Roblox, a platform where players make and share games, reported its July-to-September figures on Thursday. [1] About 138 million people played each day, 9% fewer than a year earlier. [2] Analysts had expected 145.8 million daily players. [2] Its bookings, a measure of what players spent, reached $1.7bn, above the $1.63bn expected. [2]

Time spent playing fell faster, by 15% to 34 billion hours. [3]

Bloomberg says the slowdown in play followed Roblox's stronger child-safety measures. [2] Roblox stepped up moderation, checking what players post and say, all through 2026. [4] Bleecker Street Research, an investment research firm, judged that this hurt Roblox's user growth. [4]

Roblox is being sued by government bodies and by parents of exploited children. [4] The suits say Roblox enabled sexual harassment and exploitation of its users. [4] Roblox has repeatedly denied the claims. [4] Its chief executive, David Baszucki, has been criticised for his answers on child safety. [4]

Roblox published the figures at 20:05 UK time and took investors' questions at 1:30pm Pacific. [1]

Why it matters. The next test is whether a new hit game on Roblox can turn the slowdown around. [2]

Archive of Our Own, or AO3, a free website for fan fiction, went offline on Thursday. [16] Fan fiction is stories fans write using characters from books, films and TV shows. [17] In September it held over 18.4 million works from more than 82,900 fandoms. [18] A nonprofit, the Organization for Transformative Works, runs it on volunteers and donations. [19] At first it expected 12 hours of maintenance, then said 2 to 4 weeks. [16] Later it said it had found evidence of a security incident on the site. [19] It cannot rule out that usernames, emails and scrambled passwords were taken. [19]

Why it matters. Writers lose the kudos, AO3's likes, and comments their stories would earn meanwhile. [16] Readers can still open stories they saved to their own devices. [16]

Voice actors in US TV cartoons voted on Thursday to approve new four-year contracts. [8] They belong to SAG-AFTRA, the US actors' union, and 94.95% of voters said yes. [8] The other side is the AMPTP, the alliance that bargains for film and TV producers. [8] Pay rises 12.6% over the four years. [8] The contracts add protections around how AI may be used. [8] They also raise payments into health, pension and retirement plans. [8] The deals run from 1 July 2026, backdated, to 30 June 2030. [8]

Why it matters. Fewer acting jobs have left many members struggling to qualify for the union's health plan. [20]

Four US unions asked a judge on Thursday not to treat AI training as fair use. [9] They are SAG-AFTRA for actors, a musicians' union and the two Writers Guilds of America. [9] Under US law, fair use lets some copying happen without permission, judged case by case. [9] The case pits OpenAI, a big AI company, against the New York Times and other papers. [9] Authors in it include George R.R. Martin, John Grisham and Jodi Picoult. [9] The unions' brief, a 34-page argument from outsiders to the case, warns of harm to workers. [9] It warns of a "potentially enormous transfer of value" from creators to companies. [9]

Why it matters. If training is fair use, AI firms can learn from creative work without paying for it. [9] The unions say that cost lands on the actors, musicians and writers behind the work. [9]

Skydance named the leaders of its streaming arm, which runs HBO Max and Paramount+. [14] Skydance was formed this month by merging Warner Bros. Discovery and Paramount for $110 billion. [14] JB Perrette, who helped launch Hulu, set out the team in a memo. [14] 7 senior executives from HBO Max, Paramount+ and Warner Bros. Discovery are leaving. [21] Pluto TV, its free streaming service, still has no leader. [14] Rivals Tubi and the Roku Channel have overtaken Pluto, Deadline reports. [14] About 20 Warner TV production companies abroad now sit under Skydance's TV studios. [22]

Why it matters. Perrette called saying goodbye to many talented leaders the painful part of the merger. [21]

Starz beat Wall Street's forecasts for July to September, its results showed on Thursday. [23] Starz runs a streaming service and a TV channel, and split from Lionsgate in 2025. [24] Revenue was $322.4 million, against $319.5 million expected. [23] Its loss narrowed to $34.8 million, from $52.6 million a year earlier. [23] Streaming revenue rose 1.7% to $226.6 million. [23] It followed a price rise in April and renewals at higher prices. [25] Its first owned series, Fightland, also earned money from other distributors. [23] Investor Byron Allen sold all his Starz shares for about $45 million, a filing showed. [24] He had paid about $25 million for them in March. [24]

Why it matters. Its boss says Starz is "just beginning" to profit from owning more of its shows. [26]

Celeste and TowerFall, two well-known indie games, were pulled from the Xbox store on Thursday. [27] Their maker Maddy Thorson wrote: "We did this to support the BDS boycott." [28] BDS is a Palestinian-led movement urging boycotts of companies tied to Israel's government. [12] It named Microsoft, which owns Xbox, a priority boycott target. [12] Its reason is software Microsoft supplies to Israel's military, Rock Paper Shotgun reports. [29] Celeste, a hard jumping game, came out in 2018. [27] It won best indie game at The Game Awards that year. [27] Earlier this month House House kept its game Big Walk off Xbox for the same reason. [29]

Why it matters. Xbox players can no longer buy either game, while PlayStation, PC and Switch still sell both. [12]

Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 4 opens with real news film of a 2022 crowd crush. [30] The crush happened in Seoul's Itaewon district during Halloween celebrations. [30] 160 people died and 196 were injured, Eurogamer reports. [31] The game shows about 3 seconds of rescuers giving CPR to someone who had collapsed. [30] Bereaved families asked Activision, the game's publisher, to remove the footage. [31] Activision said it was "not intended to reference or trivialise" the disaster. [30] The game's story is a North Korean invasion of South Korea. [30] Thursday was the fourth anniversary of the crush. [31]

Why it matters. A Korean game consumers' group asked for an apology and a fix, not a ban. [31]

Xbox's boss Asha Sharma wants it more profitable than Sony's and Nintendo's games arms by 2030. [32] She set the goal in a memo to staff seen by CNBC, a US business channel. [33] Xbox keeps about $3 as profit from every $100 it takes in. [33] That is a 3% margin, against 9.9% for PlayStation and 16% for Nintendo, CNBC says. [33] She wants every studio growing by June 2027, and margins ahead of rivals by mid-2030. [33] Circana, which tracks US game sales, says US Xbox console sales fell 27% in September. [32] Its analyst Mat Piscatella says none of her moves has helped Xbox yet. [33]

Why it matters. Sharma also plans films, TV and toys based on Xbox's biggest games. [32]

Gears of War: E-Day has sold over 400,000 copies, a source told The Verge. [11] It is Xbox's big new shooter, released this month to high review scores. [11] It was on Game Pass, Xbox's subscription, from its first day. [11] Analysts at Alinea estimate 1.7 million played it through Game Pass instead of buying it. [11] About 722,000 paid $30 for an upgrade to play early, Alinea estimated. [11] It was planned for PlayStation 5 too, but Xbox kept it for itself. [33]

Why it matters. Piscatella says keeping it on Xbox has not sold more Xbox consoles. [33]

Current and former EA staff told the news site Vertical Slice that morale is very low. [15] EA announced 400 job cuts last week and closed its BioWare studio. [15] One worker said colleagues learned of her layoff only through LinkedIn. [15] Staff say they are told on Zoom calls with the chat switched off. [15] EA owes $20bn after its $55bn sale to investors led by Saudi Arabia's Public Investment Fund. [15] Some say managers push AI tools hard, though they are not formally required. [10] EA's boss was paid about 305 times a typical studio worker in 2025, PC Gamer says. [10]

Why it matters. Staff who stay take on the work of those who left, often without a clear plan. [15]

Nvidia's RTX 5080, a graphics card for PC games, now costs about $2,000 in US shops. [34] It launched at $999, Tom's Hardware notes. [34] $2,000 was the launch price of the faster RTX 5090, now up to $12,000. [34] Few cards are in stock, and many listings come from little-known third-party sellers. [34] Memory makers have moved production to chips for AI data centres, Tom's Hardware says. [34] Desktop memory costs more too: 32GB sells for upwards of $500 at Newegg, PC Gamer says. [35]

Why it matters. Building or upgrading a gaming PC now costs far more than when these cards launched. [34]

The Verge reports that Bethesda will soon name its next game The Elder Scrolls 6: Sentinel. [36] Bethesda makes the Elder Scrolls fantasy role-playing games and is owned by Xbox. [36] The last main game, Skyrim, came out on 11 November 2011. [37] Bethesda announced the sequel in 2018 and has said little since. [36] The name could come next month, around Skyrim's 15th birthday. [37] The game is reportedly set in Hammerfell, a region that has never had its own game. [36]

Why it matters. In July, Bethesda staff warned that Xbox layoffs could slow the game's development. [36]

FromSoftware delayed The Duskbloods, made only for Nintendo's Switch 2, from 2026 to 2027. [38] Eurogamer calls it Bloodborne meets Sekiro meets Dark Souls, three of the studio's older games. [38] The studio said the game is at its "final adjustment stage". [38] It wants more time to tune the rules and balance of the game. [39] More people applied to its test than to Elden Ring Nightreign's. [38] Nintendo, which publishes the game, gave no date in 2027. [38]

Why it matters. The delay also keeps it clear of GTA 6's launch, GameSpot notes. [40]

Netflix is developing a live-action series of PUBG, a battle game. [5] In PUBG, up to 100 players land on an island and fight until one is left. [5] Donald Glover, the actor and musician behind Atlanta, will write, direct and star. [5] PUBG belongs to Krafton, a South Korean games company. [5] Krafton's entertainment arm, LV3H, helps produce it, to grow PUBG beyond games. [41] PUBG sold over 75 million copies before it became free to play. [42] No release date was given. [42]

Why it matters. It joins Netflix's other game adaptations, including Assassin's Creed and a Gears of War film. [5]

Sony Pictures' Screen Gems will make a film of Mouthwashing, a 2024 indie horror game. [43] Wrong Organ made the game, set on a cargo spaceship with 5 crew. [43] Sony has bought the film rights, The Hollywood Reporter says. [6] Karyn Kusama, who directed Jennifer's Body, will direct it. [43] The game also reached consoles and Xbox Game Pass on 29 October. [44]

Why it matters. IGN counts it as the latest game picked for the screen, after PUBG. [43]

Phantom Blade Zero peaked at 723,876 players at once on Steam, its first day. [45] It is an action game from S-Game, a studio in China. [46] S-Game had only made phone games before. [46] That is the 15th-biggest launch crowd ever on Steam, Kotaku says. [46] Black Myth: Wukong, an earlier Chinese hit, peaked at 2,415,714. [46] Analyst Rhys Elliott says 62.5% of its early sales came from China, Taiwan and Hong Kong. [45] He estimated its early sales brought in $43 million. [45]

Why it matters. It follows earlier hits from Chinese studios, such as Black Myth: Wukong. [46]

TelevisaUnivision's US advertising revenue fell 24% from July to September. [47] It is a Spanish-language TV company that also runs ViX, a streaming service. [47] Its rival Telemundo showed this summer's football World Cup in the US. [47] In Mexico, where it had the World Cup, its revenue rose 51% to $665 million. [47] Its streaming arm, led by ViX, had record revenue, the company said. [47] A $372 million write-down of its TV licences turned a profit into a $119 million loss. [47]

Why it matters. It blamed the US fall mainly on a rival's sports, as the World Cup aired elsewhere. [47]

California lawmakers began discussing lifting the cap on the state's film and TV tax credit. [48] The credit, a tax break for filming in the state, is capped at $750 million. [48] It was doubled last year, but unions say filming jobs are still leaving. [48] Shows apply in set windows and compete on how many jobs they create. [48] A Grey's Anatomy spinoff lost out and is now filming in Albuquerque, New Mexico. [48] Georgia's credit has no limit, and New York's works almost the same way. [48]

Why it matters. FilmLA, which issues filming permits, says production in Los Angeles keeps falling. [48]

Chiikawa the Movie rose to second at Japan's box office in its 14th weekend. [49] It is the first anime film of Nagano's Chiikawa manga. [49] It has sold 12.65 million tickets, more than any film in Japan this year. [49] It now ranks 12th in Japan's all-time box office, with about $117 million. [49] Chiikawa earned about $1.77 million that weekend alone. [49] Made in Abyss: Awakening Mystery opened sixth, earning about $922,900 in 3 days. [49] Made in Abyss is a fantasy manga with over 22 million copies in print. [50] Kadokawa Animation says a second film is already being made. [50]

Why it matters. Toho, which distributes Chiikawa, is still selling tickets months after it opened in July. [49]

Kojima Productions showed the first trailer for Death Stranding Isolations, an anime series. [7] It is set in the world of Hideo Kojima's game Death Stranding, a broken North America. [51] It tells a new story with new characters, not the game's. [51] Announced in 2025, it will stream only on Disney+ in 2027, with no exact date. [51] E&H production is animating it by hand in 2D, under director Takayuki Sano. [51] Sano was animation director on Attack on Titan's final season. [7]

Why it matters. Disney+ gets a show built on a game world that players already know. [51]

Ubisoft said it has no other Assassin's Creed remake in development. [52] Ubisoft makes the Assassin's Creed action games. [52] Its latest game, Black Flag Resynced, remade a 2013 pirate adventure. [52] The remake sold very well, GameSpot says. [53] In 2024 its boss Yves Guillemot said "Players can be excited about some remakes". [52] Teams now work on new games, including the darker Hexe, with news due in 2027. [53] Assassin's Creed Valhalla, its Viking game, gets a New Game Plus mode on 5 November. [53]

Why it matters. Ubisoft says it may still bring older games back later. [52]

Netflix renewed The Diplomat, a political drama, for a fifth season on Thursday. [54] Season 4 began on 15 October, two weeks before the renewal. [54] It drew 983 million minutes of viewing in its first week, the week's biggest debut. [55] Nielsen, which measures TV audiences, counts only viewing on TV sets in the US. [55] In its second week it reached the top 10 in 63 countries. [54]

Why it matters. Five seasons is a long run for a streaming show, The Hollywood Reporter notes. [54]

Final Fantasy Resonance sold 133,191 boxed copies in Japan in its first week. [13] The figures are weekly shop-sales estimates from Famitsu, published in Japan. [13] It sold 52,268 on Switch 2, 50,452 on PlayStation 5 and 30,471 on Switch. [13] Nintendo Switch Sports Resort was the best-selling single version, at 64,632. [13] Among consoles, 21,792 Switch 2s sold, against 16,008 PS5s and 581 Xboxes. [13]

Why it matters. Most copies of Resonance sold for Nintendo's two consoles, not for PlayStation 5. [13]

Goldin's auction for Pokemon's 30th anniversary raised over $28 million on 25 October. [56] A 2015 Mudkip card given a perfect 10 grade by PSA sold for $4.88 million. [56] A 1997 Trophy Pikachu card from Japan's first tournament sold for over $3 million. [56] Two more 2015 cards sold for $976,000 each. [56] The sale set 18 records in all. [56]

Why it matters. A card made in 2015 sold for more than a 1997 original. [56]

PSA, which grades collectors' cards, reopened its Value tier services on 29 October. [57] It closed them in May after 10 million cards piled up waiting. [57] The backlog reached 14 million cards in June, then began to fall. [57] PSA says the pause let it simplify its services and add faster options. [57]

Why it matters. Cards graded by PSA sold for millions at Goldin's Pokemon auction the same week. [56]