Unity cancels town hall, closes two offices after reported death threat

The Last of Us maker Naughty Dog is reportedly among the latest game studios to be hit with layoffs. As per Kotaku, the first-party PlayStation studio is cutting off at least 25 developers, with the most affected members being quality assurance (QA) testers, whose contracts have been shortened. Affected workers are expected to continue working until the end of October, and they allegedly won't be receiving any severance payments. Turns out, the full-time staff — last recorded headcount being 400+ in July — are not being laid off, with employees in general being ‘pressured' to keep the news internal.

Twitch was reportedly hit with a fresh round of layoffs just weeks before TwitchCon is set to kick off in Las Vegas. This would be the second round of layoffs at the games livestreaming platform this year.

 Wildfires fueled by climate change have ravaged communities from Maui to the Mediterranean this summer, killing many people, exhausting firefighters and fueling demand for new solutions. Enter artificial intelligence.

We're thrilled to announce the return of GamesBeat Next, hosted in San Francisco this October, where we will explore the theme of «Playing the Edge.» Apply to speak here and learn more about sponsorship opportunities here. At the event, we will also announce 25 top game startups as the 2024 Game Changers. Apply or nominate today!

Update: Polygon reports that a «reporting party» told responding San Francisco police «an employee made a threat towards his employer using social media.” According to the police, the employee who allegedly made the threats works in an office outside of California.

Unity has apologised to developers for “confusion and angst” caused by its proposed new pricing structure that sought to charge game creators a fee every time their game was installed, promising that changes will be made - but without suggesting that it would pull away completely from implementing the much-criticised plans.

We're thrilled to announce the return of GamesBeat Next, hosted in San Francisco this October, where we will explore the theme of «Playing the Edge.» Apply to speak here and learn more about sponsorship opportunities here. At the event, we will also announce 25 top game startups as the 2024 Game Changers. Apply or nominate today!

Unity Technologies will make changes to its wildly unpopular install-based fee policy, the company said Sunday in a post on the platform formerly known as Twitter. The update comes days after Unity announced plans for a new pricing structure, which would add a fee for developers after every install once a revenue and download threshold was met.

Unity says it will be “making changes” to its controversial install fee plans, following huge backlash from game developers.

Unity has apologized for the "confusion and angst the runtime fee policy" it announced last week has caused and has revealed it will be "making changes" to it.

Mobile game developers and publishers, with hundreds of games and millions of installs, are protesting Unity’s new controversial install-based pricing model by turning off ad monetization services for their games. In an open letter published on Azur Games’ and other company’s blogs, the companies are turning off all ironSource and Unity Ads features, two services Unity offers to developers to monetize their games. They’ll turn these services back on when Unity reviews and reverses its new policy, which has developers across the entire industry upset.

We're thrilled to announce the return of GamesBeat Next, hosted in San Francisco this October, where we will explore the theme of «Playing the Edge.» Apply to speak here and learn more about sponsorship opportunities here. At the event, we will also announce 25 top game startups as the 2024 Game Changers. Apply or nominate today!