It seems like the AAA publishers don’t know what to do with that type of mid-budget game that was the staple of the 2000s generation.

Spend a bit of money (not crazy much), make something fun with a bit of originality, and just put it out for sale. No complex monetisation strategy or pipeline to funnel people to subscriptions. We give you money, you give us game.

Great article! Ubisoft seem to be really good at making worlds that are immense and magnificent and yet utterly boring to be in.

I agree. We can celebrate what makes the PC platform great without turning it into a competition.

I’ve been a fan of Dragon Age since Origins and this game looks like another step towards the kind of simplified gameplay that every game has made. It’s disappointing that the series has gone from an RPG to a generic 3rd person action adventure game, but given the gradual evolution of the other games it’s not really surprising.

kind of game Bioware has forgotten how to make.

Such a nice way to sum it up. You would think that the success of Baldur’s Gate 3 would show publishers that there is a (large) market for actual RPGs, but that’s maybe too much to hope for.

I also pay for Kagi and I’m super happy with that decision. I do wish they’d stop putting so much AI cruft into their search engine, but at least I can disable it.

With all the money they’ll save from shutting down all the smaller studios they can just go out and buy more.

But how else can they guarantee infinite growth to their shareholders? Won’t someone please think of the poor shareholders???

I wonder if regulators will bring this up the next time Microsoft wants to buy another publisher. They fought tooth-and-nail to buy Activision Blizzard and like a child that got a new toy they’re throwing out the old ones.