AI-focused M&A is actively hurting the games investment space, according to a new report.
Video games for Jimothy: AI tools are making it easier for anyone to create a quick turnaround to capitalize on cultural trends like Jimothy.
Amazing, a real PR firm is using AI generated account executives to reach out to journalists with pitches. They even have AI headshots!
A thoughtful write-up reflecting on the shifting tides of games journalism,which echoes our thoughts in recent years: Smallscale, niche publications hosted through Substack and Medium can be expected to command smaller, but strongly loyal, tuned-in audiences.
Remember Saber CEO Matthew Karch, the exec who made a joke at Randy Pitchford’s expense earlier this week? He’s in the news again, but for a profoundly less entertaining reason this time: publicly sneering at a previously terminated employee.
YouTube has once again doubled the requirements for creators to be monetized, requiring 8,000 hours watched over the last 12 months or 20 million views on YouTube Shorts over the last 90 days.
Xbox CEO Asha Sharma’s recent visit to the Bethesda office was… interesting. Office members and the Communication Workers of America union set up a display recognizing recently laid off team members, as well as a giant inflatable rat.
Restart, an outlet launched in 2024 with backing from Walmart, saw its staff laid off. Its remaining editorial director, the notorious John Gaudiosi, is still receiving a dressing down by members of the press for 1) publishing a tonedeaf article explaining the future of Restart, and 2) saying he’ll call up former Restart staff once he’s ready to launch the site’s next project aligned with the launch of GTA6.
Members of the U.S. Senate have opened an investigation into Roblox following allegations of sexual abuse on the platform.
Meanwhile, the addictive design of Meta’s products has led to a trial involving four states. Concerns center on the tech giant’s potential impact on children.
US physical game sales dropped to their lowest monthly total since 1995.
General U.S. retail sales are down for the first time in nine months. Even Walmart is seeing a notable slowdown from years past.
The founder of PR company UberStrategist put out a public request for contacts specializing in “collection efforts when a US-based company and a China-base client collaborate.” Tinsley says they don’t know who it is but it probably rhymes with Hen Tent <3
An interesting development in the era of shortform content: influencer culture outlet Tubefilter theorizes that the vlog content format is poised to make a return,after leaders in the space across Mr. Beast, Charli D’Amelio and Kylie Jenner have turned to the longform format recently.
Game File’s Stephen Totilo mulled over an emerging trend he noticed in the flurry of Chinese-developed games featured in Opening Night Live.
Remember when everyone learned that Reddit content was getting cited for answers by tools like ChatGPT? That may be changing; AI platform monitor Promptwatch has tracked a drastic drop of ChatGPT citations sourced from Reddit starting from Aug. 14.
A perspective check on industry health, courtesy of the analyst group Newzoo: “Growth is [up] across the board. Every platform, whether it’s PC, mobile or console, and every market is growing. So the market is looking very healthy at this moment.”
A very in-depth report on the games industry in 2026, including how much each demographic is spending (and where), and the types of games that most players are looking for.
Cyberleek, the group or person who was behind the recent GTA leaks, pulled all of the money out of the memecoin they were promoting with watermarks across all leaks. They seem to have made off with $250,000.
On today’s episode of The Leopards Are Eating MY Face?!: Milo, one of the worst people Gamergate platformed, has been detained in the U.S. by ICE.
The White House website now hosts an “arcade” of grossly politically charged browser games that parody classics like Tetris, Snake and Flappy Bird.
The decline of Google (and general search engines) is impacting media in more ways than just being a make-or-break for driving traffic. Kotaku’s Senior Reporter Rebekah Valentine vented about the fact that shortform news reports take her twice as long to fact check than they used to, thanks to fact checking now being a bigger timesink.
A breakdown of the games industry in Germany over 2025, including who is playing, what they’re playing, and where they’re playing. The industry grew by 4% over the year, and is Europe’s largest market for games.
With consumers noticing and disliking AI use in brand deals, companies are turning to older creators for more authentic content & sponsorships.
The Creative Director behind the Ori series has created a new website to… take bias out of reviews (lol) from critics, including ranking websites based on review scores that don’t exist. The point of the site is to elevate what players think above all, with review scores that are not the same as player scores being considered less valid. Send help.
