2020 in video games


In the video game industry, 2020 is expected to see the launch of the next generation of video game consoles, with both Microsoft and Sony Interactive Entertainment poised to release the Xbox Series X and PlayStation 5 consoles near the end of the year, respectively.

Major events

MonthDayEvent
January21Daybreak Games was split into three separate game development studios: Dimensional Ink Games, Darkpaw Games, and Rogue Planet Games; and Daybreak was reorganized into a publisher.
January22Tencent announced that it would fully acquire Norwegian developer and publisher Funcom.
January24Activision Blizzard entered a multiyear deal with Google to exclusively broadcast all their esport content, via YouTube following the conclusion of a prior deal with Twitch.
January24The Call of Duty League launched its inaugural season.
February5Rod Fergusson left his role as lead on the Gears of War series at The Coalition to oversee the Diablo series at Blizzard Entertainment.
February8The 2020 Overwatch League season began.
February11–13The 2020 D.I.C.E. Summit was held in Las Vegas, Nevada.
February19World War Z developer Saber Interactive was acquired by Embracer Group for.
February25Kazuhisa Hashimoto, creator of the Konami code, died at the age of 61.
February25Sanzaru Games was acquired by Oculus Studios.
February27–PAX East was held in Boston, Massachusetts.
March1PAX East was held in Boston, Massachusetts.
March4Star Theory Games was shut down.
March11Rockstar Games' co-founder and lead writer Dan Houser left the company.
March16–20The 2020 Game Developers Conference was held via streaming media due to the cancellation of the physical event as a result of the coronavirus outbreak.
April3Science Adventure developer Mages was acquired by Colopl for ¥1.612 billion.
April17Video game-centric crowdfunding and investment firm Fig was acquired by Republic, a larger investment firm, to expand Fig's capabilities for funding options.
June11Sony Interactive Entertainment held its "PS5 - The Future of Gaming" event where it unveiled the PlayStation 5 design and a new slate of upcoming games.
June22Microsoft announces the closer of its Mixer stream service on July 22, instead transitioning and partnering with Facebook Gaming.
June22Ready at Dawn was acquired by Oculus Studios.
August10–16Playcrafting hosts its fourth annual Play NYC event online this year. Panels include talks from Avalanche Studios, Private Division, and Rockstar Games. The event is also home to the annual Graffiti Games. This year's initiative will highlight the work of Black game developers.
August27–30An online version of Gamescom 2020 is planned to be held, after Germany banned physical events though August 2020.
September23–27An online version of Tokyo Game Show 2020 is planned to be held, after physical event has been cancelled.

Impacts of the COVID-19 pandemic

The highly contagious coronavirus disease 2019, first observed in China in December 2019, had a major outbreak across the world starting in January 2020. Within China, steps to prevent spread of the disease included large-scale quarantine of affected populations which impacted production within the country. This had a large number of impacts on social, medical, and economic systems worldwide. The video game industry was impacted by the outbreak in various ways, most often due to concerns over travel to and from China or elsewhere, or related to slowdowns in manufacturing processes within China.

Reactions to the George Floyd protests

In the wake of the George Floyd protests and resurgence of support for the Black Lives Matter movement across several entertainment sectors in early June 2020, the video game industry also responded. Most larges publishers and developers shared their support of the protests and BLM as with other larger entertainment companies. A number of video game announcement events had been planned on the week of June 6 and onward as a virtual replacement for E3 2020, but most of these were shifted by a week or more to allow the voices of the protests to have the necessary focus. Many companies announced plans to donate funds towards black-oriented organizations, including Electronic Arts, 2K Games, Riot Games and Humble Bundle committing to such foundations, while others like Ubisoft, Square Enix, and The Pokemon Company also committed to significant donations. Itch.io raised over for black charities through sales of a game bundle with games from over 1,300 developers. Electronic Arts and Infinity Ward pledged to combat racism that they were aware had persisted by users in their games in light of the events.

Accusations of sexual misconduct

In late June and early July, as a continuation of prior #MeToo movement effects on the industry from 2017, several people started speaking out of specific accounts of sexual misconduct and harassment towards others in the industry. Initial complaints had been directed towards Twitch streamers but soon had reached major companies including Ubisoft, Insomniac Games, and Electronic Arts, with most studios taking actions to deal with the accused and instituting better policies to handle internal and external issued related to sexual misconduct. In particular, charges were made toward the CEO of Evolution Championship Series, Joey Cuellar, who was subsequently let go. Multiple publishers that had backed the event had pulled out on this news, and the EVO event, which had already been reworked as an online event due to the COVID-19 pandemic, was subsequently cancelled.

Hardware releases

The list of game-related hardware due for release in 2020.

Game releases

Series with new installments include Assassin's Creed, Animal Crossing, ', Danganronpa, Deadly Premonition, Digimon, Doom, Dragon Ball, Dragon Quest, Final Fantasy, Granblue Fantasy, Half-Life, Halo, The Last of Us, Lego, Mafia, Mana, Medal of Honor, Megami Tensei, Microsoft Flight Simulator, Minecraft, ', Mystery Dungeon, No More Heroes, Oddworld, One Piece, Ori, Paper Mario, Persona, Project CARS, Resident Evil, Rune Factory, Serious Sam, Shantae, Star Wars, Streets of Rage, System Shock, Tales, Tom Clancy's Rainbow Six, Total War, Trails, , Wasteland, Watch Dogs, Windjammers, and Yakuza.

January–March

April–June

July–September

October–December

Unscheduled releases

Below is a list of games which have been announced to be released in 2020, but have no exact release date or month yet.

Video game-based film releases