Good morning gamers. Keep your eyes peeled for some holiday game deals!

🏆 You’ve placed your votes and the results are in! Congratulations to all the winners of our first ever Weekly Recon Video Game Awards. 

1. Video Game of the Year - Resident Evil Village

2. Best Story - It Takes Two

3. Best Multiplayer - Halo Infinite

4. Best Post-Launch Content - Ghost of Tsushima: Iki Island

5. Guilty Pleasure - Minecraft

6. Most Anticipated Game of 2022 - God of War Ragnarök

7. Esports Team of the Year - Natus Vincere (CS:GO)

8. Esports Player of the Year - Oleksandr “s1mple” Kostyliev (CS:GO)

9. Streamer of the Year - xQc

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BioShock 4 Is Coming  

The BioShock series has a special place in the hearts of gamers who love the immersive sim genre. These gamers have been waiting for news since 2019 when 2K Games originally announced that the development of the next BioShock game was being led by Cloud Chambers. In a surprising turn of events that was music to BioShock-fan’s ears, two sources came forward with new BioShock 4 information.  

Journalist Colin Moriarty took to the Sacred Symbol podcast to speak about some of the details he’s heard (also corroborated by VGC sources). He said,

• The game has been kept on a very tight internal leash, codenamed project “Parkside”

• Takes place in a 1960s fictional Antarctic City called “Borealis” 

•  Is narratively tied to the other three games from the BioShock series 

•  Series veterans Jonathan Pelling (art designer), Hoagy de la Plante (creative director) and Scott Sinclair (art director) are all working on the project

• Cloud Chamber is targeting a 2022 release window 

A new gaming insider that goes by the name of “Oops Leaker” on Twitter released some early (circe 2019) BioShock 4 game pitch documents. They revealed,

• The game’s name was pitched as “BioShock: Isolation” and is an open-world game set between two drastically different sides of the same isolated dystopian city

• City side #1 is a “free and wealthy society led by a successful entrepreneur” while City side #2 is “an isolated underground city, separated from the upper world, led by a dictator waging a vertical war”. There is a Flipside Zone which is the border between both sides where the war is unleashed

• Built using Unreal Engine 5 and includes an interactive living world that changes as players progress through the storyline (with a healthy dose of side quests)

• The development team includes BioShock veterans from Irrational Games and devs who worked on Watch Dogs: Legion, Shadow of the Tomb Raider, Mafia 3 and Deus Ex. 2K wants Garry Schyman, the original composer of the BioShock series to compose the music

• An announcement is expected in Q1 2022

The Future of Battlefield

Battlefield 2042 did not have the launch it expected and now they’re making some significant changes. Last week, EA announced a major studio shake-up as part of a process to create a “connected Battlefield universe”. 

Respawn co-founder Vince Zampella said that they will continue to grow and evolve Battlefield 2042. He emphasized that they will use the new kinds of experiences and business models to connect the Battlefield world and that they will build their community by focusing on the Portal mode and content created by the players. 

Ripple Effect, formerly known as DICE Los Angeles, is the new Seattle-based studio founded by Marcus Lehto. Lehto is the co-creator of the Halo universe and the father of Master Chief. He has been tasked with assembling a top tier team to work on a project within the Battlefield universe. According to Gamespot, Lehto’s team is focused on world and narrative building within the Battlefield Universe.

Tom Henderson @_Tom_Henderson_

Week 1 sales: Battlefield 3 - 4.68M Battlefield 1 - 3.46M Battlefield 4 - 2.59M Battlefield: Hardline - 1.48M Battlefield: Bad Company 2 - 1.39M Battlefield: Bad Company - 0.44M #Battlefield2042 - 4.23M

11:27 AM ∙ Dec 3, 2021

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Esports Corner 

100 Thieves is Stealing the Spotlight

Esports and lifestyle apparel company 100 Thieves has successfully completed a Series C funding round raising $60 million. 100 Thieves is now reportedly worth $460 million and this funding will help fuel the company's plans for new strategic acquisitions in the gaming space, and the launching of a new unannounced line of business. Founder and CEO Matthew “Nadeshot” Haag said that their revenue more than doubled in 2021, and that “100 Thieves now has the capital to launch and acquire new companies that I know our community will love”. 

Complexity Stars

North American based esports organization Complexity Gaming announced a new gaming division for professional athletes and celebrities called Complexity Stars. The initiative aims to integrate gaming and esports communities with celebrities and professional athletes helping them amplify their brands with the next generation of sports fans. The division will work towards organizing tournaments, crossover events, brand partnerships and creating branded content to bring their star-studded lineup deeper into the world of gaming and esports. The lineup currently consists of NFL and NBA players, UFC fighters and Olympic gold medalists. 

November’s Record-Setting Viewership 

2021 was a major bounce-back year for the esports industry. Tons of games resumed their typical tournament structure and some even went back to hosting live in-person events. November was arguably the most successful month of the year so let's take a look at what happened with the help of analytics website Esports Charts.

• The grand finals match of the 2021 League of Legends World Championships between Edward Gaming and DWGK peaked at more than 4 million viewers.

• The grand finals match of the CS:GO PGL Stockholm Major between Natus Vincere and G2 set an all-time CS:GO record (by more than double) peaking at 2.7 million viewers.

• The ONE Esports MPL Invitational 2021 (Mobile Legends: Bang Bang) and the Free Fire Asia Championship peaked at more than 1.1 million viewers, making them the 3rd and 4th most popular tournaments of the month.

• Twitch Rivals x World Series of Warzone Duos North America and Last Dance in Verdansk were in the top 5 most popular tournaments amongst English viewers.

Gaming Roundup 

• According to CD Projekt Red President Adam Kicinski, their goal is to continue building on their major established IPs. He also said that the development of the next Witcher game will start in 2022 but it won’t follow the trilogy storyline. 

• Representative Paul Tonko, Senator Richard Blumenthal, Senate Majority Leader Charles Schumer and Senator Ben Ray Luján are introducing a new bill called “Stopping Grinch Bots Act” to crack down on bots buying high value gaming consoles.

• Hazelight Studios has abandoned the trademark for their game of the year candidate “It Takes Two”. Take-Two Interactive, the parent company behind Grand Theft Auto, issued a trademark claim against them. 

• Arkane Austin (a division of Arkane Studios) is rumoured to be developing a Prey sequel called “Prey 2: Neuroshock”. The leaker claims that the development started in 2019 as a result of an internal game jam project.  

• Respawn Entertainment announced last week they’ve discontinued any new sales of the original Titanfall game. According to Respawn, Titanfall remains at the core of their DNA and it will continue to live on in Titanfall 2, Apex Legends and in the future. 

• According to Bloomberg, PlayStation is working on a new service that would rival the Xbox Game Pass. The service will reportedly launch in Spring 2022 with an assortment of classic games from the PS1, PS2, PS3 and PSP.

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