An anonymous reader shares a report: Brooke Holden had all but given up on breaking into the video game business. [...] "Professionally inexperienced but passionate team manager looking for a hobby project to help support and manage," she posted to a subreddit for assembling game dev teams. It was just a lark, yet a half dozen replies accumulated under the post. One in particular stood out, from an account with an active Reddit history on developer recruitment boards. The poster's name was "Kova," and he told Holden that his small team of three developers had recently ballooned into a 48-member operation that needed a manager "on everyone's arse." Holden was exhilarated. On June 22, 2019, she signed a contract with Kova's company Drakore Studios, accepting the position of junior production manager at $13 per hour.

There was just one problem: Drakore Studios didn't actually exist. Over the course of a month and a half, "Kova," real name Rana Mahal, convinced at least 25 people to join a game studio that was not a registered company, and develop a video game to which he did not own the rights, in exchange for no pay. Six of them came forward to tell their story to Kotaku. The story they told was one of deceit, exploitation, incompetence, and hope, and one fuelled by gamers' desperation to participate in an industry that has stoked their imagination, lifted their mood and forged friendships since childhood.

According to a recent financial report from Sony, the PlayStation 4 has become the fastest home console to reach 100 million sales. Geek.com reports: The 100 million mark is an impressive milestone for any console no matter how long it takes to reach it. Sony previous hit it with the original PlayStation and set the total sales record with the PlayStation 2's 155 million sales. Meanwhile, Nintendo also achieved this with the original Wii, the Game Boy line of handhelds, and the 154 million sales of the Nintendo DS. But after failing to hit the target with the beleaguered (albeit still successful) PlayStation 3, Sony has bounced back with the PlayStation 4. And since the PS4 has only been on the market for five years and seven months, it beat the record two months earlier than the previous fastest seller the PS2.

If the US-China trade war continues to escalate, consumers could soon find themselves paying more for PlayStations. From a report: As with other electronics giants, Sony manufacturers most of its consoles in China, with the company warning that if a new round of higher tariffs goes into effect the price for its game console may go up. "We believe, and therefore have told the U.S. government, that higher tariffs would ultimately damage the U.S. economy," said Hiroki Totoki, Sony's chief financial officer, according to The Wall Street Journal. Totoki added that the company hasn't decided yet how it would handle additional tariffs but said that it may have consumers share some of the cost. In May President Trump raised US import tariffs on $200 billion of Chinese goods from 10% to 25%, threatening to place additional tariffs on another $300 billion of Chinese exports which would include video games. The US and China resumed trade talks Tuesday.

Rockstar North, the Edinburgh-based developer of Grand Theft Auto, has paid no corporation tax over the past 10 years, despite making billions in revenue for its parent company Take-Two Interactive, while claiming more than $52m in tax relief. From a report: A report from the investigative thinktank TaxWatch UK estimates Rockstar Games' operating profit at $5bn between 2013 and 2019, during which time the company released Grand Theft Auto V (GTA V) and Red Dead Redemption 2. Rockstar North is part of Rockstar Games. GTA V has sold more than 100m copies, making it one of the most profitable entertainment products of all time. It racked up $1.2bn in its first three days on sale in 2013. According to Take-Two earnings reports, GTA V's online component, GTA Online, has generated hundreds of millions in revenue. But the company paid no corporation tax between 2009 and 2018. It received $52m in tax credits from the government's video games tax relief scheme, which was set up in 2014 to bolster the UK's $6.1bn games industry, much of which is made up of small and medium-sized developers. The sum is equivalent to 19% of the total relief paid to the entire UK games industry since 2014, TaxWatch reports.

$30 million in prizes were up for grabs, the largest ever for an esports event, and more than 40 million attempted to qualify for a spot. Now IGN reports: The grand champion of the Fortnite World Cup finals has been crowned. Kyle "Bugha" Giersdorf, a 16-year-old American boy, took home the trophy and a $3 million prize... "Words can't even explain [how I feel] right now," Giersdorf said from the Champion's circle. "I'm just so happy. Everything I've done, the grind, it's all paid off. It's just insane."
And the Guardian reports that a 15-year-old won $1.25 million (£1m) when his two-man team placed second in the duos competition. He told the BBC that his mother initially thought he was wasting his time. "Now I've proved to her that I can do stuff, I'm really happy," he said. With regard to spending the prize money, his mother said her son was not materialistic, and that she anticipated he would spend the prize money on a "lifetime of Uber Eats".
IGN also reported on another Fortnite drama: A pair of Fortnite World Cup competitors, formerly banned by Epic for cheating, were the target of much ire Saturday, as the crowd loudly booed one's appearance onscreen and subsequently cheered for their loss...

Epic Games previously banned XXiF and Ronaldo from Fortnite for 14 days, after an internal review found that the players had colluded with other players in order to acquire easy elimination points during week 3 of the Fortnite World Cup qualifiers, according to Dexerto. The pair were subsequently dropped from their team, Rise Nation. That initially sounded like the end of the whole matter, but then XXiF and Ronaldo qualified during the week 8 qualifier, finishing in third place and securing a spot during the finals.

XXiF and Ronaldo ended up placing 28th during the duos finals, securing them $50,000 each in prize money.
Fornite had to ban more than 1,200 Fortnite accounts for cheating in just the first week of the World Cup Open online.

To celebrate the 25th anniversary of Doom, there's now mobile versions in the Google Play Store, reports Android Police, "and since this is a 25th-anniversary release, it includes the fourth expansion Thy Flesh Consumed. It's the complete package folks, and it's finally available on Android as an official release."

And in addition, three Doom re-releases are now available for the Nintendo Switch, Xbox One, and PlayStation 4, reports the Verge -- though there was one little glitch: Bethesda says it'll get rid of the strange requirement that players must log into an online account before they play the newly re-released versions of Doom, Doom II, and Doom 3, which went live yesterday. Players quickly criticized Bethesda for the seemingly ridiculous limitation -- the first of these games was released more than 25 years ago, at a time when there was obviously no internet requirement. The online login will be made optional in a coming update, Bethesda said today.
The re-releases were part of QuakeCon 2019, reports IGN, noting that Bethesda also showcased Doom Eternal's multiplayer, "revealing new details about the unique 1v2 Battle Mode."

Forbes hails the re-releases as "id Software's fast-paced, ultra-violent...classic shooters," adding that "It appears the re-releases are actually Unity remakes, though whether much has changed beyond resolution support remains to be seen." But they may also have some other minor differences, Engadget reports: There have been a few other complaints as well, such as the addition of copy protection, graphical changes (such as filtering that softens those 1993-era graphics) and apparent music tempo slowdowns on the Switch. That's not including the removal of downloads for the old PS3 and Xbox 360 versions. It's not a fiasco, but these clearly weren't the straightforward ports some were expecting.

Online gaming may be popular and fun, but it's not without pitfalls. More than 70% of online gamers have experienced some form of harassment, according to a survey released Thursday from the Anti-Defamation League's Center on Technology and Society. From a report: And 65% of players said they've experienced "severe harassment," including physical threats, stalking and sustained harassment. "Online hate causes real harm," ADL CEO Jonathan Greenblatt said in a release. "Every time someone in an online multiplayer game physically threatens or harasses another player repeatedly because of who they are or what they believe, that experience doesn't just end for that individual when the game is over."

Among online gamers who experience harassment, 53% reported being targeted based on their race, religion, ability, gender, sexual orientation or ethnicity, according to the ADL. Nearly 30% also report being doxed, which means having their contact or other personal information published online. The ADL also said that some gamers reported being exposed to "extremist ideologies and hateful propaganda."

How much bigger can video games get? Video games are only getting more costly, in more ways than one. And it doesn't seem like they're sustainable. From a report: There's the human cost, which Kotaku has chronicled extensively. Contract workers are continually undervalued and taken advantage of, as Call of Duty: Black Ops 4 developer Treyarch is reported to do.[...] That's only the start of it. When you adjust for inflation, the retail cost of video games has never been cheaper, and it's been this way for some time. The $60 price point for a standard big-budget release has held steady for nearly 15 years, unadjusted for inflation even as the cost to make big-budget video games has risen astronomically with player expectations. Since changing the price point seems to be anathema, we've seen the industry attempt to compensate with all manner of alternatives: higher-priced collector's editions, live service games that offer annual passes or regular expansions a la Destiny, microtransactions, and free-to-play games. Then you have loot boxes. [...]

Let's run down the Big Three. We're more than halfway through 2019, and Electronic Arts has only published one single-player game, the indie Sea of Solitude. Last year was much the same, with two indies as its only single-player releases: Fe and Unraveled 2. Activision's portfolio of single-player games looks even thinner: Sekiro: Shadows Die Twice is the only exclusively single-player, non-remake game that the publisher has released since 2015's Transformers: Devastation -- which itself is no longer available, thanks to an expired licensing agreement. Ubisoft is an exception, regularly releasing entries in single-player game franchises like Far Cry and Assassin's Creed. But it buttresses them with aggressive microtransactions and extensive season pass plans. (And the occasional diversion like Trials Rising and South Park: The Fractured But Whole.)

The big-budget single-player experience is now almost entirely the domain of first-party studios making marquee games for console manufacturers, which bankroll games like Spider-Man and God of War. The economics of first-party exclusives are totally different -- they're less about making money by themselves and more about drawing players into the console's ecosystem. This is worth considering, because as big publishers prioritize live, service-oriented games, the number of games on their schedules has dropped. If you look at the Wikipedia listings for EA, Ubisoft, and Activision games released by year, you'll get a stark -- if unscientific -- picture of how each big publisher's release slate has thinned out in the last five years, relying on recurring cash cows like sports games and annualized franchises and little else. In 2008, those three publishers released 98 games; in 2018 they released just 28, not including expansions.

While tech giants like Microsoft and Google are building cloud gaming platforms for the latest blockbuster titles, one start-up is taking a different approach. From a report: London-based firm Antstream says it wants to bring a streaming experience to retro gaming enthusiasts. The company has developed a cloud gaming service that gives players access to a library of over 2,000 classic video games. It's a model that CEO Steve Cottam sees going global. And to bolster that ambition, the company has raised its first significant round of funding, led by the Chinese tech giant Tencent and backed by British venture firm Hambro Perks. For Antstream, the project is about resurrecting an experience long buried in old devices like the Commodore 64 and the Amiga. Cottam told CNBC in an interview that the idea for the company stemmed from what he's been seeing elsewhere in the entertainment industry. "You've got Spotify and Apple for your music, while in movies you've got Netflix and Amazon," he said. "It's so easy to find that content, but games just got lost because of all these different formats, and they didn't work on modern devices."

Asus has unveiled a spec-heavy gaming phone called the ROG Phone II. When it launches later this year, it'll be one of the only phones to feature Qualcomm's new gaming-focused Snapdragon 855 Plus processor, a 120Hz AMOLED display, and massive 6,000mAh battery. PhoneDog reports: The ROG Phone II features a 6.59-inch 2340x1080 AMOLED display with a 120Hz refresh rate and it's the first phone to include Qualcomm's gaming-focused Snapdragon 855 Plus processor. Both the CPU and GPU in the SD855 Plus are clocked higher than in the standard SD855, helping you get better performance. ASUS has crammed 12GB of RAM inside the ROG Phone II's body, too. Another gaming-centric feature of the ROG Phone II are its AirTrigger buttons. Located on the side of the device, they give you extra buttons for your games and an improved software algorithm over the first ROG Phone that lets you rest your fingers on the AirTriggers, meaning you can react more quickly since you're not having to move your fingers to reach for the buttons.

Other notable features of the ROG Phone II include a 48MP main camera with Sony IMX586 sensor, a 13MP ultra wide rear camera with a 125-degree field of view, and a 24MP front camera. There's up to 512GB of built-in storage available, an in-display fingerprint reader, dual front-facing speakers, and a 3.5mm headphone jack. Powering the whole package is a whopping 6000mAh battery. There are two USB-C ports on the ROG Phone II, with one in a traditional place on the bottom of the device and the other on the side of the phone so that it doesn't get in your way when you're gaming and charging. Both ports support Quick Charge 3.0, but the side port can charge more quickly with QuickCharge 4.0 support. It also includes support for 4K video output using DisplayPort 1.4. We don't have an official price or release date yet, but it's likely to start shipping later this year at around $899, which was the cost of the original ROG Phone.

Long-time Slashdot reader dnix writes: Apparently having a lot of people playing Fortnite is good for the open source community too. Epic Games' MegaGrants program just awarded the Blender Foundation with $1.2 million over the next three years...to further the success of the free and open source 3D creation suite.
It's part of the company's $100 million "MegaGrants" program, according to the announcement. "Open tools, libraries and platforms are critical to the future of the digital content ecosystem," said Tim Sweeney, founder and CEO of Epic Games. "Blender is an enduring resource within the artistic community, and we aim to ensure its advancement to the benefit of all creators."

It was the best-selling game of June, with IGN calling it "the most accessible game design tool ever created, and that core is just one part of a greater whole..."

Since its launch three weeks ago, fans have already built over 2 million custom stages, NPR notes -- but the real news is that Super Mario Maker 2 finally represents a shift in Nintendo's attitude towards its fan community: It's Nintendo's reliance on the creative spirit of these dedicated players that makes the Super Mario Maker series such a quietly radical property within the Nintendo canon... By loosening its grip on a beloved property and tossing the keys to the player community, Nintendo feeds into the fan-obsessive tendencies they've previously refused. With the Super Mario Maker series, Nintendo acknowledges the history of competitive speedrunning, tournament play, and even the masochistic fan games that have made their games visible and interesting in an entirely different way. It's the rare Nintendo game that is depending on those players, creators, and spectators to keep it alive. Super Mario Maker 2 has only been out for a few weeks, but already we've seen how the game's deceptively complex course editor has led to the community making some astounding levels...

Nintendo has always been old-school in the way they rely on offline experiences, downplaying the kind of online communities that other developers prioritize. Ironically, it is that indifference that has made fan communities formed around Nintendo games feel singular and special -- they're smaller, more intimate, and regulated by the players themselves. With the Super Mario Maker franchise, Nintendo finally acknowledges the power and influence of its most obsessive fans -- by creating something that couldn't thrive without them.
IGN argues that "it's astonishing how incredibly well it's all held together in one cohesive package... It does nearly everything better than its already excellent predecessor, introducing some incredible new ideas, level styles, building items, and so much more - all while maintaining the charm of Mario games we know and love."

And Slashdot reader omfglearntoplay writes "If you like old games from the 1980s, this is your game."

Slashdot reader John Nautu shares a report from Windows Report: Microsoft released their Q4 earnings and it's (almost) all good news. The giant registered amazing growth on all departments, increasing its share price by one third. It was a record fiscal year for Microsoft, and the numbers exceeded all expectations:

- Revenue was $33.7 billion and increased 12%
- Operating income was $12.4 billion and increased 20%
- Net income was $13.2 billion GAAP and $10.6 billion non-GAAP, and increased 49% and 21%, respectively
- Diluted earnings per share was $1.71 GAAP and $1.37 non-GAAP, and increased 50% and 21%, respectively
- GAAP results include a $2.6 billion net income tax benefit explained in the Non-GAAP Definition section below

Of course, Microsoft's partnership with many industry leading companies also played a role in the constant development and improvement of their products. Despite Azure leading the way, Office 365, Windows, and Microsoft Teams also contributed to the growth. [Teams recently overtook Slack with 13 million daily users.] It's not all good news though. The Verge notes that the company's gaming business has stalled. "Gaming revenue declined by 10 percent this quarter, alongside Xbox software and services revenue decline of 3 percent."

Ryan Duguid, Chief Evangelist at Nintex, said the company is planning some big things for next year: "In 2020, we expect to see Microsoft double down in three key areas to further differentiate from the leading tech giants: AI and ML (across the entire platform), data (infinitely expandable, cost-effective, and supportive of ODI), and modern workplace (productivity software)." In after-hours trading, Microsoft shares gained more than 1%. "The closing price gave Microsoft a market capitalization of $1.045 trillion, the only U.S. company worth more than $1 trillion," reports MarketWatch.

This August, Nintendo is releasing a new Switch model with a longer battery life. It will be priced the same as the current model and, aside from the improved battery, feature the same specs. From a report: The new model's battery life will last between 4.5 and 9 hours, depending on the game. For Breath of the Wild, for example, the battery life will last for an estimated 5.5 hours. In comparison, the current model has a battery life that's between 2.5 and 6.5 hours, depending on the game. Once again, for Breath of the Wild, the battery life is 3 hours.

An anonymous reader quotes a report from CBC.ca: Screen time -- and social media in particular -- is linked to an increase in depressive symptoms in teenagers, according to a new study by researchers at Montreal's Sainte-Justine Hospital. The researchers studied the behavior of over 3,800 young people from 2012 until 2018. They recruited adolescents from 31 Montreal schools and followed their behavior from Grade 7 until Grade 11. The teenagers self-reported the number of hours per week that they consumed social media (such as Facebook and Instagram), video games and television. Conrod and her team found an increase in depressive symptoms when the adolescents were consuming social media and television. The study was published on Monday in JAMA Pedatrics, a journal published by the American Medical Association. The researchers "found that the increased symptoms of depression are linked to being active on platforms such as Instagram, where teens are more likely to compare their lives to glitzy images in their feeds," the report says. "They also tested to see if the additional screen time was taking away from other activities that might decrease depressive symptoms, such as exercise, but found that was not the case."

Surprisingly, time spent playing video games was found to not be contributing to depressive symptoms. "The study suggests the average gamer is not socially isolated, with more than 70 percent of gamers playing with other people either online or in person," CBC.ca reports.

You'll be able to complete the trifecta of tiny 16-bit throwback systems on March 19, 2020, when Konami releases the TurboGrafx-16 Mini. From a report: It'll include Dracula X, Bonk's Revenge, Gradius and many more games, including many Japanese exclusives. Konami said last week that it will sell the device exclusively through Amazon, with preorders opening up on Monday, July 15 during the online retailer's "Prime Day" promotion. The U.S. will get the TurboGrafx-shaped device shown above, while Japan will get a version modeled after the PC Engine and Europe's model will be styled after the CoreGrafx revision. No price has been announced for the U.S. model, but the Japanese one will cost 10,500 yen or around $100. The game library will be almost identical across all three systems, including 24 American versions of games and 26 Japanese versions. There is a little bit of overlap between the two -- for example, both the U.S. and Japanese versions of the action RPG Neutopia are included. That means it's not quite 50 games total, but it's still a rich lineup, which even includes CD-ROM games and some games from the Japanese SuperGrafx system.

Qualcomm has announced a mid-year refresh of its flagship Snapdragon 855 chipset. The new Snapdragon 855 Plus is further optimized for gaming, VR, AI, and 5G connectivity. From a report: It sticks to the same overall design and chip layout as the 855, but Qualcomm says the Plus's eight-core Kryo CPU runs at higher peak clock speeds of up to 2.96GHz. But more important to gamers is a 15 percent performance improvement from the Adreno 640 GPU. That will likely result in the 855 Plus making its way into the next wave of gaming-focused smartphones like those we've seen from Asus, Razer, and other companies. As for AI and VR improvements, Qualcomm is continuing to talk up its fourth-generation AI Engine that's capable of "more than 7 trillion operations per second." The Snapdragon 855 Plus will deliver "best-in-class cellular performance, superior coverage and all-day battery life in premium 5G devices," according to the company. It's still using two separate modems to get there, however, with both a Snapdragon X24 LTE 4G modem and Qualcomm's X50 5G modem on board. I guess we won't see a more efficient approach until the inevitable Snapdragon 865.

The Minecraft team has released "a handy video to illustrate exactly what to expect from the Minecraft Earth beta" on the Minecraft blog.

"We've even included actual moving images from said beta (with an impossibly upbeat, yet beautifully pedagogical voice-over by Stephen Scott of the Minecraft Earth Design Team, as a fun bonus!)" The closed beta will launch for iOS in the next two weeks, with the Android version following soon thereafter. As with most closed betas, the number of participants will be limited in numbers and locations. This is to make sure our servers are able to keep up with all the exploration, creation and, hopefully, surviving that is going on around the world...

As is also common with beta versions, your progress will occasionally be reset as we test and develop various features of the game.

If you are selected to participate in the closed beta (congratulations!), you will receive an invitation email to the email address you have associated with the Microsoft Account or Xbox Live account you submitted in your registration. If you are selected (congrats again!), you will need to play at least once every 7 days. If you don't, we'll give your spot to someone else, as space in the beta is very limited.

You have to be 18 years or older to participate.

The 1978 arcade game Space Invader will become a major motion picture, reports Engadget. "The writer behind the 'Mortal Kombat' reboot is involved."

Deadline reports: It will take work fleshing this into a full-fledged alien-invasion movie, but the title is certainly a brand. In the game, a series of blocky aliens descended from the top of the screen to the bottom, and players basically blasted them until their thumbs cramped, or the invaders succeeded in overwhelming the slow-triggered defender of earth.
"Nothing surprises me any more," adds the headline at Io9. Once, I would be surprised and bemused by the things Hollywood tries to turn into major franchises in 2019. I might observe how the truth now matches what we used to make up as parody. But, look, Battleship is a real movie and Rihanna was in it and that was seven years ago... Since the arcade game is entirely devoid of plot, except for the riveting narrative of shooting up until your thumbs cramp, it'll probably be some entirely original plot about alien invaders, maybe something Independence Day-esque, with some inevitable cute nods to the original thrown in... [W]e'll keep you posted as long as you keep putting quarters into the machine.
Yahoo Movies UK calls the news "apparent proof that Hollywood will literally make a movie out of anything... Also in the pipeline is a live-action outing for Sonic the Hedgehog, which was delayed earlier this year so that Paramount could redesign the character following a fan backlash."

I'm still waiting for a big-budget Hollywood blockbuster based on Pong.

Carnegie Mellon University and Facebook AI research scientists have developed an AI dubbed Pluribus that took on 15 professional human players in six-player no-limit Texas Hold 'em and won. The researchers describe how they achieved this feat in a new paper in Science. Ars Technica reports: Playing more than 5,000 hands each time, five copies of the AI took on two top professional players: Chris "Jesus" Ferguson, six-time winner of World Series of Poker events, and Darren Elias, who currently holds the record for most World Poker Tour titles. Pluribus defeated them both. It did the same in a second experiment, in which Pluribus played five pros at a time, from a pool of 13 human players, for 10,000 hands.

Co-author Tuomas Sandholm of Carnegie Mellon University has been grappling with the unique challenges poker poses for AI for the last 16 years. No-Limit Texas Hold 'em is a so-called "imperfect information" game, since there are hidden cards (held by one's opponents in the hand) and no restrictions on the size of the bet one can make. By contrast, with chess and Go, the status of the playing board and all the pieces are known by all the players. Poker players can (and do) bluff on occasion, so it's also a game of misleading information.