Tencent, the sprawling multinational that spent years gobbling up studios like Riot Games and Techland while investing in others including Ubisoft, Remedy, and FromSoftware, has chastized itself for becoming a passenger during 2023.
As reported by Reuters, Tencent CEO and co-founder Pony Ma indicated the company has been coasting along while its major competitors have been rolling out global hits.
Speaking at the company’s annual meeting, Ma reiterated that video games remain Tencent’s flagship business but suggested the company “achieved nothing” in the market over the past year.
“Gaming is our flagship business […] but in the past year, we have faced significant challenges. We have found ourselves at a loss as our competitors continue to produce new products, leaving us feeling having achieved nothing,” he said.
Tencent playing “catchup” on AI
Ma added that some of Tencent’s latest releases have failed to meet internal expectations, but didn’t specify which titles underwhelmed. He also suggested the company was until recently playing catch-up when it comes to AI tech, but is now able to “follow the pace” of leading rivals.
Ma said Tencent should be focused on leveraging its own ‘Hunyuan’ generative AI model across various businesses. It’s unclear if that means the company’s internal game studios will be encouraged to lean on the technology.
Tencent has been grappling with tightening playtime and spending regulations in China, resulting in the company investing in more western studios. In 2023 alone, Tencent became the majority shareholder of Dying Light maker Techland, sunk cash into new startups like Lighthouse Games, and led a $10 million investment into fitness game maker Quell.
More recently, however, Tencent subsidiary Riot Games laid off 530 workers after claiming it scaled up too quickly and overreached with a number of “big bets.”
I have an idea to help more people play our games! Let’s put a kernel-level anti-cheat on them so nobody who uses linux can play them anymore! Oh wait…
Not sure Linux gamers make a big enough amount of buyers to care about… but I’m not running a game with a kernel-level anti-cheat on Windows either. Not even if it didn’t come from a Chinese-controlled company.
There’s “not caring about” them and there’s “making it so people who could play before now can’t”. You’re purposely shrinking your active user base while simultaneously shutting out a growing segment of the market. In the name of a feature that’s arguably not even effective at its goal.
So you don’t play multiplayer titles? Almost every more or less competitive multiplayer game uses kernel-level EAC or BattleEye. At least on Linux they only run in userspace, if the dev allows it.
But I agree, no proprietary program gets root access on my system (except drivers, firmware and the like, I need a functional system).
Yeah, VAC is the only AC I’m aware of that doesn’t have a driver component.
Overwatch also doesn’t have a kernel-level/driver component. Since aim is only a relatively smaller part in Overwatch cheats aren’t as big of a problem compared to CS. At least it’s easier to counter a cheater by playing better (e.g. positioning, ability usage).
I used to play Overwatch, which doesn’t do kernel-level. Honestly, if the choice was no multiplayer at all, or unknown 3rd-party kernel-level obfuscated unsecure shit… I’d pick the former.
I also keep my Windows installs with the default MS drivers as much as possible, for a similar reason.
That might be subject to change because i really dont see myself going from win 10 to 11. That will atleast be my time to only use linux.
If you only/mostly play games, and they work on Linux, then you may want to switch to Linux right away.
If you also use Windows-only software, or want to develop stuff with VSCode and dev containers, then Win 11 with an Intel 12th gen or newer processor is a great combination (supports RAM encryption, with separate keys per-VM).