Fans of the Pokemon Sleep app have been showered with in-game events the past few months, and we just learned what we’re getting for the winter holiday season. This December, Pokemon Sleep fans will enjoy a weeklong Double Dream Shard event.
16.11.2023 - 21:39 / mmorpg.com
Greg Street, the studio head at the newly announced Fantastic Pixel Castle, sat down for an hour-long discussion with Twitch streamer Kanon_XO to talk about the upcoming MMO his team is working on. The discussion was wide-ranging, hitting on creative freedom under NetEase, monetization, and more.
Street, who until recently was working on the Riot MMO as its executive producer, left the company earlier this year to attend to personal matters. However, after a bit of rest and getting affairs in order, Street started to look towards what was next. Some speculation has been that he left Riot in order to start Fantastic Pixel Castle, which, in the interview, Greg disputes, saying that NetEase's offer to start his own studio was simply one of many coming his way after he left Riot. NetEase's just happened to be the most attractive.
Kanon_XO (who we interviewed recently as part of our article on Black Desert Online's community initiatives back at TwitchCon) has actually interviewed Street once before during his days at Riot. However, that conversation was massively edited thanks to the corporate overlords dictating what could and could not be public then.
This time, though, Street and Kanon's conversation was unfiltered and unedited — an hour-long livestream where Street touched on many topics. One of the major drum beats Street has mentioned at every step is just how much creative freedom the team has under NetEase. Talking with Kanon, he made a point to explain that NetEase is fully funding the studio, and has even given assurances that if the first game doesn't exactly do well, it's not the end of the relationship.
When answering a question about whether there is a minimum NetEase is expecting or a deadline from the parent company, or whether or not they are just trusting Greg's team and believe in them, Street responded affirming that, with NetEase going so far as to say that if the first game doesn't work out, they'll try again.
«They believe. What they would say is they're very picky about who they work with; they're not just going to give anyone a studio. I have some other colleagues who have studios with them now. But they've even said, like, 'You know, if the first game let's make another game.' You know, making games is hard, and you hope the first game is a big hit but sometimes it doesn't work out. And that attitude is so unique and so healthy.»
Street told Kanon that this is the «happiest» he's been in his career, thanks to NetEase's freedom and attitude towards the studio.
The interview also touched on some of the gameplay elements we know about Fantastic Pixel Castle's «Ghost» MMO right now, including the Blue and Red shards that it'll have. The team touched on this during their Q&A, and Greg talked
Fans of the Pokemon Sleep app have been showered with in-game events the past few months, and we just learned what we’re getting for the winter holiday season. This December, Pokemon Sleep fans will enjoy a weeklong Double Dream Shard event.
Today, December 5, was an important day in the artificial intelligence space. Union Minister Rajeev Chandrasekhar met social media platforms to review progress made by them in tackling the issue of deepfakes, and misinformation in general. New advisories for compliance are expected to be released. Meta Platforms and IBM have joined an AI alliance with 40 other organizations to create an industry group dedicated to open-source AI work, aiming to share technology and reduce risks. This and more in today's AI roundup. Let us take a closer look.
Ubisoft has announced that The Crew Motorfest is partnering with motorsports brand Hoonigan for Season Two.
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Cyberpunk 2077’s 2.0 update was supposed to be the last major addition to the game. But now CD Projekt Red is adding Update 2.1 to Cyberpunk, with some features that fans have been asking for since the game was first released.
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Path of Exile 2’s recent gameplay showcase looks snazzy, but Path of Exile’s next expansion, Affliction, is shaping up quite well. It goes live on December 8th for PC and sees players venturing into the Viridian Wildwood, using Sacred Wisps to burn away the Affliction.
While this week may feel like a bit of a slog after the long holiday weekend, luckily the new TV this week does not. Take Obliterated, for example, Netflix’s latest bawdy comedy about an elite special forces team having to go through their own The Hangover-esque recovery as they try to track down a nuclear bomb. It’s a comedy that is often raunchy but even more frequently funny, and the show is smarter than it has to be.
It’s crazy to think that Everwild, Rare’s next game, was announced in 2019, especially since development has been ongoing since 2014. While there haven’t been any new announcements or details, the company is still hiring for the project.