Warner Bros. Discovery has said that a Hogwarts Legacy sequel is a big priority for the company.

Speaking at the Bank of America conference on September 4 (via Variety) chief financial officer Gunnar Wiedenfels reportedly said that following the massive success of Avalanche Studios' Harry Potter role-playing game (RPG), Warner Bros' games division is now interested in a follow-up.

"Obviously, a successor to Hogwarts Legacy is one of the biggest priorities in a couple of years down the road," Wiedenfels said. 

"So there is certainly a significant growth contribution from that [games] business in our strategic outlook here."

Wiedenfels also brought up the company's most recent AAA release, Suicide Squad: Kill the Justice League, which underperformed in sales for the company and recently resulted in numerous layoffs at Rocksteady Studios.

The CFO said that the game was a "miss" but that the games business continues to be a "strategic asset" for the overall company. 

Hogwarts Legacy sold more than 24 million copies since launching in February 2023 and has generated over $1 billion in revenue for Warner Bros, making it the best-selling game of the year, overtaking the likes of The Legend of Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom and Baldur's Gate 3.

According to a Bloomberg report earlier this year, Rocksteady was working on an announced director's cut of Hogwarts Legacy, which would seemingly be an enhanced version of the base game featuring additional content. 

Warner Bros. Games is continuing to cash in on the popular Harry Potter brand as it's just launched Harry Potter: Quidditch Champions, a spin-off sports game developed by Unbroken Studios for PC and consoles.

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Star Wars Outlaws' creative director has confirmed that he will be spending his last weeks working on the game to add more improvements, before moving on to The Division 3.

"It's been announced that I'm exec[utive] producer on The Division, so these are my last weeks, but I'm making sure that I'm pushing as much as I can on the last weeks," said Julian Gerighty in a recent interview with GamesRadar.

This doesn't mean all work on Massive Entertainment's open-world Star Wars game will stop, as Gerighty has revealed that the development team is now in the process of implementing some adjustments to Outlaws, which could mean quality-of-life updates and other hotfixes are on the way.

Gerighty also added that while he and other staff members don't have long left before they need to move back to The Division 3's development, they're trying their best to deliver the content planned for later this year.

"We're pushing a lot of improvements," he said. "We don't want to let it go. They're going to have to kick us out the door. And that's improvements, not just on the base game, but it's things that we're going to deliver later on this year and next year with the downloadable episodes that we're creating there." 

These downloadable episodes are the two expansions previously announced for the game's Season Pass - Wild Card and A Pirate's Fortune - the first of which launches in Fall 2024 followed by the second in Spring 2025.

Gerighty also shared a little insight into both story packs, saying, "We're going to be able to build on that and make something that's really Sabacc themed," Gerighty said, referring to Wild Card's story. 

"The next one that features Hondo from the animation [The Clone Wars] – he's a legendary Space Pirate, a great character, super humorous – so that it's space piracy and pushing the space aspect of the game, which, I mean, we would have loved to spend more time in space."

Although Gerighty will be moving on from Star Wars, he adds, "Whatever happens next, I'll be playing it for sure."

The Division 3 was announced last September but we don't have too many details about the game, only that Ubisoft was "actively building a team" in 2023, so the game is likely a few years away.

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BioWare has shared an in-depth look at Dragon Age: The Veilguard's progression system.

Following the latest gameplay demo, which gave us a deeper look at the world we'll be exploring in The Veilguard, BioWare has now offered a new deep dive into the game's leveling system.

In a new blog post accompanied by a 10-minute breakdown video, it was revealed that in a role-playing game (RPG), players will be able to reach a max level of 50, which is higher than its predecessor, Dragon Age: Inquisition.

BioWare said that the largest form of experience points comes from completing quests in this game and that the "bigger and more momentous the quest, the better the bonus will be."

We also got a look at the Constellation Skill Tree, featuring branching skill paths depending on the class and specialization the player chooses that appear to be more advanced than the previous game.

There will be slots for 'Class' for core skills and weapon proficiencies, 'Ability' which can be assigned to an ability slot on your toolbar, a 'Major Passive' or 'Ability Upgrade' option, to add effects or modify existing Abilities, as well as 'Traits' to modify existing class skills, and 'Minor Passive' or 'Stat Boost' upgrades to increase efficacy in Abilities.

"Node selections are designed to harmonize into cohesive builds. This ensures that Rook’s strength is always growing as the playstyle is being refined," BioWare explained.

As for armor, accessories, and weapons, players will be able to discover or purchase equipment across many places throughout Thedas and, like former Dragon Age games, each item will have its own unique stats.

Players will also be able to locate the Caretaker’s Workshop in the Lighthouse, you're headquarters, where you can upgrade and enchant equipment as well as unlock additional effects for Rook and their companions.

Upgraded equipment will also receive increased stats and each time Rook upgrades the rank of the Caretaker’s Workshop, more enchantments will become available, but only one single enchantment can be applied per item at a time.

Although players will initially have to align with a certain faction during character creation, this doesn't mean they're armor-type will be locked. Unlike in Inquisition, The Veilguard will let players transmogrify their equipment, allowing them to have the best armor in terms of stats while wearing a different appearance.

The Veilguard's seven companions will also have their own leveling system, with each level gained granting them two skill points. 

"Each companion will have quests to deepen Rook’s bond with them, and this is one of the main ways for them to gain experience," BioWare said. "Companions also can gain experience through unique conversations and decisions with them. These quests and bonds are not limited to romantic interests; platonic friendships are just as important and in focus in Dragon Age: The Veilguard."

Dragon Age: The Veilguard is set to launch on October 31 for PlayStation 5, Xbox Series X, Xbox Series S, and PC. 

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Star Wars Outlaws' creative director Julian Gerighty has said that he is disappointed with the game's review scores.

Ubisoft's open-world Star Wars game officially launched last week on PC and console and currently sits at a comfortable score of 76 on Metacritic despite its mixed reception across PC, PlayStation 5, Xbox Series X, and Xbox Series S.

In a recent interview with GamesRadar, Gerighty admitted that he was "a little disappointed" when the review scores were released, but is glad that players are connecting with the game either way.

"I'm a little disappointed with the Metacritic; Of course, recognition from press and critics is very important to us, but players are really connecting with what we did," Gerighty said.

The creative director added that there's a "level of pride, happiness, and sense of accomplishment" among the team at Massive Entertainment and that the team "literally reached for the stars" throughout the game's four-year development.

Gerighty continued, saying that Star Wars Outlaws will be a game players will keep coming back to for years and that the studio has plans to improve it further.

"This will be a game that millions of people are going to play for years and years, and we’re never going to stop improving it," he said. "Well, that’s a lie, we’ll probably stop improving it, but today my mind is not on stopping improving it."

In terms of what's to come, Massive Entertainment hasn't laid out plans for any quality-of-life improvements just yet, but we do know that more post-launch content will be arriving later this year.

As detailed in the Season Pass roadmap, Star Wars Outlaws will receive two story packs, both of which can be purchased separately if players didn't purchase the Gold or Ultimate Edition.

Story Pack One is called Wild Card and is set to arrive in Fall 2024, and will follow Kay Vess infiltrating a high-stakes Sabacc tournament alongside Lando Calrissian. Story Pack Two is A Pirate's Fortune, and will be released in Spring 2025, featuring the return of the fan-favorite pirate Hondo Ohnaka.

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The latest round of Nintendo Switch 2 rumors suggest the upcoming, tentatively-named console may have entered mass production.

That's according to MST Financial senior analyst David Gibson, who took to X / Twitter to post something interesting about Nintendo's primary assembler, Hosiden.

"No-one seems to have noticed the Nintendo assembler- Hosiden is spending ¥2bn on production equipment and ¥1bn on automation in FY3/25 for its major customer in amusement (Nintendo)," writes Gibson. He adds that he expects "Sept news and March 2025 release for [the] next device."

The graph included in the post indeed shows an uptick in automation spending, as well as the addition of spending on production equipment and a new Vietnam-based factory. If anything, it shows that some kind of hardware manufacturing could be underway at the Osaka-based assembler.

In related news, spotted by VGC, industry leaker Nate the Hate took to the comments section of a post on the r/GamingLeaksandRumours subreddit regarding Hosiden's uptick in spending. Nate simply comments that Nintendo Switch 2 "has backwards compatibility support."

This isn't the first time we've heard about the possibility of backwards compatibility support on Nintendo's succeeding console. Last year, a Nintendo executive hinted at Nintendo Switch 2 backwards compatibility during an annual shareholder Q&A session.

At the time, they had said: "with the Nintendo Switch, we can directly connect with various customers through Nintendo Accounts.

"In the transition from Nintendo Switch to the next-generation console. We will do our best to make the transition smooth for our customers."

While not outright confirming backwards compatibility for Nintendo Switch 2, the notion of a more seamless transition (at least when compared to folks making the jump from the disc-based Wii U to the cartridge-compatible Switch) may indicate that things like Nintendo Switch games and Nintendo Switch Online accounts could carry over to the new console.

Furthermore, Nintendo has traditionally broadcast a Nintendo Direct presentation in September every year. Should that precedent hold true this year, we might finally see an official announcement of the Nintendo Switch 2 this month.

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Dragon Age: The Veilguard just got a brand-new gameplay demo exploring several new locations and the mage class.

As part of IGN's month-long coverage of The Veilguard, which was teased last month through BioWare's roadmap, fans were treated to 22 minutes of gameplay guided by the game's director Corinne Busche, and creative director John Epler.

After sharing a series of screenshots last week, the demo started by giving us our first in-game look at the player's base of operations in the Fade, The Lighthouse, which is owned by Solas.

As Rook, the playable protagonist, walks around the base the area looks huge and you can see there are many places you can explore, for instance, the seven companion bedrooms. 

Each has their personal space in The Lighthouse, and from what the developers teased, these places can be upgraded as you progress through the story to fit the respective character's personality. 

BioWare also confirmed that the game will feature visual, glowing alerts that will let players know when a companion is ready to speak with them, so there's no worry about missing optional dialogue. 

As for the rest of the demo, the directors guide us through the beginning of a quest for one of your companions, and Grey Warden, Davrin; along with his adorable griffon Assan. 

After accepting the quest, the player heads to the Crossroads - an important place in Solas' history where he originally began his plans against the Elven Gods, as well as a place the developers said players can spend more time exploring and learning about moments in Solas' history. 

Although this is Davrin's personal quest, he has proceeded to the quest location on his own because, as the developers put it, it gives the companions more autonomy in the story. 

We also got a decent look at a new party combat, specifically with the mage class and the orb and dagger weapon duo. The developers compared this class to Dragon Age: Inquisition's Knight Enchanter specialization, which allows the player to stack elemental damage on an enemy, and then use the dagger to detonate the magic.

BioWare also demonstrated the new skill combinations that can be used alongside your companions, which can deal greater damage to enemies. Since there are several classes in the game, players will be able to experiment by combining mage abilities with Harding's rogue skills, for example. 

The developer also confirmed that when players are knocked down in battle, companions will be able to revive them with the click of a button.

Dragon Age: The Veilguard launches on October 31 for PlayStation 5, Xbox Series X, Xbox Series S and PC. 

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Following poor sales and a drastically low player count, live-service PS5 multiplayer hero shooter Concord is being taken offline just two weeks after its full launch.

The news was confirmed by Concord game director Ryan Ellis via an official PlayStation Blog post. Ellis confirms that the game will be taken offline on September 6, 2024. That gives you just three days, at the time of writing, to squeeze in some play time if you happen to own the game.

In the post, Ellis writes: "We have decided to take the game offline beginning September 6, 2024, and explore options, including those that will better reach our players.

"While we determine the best path ahead, Concord sales will cease immediately and we will begin to offer a full refund for all gamers who have purchased the game for PS5 or PC. If you purchased the game for PlayStation 5 from the PlayStation Store or PlayStation Direct, a refund will be issued back to your original payment method."

The post goes on to detail how players who purchased Concord on PC via Steam or the Epic Games Store can obtain their own refunds, as well as those who bought the game through various other retailers.

It's nothing short of disastrous news for Sony Interactive Entertainment, the game's publisher, and its plans to produce more live-service games, as well as Concord developer Firewalk Studios, naturally. The game, which the developer confirmed took a frankly absurd eight years to make. The team had also stated it was "strapped in and ready to push [the game] for years to come."

While Concord's budget and sales numbers remain unconfirmed, a report by Forbes' Paul Tassi suggests the game had made approximately $1 million, selling an abysmal 25,000 copies. With Tassi also stating that budget estimates are "around the $100 million mark," that's a pretty tragic return on investment.

It remains to be seen as to whether or not Concord will make a comeback; the wording of the PlayStation Blog post, particularly the desire to "explore options," implies there may be a future for the game yet. However, given its Steam all-time peak concurrent player count of 697 (according to SteamDB), it seems like Concord and its players don't have much of a future to look forward to.

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Funcom has said that bringing Dune Awakening to Xbox Series S will be a "challenge".

The massively multiplayer online game (MMO) inspired by the best-selling Dune book series by Frank Herbert is set to launch on PC in early 2025, but Funcom has yet to share a release window for the console versions.

According to Dune Awakening's chief product officer Scott Junior, one of the main reasons for this is so Funcom can spend more time optimizing the Xbox version alongside the PlayStation 5 version, more specifically, the lower-powered Xbox Series S.

"So, it's one of the reasons we're coming out on PC first," Junior said in a recent interview with VG247. "There's a lot of optimisations we need to do before we release on the Xbox. But yeah, Xbox Series S is a challenge."

Junior added later on in the discussion that work is progressing and that those who own an Xbox Series S and are looking to play Dune Awakening on the console will be able to do so.

"Yeah, yeah it does," the developer said when asked if it will run on low-performance machines despite the optimizations. "But it will still perform well on hardware that's years and years old. We'll be able to do it!"

Dune Awakening is built in Unreal Engine 5 and recently received a brand-new 30-minute gameplay trailer at Gamescom Opening Night Live 2024 where we got our first look at the game's in-depth character creator as well as the open world of Arrakis.

Players will be able to join a guild and align with House Harkonnen or Atreides, and "clash for the precious spice in dynamic guild versus guild battles involving a range of vehicles, tech, and specialized combatants."

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Ballistic Moon is the latest studio in the games industry to make job cuts, one month before the launch of the Until Dawn remake.

As reported by Eurogamer, it was first believed that two staff members at the studio had been laid off. Now, at least 11 developers have shared news of their redundancies and are now looking for work.

"Like many others in this wonderful but turbulent industry, I am sadly being made redundant from my role as a Junior Game Designer at Ballistic Moon," said Cassy Cornish on LinkedIn.

Another former developer, Harry Williams, wrote, "After two ex[c]iting years working on the wonderful Until Dawn 2024 at Ballistic Moon, I am unfortunately being made redundant as a Technical Designer. 

"I've loved working with everyone at BM and hope I cross paths with members of that family in future projects!"

It's unclear at this time if the number of employees affected is more than the 11 currently confirmed.

Ballistic Moon has since verified the layoffs in a new statement on Linkedin, explaining that due to "complex challenges" the games industry continues to face, it decided to "significantly scale down" the team to secure the studio's future.

"As the games industry continues to face complex challenges, we at Ballistic Moon are confronted with some difficult realities," the statement reads. "It is with deep regret and a heavy heart that we must make the tough decision to significantly scale down our team to secure the future of our studio. This comes after our development of Until Dawn for PS5 and PC.

"We want to express our sincere gratitude to every team member for their hard work, dedication, and unwavering commitment to Ballistic Moon. Saying goodbye to such a talented and passionate group of people is incredibly difficult, and we are profoundly sorry for the impact this restructuring will have on our employees and their families.

"As we navigate this transition, Ballistic Moon remains focused on supporting the launch of Until Dawn and is committed to exploring new opportunities and collaborations for the future."

Ballistic Moon's Until Dawn remake is set for an October 4 release and is an enhanced version of the 2015 interactive horror game from Supermassive Games featuring overhauled visuals rebuilt in Unreal Engine 5, as well as other major improvements.

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Rocksteady Studios has reportedly been hit by layoffs following the Suicide Squad: Kill the Justice League's low sales. 

That's according to Eurogamer, who first reported that the studio's quality assurance (QA) department has been cut in half over the past month, bringing the size of the team down from 33 members to 15.

The reasoning behind the layoffs is being cited as "restructuring", with other job cuts expanding outside of the QA department as well, including several members of junior staff and some who have been at the studio for more than five years.

Staff who wished to remain anonymous also told the publication that the job losses - including developers with "specialized knowledge" - are also affecting the Rocksteady staff at large, as employees will now be required to handle their work on top of their own.

The same sources also said that Rocksteady's senior management has expressed that product quality will now suffer following the layoffs.

Last month, Warner Bros. reported that its gaming revenue had fallen by 41% year-on-year due to the poor performance of Suicide Squad: Kill the Justice League, which cost $200 million to make.

Warner Bros. Discovery's chief financial officer Gunnar Wiedenfels said in an earnings call that the DC supervillain shooter had "fallen short of our expectations". 

Although Suicide Squad underperformed, Rocksteady is still working on the game's season pass which will offer additional post-launch content following its early February release. 

The first of these updates arrived in March with Season One, with the debut of The Joker as a playable character, followed by Season Two in July, which introduced Mrs. Freeze to the roster, a new map, and two episodes titled Frozen Hearts and Winter. The studio also has plans for seasons three and four.

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Xbox boss Phil Spencer has admitted to making some bad calls in his career but says he has no regrets about not making Destiny and Guitar Hero platform exclusives.

Speaking at the "Story Time with Phil Spencer" panel at PAX West over the weekend, the Xbox CEO of gaming touched on Bungie's 2014 shooter and Microsoft's decision to not sign the game as an Xbox exclusive (via Eurogamer).

Spencer also admitted that, initially, Destiny didn't click with him until the game's first expansion, The House of Wolves, and that he didn't think it was "going to work" before it was eventually published by Activision.

"There are so many mixed emotions and stories for me around Destiny," Spencer reminisced.

"Do we want to sign this?’ We ended up not signing Destiny. It obviously went with Activision, and to seeing what it grew into, like from a business kind of Xbox standpoint, I can look at it [as] it's just a really interesting journey in terms of what [Bungie] built."

He added, "Obviously, Bungie was part of Microsoft when I started at Xbox, and I shared a floor with Alex Seropian [and] Jason Jones [Bungie's co-founders] in the building that we were in Redmond. I learned a ton from just being around Bungie."

"I've passed on some of the worst… like, made some of the worst game-choice decisions," he said, before discussing the original pitch of Guitar Hero.

"An interesting one is when this team came down to Redmond and Alex Rigopulos, he pitches a game where they're actually going to make plastic guitars, and they're going to plug into consoles, and then they're going to sell tracks where you're going to play Simon on this guitar and I'm like, really? Do we really think that's going to work? 

"I hear that turned into a pretty good game," he joked.

However, despite his decision to not sign two games that have since proved to be massive successes, Spencer explained that he doesn't have any regrets and tries to "look forward and be positive about the things that we are doing."

"I'm not a regrets-type person," he said. "Maybe that's a fault of mine, but I passed on so many games... I just like to celebrate what the team [at Bungie] has done. I mean, it's incredible."

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If you own one or more of the iOS ports of recent Resident Evil titles, then you might just want to avoid updating them again. Developer Capcom has added an online check-in requirement to these apps, meaning they now require an internet connection to play.

The news, spotted by Eurogamer, was initially posted as a PSA to the r/iosgaming subreddit. The post is accompanied by an image showing that Resident Evil 7: Biohazard, Resident Evil Village, and Resident Evil 4's iOS ports are ready for an update. For all three, the update details state: "Due to changes to the startup process, an internet connection is now required when starting this app."

Quite understandably, the news has not gone down well with players on the subreddit, with many expressing a desire to seek a refund from Apple. However, some note that the backlash likely won't be too severe following the poor sales of these Resident Evil iOS ports.

You might argue that because an internet connection is only required on startup, this update isn't that big of a deal. But that's kind of missing the forest for the trees. Surely, the entire point of having mobile ports of these games is to offer the option of playing them on the go without restriction. Depending on where in the world folks are, an internet connection isn't always a guarantee, even if it's just for a few seconds at startup.

It remains to be seen whether or not Capcom will revert to this requirement following the backlash. But as stated earlier, given the lackluster sales of these iOS ports, it seems more likely that the change is here to stay. Which, honestly, makes the requirement that much more baffling in the first place.

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