishing deal this week, though it doesn’t appear to be an MMO – and maybe not even multiplayer. The New World company and publisher will work with Maverick Games on a AAA “narrative-led, open-world driving game for PC, PlayStation 5, and Xbox Series X|S.”
MY.GAMES – Finally, the newly relocated MYGAMES is celebrating its fifth birthday as MY.GAMES (as long as you don’t count its years as MY.COM before it). “The celebration kicked off on May 28 with special gifts available across all of MY.GAMES major titles,” the company says. “Players can look forward to receiving useful gizmos, unique cosmetics, in-game currency, and other gifts in titles such as Rush Royale, HAWKED, War Robots, Grand Hotel Mania, Warface: Clutch, Storyngton Hall, Hustle Castle, Left To Survive, Guild of Heroes, and Tacticool.” The company, of course, runs many more games than that; we’re more likely to cover Skyforge and Conqueror’s Blade.
