What’s up, guys? Welcome back to Newsweave. Yesterday was certainly eventful as all kinds of chaos broke out online for Microsoft when it came to studio closures, cancellation of games, and just layoffs left and right. And it’s left a lot of people’s heads spinning, and we’re going to go over all the stuff hopefully that we can get into here today. Also, we are going to be talking about Nintendo with what looked to be leaked sales data that they themselves had to come out and sort of respond to since it had to do with the Switch 2 and how many systems sold up to this point. Then we also have Sony when it comes to their next generation, next generation prospects, but also what exactly is in store for them with the PS5 Pro next year. That with their very deep collaboration with AMD. So, if you guys enjoy these videos, make sure you hit that like button. Helps out a ton. And if you’re new here to the Spawnwave channel, make sure you subscribe down below. And of course, members for the channel do get newswave early. If you would like to learn more about that, click the join button or link in the description down below. And we’re going to start today with one piece of news rumor that started to make the rounds very, very quickly. And then it got sort of mixed in with all the Xbox layoff talk and studio closures and cancellations. This has to do with Phil Spencer and him apparently retiring when the next generation Xbox launches. Now, from what I can tell, this originated from Ghost of Hope over on X, who’s a a like a Call of Duty insider, where they simply said, you can see that Phil Spencer will be retiring from his role as CEO of Microsoft gaming after the launch of the next generation Xbox. Now, naturally, this is a big piece of news that people may want to follow up on here with Microsoft, and The Verge indeed did that. Carrie Perez as the head of Xbox communications in a statement to the Verge says Phil is not retiring anytime soon. So there you go. Pretty cut and dry. Now here’s the thing. Look, Phil Spencer eventually will retire obviously and sure it could happen after the launch of the next Xbox system, which rumors keep pointing more and more towards the end of next year. And that feels very soon, but look at look what’s going on with Microsoft right now. They’re they’re selling a system that’s incredibly expensive and layoffs are happening everywhere and seems like they’re reshuffling the deck with some of their studios and games. So, anything’s possible at this point, but at least at this time, Phil Spencer not retiring anytime soon. I guess despite what was said with this latest rumor. Also, it looks like Neil Drman is going to pull back a bit with his involvement on the HBO Last of Us series. this in a statement we can see where he says, “I’ve made the difficult decision to step away from my creative involvement in The Last of Us on HBO with work complete on season 2 before any meaningful work starts on season 3. Now is the right time for me to transition my complete focus no and its future pro prospects projects which naturally includes things like Intergalactic and I’m sure some other game other games that are currently in development.” That first line I’m sure had people losing it a bit there because it just says I’ve made the difficult decision to step away from. Yeah, I’m sure that put did a number on people before they got f a bit further down in that um in that paragraph, but to me it makes sense. There’s a lot happening at Naughty Dog and at this time going into season 3 where they’re going to transition to uh say different character and point of view. I guess he would be needed less and less and he’s sort of got the two episodes. I’m sure he wanted to I don’t want to say do a redo on, but maybe go back and touch up a bit from the game and add some more content and uh and other lines and stuff in there that we didn’t necessarily get in the game. So, I I actually think his episodes that he did were very, very good, but at this time, he’s got a lot of other stuff he has to work on in this case with the games. Oh, and during that Bandai Namco event yesterday, we did have the My Hero Academia game that was officially announced. We can see this over on Gamatsu. They say My Hero Academia: All Justice announced for PS5, Xbox Series, and PC. We do not have any kind of release date announced for this. And look, I see these games get announced, and they said, “Oh, a new My Hero game is going to be announced here.” They they told us that ahead of time and as soon as I heard that I said well it’s probably a 3D arena fighter and it is I I mean look they said it’s going to go alongside of the final season for the the series here which is great but it’s a three versus three 3D arena fighter. So unfortunately when I hear that I go yeah that’s about right. Like nothing really surprises me here. And I do wonder if it’s going to be something that’s just kind of like business as usual for what happens with a lot of these anime video game adaptations. So, I’d like to see them maybe try something else with it, but I also understand this should sell well enough just being alongside of a popular franchise and being able to leverage that IP. And guys, with some of the quick news out of the way, let’s get into the bigger stuff. We’re going to start right away with Nintendo and then we’ll move into Microsoft and the whole thing that happened with with Xbox. Uh the stuff with Nintendo, though, is kind of weird because what happened is that people noticed, specifically one outlet, that Nintendo seemed to quietly update the website with Switch to sales data. And it was weird because they didn’t make any big announcement about it. It did happen a bit after their annual gathering of the shareholders. So, it kind of lined up with some of the financial stuff that maybe they decided to update with. Um, but we can see this is posted. This is over on my Nintendo news saying Nintendo’s revealed that the console sold the most amount of units in the Americas, which led sales with approximately 1.8 million units sold. The Americas are followed by Japan with 1.47 47 million and Europe with 1.18 million. The other regions accounted for 0.55 million units and that all comes together for roughly 5 million million units sold worldwide. Now be in perspective naturally as they have the comparison here. The Nintendo Switch one that sold 2.74 million units during its first month on sales. So this would effectively almost double up on the sales of their of their previous generation launch. Here’s the thing though. It seemed very very weird when this happened because it it got updated for me Eastern time. It’s like almost the middle of the night and then my Nintendo news just happened I guess be looking at their investor relations page and graphs and and it just out of nowhere kind of. So people wanted to of course go ask Nintendo, hey, what’s going on here? Why why did you decide to update this but not make any kind of announcement? Well then the information disappeared off the website. They kind of pulled it back. That of course would then lead to people going, “Oh, so you accidentally publish the data and now you have to try to pull it down hoping that no one really saw it. A little late for that.” But we did get a formal response from Nintendo. This we can see is posted. This is over on X from David Gibson who says, “I asked Nintendo about the leak of Switch 2 data.” And they replied, “It appears that test data prepared for a website update was unintentionally made publicly accessible. temporarily visible data was for testing purposes only and is not accurate and not related to any sales result or projection of Switch 2. So I mean you can believe Nintendo are not here in terms of them updating their graphs or their charts for the Switch 2 since I mean consider this they do have the Switch one still selling. So they would have to at least update their graphs so that it can show the two different systems alongside of each other while being bar charts and and line charts and graphs. And there’s a lot that goes into that. I get it. And it has to be able to be updated almost in real time as information comes in each quarter. So here’s the thing though. You hear five million, you’re like, “Wow, that’s a lot.” I it it pro it’s probably more than that. And that’s the thing. Even David Gibson says they’re expecting 5.4 4 million when results are announced. That would be on August 1st. Keep in mind, we’re already outside this now in July of their their recent fiscal quarter wrapping. That was at the end of June. Remember, it’s April, May, and June. So, we would get one month just because it’s part of that previous quarter of Switch to sales. And Nintendo’s already told us that it easily eclipsed the 3 million mark. That didn’t seem to be a problem at all. So now people looking towards the end of the month like okay five to six million sounds right somewhere in there. I I do think 6 million could be pushing it a little bit. I mean 6 million in 30 days is less than that actually be very very impressive but this system has had a ton of momentum at launch and it seems to continue on now with Donkey Kong coming up this month that look I mean people have a lot of flying opinions are flying over the place around Nintendo. When they drop a game like that, I think a lot of people go, “Yeah, game looks pretty good.” Especially when you hear it’s the Mario Odyssey team behind it. They’ve showed us a lot about it and we’re two weeks away. A lot of excitement drumming up there. So, that’s another game that should be able to continue the Switch to Momentum. But in those first 30 days or so, wouldn’t shock me if it did touch 6 million. But I think, as David Gibson points out here, probably 5 a.5 million is about right. But we’ll find out August 1st when Nintendo goes back and updates the information and puts out all the numbers which naturally we’ll be covering here. Next up, let’s talk about Microsoft and I mean what was just a disastrous day yesterday as we had word that there would be layoffs happening this week within Microsoft but I don’t think any of us were expecting it to be this drastic because some of the numbers that were getting thrown around were just like mindboggling at times. So, let’s start here as I did come across a publication that did their best to sort of condense all the information so you can kind of go through it pretty easily. I’ll have that link down below which we can see. This is over on GameSpot. They say Microsoft announced mass layoffs on July 2nd impacting many areas of the company’s sprawling business including Xbox. Overall, Microsoft is set to be cutting 4% of its staff worldwide, which okay, so these companies love using big corporations percentages instead of actual number. How many people, right? Because you read 4%, you’re like, okay, could be worse. And then you read the number next to that, that’s affecting about 9,000 people since Microsoft, well, they employ 200,000 people globally. So 4% sounds small. 9,000 people does not. Anyway, that’s not all like affecting just Xbox. That’s spread out across all of Microsoft, but it does seem like a a sizable amount here from that 9,000 is indeed affecting Xbox. All right, so let’s go over it looks to be most of the studios that were affected here and how like Raven Software and Highoon. So these are two different Call of Duty support studios or even co-developing studios. Both studios have seen layoffs. Sledgehammer is led like Call of Duty titles in the past, they have seen layoffs now. So, one like head COD studio there and then two supporting ones seeing substantial layoffs. Turn 10 Studios was it was shocking. I mean, not as shocking as another one, but this is up there because this is this is like a storied studio for Microsoft. They’ve been there with with Forza Motorsport since the original Xbox. And for the most part, they turn in good to great games every outing. Like they rarely miss with a Forza title, if ever. But they saw roughly half, yes, right, half their studio get laid off, which tells me that Turn 10 Studios is probably a support studio will mostly help or work to update the current Fortza Motorsport going forward. and we’ll work on the the tech and the engine behind it that would be used for Fortza Horizon, which clearly is the most popular version here between the two franchises, Fortza Motorsport and Fortza Horizon, as we’ve seen with some of the player numbers that have come in. So, that’s kind of where Turn 10 is at this time. Halo Studios, we saw employees who are posting online that they’ve been let go from Halo Studios. So, it seemed like they were hiring, which look, I I know revolving door, I’m sure, for some of these studios as they’re laying people off. They’re also bringing people in. But again, Halo Studios, who’s from 343 to Halo, it’s it’s not great when you’re hearing about even layoffs hitting them as they seem to be trying to rebuild and then bring back, we’ll see, Halo in general. Zenamax Online Studios, they had their new MMO cancelled. We don’t know much about it at all. And then they saw layoffs that went along with that. The Initiative closed down. Yeah, this uh this this one hit hard because that means Perfect Dark is just cancelled. And th is a game that legit legitimately had a lot of interest from people just to see how it would turn out or if you’re a fan of Perfect Dark from back in the day. It’s okay. We had Perfect Dark in the N64, Perfect Dark Zero in the 360. Great. We’re going to see the initiative who was I mean just bring in a ton of talent from its area where it opened up there in uh what over in over in California Sony in like Santa Monica near like Sony and stuff. They were trying to absorb a lot of the talent there and they they get Perfect Dark. It’s like great this could be awesome. They show the gameplay from last year that was supposed to be gameplay. Still questions around that now. Definitely. And now it’s gone. That’s it. Which again insanity to me. I did a video yesterday like reacting to that specifically and it’s just mind-boggling that Perfect Dark after seven years with the initiative is just gone now. Blizzard also seeing layoffs Warcraft Rumble that support for that is ending and then Rare. So Ever Wild got cancelled. All right. And along with Ever Wild, we see layoffs. Sure, because there’s a team clearly behind that at Rare that is not working out. The Sea of Thieves team that continues to roll along. So, I mean, you expect them to mostly be intact. Ever Wild was never really presented to us as something that was uh that was solid, like they knew what they were doing. It’s like it always kind of felt like a game where they showed it to us before they even had a concept or idea or direction for the game. So, it’s it’s not shocking to me that it got cancelled. We’ve been wondering if it was ever going to come out and okay, it looks like it’s not. But along with the layoffs at Rare, you can see this over on VGC. Greg Males, who’s Rare’s most experienced and influential game designer, will leave the company after more than 35 years. I mean, guys, we’re going back to the the N64 days, even before that. Like, it’s oh, it rare. We know that they’re like the Sea of Thieves studio now, which hey, if you’re a Sea of Thieves fan, that’s great. You’re pretty happy with them. I’m sure I’m sure there are many of us who also remember the old days of Rare and seeing them now, it’s like kind of kind of stale. I don’t know what if Ever Wilds was going to be good. I I assume because it’s getting cancelceled, there were things going on in the background that we’re not privy to that it wasn’t working out organiz like from the organization side or the development side. But at least it would have been rare doing something different. And when you have Phil Spencer on record five months ago, I think on the Xbox era podcast saying that he’s very happy with what was going on at Rare, just played Ever Wild, he’s like, “This is great.” Then here we are 5 months later in July and they’re the game’s canceled and a chunk of Rare is being laid off and then you have like the veterans there leaving after 35 years. Not a great look for Microsoft for Xbox or for Rare. And I think that’s been the biggest takeaway for me right now is it it does feel like Microsoft and Xbox are such disarray. It doesn’t feel like they have a great direction. and maybe they turn it all around when they show us what their vision is for the future and the next generation Xbox, but right now we’re just kind of in limbo. They’re clearly done with the Xbox series with the way that they’ve priced it and how the sales have been for that console and that platform. They’re still releasing games for it clearly, but they they have their sights set on whatever their next endeavor is with the the Xbox Series X or whatever they call it. So, that’s kind of where we are. We’re just sort of in this wait and see time period and maybe it is end of 2026 and we’ll see that. But just right now they seem very scatterbrained and if it really does feel like a tugof-war within Microsoft between kind of the business side with like Sati Nadella and and CFOs and stuff and Phil Spencer and the gaming side with Sarah Bond. So hey, we’ll see as we go along here, especially towards their next generation push, but it was not a good week for Microsoft and certainly many of the developers within those studios. And in our last bit of news, let’s talk about Sony, Mark Cerny, AMD, and their push towards their own next generation endeavor, which we assume is the PlayStation 6. As of now though, they are certainly talking a lot about the PS5 Pro and its upgrade for next year in 2026, which we can see this was posted. This is over on Tom’s Guide, who was able to sit down and talk with not only representatives of AMD, but also Mark Cerny. And this was about Project Amethyst, which that was unveiled late last year in that Mark Cerny PS5 Pro technical seminar. It was like right at the end. And as is described here by Tom’s guide, it’s basically a fancy word for AMD and Sony team to work together on building better machine learning algorithms and uh com convolutional neural networks for improving game graphics. Cernney claims he expected Project Amethyst to take years to generate a significantly better upscaling algorithm and was surprised when the team did it in roughly 9 months, which kind of explains why they went with PSSR and then all of a sudden they’re like, “Oh yeah, next year in 2026, yeah, you know, we’re we’re going to go with uh FSR for it’s just it’s very very good. We’re going to bake that into PSSR and that’s kind of our move because as he mentions nine months here to get it done at least to get to a point where it’s significantly better upscaling algorithm.” So sure sort of makes sense almost what looks like a shift in plans but he goes on to say the algorithm they come up with could be implemented on current generation hardware. So the codeveloped algorithm has already been released by AMD as part of FSR4 on PC and we’re in the process of implementing it on PS5 and it will be released next year on PS5 Pro. AMD is moving extremely quickly. Cerny said what I’m trying to do is prepare for the next generation of consoles. So, my time frame is multi-year here. And that’s that’s the other big thing is AMD naturally is moving quickly because they have a wide range of video cards to support and they I’m sure have a road map where they would like to release some video cards before the PS6 comes out, which based on some of our time frames and what he’s saying here, multi-year, I do think is 2028, but I guess it could be late 2027. Look, the PS5 could go to 2030. I think people would be just fine with that right now because it’s been a slower roll out of just releases from Sony’s first party big first party studios that are specific to the PS5 and not really PS4 design games that are then moved up to PS5. So, I I think right now there’s no hurry for the PS6. And if he can take multi-year time frame to just make a better system when the time comes, which hey, 2030 is 10 years, you know, like at that point, I think most people go, “Yeah, that makes sense. I’ve gotten 10 years out of this launch PS5. What’s next for me with the PS?” And that’s going to be the big question. What is next? Because would a big jump in graphical fidelity really sell it? I don’t necessarily know about that. But I guess we’ll see what they have for us. Starting with the PS5 Pro next year when they push this new FSR4 PSSR enabled upscaler. And before we go to the comment of the day, we’ll take a look at the poll that I posted up yesterday where I ask, “Do you currently own an Xbox Series console?” 59% say no. 41% though say yes. Okay, so we’re it’s 6040 essentially here. All right. And I do see some people in the comments are like, “Yeah, I use my Xbox Series.” And a lot of it is for backwards compatibility right now because that is the one thing that I think most people can agree on. Microsoft has done a very good job with backwards compatibility clearly over Nintendo or or Sony. I mean they go back to the original Xbox on the Xbox series with select titles. And that is one of the big pushes they have right now going to next generation is they’re going to work to have this Windows Xbox OS that can play a lot of your older Xbox games you play now, but on newer hardware and on PC and on gaming handhelds. Then it starts to click together a bit more, I think, for people from the convenience side and even the legacy side to be able to go back and play an original Xbox game on your new PC. That that’s stuff that would be kind of interesting to actually see work in person in front of you. That also seems like something very difficult to pull off. So, we’ll we’ll see again as we go into I think next year because yeah, it wouldn’t shock me if Microsoft does try to make the move one maybe even two years ahead of Sony. And we’ll finish up with the comment of the day as you’re seeing here. This is from Praise the Oak says already at 840K signatures. That being for stop killing games um with the for the the EU UK that already reaches goal is being mentioned here. Come on, let’s push it way beyond 1 million, 1.2 2 million, 1.5 million. If they just get it past a million, which last I checked, at the time of this recording, it was just over 900,000 signatures. You get past a million, then it’ll be put in front of lawmakers and government officials, that kind of thing, to discuss it, to figure out if it is something they should be spending their time on because, wow, a million people decided to sign this. It must be a big thing. Here’s the issue, though. Okay, so I get there is a lot of this this YouTube drama stuff going on around it, but as soon as it crosses that 1 million mark, it it’s time to professional up around this, okay? Because this is an actual shot at something of for consumer rights with gaming and the digital side and maybe even take a little control away from these big publishers that certainly want you to get used to not owning your games. So, my advice there is realize who you’re putting this in front of. And I think a cursed farms also kind of uh mentioned this and was like, I don’t know, you’re going to have a lot of people or older, you know, older law officials and stuff in in these places of power looking at this. At first, they’re going to see video games. I’m like, uh, game, we really got to talk about gaming right now. Fine, bring it in. And then they’re going to see videos that are about uh what looks like drama and spats back and forth and stuff. So to me, once it gets past the million, laser focus, right, on on what it’s about, professional up and uh make a change with this. This this could be really really big just for the future of gaming. And I hope it really works out when it gets in front of some of these lawmakers. And ladies and gentlemen, that’s going to do it here for Newswe. If you enjoyed this video, guys, hit that like button. If not, hit the dislike. Leave comments down below about everything we talked about here today. If you missed yesterday’s Newsweek, I’ll leave it up here in a card. Or maybe you want to hear more about the situation with Xbox and them cancelling things like Perfect Dark and shutting down the Initiative. I did I did a reaction video to all of that as it was happening. I’ll leave that right below it. Thanks guys for watching and I’ll see you next