The year 2023 did not have a happy ending for the Sony PlayStation manufacturer. In December 2023, Autorité de la Concurrence, the French antithrust body, imposed a fine of 13.5 million Euros for abusing its power to hurt the reputation of third-party PlayStation controller manufacturers. According to the claims, Sony pushed a software update in November 2015, which resulted in the third-party controllers' regular disconnections. 

Apart from pushing the software update, Sony is said to have abused its power by not allowing manufacturers to access Sony's Open License Program and refusing to communicate with interested applicants. After investigating the case, the French regulator fined Sony's parent company and three subsidiaries. 

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Sony is Negatively Impacting Third-Party PlayStation Controllers, Fined 13.5 Million Euros 

The French regulators, Autorité de la Concurrence, said Sony decided to tackle the counterfeiting problem by pushing a software update on the PlayStation 4 in November 2015. After the update, the unlicensed PS4 controllers or the third-party controllers faced regular discontinuation, disrupting the PS4 controller market and helping Sony hold the market's monopoly. According to Autorité de la Concurrence, Sony's move was "detrimental" and "caused harm" to the third-party controller manufacturers, resulting in a negative brand image for them.

Amidst the connection issues, manufacturers only hoped to enter Sony's Open License Program to gain an official PlayStation license over the controllers. Sony seemed to have abused its power by refusing to communicate the program access criteria with the interested manufacturers and not allowing them to enter their program. Additionally, Sony impeded its rival companies from joining the PlayStation's licensing program. "Sony applied the criteria in a discretionary manner, even though access to the program was the only way to avoid disconnections," the French Authority stated in their announcement.

According to Autorité de la Concurrence (via TheGamer):

The Authority notes that by refusing to communicate to manufacturers who requested them the criteria for access to the OLP program, Sony was able to apply them in a discretionary manner, even though access to the latter was the only means of [avoiding] disconnections.

Due to Sony's infraction, the PlayStation controller market was highly disrupted, and the brand image of the third-party controller manufacturers was tarnished. After abusing its powers, Sony ruled the market with its heavily priced first-party controllers. The French Authority has fined the parent company alongside three of its subsidiaries.

• Sony Interactive Entertainment Europe Limited
• Sony Interactive Entertainment Inc. K.K 
• Sony Interactive Entertainment France
• Sony Group Corporation

After the French Authority's announcement, Sony has not commented on the Autorité de la Concurrence's findings and the 13.5 million Euros fine. 

Final Fantasy 14’s Crossroads patch finally has a release date, the first major update for the MMO following the launch of Dawntrail. This update will bring several new bits and pieces, including the Yuweyawata Field Station dungeon, Chaotic Alliance Raids, and more role quests.

"Players who have completed all Dawntrail role quests or all Wachumeqimeqi quests will be able to enjoy a finale to wrap up their respective stories," the Final Fantasy team explained. And that’s just a sneak peek of everything coming to Final Fantasy 14 on Crossroads’ release.

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What’s Coming To Final Fantasy 14

• New Main Scenario Quests – Crossroads
• New Dungeon – Yuweyawata Field Station
• New 24-Player Alliance Raid – Echoes of Vana’diel - Jeuno: The First Walk
• New Trial – The Minstrel’s Ballad: Sphene's Burden
• New Unreal Trial – The Jade Stoa (Unreal): Face off against Byakko, one of the Four Lords, at level 100
• Chaotic Alliance Raid – The Cloud of Darkness (Chaotic): A new 24-player, high-difficulty raid arriving one week after Patch 7.15
• New Ultimate Raid – Futures Rewritten (Ultimate)
• New Allied Society Quests – Players will be able to participate in new allied society quests for the Pelupelu that are designed for battle classes and jobs
• A New Custom Delivery Client – Nitowikwe
• Additional Role & Wachumeqimeqi Quests – Players who have completed all Dawntrail role quests or all Wachumeqimeqi quests will be able to enjoy a finale to wrap up their respective stories
• New Hildibrand Quest Series – Everyone’s favorite inspector returns for more antics in Dawntrail
   

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New Game+ Support for Patch 7.0

• Replay main scenario quests, job quests, and role quests
• Duty Support Additions – Support for the non-main scenario quest dungeon Halatali will be implemented, with further additions in the future
• Player Housing Update - The ability to select interior designs from different residential areas regardless of the location of the plot and new interior designs will be added
• Player Versus Player Update – Rework of multiple Crystalline Conflict maps, PvP action changes, and more
• Miscellaneous Updates – Additional updates for the Hall of the Novice with training for a wide range of different battle mechanics, NPC voiceovers added to Doman Mahjong, and more

Recently, Final Fantasy 14's Naoki Yoshida addressed the personal abuse sent toward Wuk Lamat's voice actor, stating it "breaks my heart." Wuk Lamat was a fresh character brought in by Dawntrail but failed to strike the chords with some players. This turned ugly when voice actor Sena Bryer got transphobic abuse for her portrayal.

Amazon Prime Gaming has announced 24 different free games that will become available to Prime subscribers in November 2024. The games on offer from Amazon this month include some big names like Marvel’s Guardians of the Galaxy, Mafia: Definitive Edition, Dishonored - Definitive Edition, and Tomb Raider: Anniversary, two of which are available now.

Apart from the free games with Prime on Amazon Luna, a subscription to Amazon Prime services also provides customers with several free PC games they can claim and download for a limited time every month at the Prime Gaming official site. Last month’s selection of games included games like BioShock Remastered, Doom Eternal, and Scorn.

Marvel's Guardians of the Galaxy and Mafia: Definitive Edition are the first two free games on Prime Gaming this month, and they will be available for play starting November 1. The game, originally published by Square Enix in 2021, comes with an original story starring the Marvel team of Star-Lord, Drax the Destroyer, Gamora, Rocket Raccoon, and Groot.

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List of Prime Gaming Free Games for November 2024

November 1
 

• Marvel's Guardians of the Galaxy
• Mafia: Definitive Edition
   

November 7
 

• Bang Bang Racing
• Close To The Sun
• Dishonored - Definitive Edition
• Disney/Pixar Cars
• Duck Paradox
• Snakebird Complete
   

November 14
 

• Blade of Darkness
• Chasm: The Rift
• House of Golf 2
• Ms. Holmes: The Case of the Dancing Men Collector's Edition
• Tomb Raider: Anniversary
   

November 21
 

• Gloomy Tales: One-Way Ticket Collector's Edition
• Max: The Curse of Brotherhood
• Moonscars
• Overcooked: Gourmet Edition
• Riot - Civil Unrest
• Super Meat Boy
   

November 27
 

• Elite Dangerous
• Mystery Case Files: The Dalimar Legacy Collector's Edition
• Jurassic World Evolution
• Shogun Showdown
• Sir Whoopass - Immortal Death

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Naughty Dog’s Next Game To Reportedly Offer ‘Player Freedom’

Naughty Dog’s next title will reportedly focus on giving players more freedom. Well, that’s what minnMax founder Ben Hanson said. He claims to have received some information about the secretive project from “somebody very in the know, who worked on the game.”

“The tone was like, you are all not ready for how amazing this thing is going to be, and the tone was—I’m not going to say the game that they referenced to compare it to because I don’t want people to be like, MinnMax said it was going to be exactly like this—but they compared it to a game with a lot of player freedom.”

Hanson added that Naughty Dog’s upcoming game was compared to Hitman. In 2023, Naughty Dog head Neil Druckmann said that he would like the studio to focus less on traditional narrative in future projects.

The Elder Scroll: Legends has confirmed that it is shutting down on January 30, 2025, removing players’ ability to play the digital card game for good. While The Elder Scrolls: Legends has already been delisted from Steam, players who have the game on PC and mobile can continue to play the game until this date.

The Elder Scrolls: Legends was first released back in 2017 when it faced a lot of competition in the digital card game genre. Other titles such as Hearthstone have something of a stronghold on the genre, and The Elder Scrolls: Legends largely failed to find an audience despite its connection to Bethesda’s wildly popular RPG franchise.

The game’s Steam population peaked at almost 9,000 players back in 2017, although this quickly cratered. By 2020, its Steam player count had fallen into the hundreds and never managed to recover, in part due to The Elder Scrolls: Legends being put on hold in late 2019. It hasn’t received any updates since.

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The Elder Scrolls: Legends Players Getting Closure Message

While the company has yet to release any statement on its social media channels or website, as reported by PCGamesN, players launching the game are now getting a message confirming the game’s imminent closure.

“The Elder Scrolls Legends servers will permanently shut down on January 30, 2025,” the message confirms, also revealing that "all items in the store and entry into in-game events will be available for one gold each, so you can enjoy all the content Legends has to offer."

The message reads that "the game will be inaccessible" after this date, so there’s no option to play it offline. Sadly the game never managed to fulfill its full potential to become one of the most popular card games out there.

Unfortunately, The Elder Scrolls: Legends has already been delisted from Steam as well, which means it won’t be able to bring in any new players as it hurtles towards closure. Although the game’s remaining audience was small, it did exist.

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The Elder Scrolls: Legends Shutting Down In January 2025

It’s a shame for people who continue to play the game that they won’t be able to access it in any offline capacity. There are live-service games being shut down after just one year nowadays, so while it’s good that The Elder Scrolls: Legends at least got seven years online, they will definitely be a part of the ongoing conversation surrounding the preservation of these kinds of games.

While the game might be shutting down, the franchise as a whole is ramping up to enter an entirely new era. With Starfield now launched, Bethesda is said to be developing The Elder Scrolls 6, although a release date for the long-awaited title has not yet been confirmed.

Remedy Entertainment has provided fans and investors with an update on all of its current games. The update was provided during the company’s latest earnings report on November 1.

Starting with Alan Wake 2, it was revealed that it has made most of its development and marketing costs back since its launch. According to company CEO Tero Virtala, Alan Wake 2 has yet to “generate royalties.” The studio launched The Lake House expansion on October 22, wrapping up post-launch plans for the game.

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Update On Other Remedy Entertainment Games

With Alan Wake 2 in the past, Remedy is continuing its focus on several other projects internally. FBC: Firebreak “continues in full production with a focus on iterating on the core loop and implementing more of the UI for more player clarity based on playtesting feedback.”

FBC: Firebreak is expected to break cover in 2025 for PlayStation 5, Xbox Series X|S, and PC. The game will launch day one Xbox Game Pass as well as the PlayStation Plus Game Catalog for Extra and Premium subscribers. It will be self-published by Remedy and be a “mid-priced” game.

Elsewhere, Control 2 continues to be in the production readiness stage with plans to enter full production in 2025. “Many of the critical features of the game have been implemented to mitigate production risk, and workflows and pipelines are being tested in preparation for full production,” Virtala said. Lastly, the Max Payne 1 & 2 Remake is also in production. No updates on a potential release date for the game were revealed.

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Overwatch 2 Testing The Return Of 6v6 Next Season

After Blizzard’s announcement earlier this year that it was considering bringing 6v6 matches to Overwatch 2, having ditched them when it transitioned from Overwatch 1 to its sequel, the studio has now made its reintroduction official: 6v6 will come to Overwatch 2 in the form of two test modes next season, and Blizzard says it will be ‘watching the results closely.’

When the company revealed it was mulling over 6v6’s return back in July, it explained the original mode could have “really high, highs, but really low, lows” in Overwatch 1, and that 5v5 was ultimately selected for Overwatch 2 in a bid to "raise that floor, even though it was at the expense of some of some of those high moments."

However, the studio acknowledged the changes had come "at the cost of match variety and player freedom" and so it was looking at how 6v6 could potentially be relaunched. And now, four months on from that announcement, Blizzard has confirmed 6v6’s imminent return.

Hindenburg Research has accused online gaming platform, Roblox, of letting users solicit content related to child sexual exploitation or seek sexual favors with children on its group chat walls.

Sharing the claims in a post on the social media platform, X, formerly known as Twitter, the US-based short seller said, “We found over 50 Roblox group chat walls that are active right now, with no age restrictions, where users are soliciting child sexual exploitation content or sexual favors with children (many using thinly-coded language). The list is not exhaustive. It took us only about an hour and a half to find these and there are many more.”

Roblox tweeted:

“Roblox’s CEO David Baszucki was on CNBC today calling the platform a "beacon for safety and civility". We found over 50 Roblox group chat walls that are active right now, with no age restrictions, where users are soliciting child sexual exploitation content or sexual favors… pic.twitter.com/8dOFu1q1jA”

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Was Roblox Aware Of These Issues?

Hindenburg claimed that the gaming company was made aware of these issues long back, however, it took no action to resolve the issue. “Roblox was made aware of these issues years ago and has done nothing substantive to address them,” the post read.

In September, Hindenburg disclosed a short position on the gaming company alleging that it boosted metrics like user numbers and engagement. Roblox is involved in user-generated content to increase engagement and search from in-game spending on virtual currency.

Hindenburg earlier targeted Indian tycoon Gautam Adani and his conglomerate for being involved in money laundering, alongside other allegations. Their allegations were ridiculed by the billionaire. Last month, the company also raised new allegations against the Securities and Exchange Board of India Chair, Madhabi Puri Buch, and her husband, Dhaval Buch, that they owned shares in the money siphoning scandal related to the Adani group.

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India’s Gaming Market Could Reach $9.8 Billion By FY29

India’s gaming industry is said to expand from USD 3.7 billion in FY24 to USD 9.8 billion by FY29, achieving a compound annual growth rate (CAGR) of around 20 percent, as per a report from consulting firm 1Lattice. 

This growth is attributed to several factors, including increased smartphone adoption, a young demographic, and government initiatives aimed at upgrading India’s presence in the global gaming sector.

As per the report, with more than 950 million internet users and 820 million smartphone users, India’s gaming base reached 560 million in FY23. Key drivers of this growth include enhanced connectivity, affordable high-quality smartphones, and the expansion of digital payments, which have all contributed to the industry’s reach.