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00:00What's up, everybody? Damon here, and in today's gaming news, Sony says outright that it is
00:04disappointed in Destiny 2. We have Ghost of Yote's first month sales numbers, and Fallout 4
00:08Anniversary Edition is off to a rocky start. This is your daily fix.
00:21It's a tough time for Bungie and Destiny 2, with parent company Sony saying the studio has failed
00:26to meet its sales and user engagement expectations. In its latest financial report, Sony said it had
00:31recorded a 31.5 billion yen impairment charge, that's approximately $204.2 million, as a result
00:36of Destiny 2's underperformance. That was significant enough to drag down profits at Sony's
00:41game and network services segment, which includes Sony Interactive Entertainment. Sony Chief Financial
00:45Officer Lin Tao expanded on the issues with Bungie in an investor-related financial call, saying,
00:50Regarding Destiny 2, partially due to the changes in the competitive environment, the level of sales
00:55and user engagement have not reached the expectations we had at the time of the acquisition
00:58of Bungie. While we will continue to make improvements, we downwardly revised the business
01:02production for the time being, and recorded an impairment loss against a portion of the
01:06assets at Bungie. It's certainly been a tough time for Destiny 2 and Bungie, which is also
01:10working on the delayed extraction shooter Marathon for a release next year. Bungie was acquired
01:14by Sony for $3.7 billion in 2021, at a time when PlayStation was aggressively banking
01:19on the live service business model. Sony clearly saw something in Bungie and its upcoming
01:24slate. But as the acquisition settled in, concerns began to rise about the studio's future.
01:28Destiny 2 was struggling, and Marathon was still years away. Then came the layoffs.
01:33In 2023, Bungie laid off roughly 100 individuals and delayed Destiny 2's The Final Shape DLC.
01:39Developers told IGN at the time that the atmosphere at Bungie was soul-crushing. In 2024, this was
01:44followed up with even more layoffs, impacting 220 people despite The Final Shape's success. In the
01:49wake of those layoffs, former workers claimed Bungie misrepresented its finances and had
01:54significantly overextended itself when Sony acquired the studio. Troubles continued to rock
01:59the studio through the rest of 2024 and into 2025, with Marathon seeing a delay out of September
02:03of this year to an unknown future date. Most recently, Sony confirmed Bungie would be integrated
02:08into PlayStation Studios so the company could have more control over the developer.
02:12Destiny 2 has seen its player count plummet as updates have failed to hit the mark. The action
02:16shooter hit a new low on Steam this month, with a peak concurrent player count of just 13,497
02:22in the past 24 hours. In June last year, it hit 314,000. Recent user reviews for Destiny 2 on Steam
02:28are mostly negative, although overall reviews are mostly positive. Destiny 2's next expansion of
02:32Renegades launches on December 2nd, adding a volley of new Star Wars-inspired content. It remains to be
02:37seen if that'll win over the existing fanbase or attract enough new players to offset the shooter's
02:41recent struggles. Whenever Marathon is ready, Sony will be keen to avoid another catastrophic launch
02:46like Concord, which was pulled offline just two weeks after launch, with one estimate suggesting it sold
02:51just 25,000 copies. Bungie now faces concern over its own future with the pressure on Marathon to deliver.
02:58Moving on. Ghost of Yote has sold 3.3 million copies in its first month on sale. As part of its latest
03:05financial results, Sony said Sucker Punch's PlayStation 5 exclusive action-adventure sold 3.3 million units
03:10in the 32 days since going on sale on October 2nd, so up to and including November 2nd. Sony announced
03:16the figure without any commentary, so it's hard to know whether the company is happy with the result.
03:21However, there is a great deal of context we can add that helps us paint a picture of Ghost of
03:25Yote's commercial success. The first comparison we should make is to its predecessor, Ghost of Tsushima.
03:31It sold 2.4 million copies in its first three days after going on sale exclusively on PlayStation 4
03:36on July 17th, 2020, then hit 5 million after 118 days, just shy of four months. It's now up to 13
03:42million copies sold, including sales of the PC and PS5 director's cut. So it looks like Ghost of Yote
03:47is selling about as well as Tsushima before it, a suggestion backed up by sales data from the US and
03:51across Europe. But is that good enough? We need to consider that Ghost of Tsushima came out on the PS4,
03:56which in the summer of 2020 had a much bigger install base than the PS5 does today, and amid the
04:00stay-at-home gaming boom fueled by lockdowns. Ghost of Yote also sold for $70, which means it's
04:05dollar sales are greater compared to the $60 Ghost of Tsushima. The timing of each release differs
04:10also in that Tsushima came out in the summer and Yote came out in the fall. Yote has the crucial
04:15holiday season coming soon, and it will surely be a popular pick for those buying a PS5 for the first
04:19time or upgrading to the PS5 Pro. And finally, multiplayer add-on Ghost of Yote Legends comes out
04:24at some point in 2026, which will undoubtedly give Yote a shot in the arm next year. We all know that
04:29Ghost of Yote, like Ghost of Tsushima before it, will eventually launch on PC in director's cut form.
04:34Perhaps there will even be a PS6 version whenever that console rolls around.
04:38Serkanah's Matt Piscitella probably summed it up best last month when he said Ghost of Yote's
04:41launch sales were perfectly fine. Not amazing, not bad.
04:47And finally today, Fallout 4 Anniversary Edition was meant to act as a celebration of Bethesda's
04:51post-apocalyptic role-playing game on its 10th birthday, but things haven't exactly gone to plan
04:56as the update was met with a backlash on Steam. The $60 Anniversary Edition includes the six official
05:01Fallout 4 expansions and over 150 Creation Club items, paid mods. But there's also an
05:06Anniversary Edition upgrade Bethesda's selling to existing owners of the base game, priced at $40.
05:11While Bethesda points out that this upgrade offers a discount on all the items sold separately,
05:15fans have hit out at the pricing for the Anniversary Edition, especially in the context of Fallout 4
05:19itself being a decade old, and what the Anniversary Edition actually gets you. It's worth noting that the
05:24Fallout 4 base game is currently $20 on Steam, and the Game of the Year Edition, which includes the
05:29base game, and all the six official expansions cost $40. The Fallout 4 Creations Bundle, which
05:34includes the 150 paid mods released as part of the Anniversary Edition, costs $20 on its own.
05:39And it's the Steam story page for this bundle that has borne the brunt of the backlash,
05:42with a mostly negative user review rating. Complaints that report crashing issues, glitches,
05:48and even a problem with getting the new mods to work. The backlash has also spilled over into
05:52Steam reviews for the Fallout 4 base game, where negative reviews have flooded in following
05:56the Anniversary Edition's release, causing recent reviews to plummet to mixed. It's a disappointing
06:01start for Fallout's big push ahead of the hotly anticipated December launch of Fallout Season 2
06:05on Prime Video. A new Fallout New Vegas Bundle is also due out, with a Fallout TV show-themed update to
06:11Fallout 76 also coming in December. Hopefully Bethesda can sort these issues out sooner rather than later.
06:15And that's your daily fix for Tuesday, November 11th. Looking for something new to play and a way to
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06:33Synergy, Spin Hero, and Paleo Pines. Every purchase supports No Kid Hungry, a non-profit that provides
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06:43childhood hunger. Head on over to HumbleBundle.com and start playing today. I'm Damon Hatfield,
06:48and for all your video game news, stay tuned to IGN.
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