If you're a developer working for Xbox, what can you do to secure your job?

The platform holder has repeated the same terrible mistakes for over a decade. The reason is simple: its priorities are back-to-front.

Xbox is offering voluntary severance agreements to producers, quality assurance testers and other staff at ZeniMax as part of a broader cost-cutting initiative

Microsoft has released its latest financial results, showing significant growth in gaming revenues — thanks in no small part to the acquisition of Activision Blizzard.

However, Xbox hardware sales continue to decline and saw the steepest drop since the Xbox Series X and S launched in 2020, down 31% year-on-year.

This is a fascinating deep dive into the development of the game, with many people involved giving interviews. Instead of being in a long development hell, Lionhead knocked out the game in a stunning 18 months - which made Microsoft happy, but resulted in the cutting of a ton of content.

Crucially, the creator allows players to make modifications that aren't always possible in other RPGs, letting them modify a characters genitals (choosing between preset options), identity (male, female, non-binary/other), and voice. [Lead character artist Alena] Dubrovina says including those options was about giving players the ability to create characters that, while grounded in the lore of Dungeons & Dragons, are "relevant today."

"Gender is not defined by your body, genitals or your voice in our game, we want everyone to be who they want to be and build their own unique identity. If you want to play as a bearded non-binary dwarf with a masculine voice and green hair, why not?

"What's more frustrating for those working on SCP, and the wider Starfield modding community, is how difficult it is to work with Starfield's code without official modding tools and support. This isn't helped by the delayed mod tools from Bethesda, which the company says are coming at some point next year."

The effort to squash unlicensed controllers hurts plenty of paying customers, and might not even achieve its goals

2.5m copies shifted on first day