4 news stories that shaped the video game industry in 2022

With the online video activity market in constant growth manner, it is rare we at any time get by means of a 12 months with no some substantial bombshell announcement with enormous implications for the long run. In 2021, for instance, we observed Epic waging war in opposition to Apple’s enterprise tactics, Valve disrupting components with its Steam Deck announcement, and a harrowing Activision Blizzard scandal that acted as a tipping point for the industry and its typically difficult operating disorders.

The news didn’t sluggish down in 2022 — if everything, it escalated. The Activision Blizzard revelation in unique had something of a snowball effect this 12 months, rolling its way into a number of significant threads. Amongst large-profile acquisitions and a press for unionization, this calendar year quite significantly felt like a direct continuation of 2021. Almost nothing was a 1-off tale, but somewhat component of a historical moment that could make the 2020s the most pivotal decade in gaming historical past when all is reported and accomplished.

These are the four tales that manufactured 2022 a crucial year for gaming’s potential.

Microsoft moves to obtain Activision Blizzard

Coming out of a tumultuous 2021, all eyes were being on Activision Blizzard. The corporation was the subject of damning reports about its toxic workplace culture and the field was calling for alter. That was not missing on Microsoft, which made a drastic move in January by asserting its intention to obtain the Call of Responsibility publisher for $68.7 billion. To set that number into point of view, it’s the most significant match studio acquisition of all time by around $50 billion.

The move was met with combined reactions. Some felt that it was a important action to clean up up an Activision Blizzard that was spiraling out of management at the expense of its staff. Other individuals felt that the transfer could guide to a monopoly, as Microsoft would achieve publishing legal rights to some of the industry’s most successful titles. The move led to a significant profile dispute in between Microsoft and Sony, the latter of which painted it as an egregious anti-consumer go, even as Microsoft committed to releasing Simply call of Duty on platforms like PlayStation.

Irrespective of what players individually felt, the Federal Trade Commission saw a red flag. Just this month, the FTC announced its intention to block the offer citing antitrust worries. Now in jeopardy, the deal’s remaining destiny could develop into the one most essential gaming tale of the decade. If the deal is struck down, it could established a new precedent for acquisitions, blocking the “big three” console corporations from finding way too big. Laws like that could place a agency nail in gaming’s waning Wild West times for great.

Unionization requires middle phase

The effects of the Activision Blizzard scandal weren’t just felt at an govt level they also led to a significant milestone for staff rights. Discussions close to place of work lifestyle in games led to major conversations all-around unionization, a notion that was earlier international to the video activity industry. Rumblings of a union force began in late December 2021 when Vodeo Games developed the first gaming union in North The united states, but that thrust obtained a lot more significant-profile with every single month.

It was no coincidence that the initial major gaming union would occur from within Activision Blizzard. QA testers at Simply call of Responsibility developer Raven Application correctly structured in May by a 19-3 vote. With this sort of a higher-profile group effort at a single of gaming’s major firms, there was a renewed feeling of momentum for unionization throughout the field through 2022. Irrespective of whether or not that turns into a wider pattern in 2023, it is a historic moment for an industry that has struggled with toxicity, abuse, and a crunch tradition for decades.

Grand Theft Automobile 6 leaks

At a high degree, the video match industry’s largest firms work in secrecy. Whilst there is constantly an occasional launch date leak, it’s pretty unusual that we see a lot of a match additional than a thirty day period out from any formal push reveal. So it was in particular stunning when a hacker bought accessibility to a enormous folder of Grand Theft Car 6 movies and casually posted it on-line on a Saturday evening. The clips showed an unbelievably early and tough make of the video game — a part of the growth system that is normally still left in the darkish.

Wherever you landed on it, the story was element of a a great deal even bigger development this yr, which saw curiosity in “leak” tradition access a boiling issue as lovers began getting the phrase of “insiders” as their Bible. That led to quite a few points of confusion all through the year, from a speedily debunked story about Amazon obtaining EA to an faulty declare that two basic Legend of Zelda video games had been Swap-certain. To cap it all off, we got a new video games media website in the type of Insider Gaming, which has struggled to provide dependable real truth given that its inception. It was a yr exactly where empires were developed on impatience.

Cloud gaming takes a left convert

For the past handful of years, we’ve read businesses declare that cloud gaming is the foreseeable future. Although the tech has acquired a fair total of pushback from classic players, 2022 proved that executives weren’t just comprehensive of sizzling air — while combined messaging built it especially really hard to get a study on the tech. A single of this year’s biggest tales came when Google introduced it was shutting down Stadia, a service that aided kick off the current wave of cloud tech.