Highguard Layoffs and Wick's Revenge [Nerfed.ai]

[00:00] Vanessa Calderon: Nerf.ai, the week gaming stood still. [00:04] Vanessa Calderon: I am Vanessa Calderone, and we are coming to you with a lot of weight on our shoulders this week. [00:09] Vanessa Calderon: It is one of those cycles where you really feel the friction between the business of making games and the art of playing them. [00:16] Marcus Shaw: And I'm Marcus Shaw. [00:17] Marcus Shaw: We are broadcasting through the Nerf.ai network with a massive slate of news to unpack. [00:22] Marcus Shaw: We have got everything, from legendary actors returning to the digital screen to some of the most sobering developer news we have had to report in months. [00:30] Vanessa Calderon: Um, reflecting on the broader trends of the industry, it feels like we're stuck in a loop of high-stakes contradictions. [00:38] Vanessa Calderon: We get these massive trailer drops that break the internet, but then behind the scenes, the people who actually built those worlds are being let go before the launch party is even over. [00:47] Vanessa Calderon: It is a mood, and honestly, not a great one. [00:51] Marcus Shaw: Yeah, it is the classic one step forward, two steps back routine. [00:56] Marcus Shaw: Let us jump right into the story that has been dominating everyone's feed since Wednesday, [01:01] Marcus Shaw: the situation at Wildlike Entertainment and the catastrophic trajectory of their debut title, High Guard. [01:07] Vanessa Calderon: This one really stings because the timing is just brutal. [01:10] Vanessa Calderon: High Guard launched on January 26th, which was barely over two weeks ago. [01:15] Vanessa Calderon: Now we're seeing LinkedIn flooded with posts from former employees. [01:19] Vanessa Calderon: Reports indicate that Wildlight has laid off the majority of its staff. [01:24] Vanessa Calderon: Marcus, this was supposed to be the next big thing, right? [01:27] Marcus Shaw: Wait, what? [01:29] Marcus Shaw: I remember the reveal at the 2025 Game Awards. [01:32] Marcus Shaw: It was the final reveal, the big closer for Jeff Keely. [01:35] Marcus Shaw: They had 100,000 concurrent players on Steam on day one, [01:39] Marcus Shaw: which for a new IP is actually incredible. [01:41] Marcus Shaw: But the drop-off was just staggering. [01:44] Marcus Shaw: We're looking at a loss of about 90% of the active player base in a matter of days. [01:50] Vanessa Calderon: It's that live service trap we talk about all the time on nerf.neuronewscast.com. [01:55] Vanessa Calderon: If a game does not maintain that initial momentum, the publishers panic. [02:00] Vanessa Calderon: Wildlife put out a statement saying they're keeping a core group to keep the service running, [02:04] Vanessa Calderon: but that is basically code for maintenance mode. [02:07] Vanessa Calderon: Alex Granner, who was a level designer there, mentioned they had a whole roadmap of content that might never see a release now. [02:16] Marcus Shaw: That is insane. [02:17] Marcus Shaw: It feels like developers are not even given the chance to iterate or fix balance issues anymore. [02:23] Marcus Shaw: If you're not an instant permanent phenomenon, the plug gets pulled. [02:27] Marcus Shaw: And that leads us to the growing tension at Ubisoft, where the workforce is essentially [02:32] Marcus Shaw: saying enough is enough. [02:34] Vanessa Calderon: Exactly. [02:35] Vanessa Calderon: Over 1,200 employees across multiple international offices just finished a three-day strike. [02:43] Vanessa Calderon: This was not just a reaction to one thing, but a culmination of years of frustration. [02:49] Vanessa Calderon: They're dealing with studio closures, the cancellation of six different projects last [02:53] Vanessa Calderon: month. [02:54] Vanessa Calderon: And then they're... [02:54] Vanessa Calderon: And the management dropped the five-day return to office, man. [02:57] Marcus Shaw: Wild. [02:58] Marcus Shaw: This seems like a massive disconnect. [03:00] Marcus Shaw: You have people who have been working remotely for years, hitting their targets and shipping [03:05] Marcus Shaw: content, and suddenly they are being told they have to move back to expensive tech hubs [03:10] Marcus Shaw: or lose their jobs. [03:11] Marcus Shaw: The union reps are pointing the finger directly at Eve Guillermo, claiming he has lost the pulse of the company. [03:17] Vanessa Calderon: When we look at the industry as a whole, Ubisoft is just one piece of a very broken puzzle. [03:24] Vanessa Calderon: Riot Games also cut about 80 people from their fighting game team this week. [03:28] Vanessa Calderon: This is the team working on 2XKO, which had a lot of hype behind it. [03:33] Vanessa Calderon: It is just a very grim landscape for developers right now. [03:38] Marcus Shaw: Yep. [03:38] Marcus Shaw: It is a hard pivot from the hiring spree we saw a few years ago. [03:42] Marcus Shaw: But let us try to find a silver lining here, because there is actually some massive news on the project front. [03:47] Marcus Shaw: Sabre Interactive, the studio that just crushed it with Space Marine 2, is taking on a certain legendary assassin. [03:55] Vanessa Calderon: For real? They are officially developing a AAA John Wick game? [04:00] Vanessa Calderon: This is not some small mobile tie-in. We are talking about a full-scale, single-player, third-person action title. [04:08] Vanessa Calderon: And the best part is that Keanu Reeves is actually involved to provide the likeness and the voice. [04:13] Marcus Shaw: That's insane. [04:14] Marcus Shaw: That's insane. [04:15] Marcus Shaw: The premise is actually pretty cool, too. [04:17] Marcus Shaw: It is set well before the events of the first film. [04:19] Marcus Shaw: During the years, John was building the legend of the Baba Yaga. [04:22] Marcus Shaw: We are going to see the impossible task that allowed him to retire in the first place. [04:28] Marcus Shaw: Saber is promising gunfoo combat and cinematic camera work that matches the style of the movies. [04:33] Vanessa Calderon: I mean, I hope they get the physics right. [04:36] Vanessa Calderon: I'm sorry. [04:37] Vanessa Calderon: What I meant was I hope they focus on the fluidity of the movement as much as the shooting. [04:43] Vanessa Calderon: If I cannot use a pencil as a weapon in at least one level, they have missed the mark. [04:48] Vanessa Calderon: They are targeting PS5, Xbox Series, and PC, [04:52] Vanessa Calderon: though they are being smart and not giving us a release window yet. [04:56] Marcus Shaw: Keeping the expectations grounded is probably the best move Sabre can make right now. [05:00] Marcus Shaw: Now, speaking of unique settings, Kraft in Montreal just gave us a look at something called Project Windless. [05:07] Marcus Shaw: This is a massive departure from their usual P-U-B-G style of content. [05:10] Vanessa Calderon: Right. This is based on the Korean fantasy novel, The Bird That Drinks Tears. [05:16] Vanessa Calderon: The art style they showed off is absolutely haunting. [05:19] Vanessa Calderon: You play as the hero king who belongs to a race called the Recon. [05:24] Vanessa Calderon: These are basically giant, eight-foot-tall bird people who are legendary warriors but have a pathological fear of water. [05:32] Marcus Shaw: Wild! They are using Unreal Engine 5 to power something they call mass technology. [05:39] Marcus Shaw: The goal is to simulate thousands of individual soldiers on a battlefield simultaneously. [05:44] Marcus Shaw: They want the player to feel like they're actually in the middle of war, not just playing a tactical simulation. [05:50] Marcus Shaw: And they were very firm about it being a premium single-player experience with no live service elements. [05:56] Vanessa Calderon: That's rough for the publishers who love microtransactions, but it sounds like a dream for the rest of us. [06:03] Vanessa Calderon: After the high-guard disaster, hearing a developer commit to a complete, standalone single-player game feels like a vacation. [06:11] Vanessa Calderon: I just want to be a giant bird and swing twin-star forged blades without worrying about a battle pass. [06:17] Marcus Shaw: Yeah, it is definitely a breath of fresh air. [06:20] Marcus Shaw: However, if you were planning on upgrading your hardware to play these new titles, [06:24] Marcus Shaw: Valve had some disappointing news this week regarding their upcoming hardware refresh. [06:29] Vanessa Calderon: Fair. [06:30] Vanessa Calderon: They have officially pushed back the release of the new Steam Machine, [06:34] Vanessa Calderon: the updated Steam Controller, and the Steam Frame VR headset. [06:39] Vanessa Calderon: Originally slated for late 2025, everything has been moved to the first half of 2026. [06:46] Vanessa Calderon: Valve is citing the ongoing global memory and storage crisis as the primary reason for the delay. [06:53] Marcus Shaw: No way! I was really looking forward to that steam frame headset. [06:57] Marcus Shaw: Valve mentioned that the cost of RAAM and high-speed SSDs has spiked so much that they couldn't hit their target price point without taking a massive loss or overcharging the consumers. [07:09] Marcus Shaw: It is a tough call, but Valve usually prefers to wait until the tech is affordable for the masses. [07:16] Vanessa Calderon: But looking at the hardware side of things, it makes you appreciate the value of services [07:20] Vanessa Calderon: like Game Pass even more when new tech is out of reach. [07:24] Vanessa Calderon: We actually have a massive drop happening today, February 13th, for subscribers. [07:29] Marcus Shaw: Yep, it is a big day. [07:31] Marcus Shaw: High on Life 2 is finally here. [07:33] Marcus Shaw: If you enjoyed the first one, you know what to expect. [07:37] Marcus Shaw: More talking guns, more absurdist humor, and a lot of intergalactic weirdness. [07:42] Marcus Shaw: At the same time, the original Kingdom Come Deliverance is hitting the service, likely to get people hyped for the sequel. [07:49] Vanessa Calderon: Brutal. I mean, my backlog is already screaming at me, but next Tuesday, we are also getting a vowed and Avatar Frontiers of Pandora. [07:59] Vanessa Calderon: It is like they want us to never leave our houses. [08:02] Vanessa Calderon: I am also surprisingly interested in that indie title that dropped yesterday, Roadside Research. [08:09] Marcus Shaw: Wow, that is the Alien Gas Station Simulator, right? [08:13] Marcus Shaw: It looks like a very strange mix of Papers, Please, and a management sim. [08:17] Marcus Shaw: You have to run this remote station while hiding the fact that you are an alien all while the government is breathing down your neck. [08:23] Vanessa Calderon: Exactly. [08:25] Vanessa Calderon: It is like a perfect metaphor for being a developer in 2025. [08:29] Vanessa Calderon: Just keep the lights on and hope nobody notices you're struggling. [08:33] Vanessa Calderon: Speaking of things going wrong behind the scenes, we have to talk about the truly bizarre situation at Build a Rocket Boy. [08:41] Marcus Shaw: That's insane. This is the studio founded by former rock star legend Leslie Benzies. [08:47] Marcus Shaw: Apparently, employees discovered a piece of surveillance software called TerraMind installed on their work machines. [08:53] Marcus Shaw: It was running in the background, monitoring everything from keystrokes to active applications, [08:58] Marcus Shaw: and it was allegedly slowing down their rendering software. [09:01] Vanessa Calderon: Right. And when the staff confronted management, the response from co-CEO Mark Gerhard was wild. [09:09] Vanessa Calderon: He claimed there is a multi-million dollar, quote, sabotage campaign being orchestrated against them by a major American competitor. [09:18] Vanessa Calderon: He basically said the surveillance was necessary to catch corporate spies within the company. [09:24] Marcus Shaw: Wait, what? That sounds like the plot of a techno thriller, not how you run a game studio. [09:30] Marcus Shaw: Their previous project, Mind's Eye, did not exactly set the world on fire last year, [09:35] Marcus Shaw: and now they're filing criminal complaints against journalists who are reporting on the surveillance. [09:40] Marcus Shaw: It is a very messy situation that is only getting messier. [09:43] Vanessa Calderon: For real. [09:45] Vanessa Calderon: It is a reminder that even when you have industry veterans at the helm, things can go sideways fast. [09:53] Vanessa Calderon: We will be keeping a very close eye on that story as it develops, especially with the legal threats flying around. [09:59] Vanessa Calderon: It's just another chapter and what has been a truly exhausting week for the industry. [10:06] Marcus Shaw: Yeah, I think we all need a weekend to just reset. [10:09] Marcus Shaw: Go play some of those Game Pass titles. [10:11] Marcus Shaw: Ignore the surveillance software on your fictional work computers [10:14] Marcus Shaw: and maybe stay away from any alien gas stations for a while. [10:18] Vanessa Calderon: That is a solid plan, Marcus. [10:20] Vanessa Calderon: Thank you for joining us for this deep dive. [10:22] Vanessa Calderon: I am Vanessa Calderon. [10:23] Marcus Shaw: And I am Marcus Shaw. [10:25] Marcus Shaw: Catch you all in the next lobby. [10:28] Marcus Shaw: GG. [10:29] Vanessa Calderon: Neural Newscast is AI-assisted, human-reviewed. [10:33] Vanessa Calderon: View our AI transparency policy at neuralnewscast.com.