A recent CS2 Case Tracker report for 2023 revealed that Counter-Strike case sales alone generated over $1 billion USD for Valve. Players opened over 400 million cases, spending $980 million USD, with additional revenue from Steam’s market transactions likely pushed earnings past $1 billion. Oof.

Palworld, the viral survival Pokémon-like has released in early access and immediately taken Steam by storm, surpassing lifetime player count peaks of games like Cyberpunk 2077 and Elden Ring. Over four million copies have been sold, and over one million concurrent players were playing in its first three days.

11 bit studios have unveiled a gameplay preview of Frostpunk 2 - announced in 2021, it follows the 2018 survival city-builder, set in an alternative late 19th-century volcanic winter. The sequel, 30 years later, introduces district creation, impactful laws, and new threats. Absolutely love the tone, styling and UI here.

13 year old Willis Gibson, who goes by Blue Scuti, has done what once thought impossible - reaching level 157 and crashing NES Tetris. aGameScout has a great video explaining the history and tech behind this achievement. Watch the full run here. Legendary.

The Steam Awards 2023 have concluded and winners announced. BG3, Lethal Company, Sifu and a couple of others make sense, but the usual popularity-contest voting has revealed the problem with this format (again). Starfield ‘most innovative’ after having been universally panned as dated, and RDR2 as ‘labour of love’ after having not received an update in years. Righto!

Prepare your wallets, the Steam Winter Sale is here. Baldur’s Gate 3 gets its first discount, and Elden Ring is 40% off, so if you’ve yet to jump into these must play titles, now’s the time. Voting has also opened for the 2023 Steam Awards, so be sure to tick that off too (let’s go Yomi Hustle!).

As discovered by a sleuth on Reddit, and soon thereafter seemingly confirmed by a (since removed) tshirt store listing, Hideo Kojima is partnering with A24 on a live action Death Stranding film. Details about the adaptation remain undisclosed, but Kojima has previously stated that if this were to ever happen, he would be deeply involved in production. Absolutely no idea how this would work, and not super keen on it given how much of the point of the game - moreso than most, IMO - is… you know, the player interacting with it, but we’ll see! Update: Confirmation and more info has been provided by Kojima Productions.

ESA ends E3 after 28 years, citing waning interest - despite an attempted revival, the 2023 event was canceled. Their statement emphasises ESA’s ongoing commitment to industry advocacy, but the once iconic gaming showcase itself has reached its final chapter. Thanks for the memories indeed.

After only four days, The Day Before has been removed from Steam after becoming one of the platforms worst reviewed releases. If that wasn’t stunning enough, the studio behind it, FNTASTIC, has announced their complete, immediate closure and CEO Eduard Gotovtsev’s social accounts are seemingly wiped clean. Publisher Mytona are managing refunds. Colossal oof.

As previously mentioned, 2023 was rough for game devs, but there’s no denying it was a remarkable year for releases. So given all the amazing new games I played this year, it says even more about how special Baldur’s Gate 3 was - because when it came time to think about GOTY, it was not even close. BG3 is an incredibly special, once in a generation game the likes of which we likely won’t see again for some time.