I'm a person who is always dreaming up new worlds - Mac Walters, Mass Effect writer

Hey there!

A teenage prodigy is designing an exclusive game for the PS5. When I was 13, all I was able to design were love letters for the cutie in the 3^rd row.

Mods are officially coming to Starfield and a lot of games are launching this week.

Let us power-up you.

Welcome to The Power-Up #1

Round-up of the day

🥽 According to Nash Weedle, an usually-accurate leaker, Nintendo could work with Google on a VR headset. This device, which already would exist as a prototype, would be independent of Switch 2.

👦 Max Trest, a 13-year-old developer, is working on an exclusive game for PS5. named Astrolander. The game is set to launch next year and is already available for wishlisting on the PS Store. “Action-packed local co-op game featuring dramatic cinematics, intense action, and lush levels” – is his description of the game.

👻 Since its launch in 2020, Ghostrunner has sold over 2.5 million units. Reminder: Ghostrunner 2 will launch on October 26 for PS5, Xbox Series X/S and PC.

🔥 Stalker 2's developer, GSC Game World, recently experienced another setback. A fire broke out at its Prague office, causing significant damage to one of its three floors and potentially affecting backup servers. No one was hurt in the fire, and an investigation is underway. The team had moved to Prague last year following the Russian invasion of Ukraine and has also experienced multiple hacks and leaks.

🏢 Once again, the Chrysler Building will be absent from Marvel's Spider-Man 2, as the developers couldn't come to terms with the copyright holders of the building. The building appeared in Spider-Man (2018), but after changing owners, it was not featured in Spider-Man: Miles Morales.

🗡️ Gotham Knights has been rated for the Nintendo Switch, meaning the game will be coming to Nintendo's hybrid platform in the near future. 

💰 Mystic Games CEO Matthew Buxton criticized the existing Web3 gaming landscape for focusing too much on financial vehicles and not enough on creating engaging experiences, in an interview about the challenges and potential of Web3 gaming. Their new mobile game, Call of the VoYd, aims to properly integrate Web3 elements like verifiable rare items without compromising gameplay quality.

Biz Reel

📌 GameStop's Q2 2023 financial results show $1.164 billion in net sales, a 2% year-on-year increase, and a net loss of $2.8 million, significantly less than the $108.7 million loss in Q2 2022.

📌 After 7 years at Epic Games (and 25 years in the industry), Fortnite boss Donald Mustard is retiring. Before founding Chair Entertainment with his brother Geremy and creating hits like Shadow Complex and the Infinity Blade series, he worked at GlyphX Games on Advent Rising; he later became Chief Creative Officer at Epic Games after it acquired Chair in 2008.

📌 Motorsport Games announced that Dmitry Kozko, the former CEO, has stepped down from the board. The announcement follows the company's loss in several employee lawsuits over unpaid wages, but it's unclear if his resignation is connected to these legal setbacks.

📌 Simulation games generated $2.7 billion in the first half of this year, marking a 72% increase from 2019 and surpassing pre-pandemic revenue levels. If this spending pace persists, 2023 is on track to become the most profitable year ever for simulation games.

📌 Huuuge Games (Huuuge Casino, Billionaire Casino) saw a 13.76% drop in first-half 2023 revenue to $140.934 million, but experienced a dramatic 123.71% increase in operating profit to $48.902 million compared to the same period in 2022.

📌 Johannes Mang, with 21 years of industry experience including leadership roles at Electronic Arts, joins Rovio Stockholm as head of studio.

Game Central

🎮 Roblox will come to PS4 and PS5 in October 2023. A full release on Meta's VR platform Quest was also announced. Roblox has more than 60 million players a day, according to the firm, but it has come under criticism over concerns about poor moderation of its content, as we said in a previous newsletter.

🎮 Meanwhile, the company showcased upcoming games Playgrounds Basketball, Eternal Heroes, and Skullbeat at its San Francisco developer conference, with funding from its $35 million Roblox Game Fund to support innovative developers.

🎮 A Singapore rating indicates the forthcoming release of Horizon Forbidden West Complete Edition, which will bundle the main game with its Burning Shores DLC.

🎮 Todd Howard has confirmed that officially supported mods will be coming to the Starfield ecosystem in 2024, when modders will get access to the Creation Kit, which is Bethesda’s official toolset for creating complicated mods in its games.

🎮 A rumor says that the next Mass Effect won’t be an open world game, like Andromeda was, but will return to the more linear structure of the original trilogy.

🎮 Some of the games launching this week (we bolded the games we’re interested in):

• September 12 – Eternights (PS4/5, Xbox One/S/X, PC)

• September 13 – Gunbrella (Switch, PC), Super Bomberman R 2 (PC, PS4/5, Xbox One/S/X, Switch)

• September 14 – Dune: Spice World (PC), Monster Hunter Now (iOS, Android), The Crew Motorfest (PS4/5, Xbox One/S/X, PC)

• September 15 - Nascar Arcade Rush (PS4/5, Xbox One/S/X, Switch, PC), Mortal Kombat 1 – early access for Premium Edition (PS5, Xbox S/X, Switch, PC)

That’s it for today. Thanks for reading. Stay powered-up until next time.

Bobby & Andrei