This week, we’ve rounded up stories about esports and Rocket League and Call of Duty: Warzone. Big money is changing hands to help a Chinese esports solutions provider grow abroad. Blizzard’s team is expanding by absorbing an internal studio. The European Union financially penalizes some AAA game companies for certain business practices. Speaking of business practices, Newegg is testing an interesting method to block resellers from hoarding hot ticket tech items.
Read on to level up your knowledge!
Index:
- Rocket League Crosses Over With X Games
- Call of Duty: Warzone Set to Make Splash in Esports
- Vicarious Visions Joins With Blizzard
- VSPN Lands $60M to Expand International Presence
- Game Companies Fined by EU for Geo-blocking
- Newegg Tries Upsell Lotto System to Fight Resellers
Rocket League Crosses Over With X Games
Source: Shacknews
The line between live events, digital events, and games continue to blur (or perhaps blend?). Shacknews details how Psyonix’ soccer-and vehicle hybrid game is mixing it up with the annual extreme sports competition, the X Games.
Activision’s Call of Duty: Warzone, a battle royale-themed take within the Call of Duty franchise, will have a seat at the table within the esports offerings of the growing CDL (Call of Duty League).
How, when, and in what ways? Stop by this Engadget story for all the details you need to know!
Vicarious Visions Joins With Blizzard
Source: Gamesindustry.biz
Activision Blizzard has shuffled the deck with one its studios: The Santa Monica-headquartered company has moved Vicarious Visions from the Activision side of the fence and into the fold of its Blizzard team, where the steam will develop and support Blizzard projects. Catch up on all the info on this story at Gamesindustry.biz.
VSPN Lands $60M to Expand International Presence
Source: MBW
VSPN (Versus Programming Network), a significant player in the booming Chinese esports business (from venues to tournaments), has raised a $60 million round of funding to help it expand abroad. Swing by this TechCrunch story for more info!.
Game Companies Fined by EU for Geo-blocking
Source: IGN
“The European Commission has fined Valve, Capcom, Bandai Namco, Focus Home, Koch Media, and ZeniMax a combined €7.8 million (~ USD 9.4 million) over the practice of “geo-blocking,” which the Commission says breaks European Union antitrust rules.
Geo-blocking is the practice in which a platform holder like Steam forces users in one country to pay the set video game price for only that country, instead of allowing them to purchase the game somewhere else within Europe where it might be cheaper.”
Read up on more at this IGN story about the background behind geo-blocking and what games companies may or may not do to adjust to these rules.
Newegg Tries Upsell Lotto System to Fight Resellers
Source: Kotaku
It’s tough buying next-gen GPUs (or consoles) these days. You might beat the resellers and bots, but then you may get forced to pay more anyway, when you have your arm twisted to purchase a hardware bundle with the GPU that you actually want. Is it enough of a better value that you will accept it vs. a doubled or tripled price from a third-party seller? Read Kotaku’s perspective on this ongoing story.
Do you have interesting news to share, or something coming up that would also fit into this regular feature? Let us know!
