Wuthering Waves is a fairly popular gacha game that first launched on PC and PlayStation before eventually making its way to Xbox. Unfortunately for fans, the Xbox release hasn't quite lived up to expectations. Players have been calling on developer Kuro Games to address a range of technical issues, with one user, @ClebsAlexandre on X (formerly Twitter), showcasing just how rough the game looks on an Xbox Series X.

The footage highlights severe texture pop-in, graphical glitches, missing shadows, and what appears to be very low-quality settings, leading some fans to speculate that the Xbox version may have been built using the game's mobile version as its foundation.

I must admit, I'm not particularly into gacha games myself, but seeing just how poor the game looks on Xbox is genuinely disappointing, especially when the PlayStation version appears to run and look far better, at least according to some users.

I highly doubt this is an Xbox hardware issue. We know the Xbox Series X, and yes, even the Series S, are more than capable machines. Instead, I suspect something has simply gone wrong with the port, and hopefully it's something Kuro Games can address in a future update.

Fans on X are understandably frustrated. One user wrote, "Thank you so much for the experience of a mobile game running on low settings on the Xbox!" That said, while looking into the issue, I did come across a handful of PlayStation 5 players reporting similar problems, suggesting this may not be entirely isolated to Xbox.

Even so, I hope Kuro Games is able to get these issues sorted. As things stand, the Xbox version looks and performs well below what you'd expect from a modern title, especially on the Series X.

If you've been playing Wuthering Waves on Xbox, let me know how it's been running for you. Are you happy with its performance, or are you just as disappointed as many of the players posting online? Be sure to leave a comment below, and as always, don't forget to take part in our poll!

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Xbox recently revealed a pretty impressive lineup of games coming to Xbox Game Pass, with Palworld 1.0 and Tony Hawk's Pro Skater 1+2 among the biggest announcements. However, while Palworld 1.0 is still on the way, Tony Hawk's Pro Skater 1+2 has since been removed, with Xbox updating its original announcement to include the following note:

"We've removed Tony Hawk's Pro Skater 1+2 from the list of titles coming soon to Game Pass."

As for why it was removed, your guess is as good as mine, but Tony Hawks is actually an IP Xbox owns, making its removal even more head-scratching, though some have speculated it could be due to music licensing. Rumors surrounding the long-term viability of Xbox Game Pass have been circulating online for a while now, with some reports claiming Xbox leadership views the service as unsustainable. Xbox is also in the middle of a major restructuring, with studios becoming independent and around 1,600 layoffs taking place so far.

It's impossible to say whether pulling a single game from the lineup means anything on its own, but it doesn't exactly inspire confidence either. At the very least, it leaves me feeling a little more cautious about what the future of Game Pass might look like.

I'm actually a big fan of Game Pass. It's given me the opportunity to play games I probably never would've tried otherwise, and I'm much more willing to take a chance on something new if it launches on the service.

That said, I feel like I'm in the minority. I think the average gamer is more likely to stick with the games they already know, whether that's Fortnite, Call of Duty, Roblox, Minecraft, or the latest sports title, and that’s all without mentioning the attention war with the likes of short-form content. Now, there’s nothing wrong with sticking to the games you know, but with Game Pass growth slowing, it doesn't exactly paint the most encouraging picture for the service's future. For context, reports suggest the subscriber count has fallen from around 34 million to 30 million active users.

Let me know how you feel about Tony Hawk's Pro Skater 1+2 being removed from the upcoming Game Pass lineup. Do you care, are you worried, or do you think it was simply a mistake?

As always, let me know your thoughts in the comments, and be sure to take part in our poll!

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Dozens of games were just made available to stream through Xbox Cloud Gaming. Those titles are now supported by the "Stream Your Own Games" part of Xbox Game Pass that lets you stream supported titles through the cloud.

As popular as playing titles that come with Xbox Game Pass is, many of the best Xbox games do not come with the subscription. Stream Your Own Games allows you to play many of your favorite titles to your phone, tablet, PC, or other supported devices.

This month's collection of newly supported games includes several popular titles such as Call of Duty: Black Ops 6 and Assassin's Creed Black Flag Resynced.

The folks over at True Achievements gathered together the complete list:

To use the Stream Your Own Games feature, you need to purchase a copy of the game and be subscribed to Xbox Game Pass. You can be subscribed to Game Pass Essential, Premium, or Ultimate to stream your games.

Originally, the Stream Your Own Games library only had 50 games. It's steadily grown since then and supported games now number in the hundreds. Over 70 new titles were added this May.

You can check out the complete gallery of supported games on Xbox's website.

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Once Human first launched two years ago, initially just on PC, with a mobile version following in 2025. Now, finally, it's coming to console after a period of beta testing.

Once Human is officially set to launch on Xbox Series X|S and PS5 on August 25, 2026. Additionally, it will be coming to the Xbox app on PC on the same date.

It's not Xbox Play Anywhere, but it doesn't need to be, since it's a free-to-play game. It does have full cross-play and cross-progression, though, including account linking if you've previously played on PC or mobile.

Additional goodies include keyboard and mouse support on console, and while it is free to play, there will be a couple of paid packs you can buy if you so wish with some premium items in to help you on your way.

"Survive in a supernatural apocalypse where reality has fallen apart. As a Meta-Human, explore a vast, Stardust-infected open world where monsters are threat and key to your survival. Every expedition is risk and resource. Gather materials and build your ultimate territory, but be prepared to defend your home against relentless sieges."

Two years is a pretty long wait, and Once Human now is not Once Human as it was. But it's an interesting idea. There are aspects of looter games mixed with survival elements and both PvE and PvP gameplay, with the latter being an opt-in rather than forced upon players.

The console version doesn't appear to be up-to-date with the existing PC and mobile versions, at least at first. A Q&A on the Once Human website states that "in the future, the console version will catch up with the progress of other platform versions, and it is expected to remain consistent."

That all seems fair, at least for launch. For one, it's more important to get it out there and make sure it's actually all working as intended. Two years is a lot of content and updates, and I think it's a smart move. It should be less overwhelming, if nothing else.

The one thing that isn't listed in the Xbox version right now is any sign of achievements. For two years this has been a frustration of the Steam release, with multiple threads referencing the fact that the developers haven't added any.

Xbox console games should have achievement support, so maybe it's just an omission from the early listing. Conversely, maybe the launch on console may finally help bring achievements to Steam. In any case, we don't have long to wait and find out.

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The Xbox camp's airwaves have been dominated by pessimism now for as long as I can remember.

For years and years, Xbox fans and employees alike have endured a rollercoaster of ups and downs for Microsoft's gaming brand. Whether it's layoffs, unpopular decisions, or external factors like the memory crisis — team Xbox can't catch a break. Things can't get any worse, right? Well ...

Much has been said about the callousness of this latest round of Microsoft layoffs, which hit the entire run of the company, as has become tradition almost every July now. It's painful knowing that these cuts and reductions won't solve the biggest problem facing Xbox, and traditional gaming platforms in general.

The eternal question: where will the next phase of real growth come from?

The attention economy is getting more saturated by the day

The uncomfortable truth for traditional video game platforms is that revenue is only growing by squeezing the existing user base. PlayStation, Xbox, Nintendo, and even Steam are basically trading the same fixed amount of users back and forth. Some estimates predict a contraction in gaming this year, owing to the memory crisis pushing prices beyond people's means.

The memory crisis won't be forever, but even after that, therein lies an existential question: huge swathes of younger cohorts have side-stepped Xbox, PlayStation, and even Nintendo, in favor of Roblox.

The Robloxification of gaming demographics cannot be overstated. Roblox has more monthly active users than Steam and Xbox combined, and double that of Minecraft. It's only when you throw in casual games like Candy Crush Saga that Xbox really begins to approach similar figures, but it obviously becomes a faulty comparison at that point.

It's also true that Roblox hasn't made a penny (yet). They're in their growth phase, burning cash on changing user behavior before jacking up prices — effectively the Spotify and Netflix model. Eventually, creditors will want to see returns, by which point Roblox hopes to have become the default gaming development platform. For many, it already has.

Xbox and PlayStation have grossly under-invested in younger cohorts, and Nintendo's insistence on gatekeeping their franchises behind hardware has limited their ability to reach younger audiences. The fact that traditional core games also take exponentially longer periods of time to produce means that youngsters might completely age out of titles that target them before they even ship, by which point trends will have changed, and tastes will have evolved.

Indeed, in our attention-anemic, hyper-infotainment, insta-gratification society, Roblox's "quick and dirty" game delivery model is perfect for the era. Games come and go in a flash, devouring the latest memes and in-jokes that baffle older generations and celebrate youth culture in ways God of War or Halo simply cannot tap into now.

For sure, Roblox's rise to dominance is less about gameplay quality or visual fidelity, but more about the social value Roblox offers that has made it a juggernaut. The vibes.

The fact Microsoft looked to a former Meta executive to run Xbox is likely no coincidence.

Can Xbox become ... COOL?

One criticism I have of Phil Spencer and, honestly, Microsoft in general is their utilitarian approach to product design. Xbox and Windows both have become sterile in recent years, with fun and quirky features relegated to memes and memories. Indeed, trends are cycling more quickly than ever, turbo-charged by artificial intelligence and short-form social media. That's perhaps not ideal if you're a corporation that moves as slowly as Microsoft, which also has no culturally relevant social media layer.

Therein lies Xbox's core problem. Putting the legal troubles and safety concerns to a separate discussion for now, Roblox has amalgamated social media and gaming into this amorphous digital monster that seems inaccessible to Microsoft and Xbox in general.

How can Xbox hope to become culturally relevant in an era where culture is now a chaotic revolving door? It was barely relevant to begin with, but in ages past it had the advantage of an era where corporations had greater control over content and context. Modern internet culture spawns from a vast and increasingly artificial digital ooze which bubbles up an occasional banger only for it to almost instantaneously deteriorate when corporations get their tasteless claws in. The rise of independent creation has corporations like Microsoft and Xbox completely locked out.

But Xbox does have one cube-shaped trick up its sleeve here ...

Xbox CEO Asha Sharma has stated that her short-term goal is to improve the situation for the core. Namely, older gen-z, millennials, and gen-x, who are pretty locked in their ways and want specific types of games and experiences. They aren't the future of the platform, though, nor are they the future of growth. We're aging out, getting old, having kids, and, ya know, dying to be blunt about it.

For Xbox to maintain competitive salaries against AI funny-money talent scouts and inflation, it needs to find new growth. This summer, that growth came from cuts and price increases. That's hardly sustainable, though. It's a short-term solution to hedge against a longer-term problem.

The big problem is Xbox's lack of new user acquisition. Xbox Game Pass, Xbox Cloud Gaming, and devices like the Xbox Ally haven't really helped. Most Xbox Cloud Gaming and Xbox handheld gamers are already Xbox Series X|S users. The trick is finding those elusive new users, which Microsoft describes as "NTX" internally (new to Xbox).

The crux of it will make for uncomfortable reading for Microsoft higher-ups: Xbox needs to become social media adjacent. It needs to be less sanitized. It needs to lean into that digital ooze I mentioned, and, perhaps even a little dangerous if it wants to succeed in an era where cultural capital is more important than pixel density.

I don't think Microsoft has the stomach for it ... but this is Asha Sharma's wheelhouse. It's probably no accident that she was specifically chosen for this job. It's probably no accident that she just bought Minecraft, Xbox's closest Roblox allegory, in-house. It's probably no accident that she hired Matthew Ball, who wrote the book on social media-adjacent games like Roblox as CSO.

It might take years to see the fruits of her ideas in this area ... and in the short term, she's going to focus on strengthening the core of what Xbox is today. But I believe she's also planting seeds for a social media revolution at Xbox — bringing Microsoft into an industry that it has long been too afraid to even touch.

What's your take? Let me hear it in the comments, down below.

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After Sony announced that it's delisting over 500 movies from users' accounts with no refunds, discontinuing physical discs for PlayStation games, and closing down PlayStation 3 and PSVita's digital stores — people are increasingly skeptical of making all media digital-only.

Brazilian Xbox gamer, Ordo_Liberal, also found this out the hard way, as back on April 6 (via Reddit), 2026, his Microsoft account was hacked and promptly suspended by Microsoft as its IT team determined it was "unrecoverable" by policy, due to the account's security details being changed by the hacker.

This isn't the first time we've seen reports of this at Windows Central. Microsoft's policies for restoring accounts are often incredibly flimsy. Getting in touch with the right support services can be a Kafka-esque nightmare of AI bots and outsourced customer service layers.

As a result of being blocked, Ordo_Liberal not only lost his Xbox games but also lost all his OneDrive files.

Enraged that Microsoft took away his game library and insisted he buy them again, Ordo_Liberal then sued Microsoft in a digital library lawsuit. The court case dragged on until July 12, 2026, when Ordo_Liberal announced on Reddit that he had actually won.

According to (translated) comments, the Brazilian court ruled in favor of Ordo_Liberal under Brazil's strict consumer laws, and has ordered Microsoft to completely restore Ordo_Liberal's account, giving him his entire Xbox digital games library back, and pay him $400 in damages.

Digital preservation of games has become quite a hot topic in recent days, following Sony's culling of physical media to the point where some would argue that "piracy is the only extant form of media preservation" due to no viable, legal option being available.

However, Ordo_Liberal's court win against Microsoft for taking away his digital library for something that wasn't his fault proves that it is possible to find a legal means to protect and preserve digital games and a player's ownership rights over them, provided they have the courage, legal know-how, and careful planning to do so.

The European Union is also taking a more aggressive stance on digital preservation lately. As more and more of our data goes up to cloud services, consumers are becoming increasingly aware of the consequences when companies like PlayStation or Xbox pull the plug.

Microsoft needs to do better here, and if they refuse, maybe the courts will be able to force them to do so.

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Microsoft did say it wanted to make more console exclusives, but perhaps this isn't what Xbox fans had in mind.

One of the best features on Xbox One and Xbox Series X|S is the backwards compatibility program. It features hundreds of games from Xbox 360 and OG Xbox consoles, giving you the opportunity to dip into some nostalgia even on modern systems. Some games on there aren't available at all on any other platform, too.

Some of the older Call of Duty titles were simply never ported to modern PlayStation systems, meaning the only ways to access them on modern platforms is via either PC or a modern Xbox.

To plug the gap, Microsoft and Activision just did some very basic ports of Call of Duty: Black Ops 1 and 2 to PlayStation 5. And PlayStation fans are loving it. The games are beating GTA 6 on the PlayStation charts, which shows how much nostalgia there still is for some of these classic games. Xbox fans, however, are NOT happy — and it's not because they're gatekeeping.

Microsoft's purchase of Activision Blizzard gave it full control of the Call of Duty franchise. Classic Call of Duty games were already broadly available on Xbox backwards compatibility, complete with online matchmaking and the like. However, given the lack of security updates for Xbox 360 consoles, system hackers are prevalent, making some of them virtually unplayable.

Call of Duty: Black Ops 1 and 2 are as basic as ports can be. Activision has practically done nothing to enhance them besides a res bump, and it seems honestly intentional. I imagine the reason they haven't is because it would rub even more salt in the Xbox wound — it's almost like they're designed to mimic the Xbox 360 back compat versions as much as possible. Iron Galaxy also did the (very solid) ports for Tony Hawk's Pro Skater, so it's not a matter of skill here.

Even if they do offer some visual enhancements, the real issue is the prevalence of hackers on the Xbox back compat versions. The Xbox 360 security layers have been torn down over the years, allowing for cheaters to ruin the experience. Since the Black Ops 1 and 2 ports on PlayStation 5 are siloed away from older systems, they're far less susceptible.

As a result, what you have here is a de-facto PlayStation console exclusive, published by Xbox.

Usually I would gloss over a basic port of a Xbox 360 game, but as you can see from how hard the game is charting, these are very beloved titles. While players wait for September's sprint of heavy hitters, indulging in some innocent nostalgia would've been a nice bet. Clearly the PlayStation charts agree.

It's a pure oddity that Microsoft decided to leave Xbox fans out here, and the reactions on social media have been what you might expect. As a gesture, it seems like Microsoft has decided to make the Black Ops' DLC free on the Xbox Store, but the hacker-ridden base game is still a frankly absurd $40.

I've reached out to Microsoft and Activision to get comments on why they decided to leave the Xbox version of Black Ops 1+2 broken in light of this trending PS5 port. But I suspect they had no idea it would do so extremely well on PlayStation. Had they not trended, it probably wouldn't have shined such a bright light on the state of the Xbox backwards compatible versions either — although I've been receiving messages about it for quite a while now.

I suspect Microsoft and Xbox won't do much to resolve the situation. They've opened a can of worms here. The source code for the original games and their server infrastructure is likely on ice. Microsoft could ship new Call of Duty: Black Ops 1+2 ports that cut off the previous versions. The downside is, users on Xbox 360 (and yes, there are still tens of thousands of players on Xbox 360) and back compat would be left adrift.

It all just screams of lack of organization and forethought, but things are pretty chaotic at Xbox right now ...

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While the ZeniMax and Bethesda studio id Software is best known for its DOOM games — including both the classic titles as well as the modern installments DOOM 2016, DOOM Eternal, and DOOM: The Dark Ages — it's explored other properties and ideas in the past, and has reportedly been "toying around" with doing so again.

...That is, until the developer was slammed by layoffs this week that came as part of a larger "reset" for Xbox and its first-party teams that's seen 3,200 roles cut and four studios divested from Microsoft's Xbox Game Studios portfolio.

Early reports suggested that half of id Software was discharged from Microsoft and Xbox, with some follow-up digging indicating that the situation is even worse, as 40 remote employees have reportedly been let go as well.

Described as a "bloodbath" by one former dev, the cuts have seemingly made it extremely unlikely that id's ideas for non-DOOM projects will ever be developed (especially with Xbox directing ZeniMax/Bethesda to focus on core IPs). A new report from GamesBeat, though, gives some insight into what those concepts were.

Aside from a multiplayer-focused DOOM game with co-op, the studio was also considering a game heavily inspired by the John Wick films called Fury, a new entry in the Perfect Dark series, and a survival-focused Western game with robots called Ironwood.

Fury was a new original property pitched by id Software's studio co-director and game director Hugo Martin, with "elements of sci-fi, noir, and Louisiana and Chicago gangsters" and "a modern, cyberpunk-like feel." Notably, it had a "Gun Fu" gameplay style that blended gunplay with martial arts melee combat, and was intended to feel like a playable John Wick movie. It was never greenlit.

Allegedly, id was also exploring the possibility of making a Perfect Dark game. The Initiative's Perfect Dark reboot was canceled last year when Microsoft and Xbox shuttered the studio; with nobody else working on a new installment in the 2000s stealth-action shooter series, id considered doing so and reportedly even had concept art drafted.

Finally, there's Ironwood. Very little is known about it other than that it would be set in a Western environment with robots and survival gameplay, though it's been said it would be very similar to the popular HBO TV show Westworld.

Apparently, there were, and are, no plans for a new Quake — another iconic shooter series id created in the '90s.

Personally, I think the concept for Fury sounds incredibly cool, and I'd love to have seen the full id Software team make a Perfect Dark game. With over half the studio now gone, however, the chances of anything other than a DOOM title being made seem extremely slim.

Perhaps one day, several years into the future, id will be able to explore some of these concepts further. With Xbox CEO Asha Sharma aiming to "move faster" with its biggest franchises, though, I doubt that would happen anytime soon.

How are you feeling about Microsoft's mass Xbox layoffs, and the major impact they've had on id Software? I'm curious, so let me know in the comments below as well as in our poll.

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Earlier this week, Microsoft initiated a large wave of 4,800 layoffs that hit the firm's Xbox and gaming divisions particularly hard, with four studio divestitures and 3,200 cuts — 1,600 immediate, and 1,600 more coming in the next 12 months — striking in what's been called a "reset" for the Xbox business.

Though the redundancies have affected teams across all of Xbox, they've impacted certain game studios such as ZeniMax and Bethesda and Obsidian Entertainment quite disproportionately. Another developer that's experienced a severe reduction in force is id Software, the team that creates and oversees the modern DOOM games.

Initially, it was reported that half of the entire studio was laid off as part of Microsoft and Xbox's restructuring — a major and devastating loss of talent that shocked the community and upset developers at id, given the popularity of its games and the potential of the always-evolving id Tech game engine.

According to a new report, however, the total number of layoffs at the Texas-based developer is even larger. At first, it was believed that 96 roles were removed at id. Now, though, Game Developer writes that a Worker Adjustment and Retraining Notifications (WARN) notice — obtained by the outlet from the Texas Workforce Commission upon request — has revealed that 40 remote workers at the studio have been let go as well.

That brings the total number of id Software cuts up to 136, meaning that the studio's workforce has been hit significantly harder than early reports indicated. Notably, the WARN document also confirmed that 22 staffers have been affected at Bethesda Game Studios' office in Austin, Texas, with 158 Texas employees laid off across both teams.

146 of these workers are reportedly represented by the Communication Workers of America labor union; Bethesda Game Studios has its own union, too, and it's been very vocal about its frustration with this week's redundancies.

With how concerning the news of the loss of half of id was, hearing that an additional 40 workers were laid off on top of that is extremely worrying. I can't help but be fearful about the studio's future, and that it no longer has a headcount sufficient for the efficient development of new DOOM games and other projects moving forward.

The painful irony of the situation is that these cuts have come at the same time id released its new Revelations DLC for its latest game, 2025's DOOM: The Dark Ages. So far, the new expansion has garnered strong reviews, and I'm glad to see it...but it's also heartbreaking to see that many of the creative minds responsible for it, The Dark Ages, and other modern DOOM titles are now gone.

Do you believe that Microsoft and Xbox went too far with the cuts made to id Software? Voice your feelings on the matter in the comments, and vote in our poll as well.

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Shortly after it was reported that Xbox's RPG studio Obsidian Entertainment lost 25% of its workforce to Microsoft's mass Xbox layoffs earlier this week, it's come to light that the developer has moved on from other projects to work on a new Fallout game.

That news comes from a new Bloomberg report that Windows Central can corroborate with our own sources. According to those familiar with the situation at the storied Irvine-based studio, multiple planned projects — including a sequel to 2025's Pillars of Eternity action RPG Avowed — have been canceled to prioritize the Fallout title.

Notably, the team working on the new Fallout game will be led by Josh Sawyer, the game director of Obsidian's legendary 2010 title Fallout: New Vegas that was developed in partnership with Bethesda to fill the gap between 2008's Fallout 3 and 2011's The Elder Scrolls 5: Skyrim. New Vegas is widely considered by many fans to be the series' best RPG, lauded for its writing quality, reactivity to player actions, and deep, systems-driven gameplay design.

Bloomberg reports that previously, Sawyer was working on an RPG that was "similar structurally and thematically to Fallout," but wasn't actually part of the iconic franchise.

It's also been said that Bethesda Game Studios — the steward of the Fallout IP, and the developer behind the creation of Fallout 3, Fallout 4, Fallout 76, and the Fallout Shelter spinoff — will work with Obsidian on the new game. At the moment, it's unclear if this means the two studios will directly co-develop it together, or if Bethesda will merely provide support.

Demand for a new mainline Fallout entry is very strong right now, what with Amazon's extremely popular Fallout TV show, now filming its third season, driving significant excitement for and interest in the post-apocalyptic sci-fi property.

With Bethesda largely focused on The Elder Scrolls 6 after Starfield and Fallout 5 a long way off, I'm not surprised to see Microsoft and Xbox direct Obsidian to pivot over to the series. After all, given its experience working on it with New Vegas, you could argue there's not a team better suited for the task...though, Obsidian losing a quarter of its staffers — many of whom are reported to have been senior devs — makes me wonder how many of New Vegas' creators are actually still there.

As for the canceled Avowed sequel? Development on it was reportedly progressing smoothly and Obsidian was planning to announce it in 2027, but in the end, it didn't fit in with Xbox's new "reset" and plans to double down on its largest franchises. Its CEO Asha Sharma recently stated she wants the brand to "move faster" with core IPs like Fallout.

It's been said that some Obsidian devs will continue to work on the sequel with hopes that it will one day be fully greenlit again. Additionally, the studio will continue to develop planned DLC expansions for 2025's The Outer Worlds 2 RPG, as well as content for the Early Access survival game Grounded 2.

Are you excited for Obsidian to make a new Fallout, or would you have preferred it to finish its Avowed sequel? Let me know in our poll above, and in the comments below.

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Original article: This week's huge wave of 4,800 layoffs across Microsoft have brought the largest ever series of cuts to Xbox in the brand's history, with 3,200 roles axed and four studios split away from the company (and with Microsoft also reportedly in talks with the French government to try and find a path forward for Marvel's Blade dev Arkane Lyon as well).

Workers have been affected throughout Xbox teams and its first-party game development studios, with some affected more severely than others. Since news of the cuts came on Monday morning, it's become clear that staffers under the ZeniMax and Bethesda umbrella and at DOOM dev id Software have been hit particularly hard, with the latter losing half of its entire workforce.

Reportedly, another studio that's been battered by Xbox's efforts to "reset" is Obsidian Entertainment, the RPG developer best known for creating the beloved Fallout: New Vegas as well as the Grounded series, Pentiment, Avowed, and The Outer Worlds 2 for Xbox after it was acquired by Microsoft in late 2018. Though it's not shutting down as rumors suggested, it hasn't come through the mass layoffs unscathed.

According to sources in contact with Kotaku, roughly 60-70 employees were laid off from Obsidian — a number that constitutes 25% of the developer's headcount. Affected roles are stated to include "producers, artists, designers, programmers, QA testers, writers, and others," including many senior staff members and the only recruiter at the studio.

It's been said that most of these discharges were a part of the 1,600 immediate cuts that Microsoft made on Monday, with "a few" coming later this year as the firm lays an additional 1,600 Xbox workers off in the next 12 months.

One source told Kotaku that those who remain at Obsidian have concerns about how the studio will be able to proceed with further development on its "huge list of projects" after how steep these cuts have been. There's apparently been no guidance from Microsoft on the matter yet.

Reportedly, the developer plans to continue working on the Early Access survival game Grounded 2 and its two announced DLC story expansions for the open-world sci-fi RPG The Outer Worlds 2. Beyond that, though, it's unclear what Obsidian will do moving forward.

Notably, with Xbox CEO Asha Sharma recently commenting that she wants the brand to "move faster" with its core IPs and directly mentioning Fallout by name alongside The Elder Scrolls and Halo, I can't help but wonder if we'll see Microsoft bring Obsidian back to the post-apocalyptic RPG series. I would be quite excited for that...but a major portion of the studio's senior devs that helped create New Vegas were just let go.

I'll also highlight that these layoffs have come months after Obsidian confirmed it was going through some internal reorganization after recent games like Avowed and The Outer Worlds 2 failed to meet performance expectations. At the time, I hoped those changes would help the studio develop new games more efficiently. We can only hope that they will ultimately do so, and mitigate the impact of these redundancies.

How do you feel about Microsoft and Xbox reportedly laying off 25% of Obsidian's workforce? Did the firm go too far? Make your voice heard in the poll below, and drop me a comment with your thoughts, too.

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As it is, Assassin’s Creed Black Flag is one of the greatest Assassin’s Creed games ever made. Buckling gameplay from bow to stern, Black Flag is the title that set a pirate craze in the world. To the point that Ubisoft spent well over a decade developing the cursed game Skull and Bones.

Even with the dastardly failure of the game, Ubisoft’s vision of a pirate game has crawled its way back in the form of the Black Flag remake, Assassin’s Creed Black Flag Resynced. As a player who gained every single achievement in the original game, you can bet your coin that I had high expectations when it came to this remake.

I’m happy to say that a little over a dozen years after the original game, Resynced is back to claim the piracy title.

Assassin's Creed Black Flag Resynced: The Story

You’re Edward Kenway, the ever-loving and charismatic privateer with a dashing Welsh accent. Driven by dreams of wealth for his wife and glory to boot, Edward sets sail for the West Indies in search of riches beyond measure.

From the start, Edward finds himself in turmoil under a naval encounter that sees his world unraveled and shipwrecked. A shady figure by the name of Duncan Walpole crosses paths with Edward, and an entire world beyond the realm of piracy unfolds before him. One of the shadow and ancient struggles between the Templars and Assassins. The fight between true freedom and control.

Within hours, players will find themselves commanding their very own vessel, the Jackdaw. A versatile ship under the command of a man with legendary pirate friends like Edward "Blackbeard" Thatch, Anne Bonny, Charles Vane, and more. With his trusty crew and mythical friends, Edward looks to create a pirate paradise free from the control of the outside world.

Along this path, Edward discovers the Observatory, Black Flag’s integral piece left behind by the First Civilization that both Assassins and Templars are fighting for. A device that could potentially locate any person across the globe, powers beyond Edward’s imagination begin to clash, with him caught right in the middle.

With everything at stake, Black Flag Resynced, like the game before it, does a wonderful job of depicting a struggle of self-discovery as Edward grapples with his own ambitions as they come at odds with protecting what truly matters in the world.

Unlike the original Black Flag, none of the original modern-day storyline is present. Instead, the entire game is set from beginning to end within the eyes and confines of Edward Kenway. No more will the player find themselves going through the motions of some Abstergo office.

On top of the original story, players can expect extra epilogue missions as well that add more to the world of Edward Kenway.

Assassin's Creed Black Flag Resynced: Sail beyond the original

Everything you loved from the original Black Flag returns in Resynced, alongside a plethora of new activities to explore. From new locations to entirely new end-game missions that expand upon the original story, Resynced is more than just a remake, all while packing itself into a single game.

Modern-day stories have been replaced by Rifts, which are optional quests within the Animus that provide players with a unique “what-if” perspective shift. I won’t spoil anything, but a single one of these missions is far better than all of the modern-day experiences found in the original game, combined.

Alongside the main story, side-quests have also been expanded upon. With entirely new missions that give a better glimpse into some of the game’s most iconic characters, as well as other contracts that begin to number beyond what I’m willing to write about. Needless to say, even players who come fresh from the original will find tons of newly packed story content in Resynced!

With all the newly minted narrative pieces, Ubisoft also delivered the goods when it came to combat on foot and on the high seas. First, let’s talk about Edward’s expanded repertoire.

Edward’s melee capabilities have been expanded with perfect parries and heavy attacks. Now, when an enemy takes a parryable swing at Edward, a perfectly timed parry will open them up for a devastating finisher.

Players can also add heavy attacks to their swashbuckling swings to engage in melee beatdowns on enemies on their heels. These heavy hits are multi-enemy swings that apply to all melee weapons in the game.

Another fantastic “addition” is the rope dart, a mechanic that was part of the original, but many players felt was unlocked far too late in the game to be of any use. Correcting this mistake, Ubisoft has unlocked it for use within the first few hours of gameplay, as well as expanding on its combat capabilities.

Naval combat, as I said earlier, has also been heavily expanded. Each and every weapon on the Jackdaw now has an added secondary fire mode that drastically changes how the weapon performs. For instance, let's talk about the heated shot for the broadside cannons.

Rather than a single please-don’t-miss-shot, the heated-shot is a close-quarters monster. Enabling a rapid-fire “fire” shot that barrages the enemy with flaming cannonballs. The heated-shot is an up-close face melter when it comes to naval combat, and something I could never go back to the original without.

That’s just one of the added secondary weapons as well, with the upfront chain shots, swivel gun, mortars, and fire barrels all getting some fantastic additions to their arsenals. Open-water combat that was once perfection is now peak perfection.

Assassin's Creed Black Flag Resynced: Looks and runs amazingly

Very rarely do I get to see a remake that captures the magic of the original while surpassing it in every way. Generally, there’s always something that seems to throw me off, something that the new team felt was needed but doesn’t quite fit the world of the initial creation.

Having played through the entirety of the original Black Flag in 2013, I went into Resynced immediately astonished. The world I had once known has been captured and enhanced in ways my nostalgia-driven mind thinks the original always looked.

Iconic cities like Nassau have been overhauled with incredibly new, detailed textures and meshes, all while triggering memory circuits in my brain I thought had been long lost. My first time on shore activated something in my head that I assumed I had completely forgotten. The buildings all fit perfectly in their places as I had once remembered them.

Even trees contain the same pathways I once ran through, while paths leading from ships initiate the same but greatly updated animations of the originals. The entire Resynced experience is absolutely breathtaking in terms of how closely the world has been reimagined while remaining faithful to its predecessor.

With that, you’d think a massive performance hit would come as well, but as someone playing on PC through Ubisoft Connect, it didn’t!

I’m happy to report that I achieved well over 120 frames per second on my build with a little DLSS Quality and Nvidia Frame Generation set to 2x. I know, I know, “frame generation sucks!” I’m here to tell you that as a competitive player, frame generation is perfectly fine in this case, given the native performance I was getting was well beyond 60 fps.

My current build is an RTX 5080, 9800X3D, and 64GB of DDR5 RAM. I was running the game on the Very High preset for most of my gameplay. I bumped it to Ultra settings with ray-tracing and field-of-view maxed, and Resynced still managed to maintain an average of 110+ frames per second.

Assassin's Creed Black Flag Resynced: Should you buy it?

If you loved the original game, then yes, you definitely should. If you've never played it, but love that older-school Assassin's Creed formula, then yes, you should too!

For everyone else, it really comes down to what you're looking for in a game.

While Assassin's Creed Black Flag Resynced is massive, players can adhere to most of the mainline story without too much side-tracking. So if these larger-than-life open-world games aren't your cup of tea, just know that Black Flag Resynced can be played as a sort of linear experience.

For collectathon people like myself, Resynced isn’t quite as bad as the latest Legend of Zelda entries, but you’ll definitely be busy running around each and every island, crossing off the to-do checklist you’re presented with. Especially if you want to grab every cosmetic as I do.

Then there’s an added layer of their new Animus Hub that was originally introduced with Assassin’s Creed Shadows. More points mean more unlocks, which all just feels like an expanded version of their original Ubisoft Uplay Store.

At the end of the day, Assassin’s Creed Black Flag Resynced is everything I’ve ever loved about the series, now dressed to the Blackbeard nines and bursting with new features to keep gamers busy for days. Sure, I’ve been overwhelmed by the treasure trove of things to do, but not once have I played without a grin plastered across my face.

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Toys for Bob, the studio behind revivals of the classic Crash Bandicoot series with a long-awaited 4th installment and doing the same with Spyro the Dragon with "Spyro: A Realm Beyond", has recently expressed interest in reviving another classic platformer series, Banjo-Kazooie.

Toy for Bob confirmed its interest during an episode of the Kinda Funny Gamescast, in which the show's hosts approached them about Banjo-Kazooie. They replied: "It's a franchise we love. As platformer fans, Banjo's top of the heap."

"We have some huge, huge fans of that franchise on our staff – I'm talking, they've got the Jiggie as their profile pic, kind of a thing. They're that level of fan. If the opportunity ever arose, that would be amazing. We love the franchise."

They continued: "If you look at the through-line of the types of games we like to make, I can imagine that's part of that staple as well. I think of [those characters] as timeless. They're iconic, and I think the types of games we want to produce are ones that speak to a timeless place in the player as well, an ageless place – we call it the "inner child". So, I think they're wonderful games; we're huge fans."

While I never played Banjo-Kazooie growing up, I am fully aware of how much impact the original game had on 3D platformers, as it, along with Super Mario 64, helped set the standard for how the genre should be made for generations to come with their timeless cartoon charm and gameplay.

Unfortunately, despite popular demand, there hasn't been a new entry in the franchise since the controversial Banjo-Kazooie: Nuts & Bolts from 2008, which traded the series' iconic platforming gameplay for open-world car racing and building.

Plus, the title characters themselves, Banjo & Kazooie, haven't made an appearance in a game since they were included in Super Smash Bros. Ultimate in 2019. However, if there's any studio out there that can pull a miracle in bringing the lovable duo out from Microsoft's vault, I believe it's Toys for Bob.

Toys for Bob has done a fantastic job making platformers with their awesome remasters of the classic Crash Bandicoot and Spyro trilogies, as well as Crash Bandicoot 4, and the studio clearly loves the Banjo-Kazooie franchise, judging by how enthusiastic the developers were in the interview.

Plus, Toys for Bob fought tooth and nail to get the green light for a new Spyro game while winning back their independence at the same time, which shows they're willing to go to any length to make a new game for any franchise they cherish.

However, time will tell if Toys for Bob will be fortunate enough to be given the chance to take the reins of Banjo-Kazooie, but for now, I'll be looking forward to Spyro: A Realm Beyond because I can't wait to finally play a true sequel to the original classic Spyro trilogy I grew up playing on the PlayStation 1 during the 1990s.

How do you feel about the idea of Toys for Bob making a new Banjo-Kazooie game? Do you think they're fit for the job, or would you have another developer make a new game?

If you have any thoughts on the matter, please let us know through the poll, the comments section, or our Reddit community.

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