Jennifer Maas: Last News

Jennifer Maas TV Business Writer Amazon Ads is launching a new experience on gaming platform “Fortnite” that will offer marketing opportunities to brands and have guaranteed promotion through Amazon-owned streamer Twitch. Titled “The Glitch,” the project is described as “an integrated galaxy of brand-customized playable worlds” within “Fortnite” created by “Halo” co-creator Alexander Seropian and his Look North World game developer.

Jennifer Maas TV Business Writer Dan and Eugene Levy took the stage at the top of the Emmys on Sunday night to kick off the awards show on ABC with jokes galore, including a roast of “The Bear.” The opening segment of the 76th annual Emmy awards saw the duo (who mark the first-ever father and son to host TV’s biggest night) playfully grill the FX on Hulu series (a Disney-owned show, and thus a prime target to get a jab when the Emmys are airing on Disney broadcaster ABC): “‘The Bear’ is nominated for 23 Emmys tonight, making it the most nominated comedy in history,” Eugene Levy said. “Now, I love the show, I love the show, and I know some of you will be expecting us to make a joke about whether ‘The Bear’ is really a comedy — but in the true spirit of ‘The Bear,’ we will not be making any jokes.” The jokes centering Disney properties didn’t end there, with the Levys noting that FX on Hulu’s “Shōgun” already took home 14 Emmys at last week’s Creative Arts awards show, making it the most-decorated show in a single season.

Jennifer Maas TV Business Writer YouTube star and content creator KreekCraft, best known as the most popular Roblox livestreamer, has been signed by UTA. The streaming star was previously signed with CAA.

Jennifer Maas TV Business Writer Microsoft Gaming will lay off approximately 650 employees, or 3% of the Xbox owner’s global workforce, in a new round of eliminations following last year’s completion of its Activision Blizzard acquisition. The cuts will primarily impact staffers in “corporate and supporting functions,” per Microsoft Gaming CEO Phil Spencer.

Jennifer Maas TV Business Writer Actor John Cena recently lent his talents to a marketing campaign for Supercell‘s mobile game “Brawl Stars,” which has introduced a collaboration with Nickleodeon’s “SpongeBob SquarePants” amid the cartoon’s 25th anniversary. While a seemingly strange choice of star to promote the Paramount-Supercell teamup, Cena explained to Variety how his passion for mobile gaming and his history with the WWE makes him a good fit to lead promo for the “SpongeBob” tie-in.“Honestly, I don’t think it’s weird at all. I think I heard a stat that SpongeBob is talked about on social media just about every four seconds,” Cena said.

Jennifer Maas TV Business Writer PlayStation has officially confirmed the release of its next console, the PS5 Pro. The device will launch Nov. 7 and retail at $699.99 compared to its predecessor the PS5, which launched in November 2020 priced at $499 with a digital-only edition for $399.

Jennifer Maas TV Business Writer Future Games Show is expanding its event lineup with the Mobile Gaming Show. The Mobile Gaming Show will air on Sept. 26 at 1 p.m.

Jennifer Maas TV Business Writer When PlayStation‘s “Astro Bot” launches Friday, it will give PS5 owners access to a brand new, fully fleshed out story starring the little robot whose previous claim to fame was teaching gamers all the cool new features for the Sony gaming console launched in 2020 through pre-loaded title “Astro’s Playroom.” Four years later, Astro has broken out of his playroom and is on a bigger mission: Celebrating the 30th anniversary of Sony Interactive in an easy-entry platformer that features more than 150 cameos of beloved PlayStation characters from across mega hits and deep cuts, including “God of War,” “Ratchet & Clank,” “Ape Escape” and many more. However, the original idea for the game from Team Asobi was simply to give Astro a bigger space adventure game with more to do, while sprinkling in a few PlayStation references and characters here and there.

Jennifer Maas TV Business Writer Barney is a dinosaur from our imaginations that will finally be back on our screens this fall with the launch of new animated Max series “Barney’s World.” Starring the iconic Mattel character in his first TV show in 14 years, “Barney’s World” is set in a playground, where Barney is joined by dinos Billy and Baby Bop and their three kid best friends David, Mel, and Vivie. Through action-packed, music-filled adventures together, Barney helps the kids and audiences explore big preschool emotions, showing them how to love themselves, others, and their communities. The new series, which is comprised of 51 episodes running 11-minutes each, will debut Oct.

Jennifer Maas TV Business Writer AMC Networks and Spectrum parent Charter Communications have reached an early renewal for their multiyear carriage deal. Top AMC series include “The Walking Dead” franchise, the Annie Rice adaptations “Interview with the Vampire” and “Mayfair Witches,” “Dark Winds,” “Gangs of London” and other shows across AMC-owned cable networks BBC America, IFC, SundanceTV and We TV.

Jennifer Maas TV Business Writer Warner Bros. Discovery revealed the 2024 class for its second annual WBD Access Unlock Unscripted pipeline program, which focuses on diverse, mid-level producers on the rise to becoming the industry’s next unscripted TV showrunner. Thirteen producers were admitted for this year’s program, triple in size from 2023’s inaugural class.

Jennifer Maas TV Business Writer PlayStation will be taking its new Firewalk-developed live services game “Concord” offline this Friday, just two weeks after its Aug. 23 launch.

Jennifer Maas TV Business Writer “Harry Potter” actor Bonnie Wright, who played the role of Ginny Weasley in the eight-film Warner Bros. franchise from ages 9 to 19, is ready to pass the Sorting Hat to a new cast for HBO’s upcoming adaptation of the J.K. Rowling novels.

Jennifer Maas TV Business Writer Ubisoft and Lucasfilm’s open-world video game “Star Wars Outlaws” launched Friday, giving fans of the galaxy far, far away a chance to play as a new character, Kay Vess (voiced by “Tarot” and “Star Trek: Section 31” star Humberly González) in a story set in between the events of the original film trilogy’s “The Empire Strikes Back” and “Return of the Jedi.” This new lead isn’t a Jedi or Sith, a rebel or an Imperial sympathizer — she’s a scoundrel trying to survive the crime-ridden “Star Wars” universe with little to no knowledge of the crime syndicates that rule and no one but a little sidekick companion named Nix to help her out. “It is such a fun timeline, and I know this from the creative team — Nikki Foy, the lead script writer, and Navid Khavari, who is our narrative director, when this opportunity came to them and they found out the timeline that they were going to be playing in was in the original trilogy between ‘The Empire Strikes Back’ and ‘Return of the Jedi,’ I think everybody was in shock,” González told Variety.

Jennifer Maas TV Business Writer StatusPro’s “NFL Pro Era” will launch as a live-services offering for the VR game’s upcoming 2025 edition. An immersive, first-person simulation that gives users a professional football player’s perspective through VR technology, the new version of “NFL Pro Era” will add the position of linebacker to gameplay, allowing players to rush the quarterback, record sacks, make tackles and nab interceptions.

Jennifer Maas TV Business Writer “Call of Duty: Next” kicks off Wednesday, moving from its usual Los Angeles venue to Washington, D.C. this year in honor of Activision‘s forthcoming release in the franchise, “Black Ops 6,” which is set in the nation’s hotbed for black-ops activity. This marks the first time the “Next” event, which was created to drive social media engagement and sales surrounding the “Call of Duty” franchise by giving top gaming-focused creators a chance to get hands-on multiplayer experience with new titles ahead of release, will take place outside of California and highlights just how much Activision’s new owner Microsoft is invested in the Oct.

Jennifer Maas TV Business Writer Actor Tituss Burgess will lend his iconic judgement to Food Network this fall as the host of new competition series “Last Bite Hotel.” In the show, eight chefs have been invited to a remote hotel for a game of resourcefulness and creativity, per Food Network’s description for the series. Tasked by hotel manager Burgess to meet the culinary demands of the hotel’s VIP guests, each chef may only bring 13 ingredients for their entire stay. Cooking skills won’t be enough to get them to the finish line, as ingenuity and calculated risks are needed to survive and cook another day.

Jennifer Maas TV Business Writer New York City is not the first location that comes to mind when listing off gaming development capitals of the world — but the Big Apple is working overtime this summer to try and change that through sponsorships, partnerships and friendly competitions. The latest in a string of events branded under NYC Summer of Games, a citywide initiative running from June-September led by the Mayor’s Office of Media and Entertainment (MOME), is the ninth edition of Play NYC, the city’s top gaming convention.

Jennifer Maas TV Business Writer Prolific author Neal Stephenson’s digital content platform Lamina1 and “The Lord of the Rings” film franchise VFX company Wētā Workshop are set to collaborate on a “participatory worldbuilding” experience titled “Artefact.” The experience is expected to offer “a new blueprint for IP expansion through immersive experiences that incorporate fan action and input.” Per Lamina1’s description for the project, “Stephenson and the Wētā team will begin engaging a global community of creators and fans on the Lamina1 platform this fall, inviting them to unravel the lore behind a mysterious set of ‘Artefacts’ that will build upon the themes and lore from Stephenson’s critically-acclaimed catalog of work. Next, the superfan will take on the new role of creator, utilizing their discoveries to contribute directly to the expansion of the universe.” “Artefact” will serve as the flagship project in the Lamina1-Wētā partnership and first major multimedia property launching on Lamina1’s blockchain infrastructure and tooling.

Jennifer Maas TV Business Writer Warner Bros. Games released the new trailer for its upcoming video game “Harry Potter: Quidditch Champions” Thursday, featuring Harry Potter, Ron Weasley, Ginny Weasley, Draco Malfoy, Cho Chang and more iconic “Harry Potter” characters playing everyone’s favorite wizarding sport. “Quidditch Champions” lets players take on the Quidditch positions of either Beater, Chaser, Keeper, or Seeker in single player career mode, competitive multiplayer or online co-op mode.

Jennifer Maas TV Business Writer “Indiana Jones and the Great Circle” has received a release date for Xbox with plans to launch on PlayStation 5 next year. Xbox announced out of video game convention gamescom on Tuesday that the Bethesda Game Studios-produced game will drop Dec.