🚨📢 BREAKING NEWS: Applovin Record Revenue, More Layoffs, EvE online sold back

Never been more confident in the future of our game after [laughter] cutting staff, but need to scale back our team to better align with where we are in development. Sure. Two and a Half Gamers exclusive. [music] Breaking news. Literally [music] breaking. Hello, hello. This is again Two and a Half Gamers breaking news. Let's jump right into it. AppLovin posts record Q1 earnings, which are revenue 1.84 billion, which is up like 25% year-over-year, and with margin of 85% net income more than doubled. And they are expected to post even more in the next quarter. So, yeah, AppLovin is still killing it after all those

recent attacks. So, let's see what happens next here. And then we continue our corporate giants circle with Microsoft, which just killed gaming co-pilot for consoles. So, yeah, Asha Sharma, the new Xbox chief, is continuing [music] to cut off stuff that she seems is not really up to standard. And yeah, they're just trying to change it, change it, change it. So, let's see what goes afterwards. It's quite ironic, by the way, that an AI person is now cutting AI initiatives. Okay, lays off staff working on free-to-play shooter Project Echelon. The best part of this announcement is literally the catch phrase, "Never been more confident in the future of our game after cutting staff, but need to scale back our team to better align with where we are in development." Sure. Okay, real talk before we start. This episode is brought to you by Potensic. And if you're a mobile game publisher tired of leaving

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supposed to be some kind of PvP rogue-like experience shooter. Rogue-like hero shooter, yeah. I guess so. Let's see. I haven't really seen that much good mobile games coming from 2K. Uh Unity also reports its Q1 revenue, which rises by 17% to something like 508 million. But also on the other hand, it posts a 347 million loss, especially because it's closing its closed ironSource ad network and of course divesting from Supersonic, the mobile publisher. Then we have CCP Games rebrands as Fenris Creations following a sale of Pearl Abyss. This is This is This is extremely good for the CEO, cuz let me just redo the numbers. So, Google is also part of this deal because actually what's happening at that like Eve Online

basically, uh if you didn't know, the the CCP Games, the guys from the small island Iceland basically, and they are partnering with Google, specifically Google DeepMind, where Google actually get a stake in the company. But, the thing is, and this is really interesting, Pearl Abyss, maybe you know Crimson Desert, the big PC RPG, is selling the studio back to its CEO for 100 million plus 20 million in cryptocurrency. But, Pearl Abyss acquired CCP Games in 2018 for 225 million in cash plus 200 million performance-related payouts. So, yeah. Um if you're the CEO and you still wanted to be the CEO since the only that this is a great deal, it's not so good for Pearl Abyss. Let's see. And then we have Supercell acquiring Metacore. Yeah, this has been talked to that on LinkedIn. So, yeah, pretty much Metacore is being

kind of Metacourt. Because the thing is that they're not only acquiring it, they're also firing around 160 people, which means that something like 30% of Metacore remains, I guess. And yeah, guys, merge category is pretty much dominated by Chinese now. It's either Micro Fun or Century with Tasty Travels or all these other Chinese games that are there. Yeah, I don't I see this as a mission of defeat basically. Then we continue with Griffin Gaming Partners launching 100 million indie Defund by Hooded Horse CEO Tim Bender. Indies are still one of the main, let's say, green spots in the industry if you count the ones that actually make it and [music] you don't count the ones that didn't make it. And what's interesting is here that it should be more of a rev share model instead of taking an equity stake as per usual kind of financing. So, let's see where this leads. Guess somebody will be making even more

friends up. Another surprising news yet just on Thursday, which is that Free Cash returns to Google Play after policy review. Free Cash being the reward that UA platform by Alameda is back after the removal over concerns on data practices marketing tactics where the app was pulled both from Google Play and App Store Apple's App Store. Yeah, Alameda basically says the new report statement that the the report contained inaccurate and misleading claims. Yeah, and they're back. So, I guess let's see how much time until they actually are back at Apple, which [music] I'm guessing will happen also soon. Wizards of the Coast declines to recognize MTG Arena union workers say NLRB election results. Yeah, so Americans and unions doesn't really work well even though there's like 30K people public petition backing the union. Yeah, Wizards of the Coast you don't know it like I have behind Magic the Gathering. So, yeah, people unionize there. I guess

not in America. And then this is like the most surprising news of the week. GameStop, if you remember GameStop the the thing that was reselling games, submits a 55 billion bid to acquire eBay. And the killer is that the again, the bid is 55 billion the current like estimated value of GameStop. Sorry, 11 billion, which is four times less. And the question is follow the money because nobody seems to know where they will actually get this giant pile of cash because it's supposed to be 50% cash and 50% stock. So, let's see how this resolves because yeah, it's going to be an thing. Anyway, that was it for the week. Quite a short one. Let's see what brings the next one. See you in the meantime. Ciao.