Liam Deane
@liamdeane.bsky.social
Games analyst at Omdia doing market research on the games industry development and technology ecosystem. Once Cork, now Amsterdam.
I regret to announce that the Americans are at it again
Let my gravestone read "PUNCTUATION GOES INSIDE THE QUOTATION MARKS."
November 10, 2025 at 5:27 PM
I regret to announce that the Americans are at it again
Just realised why Hades II's combat is so much more satisfying than every other game around at the moment: no parry mechanic
November 8, 2025 at 4:57 PM
Just realised why Hades II's combat is so much more satisfying than every other game around at the moment: no parry mechanic
Excellent use here of the journalistic "amid" to imply a link between any two events that happen at roughly the same time
Amid confirmation that GTA 6 really has been delayed again, we have word that Rockstar's Red Dead Redemption 2 has become the fourth best-selling game of all time.
Red Dead Redemption 2 Now the Fourth Best-Selling Video Game of All Time
bit.ly
November 7, 2025 at 11:07 PM
Excellent use here of the journalistic "amid" to imply a link between any two events that happen at roughly the same time
Wake up, babe. New heresy's just dropped.
Mary was not co-redeemer, Vatican says amid spread of cult of the Madonna
Pope Leo approves decree saying co-redeemer title risks eclipsing exclusive role of Jesus in saving humanity
www.theguardian.com
November 7, 2025 at 8:22 AM
Wake up, babe. New heresy's just dropped.
Even as a fairly seasoned grand strategy hand it's hard not agree with a lot of this.
People keep saying that Paradox tutorials are good now. This is a lie. They are terrible.
People keep saying that Paradox tutorials are good now. This is a lie. They are terrible.
Europa Universalis 5 keeps putting me to sleep, but I really wish it didn't
Paradox Interactive? Here's a bloody paradox for you! I love the idea of grand strategy games, perhaps more than I can …
www.eurogamer.net
November 6, 2025 at 10:34 AM
Even as a fairly seasoned grand strategy hand it's hard not agree with a lot of this.
People keep saying that Paradox tutorials are good now. This is a lie. They are terrible.
People keep saying that Paradox tutorials are good now. This is a lie. They are terrible.
Solution to climate change: abolish all physical objects
A new study has found that buying physical copies of games is "100 times more carbon-intensive" than buying the digital version
www.gamesindustry.biz/manufacture-...
www.gamesindustry.biz/manufacture-...
Manufacture and shipping of physical games is "100 times more carbon-intensive" than digital, new study finds
Data from French carbon accounting firm Greenly also finds handheld gaming may be the greenest option for players
www.gamesindustry.biz
November 4, 2025 at 12:55 PM
Solution to climate change: abolish all physical objects
For reasons that seemed to make sense at the time I wrote a thesis about this and the answer is: yes
do you die each time you go through a transporter
November 1, 2025 at 9:17 PM
For reasons that seemed to make sense at the time I wrote a thesis about this and the answer is: yes
This is true. Usually cutting jobs is hard to sell to investors because it looks like a sign of failure. "We don't need these jobs because of AI" is a way of covering your ass while sounding forward-looking.
so many companies say they are replacing people - laying them off - with automated systems, AI. but there has been no real auditing or regulatory approach to vetting such claims. i am deeply skeptical. think a lotta the cuts are just due to failures to sell or cut costs & prior over hiring.
October 29, 2025 at 4:44 PM
This is true. Usually cutting jobs is hard to sell to investors because it looks like a sign of failure. "We don't need these jobs because of AI" is a way of covering your ass while sounding forward-looking.
What is the actual principle people are trying to defend here? "Oh it's just traditional ML not AI, that's fine" What are you talking about?
This seems fine? It’s definitely a different voice but it doesn’t sound like AI to me. There’s reporting that they brought the Chief/Cortana actors back to redo all the lines, and the article that seems to be the source of the AI claims was updated with a retraction.
thegamepost.com/insider-halo...
thegamepost.com/insider-halo...
October 24, 2025 at 11:48 PM
What is the actual principle people are trying to defend here? "Oh it's just traditional ML not AI, that's fine" What are you talking about?
I presume they weren't *trying* to simulate a hallucinogenic experience here but that's sure as hell what they got
Oh my god some fucking tech dingdong posted this on Twitter with the caption "AI games are going to be amazing" totally seriously, you have to watch it. You have to. In full screen.
October 24, 2025 at 3:28 PM
I presume they weren't *trying* to simulate a hallucinogenic experience here but that's sure as hell what they got
I have some sympathy for the "whiny babies" argument (some of these people really are whiny babies) but really this is a pretty weird way of looking at things. You can't just berate the audience into paying more.
AAA video games should cost $100 on launch. this would still be extremely cheap for the amount of time and enjoyment you get out of them! But an audience of whiny babies has kept them literally at the same price for *two decades* despite both general inflation *and* sector-specific costs rising
October 24, 2025 at 1:08 PM
I have some sympathy for the "whiny babies" argument (some of these people really are whiny babies) but really this is a pretty weird way of looking at things. You can't just berate the audience into paying more.
Including some of my thoughts on the Xbox thoughts on the Xbox profitability story. While "profit margins" for business units are sort of fake, this story does underscore how the games business will always struggle to deliver to kinds of profits that Microsoft is used to.
Report: Microsoft's demand for higher Xbox profits may be behind layoffs, price increases
Report: Microsoft's demand for higher Xbox profits may be behind layoffs, price increases
A demand to hit 30 percent in profit margins may explain Xbox's year of layoffs, cancelations, and price increases.
www.gamedeveloper.com
October 23, 2025 at 3:44 PM
Including some of my thoughts on the Xbox thoughts on the Xbox profitability story. While "profit margins" for business units are sort of fake, this story does underscore how the games business will always struggle to deliver to kinds of profits that Microsoft is used to.
Is the games industry profitable? Yes, and has been throughout the entire recent layoff wave. But profit margins did slide dramatically post-covid as costs shot up but revenue didn't keep pace. Margins have recovered since then, mostly thanks to reduced personnel costs.
October 23, 2025 at 1:31 PM
Is the games industry profitable? Yes, and has been throughout the entire recent layoff wave. But profit margins did slide dramatically post-covid as costs shot up but revenue didn't keep pace. Margins have recovered since then, mostly thanks to reduced personnel costs.
The American mind cannot comprehend a nice train
October 22, 2025 at 5:58 PM
The American mind cannot comprehend a nice train
Would be interesting the trace the relationship between the Japanese tourism boom and the emergence of a bunch of Western-made games set in Japan
October 22, 2025 at 2:08 PM
Would be interesting the trace the relationship between the Japanese tourism boom and the emergence of a bunch of Western-made games set in Japan
Today in Americans Forgetting the Rest of the World Exists.
Can't believe that a structural shift that has happened in every other Western democracy would also happen in America. Guess it must be due to some highly specific domestic factors.
Can't believe that a structural shift that has happened in every other Western democracy would also happen in America. Guess it must be due to some highly specific domestic factors.
Today’s episode of The Ezra Klein Show.
The Rural Power Behind Trump’s Assault on Blue Cities
The political scientist @smettler.bsky.social examines the roots of America’s urban-rural divide and how Democrats can win back rural voters.
open.spotify.com/episode/2zQ9...
youtu.be/M9bjypc1rS4?...
The Rural Power Behind Trump’s Assault on Blue Cities
The political scientist @smettler.bsky.social examines the roots of America’s urban-rural divide and how Democrats can win back rural voters.
open.spotify.com/episode/2zQ9...
youtu.be/M9bjypc1rS4?...
Why Rural America Turned on the Democratic Party | The Ezra Klein Show
YouTube video by The Ezra Klein Show
youtu.be
October 22, 2025 at 9:26 AM
Today in Americans Forgetting the Rest of the World Exists.
Can't believe that a structural shift that has happened in every other Western democracy would also happen in America. Guess it must be due to some highly specific domestic factors.
Can't believe that a structural shift that has happened in every other Western democracy would also happen in America. Guess it must be due to some highly specific domestic factors.
Ubisoft now takes 5 years to make an Assassin's Creed game when they used to churn out one a year. Covid didn't help but it's clearly pretty marginal to the bigger picture here.
Food for thought... There's a lot of talk about speeding up game development, given how many recent games took 5-7 years to make. But many of those were hampered by the switch from Unreal 4 to 5. And ALL of them lost months to covid. Perhaps one way to make games faster is to not have a pandemic
October 21, 2025 at 8:11 PM
Ubisoft now takes 5 years to make an Assassin's Creed game when they used to churn out one a year. Covid didn't help but it's clearly pretty marginal to the bigger picture here.
This guy is to me the prime example of Twitter being dangerous for your brain. He's been frog-boiled from normie centrism into fascism without even noticing.
October 18, 2025 at 10:23 PM
This guy is to me the prime example of Twitter being dangerous for your brain. He's been frog-boiled from normie centrism into fascism without even noticing.
Teleportation is murder
Do you have any extremely niche, but serious, ethical stances?
October 17, 2025 at 3:23 PM
Teleportation is murder
Having a familiarity with the Ikea product range really ruins your enjoyment of Airbnbs
October 7, 2025 at 5:17 PM
Having a familiarity with the Ikea product range really ruins your enjoyment of Airbnbs
I've never seen Scarface which is weird because I like mob movies.
But it increasingly feels like my biggest generation-specific hole might be never having seen any Studio Ghibli film (which five years ago I'd heard of).
But it increasingly feels like my biggest generation-specific hole might be never having seen any Studio Ghibli film (which five years ago I'd heard of).
Inspired by a post I just saw in which someone admitted they hadn’t seen a single episode of Friends nor the film Love Actually… what cultural hole do you have that’s a bit weird for your generation?
I’ll go first: I haven’t seen Dirty Dancing.
I’ll go first: I haven’t seen Dirty Dancing.
October 5, 2025 at 6:27 PM
I've never seen Scarface which is weird because I like mob movies.
But it increasingly feels like my biggest generation-specific hole might be never having seen any Studio Ghibli film (which five years ago I'd heard of).
But it increasingly feels like my biggest generation-specific hole might be never having seen any Studio Ghibli film (which five years ago I'd heard of).
*guy firing up Astro Bot*
Great, another brutal tale of betrayal and vengeance
Great, another brutal tale of betrayal and vengeance
After Ghost of Yotei's tale of revenge and grief, is it about time PS5 exclusives got some new ideas?
I’m Getting Bored of Every PlayStation Game Telling the Same Story
bit.ly
October 5, 2025 at 10:10 AM
*guy firing up Astro Bot*
Great, another brutal tale of betrayal and vengeance
Great, another brutal tale of betrayal and vengeance
Yes, finding good non-mainstream games is hard and that's a problem. But it's a problem that exists just as much for other media as it does for games, and if you're not at least aware that serious games *exist* then sorry you're just incredibly incurious.
Seems to me that the fact that interested people can’t find games they find interesting and maybe don’t even know they exist is (a) obvs true so dunking on it is dumb and (b) a massive fucking problem for the artform that the corporate sector of the industry has no interest *at all* in solving
September 30, 2025 at 1:44 PM
Yes, finding good non-mainstream games is hard and that's a problem. But it's a problem that exists just as much for other media as it does for games, and if you're not at least aware that serious games *exist* then sorry you're just incredibly incurious.
Roughly half of the games market is fairly financially transparent in that it's made up of publicly traded companies that mainly or exclusively produce games and so have to publish fairly detailed information about their revenue, costs, headcount, etc.
September 30, 2025 at 8:12 AM
Roughly half of the games market is fairly financially transparent in that it's made up of publicly traded companies that mainly or exclusively produce games and so have to publish fairly detailed information about their revenue, costs, headcount, etc.
Easy to forget for those of immersed in games that plenty of people out there are still asking incredibly tedious questions like this
(honest question) what are the “good” video games? artistically i mean, not in a “i enjoyed this escapist slop” kind of way
Well. It's not Red Dead Redemption 2, but it's like one of three video games I'd genuinely consider good.
September 30, 2025 at 6:46 AM
Easy to forget for those of immersed in games that plenty of people out there are still asking incredibly tedious questions like this