Video game news in review: The biggest news from the week of August 2, 2024

It's another week of video game news! This week is kind of a downer, but hey. News isn't always good and we need to be cognizant of what's going on. Because there's a lot even in the video game world!

The Xbox 360 Store officially shuts down

Nineteen years later, the Xbox 360 store is officially shutting down. Microsoft announced the closure last August to give players ample time to prepare, but it still feels very bittersweet. Backward-compatible 360 games will still play. But yeah... the Xbox 360 store is no more.

Nobody Wants to Die release

This one was released on July 17th, but we wanted to cover it anyway. This is a first-person cyberpunk noir story where you play as a detective trying to figure out various crime scenes. The graphics are beautiful and the story is pretty good. Most reviewers have said the crime scenes keep you on rails and don't really let you figure it out yourself.

Of course, Gameranx has their "Before You Buy" if you want a deeper dive before you make a purchase; you can check it out below:

SAG-AFTRA Video Game Actors Strike

This technically started last week, but this is for video game actors. The biggest point of contention is the use of AI in video games, which could use the likeness of actors (both voice and face) without consent or fair compensation. AI is a hot-button topic in every industry, so it's no surprise it's reached the video game industry, which has so many other issues on top of AI.

We'll have to see what comes of this strike and how long it lasts. As players, we won't notice an impact on anything in the next few months, but games coming out in the future will definitely be impacted.

PlayStation's Back to School sale

Of course, it wouldn't be a video game news week without some deals! PlayStation/Sony announced a bunch of "back to school" deals on games and consoles.

Some big name game discounts are Marvel's Spider-Man 2 for $50 ($20 off), RRatchet and Clank: Rift Apart for $30 ($40 off!), Demon's Souls for $30 ($20 off), and God of War: Ragnarok for $40 ($30 off). If you're up for a bit more of a challenge, Returnal is marked down to $30 and that one is has some excellent gameplay (and a bonkers story).

There's also $50 off both of the PS5 Slim versions and if you're in the market for a PS VR2, those are $200 off!

If you're in the market for any of these, they only run through Sunday, August 3rd, so get to shopping!

What other gaming news came out this week that we missed? Let us know in the comments!