Tag: Games

Will RIOT’s Patch timeline kill 2XKO?

RIOT is one of the biggest game companies around despite realistically only launching a few successful games that keeps everything on: League of Legends, Teamfight Tactics, and Valorant. Their patch timeline is incredibly fast for League of Legends. The game is updated every 2-3 weeks with new character balances, item changes and overall mechanics. It’s no wonder the game is still being so heavily played with so many small changes each month. However, fighting games are very different and can RIOT’s new fighting game, 2XKO survive with it’s fast changes?

According to their recent blog post, 2XKO will receive balance patches every 5 weeks alongside new content once it officially launches in 2026. This means the game could change drastically every 1.5 months, especially with a small roster of 11. These changes could range from bug fixes to nerf and buffs which could greatly change how players adapt and get use to their characters. 5 weeks is quite short, especially with modern fighters like Street Fighter 6, Tekken 8, and City of the Wolves balancing their game every half to full year. Some of the most popular fighting games ever never even received a balance patch, like Street Fighter 3rd Strike, Super Smash Bros Melee, and Tekken 3. Players just had to deal with whatever the game had.

It will be interesting to see how players adapt or enjoy such quick turn arounds. Quick patches can prevent players from learning weakness or strengths with certain characters. Sometimes it takes time for players to learn, especially in fighting games. Will quick patches attract players, or will these patches end up hurting the 2XKO? RIOT can be cuthroat at cutting their games that aren’t bringing enough money like Legends of Runeterra and their Riot Forge titles. Fighting games tend to be niche as well so RIOT will need to hope the fast changes don’t turn people away. 2XKO is currently in Beta and currently available to download https://2xko.riotgames.com/en-us/

Why The Game Awards Impact Game Sales

It’s another year of The Game Awards hosted by the host, Geoff Keighley, to see who will receive awards voted by gamers across the world. The Game Awards has always been a great fan voted show but for gaming companies, it’s a great time for sales and marketing. Every company hopes their games are nominated in some sort of fashion; not for clout or prestige, but rather the influence it has on gamers to purchase their titles. With over 10 million viewers and growing each year, The Game Awards are a chance for bigger sales, especially so close to the end of the quarter.

If you notice on the Gaming Consoles and PC, you’ll notice The Game Award Sales now. Companies are happy to set their title on sale to align with their nomination. If anything, these nominations help viewers know what game is actually “good” and worth spending their hard earned money on. Obviously, opinions will differ from person to person but to the gaming companies, they are just happy to earn a thousands of dollars.

For the gamers/viewers, The Game Awards are a good chance to speak their opinions and nominate their own personal GOTY. Even open discussions on social media like X, Facebook, Reddit or whatever is great because it allows people to discuss their feelings and what may have ignored or their overall excitement and hope that their favorite may win. Developers like Kzutaka Kodaka, saw the amount of discussion regarding his title: The Hundred Line, and how people felt it should have been nominated. Their happiness of the discussion is always nice and while their titles may not have been nominated, the amount of discussion can lead to more sales for games.

While some will criticize The Game Awards for just being a trailer push for Developers and awards that “don’t matter,” it’s one of the biggest sale times for Game companies and every one of them are hoping you spend your dollars on them.

Game Giants Ep: 34 – Gamescom Review, Ben and Jairus‘ new jobs

Episode 34! We talk about Gamescom

We get to talk about Gamescom and the anime and mangas that we have been up to. All things considered, this is the most casual episodes we have done in a while. We also talked about our new career paths~
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Sony and Microsoft will Merge their Cloud Services

To the shock of everyone (including PlayStation employees), Sony and Microsoft will be working together on their cloud services for gaming. While they have been competing in the video game console industry for years, Sony is not an expert in the Cloud system. Running a cloud server is expensive and Microsoft is considered the 2nd biggest company with the capabilities. Sony and Microsoft “will explore joint development of future cloud solutions in Microsoft Azure to support their respective game and content-streaming services.”

Essentially, PlayStation’s online services will be hosted on Microsoft’s Azure Cloud platform. Don’t expect PlayStation exclusive games or services to come to Xbox or vice-versa. This collaboration can be considered a response to the Stadia from Google and Amazon’s Cloud gaming system (which still isn’t out yet).

Cloud isn’t going to take over anytime soon

Despite the Stadia coming out this year, don’t expect Cloud Gaming to take over the industry. Reports from players have said there were mixed results including delays in registering actions and reduced graphics quality. I strongly believe that console gaming will be strong in the next generation however Cloud gaming can be a game changer once 5G actually comes out. An analyst has predicted that Cloud gaming will only take 2% of the industry according to Bloomberg. 

Sources:

Bloomberg

The Verge