Welcome back to another roundup of MMO and MMO-adjacent industry news! And much like yesterday’s digest, we begin with some quarterly financials! Woo!
Bandai Namco: The Q1 earnings report for Bandai Namco’s fiscal year 2025 has arrived and it brings some good news for the investors: Net sales are up by almost 25 percent YoY, and profit is up by just over 56 percent YoY. As most gamers can guess, most of this profit spike is being attributed to Elden Ring: Shadow of the Erdtree.
My.Games’ publishing label: Last month saw My.Games unveil a new publishing arm called Knights Peak Interactive, which the company says will focus on “premium PC and console titles” including the console version of multiplayer shooter Starship Troopers: Extermination. A recent interview has offered a bit more detail about the publishing arm’s plans, including aspirations to release four to five games in 2025, followed by five to six titles in 2026.
Tencent’s Gamescom plans: Tencent will unsurprisingly be part of Gamescom 2024, primarily using its Level Infinite global brand as the umbrella for the company’s game reveals. The convention will host a presentation on August 21st that promises news from Dune: Awakening, Exoborne, Soulframe, and Warframe, while the Level Infinite booth will feature the previously announced Dune gameplay preview, along with playable demos and new information from the devs of V Rising, a look at the multiplayer racer Deathsprint 66, and a “cinematic presentation” from Exoborne.
Outersloth’s indie funding: Remember when Among Us studio Innersloth announced its indie funding Outersloth initiative? GIbiz offers an enlightening and encouraging interview with communications director Victoria Tran, who talks about how the plan is going, the moves being made to make sure it isn’t leaning on the success of Among Us, and perhaps most refreshingly, how Innersloth is ensuring it’s “not spending money in a way that’s like, ‘I guess we now have to lay off half of our people because we’re spending it on this other thing that we think is fun,'” as she puts it.
The Borderlands Movie sucks: Lastly, we get into peripheral territory: Early reviews of the live-action movie based on Borderlands are not going very well at all, with film critics calling it “uninspired,” “a disaster,” and the film version of “what an out-of-touch executive thinks the ‘cool kids’ find appealing.” Yowch. Maybe save your money on buying this ticket when it hits theaters August 9th. Or spend it on the Milli Vanilli movie instead.
