Bungie Replaces Marathon Director Amid Leadership Shakeup, Fears of Layoffs

Xbox has undergone some significant changes in recent months, with the acquisition of Activision Blizzard last year having been followed by a leadership shake-up in October that saw Sarah Bond being made Xbox president and Matt Booty being promoted to president of content and studios. Now, as reported by Windows Central, the company is seeing more significant internal changes.

Sony likes to put on major State of Play livestreams and host its PlayStation Showcase during the month of May, and it appears the company is gearing up to do so once again in 2024. Giant Bomb journalist Jeff Grubb reports he's heard «a bunch of times» from sources that Sony is planning an event for May, and it sounds more like another big PlayStation Showcase rather than a more subdued State of Play.

Helldivers 2 has been nothing short of a revelation, having enjoyed critical and commercial success to degrees that even Sony or developer Arrowhead Game Studios would have dreamt. But even with all of its success, has it become one of PlayStation’s bigger properties? Johan Pilested – CEO of Arrowhead and director of Helldivers 2 – certainly hopes to see it get to that level one day.

Sony has won a court battle instigated by Genuine Enabling Technology (GET) that accused the PlayStation maker of infringing on one of its controller technology patents. At the time of filing, the most recent Sony console would have been the PlayStation 4.

Tom Holland's Spider-Man 4 is reportedly searching for a new director to replace the Homecoming trilogy's Jon Watts, and one of the rumored contenders comes from the Fast and Furious franchise.

It’s been a long time since the glory days of the original Mass Effect trilogy, and though the series’ fanbase remains as strong and loud as it has ever been, there’s little doubt that the sci-fi franchise’s stock has fallen notably over the years, thanks in large part to the misstep that was Mass Effect: Andromeda. Series fans will, however, take solace in the fact that its next mainline instalment’s development is being led by veterans who’ve been working on the franchise for a long, long time.

Mass Effect 5 is in good hands, as the director of the upcoming sequel confirms how many people in the leadership team worked on the original trilogy. 

With the end of the Norse saga in God of War Ragnarok, Sony Santa Monica hasn’t outlined what’s next for the series. It did launchValhalla, an expansion-sized rogue-lite mode that serves as an Epilogue of sorts for Kratos, but the studio’s newest project remains unknown.

After denials by Arrowhead Game Studios CEO and director Johann Pilestedt that Helldivers 2 has flying bugs—playfully dismissing it as propaganda by “bug sympathizers”—the studio boss has now acknowledged that “most bugs fly” and that the arrival of flying bugs was only ever a matter of time.

Swen Vincke, director of Baldur's Gate 3 and founder of developer Larian Studios, used the opportunity afforded by winning big at the Game Developer's Conference (GDC) to blame the industry's current state on rampant corporate greed, a sentiment we can get behind. Plenty of developers made their voices heard at the Independent Games Festival Awards and Games Developers Choice Awards (held as part of GDC). Still, Vincke directed his ire at a specific part of the industry: publishers, those companies that proliferate games and allow them to reach a wider audience, for a price.

Team Ninja’s Rise of the Ronin has received above-average reviews from several critics before its release. Nevertheless, those who delve into its Bakumatsu-era open-world action RPG will have enough challenging combat to keep them occupied, especially in the post-game.

Bungie has recently announced that the original Marathon Trilogy will be available on Steam soon. Marathon is a beloved Bungie franchise, and old-school fans will be pleased to know that they will be able to play these classics with revamped graphics.