EA Australian Studio Suffers Massive Layoffs

By Austin Wilson | @TheAustinPost1

Videogame publisher Electronic Arts has laid off a quarter of the staff at FireMonkeys Studio in Melbourne, Australia.

FireMonkeys studio was created after a merge between IronMonkeyStudios and FireMint in 2012 and is one of the largest developer studios in Australia. The studio focuses primarily on mobile games and is responsible for some of EA's most popular mobile games such as Need For Speed: No Limits and Real Racing 3.



FireMonkeys had a staff of around 200 and Game Workers United Australia confirmed the number of staff being terminated to be between 40 to 50 people. EA is terminating staff in a bid to change the studios focus from mobile games to live services. 

"The FireMonkeys studio is working on some of our most popular mobile games. We recently made the decision to shift teams to focus more on our live services, and entered a consultation period that may impact some roles in the studio," EA said in a statement to Kotaku Australia, "We're working to match skills with opportunities as we go through this period, identifying other opportunities at EA, and providing as much help to our employees as we possibly can."

Electronic Arts CEO, Andrew Wilson, has been vocal in his desire to direct the company's efforts on live services such as their new golden goose, Apex Legends.


EA's new live service game, Apex Legends

The layoffs hit the game development industry in Australia hard and Game Workers United Australia says that the lay offs are a "devastating blow" and makes up almost 5% of the entire Australian game developer industry.

"This is a devastating blow to the industry," GWU Australia stated in response to the layoffs, "an extraordinarily disappointing decision which will affect the already crowded local freelancer and indie market, as well as undergraduate student body."

The FireMonkeys studio layoffs are happening shortly after Activision-Blizzard terminated 800 non-developer staff in a company-wide reorganization effort.

Although it's a short-term solution and ultimately harms the industry, investors see layoffs as a positive and Activision saw a huge increase in stock prices after announcing the layoffs.


EA stock increased after the surprise release of Apex Legends

EA stock soared after the release of Apex Legends and is most likely trying to reassure investors that they plan to continue to focus on the game success as well as replicate it by restructuring existing studios like FireMonkeys to focus on live service content.

Devil May Cry Voice Actor Shot At Six Times During Attempted Car Robbery

By Austin Wilson | @TheAustinPost1

There's been a lot of news coming out the voice acting community but this takes the cake. Reuben Langdon, the voice of Dante from the Devil May Cry, survived an attempted car robbery that almost turned fatal. 

While in Guatemala City, Reuben Langdon and his partner, Steve Copeland, were in their car when an armed man attempted to enter the vehicle from the passenger side. The two men panicked and sped off. As they fled, the would-be car jacker fired at the car six times.


After the indecent, Langdon and Copeland pulled over to assess the damage to their vehicle. In the video recorded by Copeland, both men are shaken as they find multiple bullet holes in their car, two of which almost hit Reuben. Reuben was also concerned for his bag and his personal belongings in the back seat.


Bullet hole in the back of Reubons seat


Bullet hole from the round that almost hit Reuben's head.

On Twitter, Langdon found the fragment of a bullet and joked about his near-death experience.

Langdon was touring Guatemala filming a documentary about Mayan culture called Vision of the Ages, a sequel to Steve Copelands documentary Shift of the Ages.

Guatemala has a very high crime rate and the U.S Department of State Travel Advisory has assessed the country as a level 3: reconsider traveling. According to the OSAC 2018 Crime and Safety Report, car robberies are a frequent occurrence in Guatemala. 

The capitol city, Guatemala City, has a serious issue with armed car robberies and American tourists have reported car robberies happening frequently at night, although daytime robberies are not unheard of.

Langdon and Copeland are fortunate to have gotten away with the damage to their car and nothing else.

Activision-Blizzard Lays Off 800 Employees

By Austin Wilson | @TheAustinPost1

Early this week, Activision-Blizzard announced it has laid off 775 of its employees.

After a rough 2018, Activision-Blizzard is laying off 8% of its staff, primarily from its non-development teams, in a new cost-cutting initiative to increase revenue and please investors. Although rumors about the layoffs have been spreading for months, the announcement that almost 800 employees were being booted was a shock to everyone.

In a post to the Blizzard community, CEO Allen Brack announced that Blizzard would be downsizing its non-development teams in the U.S. to focus resources on game development. He also states that we can see similar layoffs in regional offices in the near future.

"To better support these priorities, we need to reorganize some of our non-development teams." Allen Brack stated in a Blizzards news page, "As a result, we will be reducing the number of non-development positions in North America and anticipate the a related process in our regional offices over the coming months subject to local requirements."

Activision is providing some assistance to those who are now unemployed by offering severence packages and career support. "To assist with the transition, we are offering each impacted employee a severance package that includes additional pay, benefits, and continuation, and career and recruiting support to help them find their next opportunity."

In mid to late 2018, Activision found itself in a number of fiascos which led to investors jumping ship and a decline in stock prices.

Between the disastrous Diablo Immortal announcement during Blizzcon 2018 and the loss of Destiny following Activision's divorce from Bungie, investors began to lose faith in Activision and company stock prices took a nosedive. More evidence that the company was in trouble came to light after Activision CFO Spencer Neumann was poached by Netflix and Blizzard CFO Amrita Ahuja resigned to become the CFO for Square Inc.

Although 2018 was a PR disaster for Activision, the company still found it to be a financially successful year, earning $7.5 billion net revenue. In an earnings report, CEO Bobby Kotick stated that the financial results in 2018 were the best in the company's history.

"While our financial results for 2018 we're the best in our history, we didn't realize our full potential," Kotick states, "To help us reach our full potential, we have made a number of important leadership changes. These changes should enable us to to achieve the many opportunities our industry affords us, especially with our powerful owned franchises, our strong commercial capabilities, our direct digital connections to hundreds of millions of players, and our extraordinarily talented employees."

If Activision-Blizzards employees are so talented, why let them go? The answer: to get back investors.

Investors see it as a positive when a company in turmoil lays off staff as the company reorganizes itself and it appears to have succeeded for Activision as stock prices have increased since they announced the layoffs.



 Was it necessary for Activision to lay 800 employees? Youtuber Yongyea says no! In his video regarding the layoffs Yongyea points out that Activision CEO Robert Kotick earned $28 million in 2017 and new CFO Dennis Durkin was given $15 million just for accepting the postion.

Jason Scheier put in his two cents on the subject in a tweet showing that the 6 highest ranking individuals of Activision-Blizzard earned a total of $82,272,633 in 2017 as he also calls for employees to unionize.

Critics of the layoffs are also suggesting that higher ups in Activision-Blizzard should have followed the example of Nintendo's Satoru Iwata, who took a 50% pay cut instead laying off ground level employees.

Given much the company is actually earning in revenue, did they really need to fire almost a thousand people? And how many more are we going to see jobless in the coming months as the company restructures? If anyone who works for Activision-Blizzard is concerned about their employment, now would be a good time to start looking for new opportunities.

I wish the best for those who have been layed off and I hope you all find new work soon.

Disney Says They're Happy With How EA Is Handling Star Wars. Are They Playing The Same Games We Are?

By Austin Wilson | @TheAustinPost1

Star Wars fans have been calling for Disney to bail out of their exclusivity deal with Electronic Arts because of how poorly the publisher has handled the franchise. However, Disney has a different point of view on EA than their consumers.

During a transcribed 2019 First Quarter call, Robert Iger spoke on how Disney has tried and failed in the past to enter the gaming industry.

"And we've found over the years that we've never been good at the self-publishing side of things," Iger said, "but we've been great at the licensing side, which obviously doesn't require that much allocation of capital."


Screenshot of the Igers video game comments in the transcript

Iger also praised Disney's "close relationship" with EA, adding "we've had a good relationships with some of those we're licensing to, notably EA and the relationship on the Star Wars properties."

Mr. Iger praising EA was a bit surprising considering how little the publisher has done with the exclusive Star Wars license. Over the course of six years, EA has produced two mediocre Star Wars games with less than positive reviews by consumers and has cancelled several others, including Star Wars 1313 and Visceral Studios open-world Star Wars game, which was described as "Star Wars meets Uncharted".



EA CEO Andrew Wilson didn't actually want the Star Wars license to begin with. Mr. Wilson wants Electronic Arts to focus on games that the publisher owns like FIFA and Battlefield that will bring more revenue directly to the publisher rather than buying licenses from other companies.

Unfortunately for EA, focusing on those titles might not be as profitable as the publisher wants to believe, as Battlefield V undersold by one million units and the Belgian authorities forced EA to comply with anti-gambling laws and remove the ability to purchase in-game currency in FIFA 2018 and 2019, making it harder to sell card packs.

EA has also been suffering from a consumer backlash following the Star Wars: Battlefront 2 controversy which only got stronger when Chief Design Officer Patrick Soderlund told critics of Battlefield V "accept it or don't buy the game."

Gamers took his words to heart and decided not to buy the game. And after EA announced that Battlefield undersold by one million units, investors began to lose faith in the publisher as well, with EA stock plummeting from $92.52 to $75.20.



Maybe after the EA dropped the ball in 2018, maybe they'll turn around and put effort into Star Wars: Fallen Order. Because its clear that consumers and investors don't share the same "good relationship" that Disney has with EA.

CD Projekt Red Settles With Witcher Author

By Austin Wilson | @TheAustinPost1

CD Projekt Red has come to an agreement with
Andrzej Sapkowski, creator and author of the
Witcher franchise.

After the success of the Witcher 3, Andrzej
Sapkowski demanded further compensation,
admitting that he didn't believe the Witcher
games would be as successful as they were.

In the early 2000’s, the author sold the rights
to the Witcher games to CD Projekt Red for an
unknown amount that CD Projekt Reds
co-founder Marcin Iwinski stated, "wasn't a
huge amount of money".

“I was stupid enough to sell them  rights to the
whole bunch.” Sapkowski said during an
interview with Eurogamer Poland, “They offered
me a percentage of the profits. I said ‘no there
will be no profit at all give me all my money right
now! the whole amount.’ it was stupid. I was stupid
enough to leave everything in their hands because
I didn't believe in their success. But who could
foresee their success? I couldn't.”

After seeing the success of the Witcher franchise,

Mr. Sapkowski initially demanded $16 million

from the developers and threatened a lawsuit if

they didn't. CD Projekt Red said they want to have

a good relationship with the Author of their most

successful games but believes the amount of
money and threat of a lawsuit are without merit.
In a regulatory announcement, CD Projekt Red
stated “It is the Company’s will to maintain good
relations with authors of works which have
inspired CD PROJEKT RED’s own creations.
Consequently, the Board will go to great lengths
to ensure amicable resolution of this dispute;
however, any such resolution must be respectful
of previously expressed intents of both parties, as
well as existing contracts.”

Witcher fans who have been following the story
have ridiculed Sapkowski, calling him “a greedy
fool”. Even Dmitry Glukhovsky, author of the
Metro series, called Sapkowski an “ungrateful

Schmuck” during an interview with DTF.

Now, after months of negotiations, the developer and

the author have come to an agreement. No details

of the deal have been publicly released but it's being

reported that the amount of money being given to

Mr. Sapkowski is “much lower” than the authors

original $16 million demand.

Witcher fans are glad that CD Projekt Red and
Andrzej Sapkowski were able to come to terms
and hope that the developer and author will put
this situation behind them and continue to create
quality Witcher content.

Game Developer DMCA Claim Their Own Game To Get It Back From A Thieving Publisher

By Austin Wilson | @TheAustinPost1

Eximius developer, Ammobox Studios, made an

announcement on the games steam page that they

filed a DMCA strike on their own game to get it

back from their publisher, TheGameWallStudios.

The announcement states, "Dear Community: We

(Ammobox Studios) are forced to issue a DMCA

Notice to our own game Eximius: Seize the Frontline.

As a result, the steam page has been temporarily

disabled."

The game, Eximius Seize the Frontline, described

as a FPS/RTS hybrid, was in early access from

September 27th until early January when the

developers filed the DMCA notice. The game had

received positive reviews until the claim. Since the

claim, reviews for the game have taken a dive.

The developer claimed the game because their

publisher, TheGameWallStudios, failed to share

revenue earned from the game with Ammobox

Studios while the developer was paying for all

the games servers and services.

“In total we lost launch sales, Halloween Sales,

Autumn Sale and a portion of Winter Sale's

revenue.” Ammobox said in a post on their Reddit.

In January, after months of losing money,

Ammobox decided to “scorch Earth” and DMCA

strike their own game to get it back from

TheGameWallStudios. Valve also helped the

developers get the rights to their game back but

the Ammobox had suffered greatly.

“After the DMCA, Steam assisted us by helping us

regain the App id via the proper due process. 4

months post launch, we're nearly collapsed, full of

debt, but finally regained the App id, we will rise up.”

Ammobox is now the developer and publisher of

Eximius: Seize the Frontline and the game is once

again for sale on Steam for $29.99. Reviews for the

game have gone up as well, going from ‘mixed’ to

‘mostly positive’.

Ammobox Studios is seeking legal action against

TheGameWallStudios but the publisher has refused

to respond to their lawyers demands and the

developer states that the authorities “refuse to

see this as a case worth investigating.”

Eximius: Seize the Frontline is a unique game

with a FPS/RTS blend. The game had positive

reviews prior to the developers complications with

their publisher and reviews are becoming more

positive after they reclaimed their game. The

game was an 8 year passion project for the

developers and it's clear they made it with

gamers in mind.

If that's sounds like a game you'd be interested

in, check it out! It's a cheap game and most of the

proceeds go to a promising team of developers

who cares for their game and players.

Today's Win or Tomorrow's Loss? EA Stops Selling In-Game Currency In Belgium

By Austin Wilson| @TheAustinPost1

EA has caved to demands by Belgian authorities

and has removed the sale of FIFA points from

FIFA 2018 and FIFA 2019 in Belgium.

“After further discussions with the Belgian

authorities, we have decided to stop offering

FIFA Points for sales in Belgium,” EA said in a

statement on their official website, “We’re

working to make these changes effective in our

FIFA console and PC games by January 31, 2019.”

EA was forced to remove the sale of FIFA Points

from their online store because they were in

violation of Belgium's anti-gambling laws. FIFA

points are used to purchase Ultimate Card Packs

for random rewards which vary by rarity.

The discussion over loot boxes and gambling

came after EA’s Star Wars: Battlefront 2, which

was described by gamers and lawmakers in

opposition to loot boxes as a 'Star Wars themed

online casino’. The Belgian Gaming Commission

responded to the backlash over the game by

opening up investigation to decide whether or

not loot boxes are a form of online gaming.

“Given the importance of the protection of

minors and vulnerable players, this is very

worrying," Minister of Justice Koen Green said

in a statement.

The authorities investigated several games

developed by Triple A studios with loot box features

to find gambling related themes. Some of those

games that were investigated like FIFA 18 and

Overwatch had gambling related themes and were

ordered by the Gaming Commission to remove the

ability to buy in-game currency for copies sold in
Belgium.

While Blizzard and Activision complied

with authorities, Electronic Arts refused to

comply, stating that they “do not agree with

Belgian authorities’ interpretation of the law”.

FIFA is EA's flagship title that earns roughly

$800 million annually. So naturally the publisher

wants to protect a major source of revenue.

EA is likely less concerned with the loss of a

few thousand dollars in Belgium and more

concerned for the precedents that Belgium's

ruling sets for other EU member nations and,

more importantly, the United States, where the

game publisher has seen the most criticism.

After the failure of Star Wars Battlefront 2 and

the ESRB failing to regulate loot boxes, gamers

began calling for governments to step in and take

action. In the US, several lawmakers led by

Hawaiian senator Chris Lee have been attempting

to pass bills regulating loot boxes and online

gambling.

Senator Chris Lee speaking on Star Wars: Battlefront 2 and
the loot box controversy.

While most gamers are pleased that

governments are taking action against corrupt

industry practices, others believe that it may

lead to further problems.

The United States government has repeatedly

blamed video games for violent crime on

numerous occasions and there's a growing fear

in the gaming community that the government

would take advantage during its intervention and

begin to censor content in games.

Government intervention is being seen as the

lesser of two evils in the loot box debate, but

is it worth giving one of gaming's biggest

critics the power to influence the industry?

Gamers need to proceed with caution because the

battle won today may lead to us losing the war

tomorrow.