The Debrief, October 2025
EA deal questioned over foreign influence concerns, Roblox report, and Baby Steps strides forward
U.S. senators raise foreign influence fears over EA acquisition
Roblox’s audience is growing up fast, according to a new report
Baby Steps stumbles to (frustrating) success in the critical round-up
Hello VGIM Insiders,
It’s time for another Debrief. Every month, we take a look back at the biggest stories, business deals, new data, and cultural highlights shaping the games biz.
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And if you can’t sign up as an Insider right now, never fear. You can instead catch up with every free VGIM from October below.
A Kushy Deal, 02/10/2025
NATO’s video game frontline, 09/10/2025
The games industry’s self-censorship problem, 16/10/2025
Online Safety Act-ing on Games, 23/10/2025
Say Halo to political propaganda, 30/10/2025
The top stories
U.S. senators raise concerns over Saudi acquisition of Electronic Arts
Warren-t further attention: Democrat Party Senators Elizabeth Warren and Richard Blumenthal have written to US Treasury Secretary Steve Bessent to raise concerns about the acquisition of Electronic Arts by Saudi Arabia’s Public Investment Fund.
Autocratic aims: The letter raises significant concerns that EA’s enormous player base of 700 million will be subjected to pressure by the company’s new Saudi owners. This includes through potential use of their player data, but much more likely through simple exposure to Saudi sportswashing.
Foreign influence: But it also raises alarm about the role of Jared Kushner, Donald Trump’s son-in-law, in steering the acquisition. And with Kushner’s venture firm Affinity Partners feeding money from the PIF back into a PIF purchase, there are real fears that the sale of EA is the result of a successful foreign influence operation. We aren’t, however, taking bets on action against the purchase.
Blumenthal & Warren Sound Alarm on Acquisition of American Video Game Producer by Saudi Arabia’s Sovereign Wealth Fund & Jared Kushner’s Investment Firm, Richard Blumenthal’s office
Supercell CEO speaks out over Digital Fairness Act
Above the parapet: Illka Paananen, Chief Exec at Supercell, has done what few video games industry executives have ever done and actually attempted to publicly lobby against a policy that’s bad for business.
Clash of plans: In a letter initially posted on LinkedIn, Paananen suggested that the European Union’s forthcoming Digital Fairness Act risked wrapping the industry up in red tape, threatening to ‘kill’ one of Europe’s few tech success stories in the process.
Consultation stations: The company was one of a handful of video game businesses to submit a consultation response on the forthcoming Act. But with consumer groups and lobbying campaigns like Stop Killing Games also writing in, the industry has a fight on its hands to prevent itself from being tied up in potentially unwieldy in-game spending rules.
Game developers fret over EU’s consumer push on virtual currencies, Euractiv
Xbox Game Pass price hike raises questions about the future of the platform
Game Passing on the costs: Xbox has significantly hiked the price of its Game Pass subscription service, raising questions about the viability of both the service and Microsoft’s wider plans for the business.
Bill shock: The company has jacked up the price of a Game Pass Ultimate subscription to $30 Stateside, with UK subscribers hit by an £8 increase to take its total to £23 a month. The move was allegedly sparked by the significant underperformance of last year’s Call of Duty game, which lost hundreds of millions of dollars on launch day due to its presence on the service.
Cloudy future: The company continues to commit to catalogue-based services, with reports that it is planning to roll out an ad-funded version of its Cloud Gaming service to players. But with the company previously going all in on the ‘everything is an Xbox’ strategy, the Game Pass price hike has raised concerns that the strategy is simply not proving viable in the modern video game market.
What the Xbox Game Pass price hike says about the rising cost of playing games, The Guardian
Investments, acquisitions and business launches
Kuwait-backed Esports Global has launched a $50m fund to support 5-10 high-growth businesses around the world. Chester King is in as an advisor.
Kakao Games has been boosted to the tune of $111m through the sale of its VFX business and a paid-in capital increase.
Creative Wales has invested the equivalent of $771,000 in 12 studios working on new game concepts across the country.
Data dive
The biggest chunk of players on Roblox remains young. But the platform is maturing in age as its users grow up, according to a new report from Newzoo.
Board games, card games, and comics are the three adjacent ‘geek culture’ activities enjoyed by video game players, says new research from Big Games Machine.
And the average age of a video game player is reportedly now 41, according to this year’s Power of Play survey, commissioned by the Entertainment Software Association.
The critical conversation
Keza MacDonald goes out of her mind while playing Baby Steps in The Guardian.
An assault on a Twitch streamer exposes how online toxicity spills over to offline harm and hate, writes Nathan Grayson at Aftermath.
Alex Donaldson at Eurogamer argues that now is the time for the return of goofy opening cinematics a la Red Alert 2.
The Insider Track
I’m at the AI and Games Conference on Tuesday 4th November. I’ve got a pretty open diary, so I’m available to meet if you want to say hello.
I’m hosting the Green Games Summit on behalf of Playing for the Planet on Thursday 6th November. Tickets are still available if you want to join.
I’ll be in Belfast for the country’s media festival on Thursday 13th November, with space to meet on Friday 14th November before I fly home.
Then, I’ll be at the British Screen Forum’s conference discussing content abundance on Wednesday 19th November. It’s free to attend for members of the BS Forum.
Lastly, I’m booking in work for 2026. If you want me to write, host, or organise on your behalf, get in touch: space is going fast.
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