Here at Goonhammer, we know that it’s hard to keep track of all the news happening all the time in the games industry. So much is always going on with games of all sorts, and their related media, it can be a real blink-and-you’ll miss it situation.
That’s why every week, we round up five of the biggest stories in the gaming sphere from the past week in the Games Industry News Roundup. Our trusty news boy, Dan “Swiftblade” Richardson, is at the very real and cool Goonhammer newsdesk with the scoop.
Bioware Sheds All Staff Not Working on Mass Effect
If you were hoping that Dragon Age: The Veilguard would mark the start of a plucky comeback for BioWare, I’ve got bad news for you. Last week, BioWare announced that the company is undergoing massive restructuring, and is getting rid of all teams not working on the next Mass Effect game.
The announcement post from BioWare itself is unclear about the exact scale of the changes, nor the fate of those affected by the changes. Gary McKay, BioWare General Manager, writes in the post that, “Given this stage of development, we don’t require support from the full studio. We have incredible talent here at BioWare, and so we have worked diligently over the past few months to match many of our colleagues with other teams at EA that had open roles that were a strong fit.”
An announcement like this from BioWare is basically the games journalism equivalent of the Bat Signal for Jason Schrier, and he got busy digging in deeper to these cuts. Schrier wrote for Bloomberg that many of these staffing cuts started in August of last year, when Bioware started to lend out its team members to other teams inside of Electronic Arts on a then temporary basis. Last week, these positions turned permanent for those team members affected, and on top of this around 24 employees were laid off from BioWare. The studio, which had about 200 team members during the development of DA:TV, has now fewer than 100 team members.
While BioWare is still actively working on the next Mass Effect game, this news inspires little confidence about the future of what was once a household name in the world of video games.
Astartes II Set for 2026 Release
Christmas has come early for fans of big dudes in space armor. After years of silence on the project, Games Workshop announced that Astartes II is happening with a slick trailer.
The announcement also confirms the involvement of series creator Syama Pedersen under the banner of his new studio, Digital Bones. Pedersen created the first Astartes series in 2018, releasing in five parts on his YouTube channel before Astartes was made an official animation by Games Workshop and re-released on Warhammer TV.
The trailer, which follows several Space marines in intense but brief action sequences in disparate warzones, additionally acts as a prologue for the series to come. According to WarCom, each short sequence in the teaser provides a glimpse into the lives of the protagonists in Astartes II, before a final shot in the trailer all but confirms that these characters will be brought together in the series to serve in the Deathwatch.
Astartes II is currently set for release in 2026 on Warhammer TV.
Asmodee Reports Strong Financial Quarter as Embracer Group Split Looms
Board game giant Asmodee released its Q3 trading update last week, showing strong profits for the company ahead of its imminent split with its troubled parent company Embracer Group.
The trading update, which is based on preliminary financial figures from October through December of last year, states that the company expects net sales of around €485, up 11% year over year. Asmodee’s EBITDA (which stands for earnings before interest, taxes, depreciation and amortization) is expected to also go up year over year, growing 12% in Q3 2024. The company overall expects for net sales to grow at low single digit numbers for the 12 month period ending on March 31st, 2025.
Asmodee’s CEO, Thomas Koegler, attributes much of the success during this quarter to third party licensed products, stating, “The growth was largely driven by new releases published by Asmodee based on third-party IPs such as LEGO® Monkey Palace, STAR WARS™: Unlimited and The Lord of the Rings: Duel for Middle-earth™”.
Despite this strong financial quarter, trouble looms for Asmodee. Following the financial collapse of its parent company, Embracer Group, Asmodee is set to become an independent entity again on NASDAQ Stockholm this Friday, February 7th. As a part of this split, Asmodee will be burdened with the lion’s share of Embracer’s debt. Embracer Group initially saddled Asmodee with around €900 million in debt, but following a cash windfall from the sale of mobile game developer Easybrain, Embracer Group was able to slash this debt to €400 million.
Asmodee is expected to pay off this debt following the split, and the company has stated its desire to continue its strategy of aggressive acquisition in the board gaming space.
Games Workshop Clarifies Controversial Rule for Armies on Parade 2025
After widespread excitement after the announcement that Armies on Parade would be returning in 2025, the popular community hobby showcase show from Games Workshop hit a snag last week, and faced criticism on social media.
The center of the criticism was what appeared to be a new update to how Armies on Parade would handle conversions. Originally, the wording on the rules page for conversions made it sound as though there was a hard divide between fantasy Warhammer settings and sci-fi Warhammer settings, with the final sentence of the paragraph in question reading “Parts and components from miniatures set in the 41st Millennium and Age of Darkness may not be combined with those set in the Mortal Realms, World of Legend, or Blood Bowl.”
This drew the attention of many hobbyists on social media spaces, particularly BlueSky, who were critical of the limitations this placed on those who wanted to participate in Armies on Parade and shut down conversion opportunities that had previously been allowed. Following this, Games Workshop put out a post on official Warhammer social media pages clarifying that conversions from different game systems were still allowed for the event, just not entire models. Games Workshop also updated the FAQ page for Armies on Parade by removing the sentence about cross system parts and components that caused the problem initially.
From here at the Goonhammer newsdesk, it’s hard to tell if Games Workshop intended to softball a rule to stop cross-setting conversions and walked it back, or if the company had always intended to allow these conversions but worded their FAQ page very poorly. Either way, with the changes to the FAQ, it’s clear now that these conversions are allowed for this year’s event, as they have been in previous years.
Privateer Press Provides Update on the Future of Monsterpocalypse
Last year, Privateer Press sold the rights to its flagship game line, Warmachine, as well as other games set in the Iron Kingdoms setting and the formula P3 Paint Line, to Steamforged Games. At that time, it was unclear whether Privateer would continue to operate independently, or if it had just been bought completely by Steamforged. It turns out, the company still has plans of its own outside of Steamforged Games, and it’s just released an update about the biggest IP still under Privateer Press Control: Monsterpocalypse.
This announcement is the first the company has spoken about the game since the disastrous Kickstarter campaign for the Monsterpocalypse Board Game. The license for the development and crowdfunding for the game had been given to Mythic Games, and despite raising over $1.3 million, the game never came to fruition before Mythic Games went bankrupt last year.
Privateer Press says in the update that it does not have the means to bring this board game to fruition, but plans to offer those who supported the Kickstarter STL files for the Monsterpocalypse range and PDFs of Monsterpocalypse cards, as well as the miniatures that would be included in the board game adaptation. In conjunction with this, Privateer plans on making STL for the game available for purchase as well as a print on demand option.
According to the blog post, while variants of current kaiju are being made available through print on demand and is working on two new gameplay variants for Monsterpocalypse, Privateer Press does not have any plans for a new edition or new models in the near future for the game. While this update doesn’t provide much in terms of anything new for fans of the game, it is proof of life on a game most had considered forgotten by its parent company following the Kickstarter.
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