The immersive sim has seen a revival in recent years. Not only from larger studios like Arkane, keeping the faith alive with their time loops and space stations, but also from a bunch of smaller developers bravely exploring a typically ambitious genre. RPS has always had an affinity for these systemically luxuriant simulations, historically lauding the likes of the original Deus Ex as the best game ever made. But given everything that has come since, is that still the case? Only one way to find out: make a big list.

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The immersive sim has seen a revival in recent years. Not only from larger studios like Arkane, keeping the faith alive with their time loops and space stations, but also from a bunch of smaller developers bravely exploring a typically ambitious genre. RPS has always had an affinity for these systemically luxuriant simulations, historically lauding the likes of the original Deus Ex as the best game ever made. But given everything that has come since, is that still the case? Only one way to find out: make a big list.

Read more

Former Arkane Austin studio head, Harvey Smith, says hearing fan feedback after playing the "cleaned up, final version" of Redfall has given him "a burst of energy".

After reflecting on Game Update 4 – which introduced offline mode, "ReVamped" neighbourhood and nest systems, and the ability to pause amongst other things – Smith also teased that he was "looking forward to talking about" his plans post-Arkane Austin's sad closure.

"Hearing from the people playing the cleaned up, final version of Redfall is such a burst of energy," Smith wrote. "I'm looking forward to talking about what I'll be doing next."

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In the wake of devastating closures at Bethesda, Microsoft has started refunding those who purchased Redfall's premium Bite Back edition.

This edition of Arkane Austin's vampire shooter was set to provide players with the Redfall Hero Pass, which would have added a further two characters to the game. In November, the studio said it was "continuing development of The Hero Pass and we're excited to share more about Redfall's new heroes and other updates later next year".

However, following the studio's closure last month, Arkane Austin confirmed the Hero Pass DLC for Redfall would no longer be released. At this time, the studio said those who had purchased the DLC via either the Bite Back edition or base game upgrade would instead receive credit to the same value as the pass.

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Xbox boss Phil Spencer has commented publicly for the first time on recent Microsoft studio closures, stating he has to "run a sustainable business inside the company and grow".

Last month, Xbox made the shock decision to close a number of Bethesda studios, including Hi-Fi Rush developer Tango Gameworks and Redfall developer Arkane Austin.

Now, in an interview with IGN, Spencer has finally addressed the closures.

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A Call of Duty: Black Ops 6 campaign that looks like Mission: Impossible by way of an Adam Curtis documentary, a Gearsof War prequel that shows fans E-Day and the birth of the series’ iconic “Lancer” chainsaw gun, and a trailer that showed Perfect Dark isn’t just still alive, it’s potentially thriving. Microsoft’s…

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This week on the Eurogamer Newscast, we look back on the start of this year's June hype cycle, the period formerly known as E3, now a potpourri of other events and announcement livestreams.

PlayStation got the ball rolling last night with its latest State of Play broadcast, which included a look ahead at its rather meagre first-party plans for the remainder of 2024: a moderately buffed-up port of Until Dawn, online shooter Concord, and the charming Astro Bot. But, as our Ian wrote earlier, even the cute robot has got some people (VR fans) disgruntled. Still, as a flat-screen game, surely more people will now play it?

And then there was Silent Hill Transmission or, this time around, basically just a longer look at the upcoming Silent Hill 2 and a chance for Konami to promote a load of tie-in tat. Joining me this week are Eurogamer's Victoria Kennedy and Vikki Blake to discuss.

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Redfall's final ever update has been released, marking an end to Arkane Austin's work on the game - and indeed the now-shuttered studio's work in general.

Known as version 1.451.3.0 - a nod to video games' ongoing 0-4-5-1 easter egg, which dates back almost 30 years - this update adds features such as an offline mode and single player pausing, among others.

While these features have long been sought after - and long promised, it is a bittersweet moment. This marks the end of the game's development, roughly one year after it first released.

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Arkane Austin's ailing vampire shooter Redfall has received its final update, as the developers themselves are purged by parent company Microsoft. Announced a few weeks back, Redfall game update 4 introduces a much-requested offline mode and single-player pausing, together with some new in-game progression features and activities: a Community Standing bar whereby Support currency can be spent on rewards from the Safehouse Skill tree, and Elder Nests, aka vampire nests with specially modified vampire bosses. That's in addition to new enemy encounters in Redfall Commons, improved AI and a new Unrivaled Weapon.

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Earlier this month, it was announced that Arkane Austin, among a number of other Bethesda-owned studios, was being shuttered by Xbox, meaning that the team responsible for vampire-themed loot shooter Redfall wouldn’t be able to continue supporting the game. The developers were reportedly working on a major update just…

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A final update is on its way to Redfall after all.

Following the news Microsoft was closing a number of Bethesda studios including Redfall developer Arkane Austin, it was reported the team was working on DLC and updates - including an offline mode - until very recently.

A new post on X, however, states the update is still on the way. "Thank you all for your supportive messages," it reads. "We are working to release our final update, Game Update 4, that brings revamped Neighbourhood and Nest systems, Single Player Pausing, Offline Mode, and more. We'll provide additional details soon. Thank you all."

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Redfall is getting a final update which will add an offline mode and singleplayer pausing, among other changes. The news was announced via the Redfall account on X, which also thanked players for their "supportive messages" in light of developer Arkane Austin's imminent closure by Microsoft.

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Calm seas and sunny skies. I had not been back to Redfall in a while before this week, when events meant I suddenly knew I had to check in again. Spring has finally arrived in Sussex, so when I turned the game on one morning and sat down to play, a warming sun was already slanting in through the windows. The promise of summer! Redfall, of course, worked its spell. On the screen, a US flag hung limply from a pole against louring skies, while a stray breeze gathered and then scattered dry leaves, eddying, dithering, round and round. It was like stepping out on an Autumn evening. October Country. Everything that I wanted.

My idea was just to wander. Like a lot of people I struggled with Redfall as a fast-paced co-op action game, because it so clearly didn't want to be a fast-paced co-op action game. In my mind, perhaps unfairly, I see the pitch that I imagine was handed down from above as being something like: can you get us Stranger Things and Left 4 Dead in a single package? Arkane Austin was - feels weird and grim to say "was" - a famously smart bunch of people. I cannot believe the team didn't know where its strengths lay. Its strengths lay in slowing down, savouring the environmental storytelling and tactical options. Slow down, and this is still the game that Redfall is - the storytelling part at least. But you have to play across the game design to see it. You can't meet it head on. You have to go hunting for the magic, ducking around the gunfights, which are fine, and the bottlenecks they create. But the magic is here waiting for you.

My favourite moments playing Redfall the first time around were all on the first of two open-world maps. I loved the locations that spoke to a realistic, slightly up-itself seaside town in New England. There were boss fights and magical-realism moments in which you travelled inside a doll's house, but I preferred finding the gorgeously restored old cinema, itself a kind of doll's house contrivance with its brass railings and tip-up seats and classic movie posters. My favourite bit of storytelling wasn't about how vampires had taken over and messed with the sun. It was about a safe house that had once been a painfully contemporary smoothie bar where influencers could film themselves drinking luminous protein-and-berry blends filled with activated almonds.

Read more

This week on the Eurogamer Newscast, we discuss the future of Xbox after the announcement Microsoft is shutting a swathe of Bethesda game studios. Hi-Fi Rush and Redfall once seemed primed to benefit from being available via Xbox Game Pass, Microsoft's much-touted subscription service often seen as the best reason to own the company's console. Now, the studios behind both are gone forever.

Last year, Microsoft's marketing mouthpiece Aaron Greenberg declared Hi-Fi Rush "a break out hit for us and our players in all key measurements and expectations". Redfall, meanwhile, despite being less-favourably received, had a multiplayer roadmap and a promise of single-player, with hope the Game Pass audience would still prop it up.

But Microsoft's reasoning for closing Tango Gameworks and Arkane Austin - to focus on bigger bets - suggests Game Pass is no longer a place where creativity can reign without fear of being too niche, and where fun-if-a-bit-mid multiplayer games can't be supported long enough to receive updates just days from completion.

Read more

Redfall co-director Harvey Smith has reflected on his 16 years at Arkane, "a small company created in 1999 by 'six French guys in a room'".

His lengthy thread on X, formerly Twitter, follows yesterday's news Microsoft is closing a number of Bethesda studios, including Arkane Austin following development of the vampire co-op shooter Redfall.

Smith was at Arkane for 16 years after becoming co-creative director alongside company president Raphaël Colantonio in 2008. He worked on the likes of Dishonored and Prey. Colantonio left the company in 2017 and founded WolfEye Studios.

Read more

Yesterday, Xbox released a post for a new Fire Vapor Special Edition wireless controller, proclaiming it was time to "Feel the Burn". On any other day, this would not have raised any eyebrows particularly. The controller headlining the announcement featured a fiery-theme with burnt orange colours, so the introduction made sense when you read it in total isolation.

However, yesterday was far from just another day at Microsoft, as the company left many reeling when - just hours before it published this controller blog post - it announced it was closing a number of Bethesda studios, including Arkane Austin and Tango Gameworks.

Unsurprisingly, Microsoft's controller announcement was met with criticism due to its timing and insensitive nature. "That's how you know when a company is tone deaf," came one reply to the initial post.

Read more

Arkane Austin - one of four studios closed as part of a shock announcement by Microsoft earlier today - was reportedly working on a major update for its embattled vampire shooter Redfall that was set to introduce an offline mode this month.

That's according to IGN's Wesley Yin-Poole, who reports Arkane Austin was working on DLC and updates for the game "until very recently". These included features promised as part of Redfall's long-awaited Hero Pass and a more general update adding an offline mode.

As per IGN, Redfall's Hero Pass was set to add two new characters this "Halloween" - almost a year and a half after the game's critically panned launch - while an offline mode was due to release sometime this month, until Microsoft's closure decision put an end to those plans.

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Former Blizzard president Mike Ybarra has rallied around Xbox boss Phil Spencer following Microsoft's shock decision to close four of its game studios - including Arkane Austin and Tango Gameworks - saying, "I know this hurts him as much as anyone else."

Ybarra made the comments on Twitter/X amid widespread condemnation of Microsoft's move and as anger over the closures continued to grow. "I see a lot of shots at Phil over today's Xbox announcements," he wrote on social media. "I get it. But knowing him as a human, I know this hurts him as much as anyone else. I can't speak for all of the leadership there, but I do know him and I do know what he is likely going through."

"I'm not trying to defend the decisions," Ybarra continued. "I think we all get ourselves into situations that are tough and unexpected (certainly I have). It's part of the job, as is the accountability for the outcomes. But he's a good human and he cares deeply for the creative process and developers. That's my first hand experience in working closely with him for 8+ years and knowing him for 24+."

Read more

Arkane Lyon boss Dinga Bakaba and others from across the industry have reacted to today's news of devastating closures at Bethesda.

Earlier today, news broke that Microsoft is making huge cuts at Bethesda, including closing Redfall studio Arkane Austin, Hi-Fi Rush studio Tango Gameworks, and Mighty Doom studio Alpha Dog Games.

Bakaba, Arkane Lyon's studio and co-creative director, described the decision as "absolutely terrible" in an irate thread on X, formerly Twitter.

Read more

In the wake of devastating closures at Bethesda, Arkane Austin has confirmed the Hero Pass DLC for Redfall will no longer be released.

Instead, players who purchased the pass as part of the £100 Bite Back Edition or £30 upgrade will receive credit to the same value as the pass.

As Eurogamer reported last week, it's been a year since Redfall's launch and its promised Hero Pass was yet to be released. Now, players are being directed to sign up to receive credit, with details currently being finalised.

Read more

Xbox has today announced stunning cuts and studio closures affecting a slew of development houses under the Bethesda banner.

Redfall and Dishonored developer Arkane Austin will close, and its online co-op vampire shooter will not be updated further.

Hi-Fi Rush and The Evil Within developer Tango Gameworks will also close. Mighty Doom studio Alpha Dog Games will close and see its game switched off on 7th August.

Read more

Calm seas and sunny skies. I had not been back to Redfall in a while before this week, when events meant I suddenly knew I had to check in again. Spring has finally arrived in Sussex, so when I turned the game on one morning and sat down to play, a warming sun was already slanting in through the windows. The promise of summer! Redfall, of course, worked its spell. On the screen, a US flag hung limply from a pole against louring skies, while a stray breeze gathered and then scattered dry leaves, eddying, dithering, round and round. It was like stepping out on an Autumn evening. October Country. Everything that I wanted.

My idea was just to wander. Like a lot of people I struggled with Redfall as a fast-paced co-op action game, because it so clearly didn't want to be a fast-paced co-op action game. In my mind, perhaps unfairly, I see the pitch that I imagine was handed down from above as being something like: can you get us Stranger Things and Left 4 Dead in a single package? Arkane Austin was - feels weird and grim to say "was" - a famously smart bunch of people. I cannot believe the team didn't know where its strengths lay. Its strengths lay in slowing down, savouring the environmental storytelling and tactical options. Slow down, and this is still the game that Redfall is - the storytelling part at least. But you have to play across the game design to see it. You can't meet it head on. You have to go hunting for the magic, ducking around the gunfights, which are fine, and the bottlenecks they create. But the magic is here waiting for you.

My favourite moments playing Redfall the first time around were all on the first of two open-world maps. I loved the locations that spoke to a realistic, slightly up-itself seaside town in New England. There were boss fights and magical-realism moments in which you travelled inside a doll's house, but I preferred finding the gorgeously restored old cinema, itself a kind of doll's house contrivance with its brass railings and tip-up seats and classic movie posters. My favourite bit of storytelling wasn't about how vampires had taken over and messed with the sun. It was about a safe house that had once been a painfully contemporary smoothie bar where influencers could film themselves drinking luminous protein-and-berry blends filled with activated almonds.

Read more

This week on the Eurogamer Newscast, we discuss the future of Xbox after the announcement Microsoft is shutting a swathe of Bethesda game studios. Hi-Fi Rush and Redfall once seemed primed to benefit from being available via Xbox Game Pass, Microsoft's much-touted subscription service often seen as the best reason to own the company's console. Now, the studios behind both are gone forever.

Last year, Microsoft's marketing mouthpiece Aaron Greenberg declared Hi-Fi Rush "a break out hit for us and our players in all key measurements and expectations". Redfall, meanwhile, despite being less-favourably received, had a multiplayer roadmap and a promise of single-player, with hope the Game Pass audience would still prop it up.

But Microsoft's reasoning for closing Tango Gameworks and Arkane Austin - to focus on bigger bets - suggests Game Pass is no longer a place where creativity can reign without fear of being too niche, and where fun-if-a-bit-mid multiplayer games can't be supported long enough to receive updates just days from completion.

Read more

Redfall co-director Harvey Smith has reflected on his 16 years at Arkane, "a small company created in 1999 by 'six French guys in a room'".

His lengthy thread on X, formerly Twitter, follows yesterday's news Microsoft is closing a number of Bethesda studios, including Arkane Austin following development of the vampire co-op shooter Redfall.

Smith was at Arkane for 16 years after becoming co-creative director alongside company president Raphaël Colantonio in 2008. He worked on the likes of Dishonored and Prey. Colantonio left the company in 2017 and founded WolfEye Studios.

Read more

Yesterday, Xbox released a post for a new Fire Vapor Special Edition wireless controller, proclaiming it was time to "Feel the Burn". On any other day, this would not have raised any eyebrows particularly. The controller headlining the announcement featured a fiery-theme with burnt orange colours, so the introduction made sense when you read it in total isolation.

However, yesterday was far from just another day at Microsoft, as the company left many reeling when - just hours before it published this controller blog post - it announced it was closing a number of Bethesda studios, including Arkane Austin and Tango Gameworks.

Unsurprisingly, Microsoft's controller announcement was met with criticism due to its timing and insensitive nature. "That's how you know when a company is tone deaf," came one reply to the initial post.

Read more

Arkane Austin - one of four studios closed as part of a shock announcement by Microsoft earlier today - was reportedly working on a major update for its embattled vampire shooter Redfall that was set to introduce an offline mode this month.

That's according to IGN's Wesley Yin-Poole, who reports Arkane Austin was working on DLC and updates for the game "until very recently". These included features promised as part of Redfall's long-awaited Hero Pass and a more general update adding an offline mode.

As per IGN, Redfall's Hero Pass was set to add two new characters this "Halloween" - almost a year and a half after the game's critically panned launch - while an offline mode was due to release sometime this month, until Microsoft's closure decision put an end to those plans.

Read more

Former Blizzard president Mike Ybarra has rallied around Xbox boss Phil Spencer following Microsoft's shock decision to close four of its game studios - including Arkane Austin and Tango Gameworks - saying, "I know this hurts him as much as anyone else."

Ybarra made the comments on Twitter/X amid widespread condemnation of Microsoft's move and as anger over the closures continued to grow. "I see a lot of shots at Phil over today's Xbox announcements," he wrote on social media. "I get it. But knowing him as a human, I know this hurts him as much as anyone else. I can't speak for all of the leadership there, but I do know him and I do know what he is likely going through."

"I'm not trying to defend the decisions," Ybarra continued. "I think we all get ourselves into situations that are tough and unexpected (certainly I have). It's part of the job, as is the accountability for the outcomes. But he's a good human and he cares deeply for the creative process and developers. That's my first hand experience in working closely with him for 8+ years and knowing him for 24+."

Read more

Arkane Lyon boss Dinga Bakaba and others from across the industry have reacted to today's news of devastating closures at Bethesda.

Earlier today, news broke that Microsoft is making huge cuts at Bethesda, including closing Redfall studio Arkane Austin, Hi-Fi Rush studio Tango Gameworks, and Mighty Doom studio Alpha Dog Games.

Bakaba, Arkane Lyon's studio and co-creative director, described the decision as "absolutely terrible" in an irate thread on X, formerly Twitter.

Read more

In the wake of devastating closures at Bethesda, Arkane Austin has confirmed the Hero Pass DLC for Redfall will no longer be released.

Instead, players who purchased the pass as part of the £100 Bite Back Edition or £30 upgrade will receive credit to the same value as the pass.

As Eurogamer reported last week, it's been a year since Redfall's launch and its promised Hero Pass was yet to be released. Now, players are being directed to sign up to receive credit, with details currently being finalised.

Read more

Xbox has today announced stunning cuts and studio closures affecting a slew of development houses under the Bethesda banner.

Redfall and Dishonored developer Arkane Austin will close, and its online co-op vampire shooter will not be updated further.

Hi-Fi Rush and The Evil Within developer Tango Gameworks will also close. Mighty Doom studio Alpha Dog Games will close and see its game switched off on 7th August.

Read more

People had strong feelings, to put it mildly, after Xbox shuttered Arkane Austin, Tango Gameworks, and other studios, and we share some of our own. Also,PlayStation finally relented on a requirement that PC players maintain a PSN account, but not before colossal fan uproar, and as the dust started to settle, we had…

Read more...

Calm seas and sunny skies. I had not been back to Redfall in a while before this week, when events meant I suddenly knew I had to check in again. Spring has finally arrived in Sussex, so when I turned the game on one morning and sat down to play, a warming sun was already slanting in through the windows. The promise of summer! Redfall, of course, worked its spell. On the screen, a US flag hung limply from a pole against louring skies, while a stray breeze gathered and then scattered dry leaves, eddying, dithering, round and round. It was like stepping out on an Autumn evening. October Country. Everything that I wanted.

My idea was just to wander. Like a lot of people I struggled with Redfall as a fast-paced co-op action game, because it so clearly didn't want to be a fast-paced co-op action game. In my mind, perhaps unfairly, I see the pitch that I imagine was handed down from above as being something like: can you get us Stranger Things and Left 4 Dead in a single package? Arkane Austin was - feels weird and grim to say "was" - a famously smart bunch of people. I cannot believe the team didn't know where its strengths lay. Its strengths lay in slowing down, savouring the environmental storytelling and tactical options. Slow down, and this is still the game that Redfall is - the storytelling part at least. But you have to play across the game design to see it. You can't meet it head on. You have to go hunting for the magic, ducking around the gunfights, which are fine, and the bottlenecks they create. But the magic is here waiting for you.

My favourite moments playing Redfall the first time around were all on the first of two open-world maps. I loved the locations that spoke to a realistic, slightly up-itself seaside town in New England. There were boss fights and magical-realism moments in which you travelled inside a doll's house, but I preferred finding the gorgeously restored old cinema, itself a kind of doll's house contrivance with its brass railings and tip-up seats and classic movie posters. My favourite bit of storytelling wasn't about how vampires had taken over and messed with the sun. It was about a safe house that had once been a painfully contemporary smoothie bar where influencers could film themselves drinking luminous protein-and-berry blends filled with activated almonds.

Read more

This week on the Eurogamer Newscast, we discuss the future of Xbox after the announcement Microsoft is shutting a swathe of Bethesda game studios. Hi-Fi Rush and Redfall once seemed primed to benefit from being available via Xbox Game Pass, Microsoft's much-touted subscription service often seen as the best reason to own the company's console. Now, the studios behind both are gone forever.

Last year, Microsoft's marketing mouthpiece Aaron Greenberg declared Hi-Fi Rush "a break out hit for us and our players in all key measurements and expectations". Redfall, meanwhile, despite being less-favourably received, had a multiplayer roadmap and a promise of single-player, with hope the Game Pass audience would still prop it up.

But Microsoft's reasoning for closing Tango Gameworks and Arkane Austin - to focus on bigger bets - suggests Game Pass is no longer a place where creativity can reign without fear of being too niche, and where fun-if-a-bit-mid multiplayer games can't be supported long enough to receive updates just days from completion.

Read more

Redfall co-director Harvey Smith has reflected on his 16 years at Arkane, "a small company created in 1999 by 'six French guys in a room'".

His lengthy thread on X, formerly Twitter, follows yesterday's news Microsoft is closing a number of Bethesda studios, including Arkane Austin following development of the vampire co-op shooter Redfall.

Smith was at Arkane for 16 years after becoming co-creative director alongside company president Raphaël Colantonio in 2008. He worked on the likes of Dishonored and Prey. Colantonio left the company in 2017 and founded WolfEye Studios.

Read more

Yesterday, Xbox released a post for a new Fire Vapor Special Edition wireless controller, proclaiming it was time to "Feel the Burn". On any other day, this would not have raised any eyebrows particularly. The controller headlining the announcement featured a fiery-theme with burnt orange colours, so the introduction made sense when you read it in total isolation.

However, yesterday was far from just another day at Microsoft, as the company left many reeling when - just hours before it published this controller blog post - it announced it was closing a number of Bethesda studios, including Arkane Austin and Tango Gameworks.

Unsurprisingly, Microsoft's controller announcement was met with criticism due to its timing and insensitive nature. "That's how you know when a company is tone deaf," came one reply to the initial post.

Read more

Arkane Austin - one of four studios closed as part of a shock announcement by Microsoft earlier today - was reportedly working on a major update for its embattled vampire shooter Redfall that was set to introduce an offline mode this month.

That's according to IGN's Wesley Yin-Poole, who reports Arkane Austin was working on DLC and updates for the game "until very recently". These included features promised as part of Redfall's long-awaited Hero Pass and a more general update adding an offline mode.

As per IGN, Redfall's Hero Pass was set to add two new characters this "Halloween" - almost a year and a half after the game's critically panned launch - while an offline mode was due to release sometime this month, until Microsoft's closure decision put an end to those plans.

Read more

Former Blizzard president Mike Ybarra has rallied around Xbox boss Phil Spencer following Microsoft's shock decision to close four of its game studios - including Arkane Austin and Tango Gameworks - saying, "I know this hurts him as much as anyone else."

Ybarra made the comments on Twitter/X amid widespread condemnation of Microsoft's move and as anger over the closures continued to grow. "I see a lot of shots at Phil over today's Xbox announcements," he wrote on social media. "I get it. But knowing him as a human, I know this hurts him as much as anyone else. I can't speak for all of the leadership there, but I do know him and I do know what he is likely going through."

"I'm not trying to defend the decisions," Ybarra continued. "I think we all get ourselves into situations that are tough and unexpected (certainly I have). It's part of the job, as is the accountability for the outcomes. But he's a good human and he cares deeply for the creative process and developers. That's my first hand experience in working closely with him for 8+ years and knowing him for 24+."

Read more

Arkane Lyon boss Dinga Bakaba and others from across the industry have reacted to today's news of devastating closures at Bethesda.

Earlier today, news broke that Microsoft is making huge cuts at Bethesda, including closing Redfall studio Arkane Austin, Hi-Fi Rush studio Tango Gameworks, and Mighty Doom studio Alpha Dog Games.

Bakaba, Arkane Lyon's studio and co-creative director, described the decision as "absolutely terrible" in an irate thread on X, formerly Twitter.

Read more

In the wake of devastating closures at Bethesda, Arkane Austin has confirmed the Hero Pass DLC for Redfall will no longer be released.

Instead, players who purchased the pass as part of the £100 Bite Back Edition or £30 upgrade will receive credit to the same value as the pass.

As Eurogamer reported last week, it's been a year since Redfall's launch and its promised Hero Pass was yet to be released. Now, players are being directed to sign up to receive credit, with details currently being finalised.

Read more

Xbox has today announced stunning cuts and studio closures affecting a slew of development houses under the Bethesda banner.

Redfall and Dishonored developer Arkane Austin will close, and its online co-op vampire shooter will not be updated further.

Hi-Fi Rush and The Evil Within developer Tango Gameworks will also close. Mighty Doom studio Alpha Dog Games will close and see its game switched off on 7th August.

Read more

A year after the release of Redfall and some players are still awaiting promised DLC.

The Bite Back Edition, costing £99.99 and still available on the Xbox store, includes the Redfall Hero Pass that promises "two future heroes". The content for this edition is also available separately for £29.99.

However, Bethesda is still yet to deliver this DLC (as spotted by Kotaku), following the game's release on 1st May last year.

Read more

Tango Gameworks and Arkane Austin were both pitching new games before they were shit down by Microsoft.

“I like the look of Prey but I haven’t picked it up yet,” sounds the lament of the perma-wastrel, content to watch life’s most precious resource tick away then dissolve into the ether, never to return. “Looks good but it’s still 25 quid on Steam” sounds the cry of the fool unaware that all their possessions are but substanceless adornments to a life hollow for not having played, arguably, the only good video game ever made. “I didn’t like Prey anyway,” blowfish-ly puffs the deeply incorrect naysayer, unaware that they will never be invited to any of my birthday parties. Well, no excuses now*. Fanatical are doing a thing where you can buy FPS imsim Prey and two others from a respectable selection for a fiver.

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Like us, you’re probably still reeling from Tuesday’s news that Hi-Fi Rush studio Tango and Prey’s Arkane Austin are getting shuttered by Microsoft. According to Bloomberg, these closures were just a part of a “widespread cost-cutting initiative” that’s still underway. All signs point towards more cuts to come, basically. ZeniMax studios seem to be the main target.

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Confident design is one thing, but there is confidence, and then there’s the almost reckless certainty required in both your game’s sturdiness and the player’s curiosity to trust a feckless, glitch-hungry, poking-and-prodding player with Prey (2017)’s GLOO Cannon. Here is a first-person game set in a sprawling, multi-tiered, metroidvania-esque space station - one boasting multiple-bathroom verisimilitude - which then immediately gives the player a gun that lets them bypass the level gating by letting them make their own ladders up keycard-locked grav-elevators.

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Vampire shooter Redfall was to receive an offline mode via update this very month before Microsoft staked creators Arkane Austin, according to a report. To spell it out, the cancellation of the offline functionality means that Redfall will now be officially playable for only as long as Microsoft run the servers. Another win for videogame preservation!

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Microsoft are shutting down multiple game studios including Redfall developers Arkane Austin and the creators of Hi-Fi Rush, Tango Gameworks. The news was delivered via an email to staff from Xbox boss Matt Booty which has since been seen by IGN. Booty calls the decision a "consolidation of our Bethesda studio teams, so that we can invest more deeply in our portfolio of games and new IP."

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It has been a very bad week for Xbox Game Studios. On Tuesday, May 7, Microsoft announced it would shut down three studios: Redfall developer Arkane Austin, Hi-Fi Rush creators Tango Gameworks, and Mighty Doom studio Alpha Dog Games. On top of this, Roadhouse Games is being absorbed into Elder Scrolls Online developer…

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Microsoft Gaming CEO Phil Spencer is taking a lot of heat online for recent decisions to close beloved studios like Arkane Austin and Tango Gameworks. Last night the long-time gaming exec was apparently exploring the wasteland in Fallout 76 when another player nuked his entire campsite.

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After shutting down multiple Bethesda studios, Xbox and Bethesda leadership held a town hall meeting with staff to discuss the closures, explaining that the company’s studios had been spread too thin and that it wanted to focus on fewer projects moving forward.

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