What You Missed This Week in Video Games

“Game On” is The Fly’s weekly recap of the stories powering up or beating down video game stocks.

NEW RELEASES: Among this week’s new releases is Xbox Game Studios’ (MSFT) “Senua’s Saga: Hellblade II,” an action-adventure game that is a sequel to 2017’s “Hellblade: Senua’s Sacrifice.” The game releases for PC and Xbox Series X/S on May 21. Also out that same day is Ubisoft’s (UBSFY) new free-to-play first-person shooter game “XDefiant,” previously known as “Tom Clancy’s XDefiant,” which is available on PC, Xbox Series, and PlayStation 5 (SONY). In addition, Nintendo’s (NTDOY) role-playing game “Paper Mario: The Thousand-Year Door,” a remake of the 2004 GameCube title of the same name, launches for Switch consoles on May 23.

NINTENDO BUYS SHIVER: On Monday, Nintendo announced that it has entered into an agreement with Embracer Group AB (THQQF) to acquire 100% of the outstanding shares of Shiver Entertainment, Inc. and to make it a wholly owned subsidiary. Shiver is a video game development company that develops software for multiple platforms including Nintendo Switch. Since its establishment in 2012, Shiver has partnered with publishers and developers through commissions for large scale title developments, and recently, has worked on porting and developing software titles such as Warner Bros. Discovery’s (WBD) “Hogwarts Legacy” and “Mortal Kombat 1.” Nintendo will acquire 100% of the outstanding shares of Shiver and make it a wholly owned subsidiary. The acquisition will be completed pending satisfaction of all relevant customary closing conditions and will have only a minor effect on Nintendo’s results for this fiscal year, Nintendo said.

EUROPE GAME SALES: PC and console game sales dropped 6.2% year-over-year in Europe last month, with 10.5M game units sold, Gamesindustry.biz’s Christopher Dring (AMZN) adaptation, the author says. On the hardware side, console sales fell 47% year-over-year in April, the author noted.

‘CALL OF DUTY’ ON GAME PASS: Activision’s upcoming “Call of Duty” installment this fall will be released on Microsoft’s Game Pass subscription service, the first time a game in the franchise would launch on the service since the Xbox maker closed its acquisition of Activision Blizzard, the Wall Street Journal’s Sarah Needleman reported, citing people familiar with the matter. Under this new plan, gamers could end up paying Microsoft less for the new “Call of Duty” than it would have made with the traditional “a la carte” approach, though the company is looking to draw new users to its Game Pass subscription service in hopes that they will end up paying more over the long term, the report stated. The Fly notes that, as of the time of writing, “Diablo IV” has been the only notable Activision Blizzard game released on Game Pass since the deal closed.

OTHER STORIES TO WATCH:

• PlayStation and LEGO are working on a new video game based on the “Horizon Zero Dawn” franchise called “LEGO Horizon Adventures,” Insider-Gaming reports (read more)
• Ubisoft confirmed that “Assassin’s Creed Shadows” will release on November 15, 2024 (read more)
• Activision announced a new Poland-based studio called Elsewhere Entertainment (read more)
• GameStop (GME) provided a very conservative revenue estimate for Q1 (read more)