The Pokémon craze continues to hit the United States — and now in several countries including Germany, United Kingdom, and Japan!
This week in TPOI we’ve recapped, at a high level, some of the most positive and unique Pokémon GO milestones generating publicity. In other key industry news, Microsoft has announced the Xbox One S release date, Telltale has debuted a first look trailer at its upcoming Batman title and we’ve learned GDC submissions for 2017 are now open.
We’re proud to say that we’ve been INCREDIBLY busy with the launch of Pokémon GO, an understatement considering the social phenomenon it has become in just a week since launch! The news cycle was dominated by the game, as we’ve outlined below, and all of us at TriplePoint have also been busy exploring the world in search of our favorite Pokémon. Head to our website at www.triplepointpr.com for a little Easter Egg, and input the Konami code for a pleasant surprise. Continue reading TriplePoints of Interest – Week of July 11 – Featuring Pokémon GO!!!
This week in TPoI, we covered several important industry news stories outside of E3, including Gawker’s bankruptcy, Overwatch’s first major tournament, and Michael Bay’s journey into VR gaming. Additionally, if you’d like to hear about some of the top announcements at E3 this year, please check out our roundup on the TriplePoint blog, here. Continue reading TriplePoints of Interest – Week of June 13
In TPoI this week: Blizzard adds Facebook login and Live integration, Horizon: Zero Dawn gets delayed, and Microsoft nixes the TV DVR feature for the Xbox One.
Calling all agents: Overwatch has finally launched this week — and we’re not the only ones excited about it! The game has been getting rave reviews and the hype train shows no signs of stopping. In other news, Tencent could soon be the proud owner of Clash of Clans, and the company behind Rolling Stone will be adding a new site devoted to gamers.
Breaking a record is usually an admirable feat and often desired outcome, but Activision might not be too happy with its latest record. Call of Duty: Infinite Warfare’s newest trailer just became the most disliked gaming video on YouTube. On a more positive note though, Oculus is shipping off a few Rifts into stores and YouTube just announced cable bundles for streaming. So that evens it out, right? Continue reading TriplePoints of Interest – Week of May 1
Big steps are being taken in the games industry as the market expands into film and sports. Blizzard celebrates the launch of Whispers of the Old Gods with impressive player numbers, Valve and Lionsgate partner up, and ESL starts its own channel for eSports fanatics. Meanwhile, NBCUniversal is getting ready to add some Pandas and Dragons into their line-up. Continue reading TriplePoints of Interest – Week of April 25
This week in TPOI, Nostalrius, a private legacy server for WoW, shut down to the dismay of its many players. Rust also stirred up a bit of controversy by randomly assigning genders and races to players, but still managed to keep up its outstanding sales numbers. Oh and ESPN has also started investing in drone racing.
Goodbye, Nostalrius
World of Warcraft’s largest private server, Nostalrius, closed on Sunday night after receiving a cease-and-desist order from Blizzard earlier that week. According to Blizzard, private servers violate the company’s terms of use. The popular server, run solely by enthusiastic volunteers, was known for their support of a vanilla version of WoW and boasted over 150,000 active accounts. The forced closure drew a significant amount of backlash from the community and many felt that Blizzard should have supported the nonprofit fan project despite the illegal nature of the server, reports BBC. According to Polygon, in the days leading up to the closure, many players paid tribute to Nostalrius through a pilgrimage march from Orgrimmar to Thunder Bluff, while other fans posted footage of the crowds that gathered for the server’s final moments.
Rust Throws Gender and Race into the Mix
Rust, a multiplayer survival game still in Steam Early Access,has found itself in a strange intersection between controversy and impressive success. The game recently introduced an update that randomly assigned players a race and gender (mixing up the completely white, male character population it had earlier). The change has received both extreme criticism and praise from the community. Developer Garry Newman posted an interesting article on the feedback received after the update in The Guardian. Despite all this, Rust has reported hit 3.5 million in game sales, reports GamesIndustry, heralded as “a paragon of the creative potential of Early Access”.
ESPN Gets Their Drone Racing On
Drone racing is getting serious. ESPN has recently signed a broadcast deal with the International Drone Racing Association. Drone racing features fast-flying drones that navigate through preset courses, while racers don head-mounted displays that show them the view from the drone’s front camera. The network will stream the 2016 Drone Racing Championships on ESPN3, with an hour-long special on ESPN2 and potential other channels. Tech Crunch notes that drone racing may someday get its own vertical, much like ESPN’s efforts with eSports like DotA 2 and League of Legends
The Dota 2 Shanghai Major is taking place this week, but not without a few bumps and drama. With Valve’s public firing of 2GD and laggy streams, the tournament has definitely managed to turn a few heads…In more positive news, two gaming companies have made Fortune’s Best Companies to Work For list and Yahoo opens up its own eSports vertical. 
Continue reading TriplePoints of Interest – Week of February 29
Following the highly anticipated release of Jonathan Blow’s The Witness, we finally dig into the outstanding first week numbers! In other major news, Glu Mobile looks to recover from a shaky 2015 financial report, while Blizzard’s Hearthstone shakes up the game with new game modes and more deck slots! Continue reading TriplePoints of Interest – Week of February 1
The video game craze shows no signs of stopping! This week, SuperData Research reported a total of $61.3 billion in digital-game revenue, EA chooses its own consumer event over E3, and Mortal Kombat is coming to TV through The CW. Continue reading TriplePoints of Interest – Week of January 25
This week: new challengers approach the arena in Super Smash Bros., Riot Games gets bought by Tencent, and Star Wars: The Force Awakens kicks off to a great start! Continue reading TriplePoints of Interest – Week of December 14