Key Note Gaming

I thought it’d just be a simple sidequest. The owner of an apothecary enlisted my help to find his lost grandson, who had been taken by wolves. As I followed the trail, I heard a screeching noise from up above. All of a sudden I’m in a battle for my life against a Griffin. It’s a monster that’s far too strong for my party to handle, but we fight and claw and hold our ground until we finally get it to retreat. I breathe a sigh of relief, then set up at the nearby camp and sleep till nightfall. That sleep is interrupted by the same Griffin, back for revenge. That fight somehow boils over into another battle with a Wight, who proceeds to beat me within an inch of my life before I finally take him out, just as the sun rises, after an epic 20-minute battle. None of this was part of the actual quest involving saving the boy. It was just a series of events that cascaded into one of the most unforgettable encounters I’ve had in an open-world action-RPG. And it was just one of the incredibl...

Microsoft has become the second company ever to achieve a $3 trillion market valuation, closing at the market cap for the first time today just after it laid of 1900 workers from its gaming divisions. It first crossed the $3 trillion mark yesterday, but dipped back below before close of markets before climbing again and closing at $3.01 trillion today, or $404.87 per share. It's the second company ever to reach this milestone, after Apple, which achieved it in December of last year and has since been vying with Microsoft for the moniker of most valuable company on Wall Street. As The Verge notes , much of the hype around Microsoft stock has come from a recent dedication to AI announcements, with numerous new product announcements bolstering the stock significantly from week to week. This triumph of stock occurs on the same day that Microsoft laid off 1900 workers from its gaming division, in some ways a massive ripple effect from the company's $69 billion acquisition of Ac...

Note: This review is specifically for the version of Palworld available on Xbox and through the Microsoft Store on PC . If you haven’t seen our review of the Steam version , go check that out first! Nearly everything we said there still applies to this review, which will instead focus specifically on what’s different with this version. Palworld has taken the world by storm! And with good reason: shooting cartoon animals with assault weapons then forcing them to mine ore for you all day is alarmingly fun. But those playing on the Xbox and Microsoft Store versions that are widely accessible through Game Pass have been treated to a noticeably different experience – one I’ve seen firsthand after playing over 50 hours on Xbox since wrapping up my time with the far more polished Steam version. Unfortunately the Xbox build has quite a few additional bugs and performance issues, a missing feature here and there, and multiplayer that’s limited to just four players with no option for dedic...

Almost four years after being removed from the App Store , Epic Games has announced it is bringing back the iOS version of Fortnite, but this will only be available for countries in the European Union (EU). Remember Fortnite on iOS? How bout we bring that back. Later this year Fortnite will return in Europe on iOS through the @EpicGames Store. (shoutout DMA - an important new law in the EU making this possible). @Apple , the world is watching. pic.twitter.com/VdHWTe8i1c — Fortnite (@FortniteGame) January 25, 2024 A new post on the official Fortnite X/Twitter account reveals that the popular free-to-play battle royale will be released on iOS via the Epic Games Store. This will be made possible for two reasons: Apple announced today that it has updated its App Store policies to appease EU regulators. Most notably, iPhone users in that region can download apps from third-party app stores under the revised EU app store policy. Apple partly revised these app store policies tha...

The development team behind Blizzard's now-cancelled survival game , reportedly called Odyssey , is seemingly among the teams dramatically impacted by the layoffs at Microsoft today. According to multiple former team members posting on Twitter, the team is among the 1,900 employees impacted by the mass layoffs at Microsoft's gaming division , which comes after the company's $69 billion acquisition of Activision Blizzard and the departure of CEO Bobby Kotick last year. Mike Ybarra, who announced his decision to leave his position as President of Blizzard Entertainment, previously said that Odyssey's development team doubled in 2022 , with plans to grow further. Now, the game is not only cancelled, but seemingly a significant portion of the team that had been working on it for six years has been let go. IGN has reached out to Xbox for clarification on how much of the team was impacted. Several developers from the project took to Twitter/X to express their grief o...

Earlier this evening, The Pokémon Company issued a press release seemingly addressing the recent conversation surrounding the new Steam Early Access release Palworld and its suspiciously familiar-looking collectible creatures.  “We have received many inquiries regarding another company’s game released in January 2024,” the company states. “We have not granted any permission for the use of Pokémon intellectual property or assets in that game. We intend to investigate and take appropriate measures to address any acts that infringe on intellectual property rights related to the Pokémon.” While The Pokémon Company doesn’t explicitly name Palworld or its developer, Pocketpair, in its statement, we presume it’s investigating the record-setting Steam title based on the specified release window and recent controversies surrounding the game’s alleged infringement of Pokémon IP.  “We will continue to cherish and nurture each and every Pokémon and its world, and work to bring the w...

The Pokemon Company has finally made an official statement regarding Palworld, saying, "We intend to investigate and take appropriate measures to address any acts that infringe on intellectual property rights related to the Pokémon." While The Pokemon Company doesn't specifically mention Palworld by name, it is very clear this statement is in response to the incredible success the survival game is experiencing (8 million copies sold in less than six days!) and the claims that many of Palworld's Pals are way too close to existing Pokemon. "We have received many inquiries regarding another company’s game released in January 2024," The Pokemon Company wrote. "We have not granted any permission for the use of Pokémon intellectual property or assets in that game. We intend to investigate and take appropriate measures to address any acts that infringe on intellectual property rights related to the Pokémon. We will continue to cherish and nurture each an...