#and the DLC giving me past lore made it worse

[claudiaeparvier]

I have so many forspoken thoughts idek where to begin honestly

[octo-in-the-mainframe]

Side Order Spoilers!!!

Okay does anyone else find it weird that Smollusk and Pearl referred to both DJ Octavio and Agent 4 as "big shots"?

And that Pearl says Agent 4 "was supposed to be such a big shot"??

And that even though pieces of their souls got sucked into the Memverse they canonically have not been seen after the events of Splatoon 2 and 3 respectively???

Knowing that characters were added to Tableturf after the DLC, namely, Pearl, Marina and Acht, I wouldn't be surprised if more characters are added later.

"But Octo, didn't Nintendo say there would only be two waves of DLC?"

Well, yes...but I have reason to believe otherwise.

First, when announcing the two waves of DLC, yellow and blue were used for the first and second waves, but despite there being four colors used for the announcement, red and green made no further appearance.

I'm sure if Nintendo really wanted to, they could have found a way to make just the yellow and blue look nice, but they specifically added those two colors. Red, I get, that's Big Man's color, even if they don't use it much in promotional material, but GREEN?

If Nintendo were to make more DLC, three waves WOULD make sense, considering the leitmotif of threes throughout the game. It's the third game, there's 3 idols, 3 forces united as one, 3 Splatfest teams to choose from, etc.

But that still doesn't explain the fourth color. It breaks the pattern of threes and uses a color that is barely anywhere among our cast of characters, besides Marie, DJ Octavio, and maybe Callie.

And then I thought...what if it's to give us a taste of the next game? Next IS Splatoon 4, so I wouldn't put it past them for a sneak peek.

My other, and more likely idea was that it would center around Agent 4, which kind of ties in with the weird wording used for both Octavio and them. Perhaps we'll finally get to see what they've been up to, maybe even teaming up with a certain DJ?

As for the third wave...I'm not too sure. I think it might have to do with Lil' Judd and Marigold, though.

As we collect scrolls in Alterna, we get tidbits of the other characters' lives and some info on the Splatoon world itself.

But something that stood out to me is when we get to Pearl and Marina's scroll.

It's their outfits from the DLC, clearly meant to foreshadow their next appearance. And right before that was a scroll for the Squid Sister's podcast (and that dried up squid), which lines up since their hub world was brought to the game in the first wave of DLC.

But after Pearl and Marina, it's Lil' Judd.

Lil' Judd planning for Judd's demise.

Which has not been brought up seriously in the main game.

That...that means nothing, right? I mean, more DLC hasn't even been announced, ha-ha!!

But then the next page is Marigold, with her many pictures crossed out, with multiple names to the same-ish face. It's secretive; does she have various clones, multiple siblings? What is she?

And then, there's also the concerning connection between her and Lil' Judd.

Marigold works at Grizzco, evidenced by her voice at the counter and her vocabulary. Lil' Judd...is in CHARGE of Grizzco now, majorly implied by the new inclusion of a headpiece on him after you finish fighting Mr. Grizz.

I think the third wave of DLC will be focusing on Lil' Judd's plans to get rid of Judd and will involve a further look into Marigold and how Grizzco operates.

I mean, we can't keep stealing Salmonid eggs forever, can we? Eventually they'll run out. This endless back and forth has resulted in Big Run's happening, so it's not out of the question that we get a resolution to this.

(I personally think Big Run will have its own version of an ending, one where whenever you play Salmon Run after it it's "in the past," so that it doesn't affect whatever the conclusion was. Otherwise, the Big Runs would likely just get worse.)

Maybe we'll get to be Neo 3 this time and learn more Salmonid lore with our Smallfry friend!!

Of course, most of these concepts are speculation, but I do want to show off one last piece of evidence that I think can be rather damning.

The roped off barrier by the Metro. (Sorry I don't have an image of it, and I don't want to use anyone else's footage.)

Only removed once the DLC trailer was shown.

And look what we have here, as far back as the original Splatoon 3 Direct...

Another roped off barrier in front of the arch. Not just construction, like how Splatoon always sets up new places for the next game, no. It's a barrier, with a big empty space behind it.

I always thought it was so weird we weren't allowed to go over there, and now it seems so obvious to me what Splatoon has been implying.

I don't want to get my hopes up, or anyone else's, but I'm finding it exceedingly difficult to just move past these details and pretend like they're nothing.

What about you guys? Do you also think all of this is mighty suspicious? Do you have any theories regarding more waves of DLC, and what they could possibly be? Oh, and if you have more evidence for there being four waves, please feel free to tell me in the comments or through message. (I might not see the messages, though, because mine haven't been working that well, so mostly stick to comments and reblogs.)

Lastly, I did want to ask if anyone knows what the European version of the shop for the DLC means by “It’s possible that additional DLC, not listed above will also be distributed with the Expansion Pass.” I saw somebody mention it, I don't remember what post, but I was wondering if that was just a standard description for the European page or if it was just for this DLC. I'm in the US, and mine doesn't say that. If I'm completely wrong about this fact please tell me,,,

That's all I got though!! So, buh-bye!!!!

[fastsnax-drive-thru]

MAJOR SPOILERS FOR BIGSNAX DLC

I wanted to compile some of the less talked about (at least from what I can find) tidbits of lore! I'm so curious and I've talked it to death with people around me. I would like all the thoughts. Give them to me.

To make things easier it will be in a list of sorts.

1. Flowers

The flowers found around mother natureas shrines are odd. I couldn't find them in the list of plants shelda listed off. That being witch hazel, cinnamon, black tea. And well oil of vitriol which I didn't see come from any plant in my googling. What is interesting is the fact that this plants thorns are carved into every single doorway.

It's clear that floofty was messing with this thing too (could be what made strabby big since its clear the shrink spice shrunk things. Floofty also states that the small size is the bugsnax natural state, and later triffany attributes the big size to the uh. "Amount of fertilizer in the ground." It should also be noted that shelda describes the plants on snaktooth as more toxic than their off island counterparts.)

2. The googly eye eclipse

So what does this plant do and why is it important enough to put on every doorway? Maybe like a ward? Regional plant sure, but it's depicted right next to the-

3. Leaders of the past

Since we don't have a timeline, and we aren't sure if the murals are meant to be viewed in a specific order- it's hard to tell if the eclipse shown in the ritual mural comes before or after bugsnax. What was the ritual for? I think we can assume that leaders who wore the halo like mother naturea were her priestesses but this ritual is lead by the horned grump. And there is no longer a big mother statue in front of the temple. In terms of the first queens emergence, a crater doesn't make the most sense if something is coming out of the ground. Who knows what the eclipse did, if it did anything.

3.5 Broken Tooths existence

Bugsnax are a natural, if dangerous, part of the world (completely shooting my aliens theory in the leg). But it was through "not following the light of the mother" that this civilization met its destruction. We see with each new leader of the ancient grumps- their eyes close and they grow horns. Honestly wish shelda could have spoken straight laced here but ya get what you get.

I'm going to assume the wording implies a corruption of values for power, an abuse of the natural phenomena of bugsnax that made them much worse than they would be otherwise. Such as dumping people in a pit full of parasites, engorging them to ginormous size. I have to wonder if mother naturea statues only exist on brokentooth and no where else because her image was used to cajole followers into acting against their best interest. "The ancients may have worshipped the mother, but her light was lost on them."

The fact that broken tooth is named in reference to snaxtooth island, could imply some interesting things. Baseline- could just be named for being the smaller and distant island. Possibly, however, it could mean that the island was named specifically for the fucked up things happening over there. It was the more technologically advanced area with a different sect of religion; or at least a different religious practice that sacrificed live grumps instead of mainland Stone grumps who simply left their dead out (thanks triff). Sheldas ominous "the tooth remains broken" could mean a lot of things. Could mean those who lived on broken tooth were shunned. Could mean the island literally used to be part of the mainland. We know the undersnax can move things. Shoot- could mean the island was created because of the sacrificial practice. Broken tooth has the temple, but that doesn't mean the leaders we are aware of started there.

5.Cappuceetle implications

4. Horned grump and the triplicate space

It's hard to drop the alien thing with the buried metal pyramid that glows, has strange technology, and gives you a crystal clear image of the night sky no matter the time of day. What's up with the murals in the triplicate space showing the future seconf queen after the destruction of the tunnels. It's possible the tunnels weren't destroyed in the destruction of brokentooth but it's still odd they came back to update the murals unless the horned grump was aware of the outcome of the sacrifices in the first place. Everyone who had survived the sinking escaped I.e. Shelda's ancestors, probably didn't stay behind after seeing what happened first hand.

There's already a pretty big question surrounding ancient grumps and modern foods made with technology that neither the stone or sand grumps had- but I feel like cappuceetles existence confirms a lot of fan theory that snaxs evolve into the most alluring form for consumption. Alegander avoided eating bugsnaxs for years, was a prior barista, the only grump on the island for who knows how long. And the only brewed drink snax ever pops into existence as a pet in the only area he locked himself up in. We know they can kinda read minds already. The sheer willpower of queens. The predatory nature towards those who are emotionally compromised.

6. The sand grumps

When you look at the sand murals, it's clear the grumps are guarding the body storage with weapons. I'm just assuming it was to keep things from coming out rather than bugsnax from going in. Im sure it's not canon but I'm assuming bugsnax, like real bugs, enter the people while they are unalived. I wonder if the bugs reanimated the corpses. Anyway. All that to say- if the second queen ruled the longest and most peaceful reign... Is this behavior normal of during the reign or during the downfall. And if that kind of paranoia was normal while she was alive and ruling, was her existence common knowledge or secret. We don't see any acknowledged existence of the queens don't exist outside the triplicate space. Which really makes the murals in there weird.

Anywho. I've been sitting on this post forever. Thinking about bugsnax.

.

.

Thinking too much about bugsnax.

It's three a.m.

[eaglefairy]

I think, at some point earlier in this liveblog, I said that I've never played a game that felt so dedicated to making me dislike it while I'm trying to enjoy it, and however many hours later I am into x*noblade 2, this is still 100% true.

I think the worst part for me is that it's not just the gameplay or just the story/worldbuilding/etc I have problems with. It's both. The map and the menus are both far worse and less navigable than the first game (I'm about to redo my equipment soon and I am dreading that), and everything is so horribly explained that I genuinely gave up during chapter 3 on my first playthrough. (To be fair, this game at launch had a lot more issues than it does now, and a lot of things got fixed with the dlc and patches. Speaking of which...)

I sincerely dislike nearly every single aspect of the blade system. It was DEFINITELY one of the main things that made me drop this game back in 2017. I was failing constantly in battle because I didn't know what I was doing, so naturally I wanted to get more blades. But it was Gormott in chapter 2: the only option available to me was the gacha. But again: 2017, so I didn't have access to all the crystals in the DLC, so I could barely summon any blades! Not to mention how the game completely betrays you, the player, by giving you Tora as the third party member when he can only equip the Poppis. One thing that is crystal clear is that the core gameplay loop of this game is built around chain attacks (which aren't unlocked until chapter 3, by the way). This game's combat is at its best when every Driver is equipped with 3 blades, and that is literally impossible for Tora until over halfway into the game! Not to mention Tiger Tiger, which is a minigame from hell (and didn't have easy mode at launch, just saying).

Oh, but that's only the gameplay aspect! There's still blade designs and lore to talk about! Blade designs...okay. listen. I don't like how a lot of the blades look, I will say that upfront, and it is because of the designs of the female blades being so sexualized. However, that isn't actually my only problem with Blade designs. Honestly, I'm more disappointed that there aren't more cool animal blades. Like, we got Dromarch! And that's about it. There are some other monstery rare blades like Wulfric and Boreas, but the vast majority are just Hot Anime Tiddie Women and frankly I feel like that's a failure of imagination. And blade lore. I know I've said this a lot before, I'm waiting to say my full piece on this until I have full context, but the pieces I have are not looking good. (Thinking about how the first thing the party asks Vess when they meet her is "Where's your Driver?" still eats at me tbh.) Bonus points for synergizing in the worst possible way with the gacha mechanic: one of the thematic cores of this game is that blades are people and not just weapons of mass destruction, which is why I've summoned and discarded at least 100 of them in the past few days trying to get the specific one I want to optimize my build. As for the combat, I will give it this: I have warmed up to it significantly over time. Now that I know how pouch items work, what the intended flow of combat is, and have enough blades on my characters that I can always switch to have new arts refreshed, I'm enjoying it a lot more. That doesn't mean it doesn't have problems, though! I feel like Torna really encapsulates what this game's combat should've been; I had much more fun playing through that than I did the base game, for sure. Even though the way they did chain attacks in this game is fun and interesting, it just takes way too long. For context, chain attacks are extended by breaking element orbs that you've placed on the enemy in preparation. Element orbs are placed on the enemy by completing combos, which require 3 special attacks done in a specific order of elements to complete. There are 8 elements in the game, which means if you want to use chain attacks to their fullest extent, you have to do 24 special attacks. In order. While relying on the AI to pull up the blades you need on the party members you aren't controlling. This means that a lot of unique monsters and bosses have these oceans of HP to slog through because they need that much HP to just survive to the point where you can do a chain attack. Regular enemies thankfully don't suffer from the same HP problem, but they have a different problem (that crops up in 3 as well). Chain attacks just...aren't useful to fight them, the most common enemies in the game. Chain attacks may have been unreliable in 1, but when the enemy being targeted died the chain attack would swap to focus on a different enemy. This gave them utility against both bosses and packs of regular enemies. They don't do that in either of the following games, meaning that for a lot of battles that are challenging in a different way from singular tough enemies, one of your strongest strategies is almost useless.

Edit: forgot about this while I was writing but came back to say: my brain is not big enough to account for both driver combos AND blade combos. It just isn't, that or I just don't have the willpower to sort through everything to make sure I have at least one blade of every element AND at least one of break, topple, launch, and smash on all my characters. It's not happening. Will my gameplay experience suffer for it? I don't know! Just add it to the list of mechanics in this series I don't fully understand and we'll be good.

As for everything else...I don't know, man. The pacing is slow and bored me to tears in the beginning, the main villains are either very interesting or very annoying, I want to punt Tora into the sun at all times (and not in the vaguely affectionate way I feel about Issun in Okami), and the game is addicted to splitting the party all the time when frankly it should know that its at its best when there are 3 members with 3 blades who can do chain attacks. Honestly, I think my feelings on the game can be summed up by the words of many other people. People who, when asked if x*noblade 2 is worth it, tell the asker "it has a slow beginning but it gets good starting in chapter 5." Which is true, but...the game only has 10 chapters. That's not just a slow beginning, that's literally the whole first half of the game that you're writing off!

[morsking]

Got around to starting and finishing Old World Blues in the past couple of days. I think it’s the strongest of the game’s DLC I’ve played so far.

At first, it feels like you’re in for some wacky science fiction b-movie shenanigans once you’re introduced to the Think Tank. They’re all whimsical idiots who forget what words are, repeat themselves to elongate their sentences to look smart, and even one of them is bizarrely horny and has a fetish for... innocuous human behavior? Stretching? Yawning? They are neurotic brains in machines who take stuff apart and break it without really creating anything with it, just replicating the same results over and over and none of them seem to notice how stupid they are and it’s amazing. They took your brain, spine, and heart out of your body in an attempt to turn you into a walking vegetable, only for them to become so fascinated with the damage you took from Benny’s bullet that they fuck up the surgery and end up finding a way to keep your intelligence about you with a remote device that connects your brain to the tesla coils in your skull. Their biggest scientific discovery since... who knows how fucking long, was an absolute accident. It could only come about by chance, because you, as an existence alien to the static Big MT, shook things up tremendously. 

But as funny and baffling as all these things could be, the more you explore Big MT, the more apparent it is that for all their quirks the Think Tank are also responsible for some of the most heinous crimes against humanity you can witness in Fallout: New Vegas. They experimented with carnivorous, parasitic plants on human beings, spliced humans, dogs, and robots together, developed nightstalkers and cazadores you see in the base game, used the Sierra Madre casino and its inhabitants as a petri dish for holograms, the claustrophobic hazmat suits, and the poisonous Cloud that killed everyone and turned them into zombies. Their experiments killed all their staff, and not one of them batted an eye to what they did. And their most shocking crime is the repetition of Japanese internment with Chinese hostages, who you can find ghoulified from radiation and are forced to kill them. These prisoners can’t be reasoned with or saved because the Think Tank stripped them from their humanity long ago along with any humanity or rationality that was left in the Big Empty. The only thing they can do as being robbed of their humanity is lash out at anything that still looks human. All throughout the DLC, you are subjected to displays of the Think Tank’s obsessions and cruelties and aimless ambitions, and you wonder why. How did things get this twisted and distortioned? And then you meet Dr. Mobius, and you find out why.

In his introductory segment when you start the DLC, he seems like the parody of the crazed mad scientist terrorizing the slightly less crazy eccentric scientists and the bastard who kidnapped your brain. But when you meet him, he’s like a sweet, confused, senile old man. He’s got an endearing if a little weird addiction to radioactive snacks despite him being a brain in a machine who has no mouth to eat them. He forgets he keeps a giant killer robot scorpion with a OHKO death laser of infinite... death powered on and sucking up energy all the time and that’s why his shit never works. He uses the wrong words on his sentences because they sound like the actual words he means to use. He didn’t just steal your brain, he kept it safe for you. And also, he’s the one who lobotomized the Think Tank into the witless abominations they are now. 

Dr. Mobius witnessed his co-workers, his friends, pushing the boundaries of science further and further into dark places. Terrified for what they might do, he robbed them of their sanity and created an army not to terrorize them, but to keep them busy and from getting out. Dr. Mobius feared for the world, that it might be subjected to one new horror after another. There is great compassion in his actions but also great cruelty. He was so afraid of his friends the new world he trapped them in the old one. That’s where obsession and abhorrence belong, in the big emptiness of the past. It’s so appropriate, that Big MT is misread as “the Big Empty”. Because obsession and madness are an abyss, and also because everything that happened there was meaningless and hollow. There was no purpose to the Think Tank repeating its process of lobotomizing and observing the lobotomites. The great irony is that. That they don’t realize that what they do to human beings is what’s been done to them. Like the nature of all their names, their actions and their philosophies are cyclical and self-consuming. (Ouro)Borous. Zero. (Man)Dala (circle in Sanskrit), 8, Klein and Mobius. They are concepts that loop into themselves, symbolic of the futility of holding on to the grudges and ambitions of the Old World, a world that new only conflict and supremacy and paranoia and hostility. The fact that Mobius had to resort to brainwashing his own colleagues itself is evident even he didn’t know how to let go of the brutal utilitarian methods of the Old World in an effort to save the New One.

And what’s even worse is that didn’t matter anyway, because the mutated abominations that Borous created still found their way into the Mojave anyway. Are we supposed to accept that as a mercy that night stalkers, spores, and cazadores are the only things that slipped through the crater into the desert and be thankful for it? The only thing you can do about it now is say “Enough.” Enough of the Old World and its curses. It has no right to turn this world into a graveyard with it. It has no write to take from it and toy with it. Many times that attachment is played for laughs in Old World Blues, particularly Borous’s anti-communist fixation and enactments of his high school trauma being the basis for a training operation. But when you truly look at it it really feels like gallows humor. How many people do you reckon died in those tests at Lab X-8 because he used the test subjects as a means of catharsis? What was the human cost of that myopic insecurity and resentment? You only have to look around you. The facility is littered with guts. And it’s not the only one that looks like that. Not by a longshot.

So it came my time to also say enough to the Think Tank. I chose to kill them (more like stumbled my way into killing them because you have to thematically cycle through speech and skill checks for Mobius to give you the option of sparing everyone). It was both a roleplay gesture of revenge as much as it was a choice from me as a player to put the Big Empty out of its misery. It was already a graveyard in concept, it had to be made a graveyard in reality.

So that’s it for my review of the story. As for the more physical aspects of the DLC, I’ll say the Big Empty is probably the most interestingly designed setting I’ve ever seen. From the moment I woke up at the top of the Sink’s balcony I fell in love with what I was seeing. The layout includes some interesting platforming and traversal of the terrain from labs to cliffs to caves. Every laboratory houses something useful for you or relevant to the story and it’s easy to circle around the entire map and unlock everything as you go. The exploration comes naturally and you’re always encouraged to go back and look to see if you missed something (which you probably did, because it sure happened to me). One of the best things I found was the stealth suit. I’ve written about it already, but it is simply adorable, quirky, and also very helpful. Getting all its upgrades is worth it and not all that difficult even if it looks like a case of trial and error. There are some neat unlockables in terms of weapons as well like the stuff Elijah and Christine left behind, and lore that elaborates on their time there and Christine’s chase of Elijah to make him pay for his crimes. There is also the excellent set-up of your encounter with Ulysses in Lonesome Road, since he’s left his mark everywhere for you to see, as if luring you and taunting you. The dialogue is some of the wittiest and funniest Fallout’s ever been. The personalities in the Sink’s assistant appliances are so varied and interesting. You have the weirdly horny and seductive seed processor, the germaphobic water sink, the pessimistic and exhausted Muggy mini securitron, the jealous bickering light switches, the radio man juke box, the brave little toaster that could (murder everything), the ultra-patriotic and self-unaware book chute, the compassionate level-headed Auto-Doc, and finally the neutral, loyal, and polite Central Intelligence Monitor. Old World Blues had such an interesting and loveable cast. There is not a single human character in the entirety of the DLC, yet all of those feel vivid and alive. 

Those are my two cents on Old World Blues. A beautifully written, poignant, and entertaining piece of gaming. Now, we move on to Lonesome Road. 

[chaosmechanica]

From Mortal Kombat Community.

After the recent Mortal Kombat 11 reveal, I was excited. I was giddy. Giddy in a way I’ve never been before for a Mortal Kombat game.

It looks great (and gory, if that’s your thing). Fan-favorite characters are returning. Even fan-favorite versions of each character are returning thanks to a time travel subplot. While in combat (sorry, kombat), I’m not the most diehard Mortal Kombat player, I absolutely love the lore and worldbuilding. I know a game about soldiers, ninjas and monsters fighting in a tournament isn’t the most unique story when it comes to fighting games. However, the story mode of the last two iterations (along with the Injustice games) were some of the highest quality productions in the genre. Time was spent crafting this universe. The interactions are fun, the movesets have become amazingly animated, and the characters have the most flair they’ve ever had.

But most of all I love the updated looks of the characters. While some like Scorpion have had several iterations that are iconic and memorable, some characters have fit more into the “meh” category over the years.

Notably, the character that stood out the most was Skarlet. Her costume has changed so much from her first appearance that she’s literally unrecognizable. She’s gone from a bland, sexy bikini ninja into a character with a very distinct look, even among the Mortal Kombat roster. She’s one more kunoichi that is getting the (excuse me) makeover she deserves. Here’s what caught my attention so much,.

Skarlet’s Origin

Skarlet was originally nothing more than a wink and a nudge to fans. It’s probably why her storyline was flat.

She was first “conceived” as a rumored secret character way back when in Mortal Kombat II. The rumor was false, but the idea of a red female ninja lingered on for years. Nearly twenty years, in fact. By 2011, NetherRealm Studios made her real, through DLC. And what we got was…more of the same.

  Some may think this obvious criticism is the result of prudishness. However, it’s far from it.

Sexiness is not a character design sin. Modesty is not needed for character depth. A woman can show skin and shouldn’t be shamed or denigrated for it. This is a given that everyone can agree on.

The problem goes much deeper:

It’s uninspired.

This costume was yet another copy and paste moment for the designers: take the most basic kunoichi design and re-color it. What we have fans have seen for years. It happened with each male ninja. And it took years to make them unique. Unfortunately for Skarlet, not unlike her “sisters” Kitana, Mileena and Jade, her design meant getting what some on the internet call the “ninja stripper” design.

The Problem With Mortal Kombat’s Female Ninja Designs

Again, being “revealing” doesn’t mean being “ratchet,” “slutty,” or “smutty.” But having been a fan of the series since its inception, it’s easy to see the diminishing creativity for female ninjas as the series continued. This can be seen in the DeviantArt profile of artist OperatingTheTan. The artist’s “The Evolution of Mileena” piece emphasizes this well:

While there are some key, signature components of Mileena’s costume (chiefly, her veil-like mask), there’s not much else. Jade and Kitana don’t fare much better. They have nearly identical design choices that don’t take into account their personalities and history. There’s very little personality outside of each character’s weapons.

Outside of the very simple blood red motif, it’d be hard to tell anything about Skarlet’s character. One would have no idea that she was made to be Shao Kahn’s most dangerous and loyal assassin. Or that she is a sentient collective of blood. That Kahn made her from the bloodshed of battles. And that she considers herself as much as a daughter to Kahn as Kitana and Mileena.

Giving Purpose to “Sexiness” In Mortal Kombat

There’s also no use of sexiness as a weapon in the games. No deceptive uses. Most of the battles stem from very direct and overt confrontations. Despite the abundance of ninjas in the series, they rarely sneak up on their enemies. If Kitana, Mileena, Jade or Skarlet used their sexuality to attempt assassinations, their costumes would make sense. But this is rarely, if ever, the case.

Additionally, one could argue that perhaps women from Outerworld are just very liberal. Other females in the series are more modestly covered and generally more uniquely drawn. This is especially true of Earthrealm heroes like mainstay Sonya Blade, newcomers Cassie Cage and Jacqui Briggs, and forgotten characters like Kira. This makes sense and doesn’t assume the worse: that it was just easier to sell games with attractive, scantily clad, exotic ninja women. Maybe it was a purposeful design choice.

The truth may lie somewhere in the middle. Nevertheless, everyone can agree the previous designs were spartan and bland. But this debate is what makes Mortal Kombat 11’s Skarlet such a standout.

The New Skarlet

The new Skarlet has a costume with personality to spare.

There were two main looks revealed during NetherRealm Studios’ Mortal Kombat 11 reveal. The first is one not dissimilar to an alchemist crossed with a desert wanderer. One whom carries a variety of blood vials to manipulate and shape:

The second look is more like a fantasy mage ripped out of a modern RPG:

Immediately, Skarlet’s new look is leagues beyond her previous appearances. Her costumes are beautifully detailed and draw attention. They evoke ideas from other mediums. Additionally, her face has personality. There is fortitude in her gaze. Disgust and determination. Perverse pleasure in ripping her foes up the middle with her blade. Disdain.

This is what we need for the other female ninjas.

Jade has had both a bellydancer look and stripper pole animations, so she hasn’t really evolved yet. Mortal Kombat X gave Mileena a far more conservative look, but it didn’t feel unique to her. In that game she was an older and more seasoned warrior, but I missed her rabid unpredictability. Both characters are on different ends of the spectrum.

Arguably, Kitana has fared the best of the three. She’s had plenty of memorable costumes, especially in 2011’s Mortal Kombat (also known as MK9) and the recent Mortal Kombat X. This shows that the design team has been trying to define these characters with more unique traits, which will hopefully continue to standout in future iterations.

Final Word

Admittedly, Skarlet’s new costume could be considered a failure. It doesn’t truly represent her. One could argue that Skarlet’s Mortal Kombat X comic costume is more fitting (pun intended):

It shows everything she is meant to be. A deadly assassin, using deadly weapons. Weapons that draw blood and allow her to use her abilities (hemomancy?). And she maintains a ninja look.

All of this is true. Unless Skarlet’s character has changed in ways that leads her away from that archetype.

We don’t know what Skarlet’s new costume means for her. Is it a new direction for the character? Does it represent new desires or needs? Who knows. But it does invoke a lot of questions. Questions that pique interest. I certainly want to know more about the character. I’m curious about her place in the story mode. I want to know why she looks down at everyone. I’m curious about what she carries in her pouches and vials. I want to know where she’s traveled. It makes me wonder where she’s going. These are signs of good design.

Here’s hoping we get more of the same of this. Not just from NetherRealm Studios, who have continued to push their own boundaries and evolve with each iteration. But from all of the developers who give us the same tired designs. Go further. It makes characters memorable. Try something radically different. Fans will get over their biases if they see genuine change. Adapt.

If NetherRealm Studios is any indication, you’ll see:

We might just like it.

For more on video games, check out concepts and ideas and games that deserve second changes.

Skarlet Is A Huge Step for Mortal Kombat’s Female Ninjas After the recent Mortal Kombat 11 reveal, I was excited. I was giddy. Giddy in a way I've never been before for a Mortal Kombat game.

[fullysowerewolf]

My Likes and Dislikes for Sonic Forces

Likes:

The story, with its dark tone and mostly cohesive narrative, for me ranks up there as one of the best in the series. It’s tied with Unleashed currently as my 5th favorite Sonic story. 

The supporting cast is superb and everyone in it are the most in character they have been since practically forever. Knuckles being the biggest example of this.

The gameplay is good, fun, and enjoyable across all four playstyles, though some are more fun than others.

The Avatar concept and how they were handled in the story with their own character growth arc. 

The character creation is huge and has plenty of clothing options and physical features and is pretty great. Would really like to see it again in a spinoff game of sorts. 

Eggman’s characterization was great and is at his most threatening and darkest in the series. Crusherthedoctor’s recent post on his portrayal explains this point well. 

The voice cast brought their A game and have greatly exceeded expectations. Hopefully they will be able to keep up this kind of performance in the future.

Warren Graff actually did a decent to good job with translation, as both scripts are practically 1:1 with each other, with only a few things left out or mistranslated.

The music is amazing, though I know for some the amount of synth/techno is annoying, personally I think all the tracks are good to awesome. Another thing is how the all of the vocal tracks specifically tie into the themes of the story, which hasn’t been done since at least Black Knight.

Infinite. Just. Infinite. 

The different changes and remixes to classic levels was a pretty cool idea and was done pretty well.

The fact that Forces and Mania are actually connected and tie into each other is a great idea and I hope that Sonic Team keeps doing more in depth continuity things like that. 

Mind control wasn’t a factor or used here and that is a very good thing. Especially in the case of Shadow. 

The Wispons are fun to use and are a big part of why the Avatar stages are so good to me.

The fact that Sega/Sonic Team are actually branching out into story driven DLC for the first time with Sonic, as well as slowly making other characters playable again.

On that note, Playable Shadow.

The character dialogue in the radio chatter mostly as well as in the cutscenes is really enjoyable. Everyone almost always has something important to say that fits with the events of the plot. 

Dislikes:

The story has a moderate case of “Tell, don’t Show”, which brings it down a fair bit. It really could have used a few more cutscenes to really bring the ideas and plot points it was trying to make together.

Levels are too short and needed to be longer.

Classic Sonic didn’t serve much of a point other than to add another playstyle to the game. I know the his addition was probably set in stone long before Mania, but I feel they should have just left him out of it and just had the Phantom Ruby teleport to Forces at the end without Classic.

Sonic and especially Tails characterizations were wack and a bit off at times. Sonic’s is more forgivable since shrugging off (or at least pretending to) mental trauma is sort of his thing. But they still should have made more of a bigger deal about him being captured and tortured and should have shown the effect that had on him. Tails is much worse and this has been going on since probably Unleashed or longer. Hopefully these issues get addressed and fixed in a later story. 

Not enough enemy variety, it was mostly just the same robots throughout the game. There really should have been different robots Eggman had to have made during his reign over the planet. 

The difficulty was markedly rather easy, even on Hard mode. 

Sega needs to not use any more returning levels and bosses after this game, this also includes the Wisps. It was tolerable here, but I don’t think the fandom can take much more of seeing Green Hill, Chemical Plant, the Death Egg, and so on after Forces, same goes for seeing bosses like the Egg Dragoon and the Wisps for the fifth time.  

There wasn’t an option to change the height and body type of the custom characters, which is a damn shame. More species would have been nice too.

The last Infinite boss was a let down. I was expecting Infinite to go really crazy with the Phantom Ruby like he did during the Avatar’s Metropolis City stage, but he didn’t.

The “Is Classic Sonic from the Past or an actual other Dimension?” kerfuffle that still hasn’t been solved.

No (fake) Shadow or Chaos fight.

Why aren’t there more Wispons? I thought that the achievements stated that there were over 50 wispons? Why are there only six? It seems like a cop out to only have six (technically 7) actual wispons and have the rest just be upgrades to them. We could have had a Rocket Wisp rocket launcher or a Cyan sniper rifle wispon.

Misc.:

These are various likes, dislikes, and mehs that I found not too big of a deal to put into the major ones.

D: Wish there was some way they could have incorporated actual, full on voice acting for the custom characters/avatars. With the ability to pick your voice like in Mass Effect. 

M: I wish that the Avatar had a super form, or better yet, a Phantom Ruby powered form to fight Infinite with.

 D: Why do they need to make a fake Metal Sonic? Couldn’t Eggman just use the real one?

D: I wish the forgotten Sonic characters were in this.

D: I wish there were more enemies in the final battle scene besides the known illusions, like other anthros working for Eggman either of their own free will or via force and other robots made by Eggman. 

 L: The return of “Long time no see”

L: That Jackals, Wolves, Dogs, and Bears are now officially canon Sonic species. 

M: The Chaos Emeralds weren’t in the game. Would have liked a brief explanation about why no one used them in the story but it’s not that big of a deal so eh.

M: Dark Sonic wasn’t in it or made canon and neither was Hyper Sonic

M: Cream, Vanilla, and Gemerl weren’t in it.

M/D: Blaze wasn’t in it. They could have found a way to include her in there, I’m sure.

L: Some of Adventure’s plot points were brought up again.

L: That creepy chestburster moment during the final boss.

L: Those creepy giant, twisted Infinite abominations.

D/M: Sonic wasn’t the leader of the Resistance. I still think they could have really made a great character arc for him in Forces if they had made him the leader. But I;m still glad they made Knuckles leader since he got some much needed character rerailment and him being the leader helped with that.

M: No Sonamy unfortunately

L: I like the little cube figure manifestations that appear when ever you have the Asteroid wispon equipped.

D: The final phase of the boss apes too much off of Sonic Colors’ final boss. It’s an okay fight all things considered, but I would have liked it if it had a more unique fighting style. 

M: Some of the locations in the game have been changed from where they’ve been traditionally in Sonic lore, such as Green Hill being in the middle of a continent instead of being in South Island. This kinda irks me but it’s nothing that really ruins the story. 

If I were to give Forces a rating, despite how dumb scores have become and how they’re abused and used arbitrarily by gaming media to put more or less value and worth on a game as a crappy shorthand measuring stick for what people would enjoy, I would give it objectively 7-7.5/10 and for my personal score 8/10. 

It is a fun, enjoyable game. It’s not as good as Generations gameplaywise, but that doesn’t make it unplayable or not enjoyable in the slightest. Don’t buy into the ever constant Sonic Hatebandwagon and give it a shot if you want a high speed platforming experience. If you’re more a Mario style platformer fan, aren’t fond of the boost style gameplay, or don’t like a more serious toned Sonic game, I suggest skipping it. 

[sentinelkelly]

Destiny 2: Curse of the Butthurt Man-Children Review

Destiny 2 has been in trouble for awhile now and despite what the crying man-children on Reddit, Twitter, Facebook, the Bungie forums and the hack of journalists from Kotaku, Forbes (lol did I really include them?), IGN, and Polygon, I strongly believe Destiny 2 is getting better in some aspects and worse in others. I still believe this game have great potential in the future, but for Destiny 2 to be great, Bungie needs to be less reactive and beat the community to the punch, sort of speak. More on that a little later. Let’s get on to my blasphemous opinions.

The Story

The Curse of Osiris story reminds me of Call of Duty: Black Ops III’s story. Let me explain before you get triggered: The Call of Duty, in my opinion, always had a great story despite how you felt about the multiplayer and it’s community. When I played Black Ops III’s campaign, I couldn’t help but to be lost in the plot and be almost put to sleep. The plot was convoluted and had too much filler content that further added to my confusion. This is exactly how I felt playing Curse of Osiris’s story. Although people think the story was pretty fast, I beg to differ. It took me about 4 hours to complete, excluding getting distracted by Public Events and in real life stuff. Then again, I wasn’t speed-running. Maybe that’s why, but it was definitely longer than the Dark Below which a lot of people forget about. Bungie squandered a perfect opportunity to effectively use the Osiris lore.

At the same token, Bungie opened the door to expanding the Osiris lore  (besides a webcomic) and revealing some Saint-14 lore. I would also love some Dredgen Yor lore at some point too. Time well tell how much more lore we’ll get and of whom.

Eververse

Dear Lord... I hate the fact that the loot pool is so large and RNG is still what you expect from a Destiny game. If I had to pick which is worse between Treasures of Ages and Illuminated Engrams, I wouldn’t answer because there is no lesser of the two evils. Although, at least I get the armor in Destiny 2 while I still haven’t get a single piece of AoT armor for any character on Destiny 1... on Xbox and PS4.

At the end of the day, her wares are still optional, cosmetic to a certain extent, and not game breaking. That’s all I truly ask for in microtransacions. You can make the argument that the Ghost Shells increase xp gains, points out nearby chests and all that jazz. Then, I’ll rebuttal by calling you a retard and ask a simple question: “How does differ from other Ghost Shells and how does it give you an unfair advantage in the Crucible?” Basically, the only people who still hates Eververse are unlucky like me, poor/cheap people and conspiracy theorists that think Bungie is intentionally making her stuff look better than the non-microtransaction gear. Stop being poor. Taste is subjective.

Mercury

It’s a very small area that I would’ve forgiven if you could freely explore the Infinite Forest, Past Mercury, and Dark Future Mercury. However, you can’t. You can only replay the story missions and adventures to go to those places. Not to mention there’s only one Lost Sector. There’s enough space for at least three. Mercury was over-hyped. The Infinite Forest was filler. More could’ve been done.

Despite that, the visuals are beautiful as always. Past Mercury gives you a sense of peace and serenity while Dark Future Mercury makes the atmosphere more grim and dire. Also, doing Flashpoints on Mercury doesn’t require to actually do a single Public Event. You just have to kill majors that are running around the map.

The Leviathan Raid Lair

I have not played it yet, but I heard great things about it. It’s a shame that Bungie advertised it as just a shorter version of the current raid with different bosses and mechanics because I had low expectations and now I think I might be in for a great time.

I’ll update more when I can finally play it.

#TwoTokensAndABlue: Public Events were Nerfed

So much with being rewarding. Less xp gains, lower probability getting exotics, and quite frankly more of a reason not drop everything to go do one.

The Current State of Crucible

Crucible is still like listening to music on Spotify without premium: You gotta play until you get the gametype you want or keep backing out until you get the match you want. There are also no signs of old Destiny 1 game modes returning and the current ones being separated. 

At least, we get to tell future Kinderguardians that for a weekend, the Destiny Community was able to play a large game of laser tag and then there’s the return of Mayhem Clash. MC is the only thing making PvP worth play to me.

Armor Ornaments

I’mma just say it: Most of the ornaments makes the armor look ugly and/or are uninspired. Above all, I’m extremely disappointed with Future War Cult’s. All it does is change the color scheme to white and blue. That’s it.

I do like the fact that you can unlock ornaments account wide. For example, unlocking the Crucible Titan Mark ornament unlocks the Crucible Hunter Cloak and Warlock Bond even if you never played on the other characters.

“Heroic” Strikes

Oh boy... Where do I begin? I was very excited about this. A good percentage of my Destiny 1 playtime was shutting my brain off after a long day and running Heroic Strikes if I liked the modifiers. Destiny 2 said, “Why don’t I just take Vanguard Strikes, raise the power level and call it Heroic Strikes? That’s it!” Bungie did say that they will add modifiers, but two things: 1) Why didn’t you just wait? If it’s incomplete why release it now when you could do so later complete? 2) I hope the modifiers aren’t the Destiny 2 Nightfall modifiers. Please God no.

The Vault System is Still a Mess

Imagine every single file on your computer was on your desktop. No folders. Just right there in front of your face. On top of all that, you can only have 200 of those files on your computer before you have to start deleting stuff. That’s where we’re still at. Not to mention you can hold up to 50 different shaders on your person, yet Bungie decides to make more than 50 unique shaders. It gets better: Duplicate Dawning shaders will sort into separate stacks depending on where they were received from. Dawning shaders received through Eververse will fall into one stack, and shaders earned through activity rewards will be sorted into another. This is not a bug and was intentional. On top of all this: no increased vault space, shader kiosk, or mass deletion option.

Prestige Mode Locked by CoO-Paywall

It seems like the less you invest in Destiny 2 (monetary-wise and in playtime), the more your opinion matters somehow in comparison to actual dedicated fans of the game. The whole issue was that people who didn’t owe the DLC, can’t play the 330 version of the Nightfall & Leviathan Raid due to vanilla players not being able to reach the new level cap. Trials of the Nine was also blocked. Note: Normal Mode was bumped up for both the Nightfall and Raid so you can still reach 305 playing those. Trials ALWAYS required people to have the latest DLC and patches. Hell, Nightfalls got the same treatment in Destiny 1, and mind you, there was only one difficulty. The only people that were angry were the disgruntled Destiny 2 players who stopped playing a long time ago and/or already owns the DLC. Trust me, if you’re a hardcore fan of Destiny or remotely likes it, you would’ve made arrangements to get the DLC.  Don’t come at me with that “I love the game, but have no money” bullshit. This was all a case of “What if my friend buys Destiny 2 and I can’t play with him/her?!” Um... tell them to buy the game used/on sale and the DLC? Maybe you could buy it for them so you can play with them? Gee, this is a difficult situation I’ve never been in.

Trust me, no one who hasn’t bought Destiny 2 at this point won’t buy it because of all of the ruckus this community is making. Due to Bungie getting cuck’d by a bunch of poor people who don’t even play their game anymore that complained about a theoretical situation, the first Faction Rally of Season 2 was postponed to I assume (I hope) at the beginning of 2018. 

Quality of Life Updates Frequency

I remember a time Bungie was constantly adjusting things like the economy and user interface on top of tuning weapons and subclasses, squashing bugs and things of that nature. Destiny 2 received its first Quality of Life update in December on the day of this DLC’s release. Yeah, Bungie fixed stuff here and there between vanilla Destiny 2 and Curse of Osiris releases, but there was the over abundance of legendary shards some people had to deal with, shitty RNG not giving people what they want, etc. that was just improved. The difference between patches and QoL updates to me is one fix problems and the other improves on what was working fine but can be frustrating. There is less of the latter.

The State of the Destiny Community

Everything that I’ve stated thus far is forgivable. However, Destiny 2′s state of being the target of hit pieces of gaming media and butthurt “fan” backlash is 10% Bungie being reactive, 10% Bungie making dumbass decisions, 80% self-proclaimed fans having buyer’s remorse. Destiny 1 was considered an abomination of game around this time last year for whatever dumb reason people came up with. Destiny 1 was shitted on repeatedly. Now all of a sudden, people love and miss Destiny 1 so much. It was the community’s constant bitching that made Destiny 2 the way it is. Bungie had to find a way to not repeat Destiny 1, but guess what... people flipped flopped. Ask any Destiny fan how they felt about Destiny 1, I guarantee all will praise it, but half of them were singing a different tune last year. Destiny 2 and Curse of Osiris is the community’s fault. Bungie had some part in the blame, but: 1) Me and every other non-Bungie employee don’t know what’s going on behind closed doors at the studio in Redmond, WA. 2) If anything, blame the leadership at Bungie. Why are you getting mad some artist or sound engineer. They don’t program the game or have authority to do whatever they want to the final product if it’s outside of their department.

We are the point where people constantly complaining about bullshit like optional microtransactions and plays other games are considered “concerned fans.” Meanwhile, people like me who are objective, still actively plays the game despite it’s current state, and can compliment game when something is done right gets accused of being on Bungie’s payroll. The toxicity of this community reached heights I never thought possible and it makes me cringe to be an actual fan sometimes. Not to say I’m an angel, which I’m not, but at least I provide constructive criticism to Bungie and lash out at little Jimmy who claims to hate the game so much. I’m against people who insist upon passing on their misery onto other people who are actually enjoying the game. I’ve looked on GameStop’s app and Destiny 2 is worth between $12-18. I can recommend better games for that price. If you have Destiny 2 on disc and are that dissatisfied with it, I challenge you to sell it. If you have it digitally, I’m sure you can get a full refund somehow. I challenge you to get that refund. A reasonable adult, tries to get their money back and move on. If you don’t at least try, you’re full shit.

Bungie’s only unforgivable sin is giving birth to a community of entitled ingrates.

Final Verdict: 7.75/10

This could’ve been better and it could get better in 2018. However, out of the gate... it does not live up to the hype.

[alloftheyesses]

A Look at WTF Happened With Destiny 2

One Player said, “It feels like they went backwards. D1 was a good game with plenty of content by the end of its run. Instead of building off that, they end up taking away most of the features players waited 3 years for. By the time they end up getting it together, and give the community what they want, that “casual player base” will be long gone.”

Another said, “…If they lose the long term fans they built, they better figure out how to keep the casual players playing, or the community will fall off a cliff.”

There’s also contradictory opinions.

One Gamer said, “The game gives out exotics and high level rewards too quickly compared to the first.”

Then followed up with, …no, there isn’t enough high level rewards.

Another said, We “We’re simply not getting enough,” then followed up that statement with, “…they released new content too soon. PC players were only able to play the base game for a month or so before they have to fork over another $20 on top of the $60 they already paid to continue playing the base game and the new content without parts of the game being locked out.”

Now, I’m not going to review what’s been happening or what Bungie is doing with Destiny 2. There’s plenty of articles and videos detailing the present situation. What I want to do, and find out is wtf do I, and many others do about all this. Do I quit, Do I stay? Are the reasons justified?

“Three years. We where here for three years! This is the real complaint. This is why it hurts. This is why Destiny 2 is failing.”

Article by: Frank Marks,              December 10, 2017.

Bungie decided they were going to launch a new version of Destiny, but this time, they would change not only the entire game, but the entire demographic. Rendering the previous years pointless and bringing the new era down to having no special or extras features. Destiny 2 became ordinary and standard.

Bungie pulled a 180º and it left it’s committed audience baffled, stunned and confused. Why would they do this to us? Three years. We where here for three years! This is the real complaint. This is why it hurts. This is why Destiny 2 is failing.

After building and going through the growing pains, Bungie decided that they were going to launch a sequel to Destiny 1. After learning what everyone could want out of the game. Can you believe it? They worked hard, having conversations with fans and staff for three years, perfecting and fine tuning the game they started with. They took three years, and then threw it right back in our faces.

One of the biggest complaints fans have is, Why even make a Destiny 2?

Bungie took everything away. Then, justified it by telling its existing audience of fans that it would be because the game was going to be something new, it would be bigger and better and a game full of stories and adventures. New content and new weapons!

WOW! The majority thought! More than D1? There’s going to be all new stuff? It all sounded too good to be true. Bungie had promoted itself as taking everything away so that it could die in the past. They made it seem that all of the old stuff wouldn’t matter anymore, there would be new content and better things to do in D2 that would make us say, “Wow! Who cares about D1 now!??”

Alas, this is not what they did. They stayed true to their technical promises. They had removed everything great that fans had worshiped the game for. Bungie stripped the D1 game to it’s skivvies and left players feeling cheated. Now that may read as an over-dramatic statement. So I’’m going to list everything Bungie took away from D1 to make this “brand new experience”

The Crucible. 1. The ability to select which game mode you wanted to play, forcing players into a playlist. 2. The ability to have private matches. 3. The Ability to have up to six people on a fire team. 4. Ranked matches. There is only one way to follow your stats after competing in a non competitive match of Destiny 2 Crucible, Their website.

Strikes. 1. The ability to select which game mode you wanted to play, forcing players into a playlist. 2. Removing strikes from planets, forcing players to use the strikes playlist, rather than allowing players to choose what they wanted to do.

Bungie.Net 1. The ability to access, view and make changes to your vault. Forcing players to use the Destiny companion app on their phones, that doesn’t support Destiny 1. 2. The ability to access and review a library of Grimoire Cards. Forcing the player to venture through loading screens and menus to read or reread all of Destiny lore and history in game.

Then there’s the things that they changed for the sake of changing them. Quests or missions are now called “Milestones.” They didn’t change how these worked they just renamed them. Patrols are confined to a planet. Allowing the player to choose when and where, if they wanted to do a patrol.

Removing unique Faction Leader rewards. Where Faction leaders used to reward players with unique drops, Faction leaders now all pull from the same rewards list and drop them back at you with a random number that reflects the average number of your equipped gear. (Yeah, that’s not simplifying it guys!)

ZUR The mystery man selling raid ready gear and exotics that you could only get from doing unique specific content in D1, now sells the exotics that you can earn at any point in game before he even sells them.

SHADERS Free random drop shaders that a player could earn while playing specific content was removed in lieu of a new system where a player could earn a one time use cosmetic shader that could be applied to any peace of gear or weapon. The down side to this is that special unique legendary and exotic shaders are being sold through an optional. pay for random system with a face named, “Tess Everis.” Players can earn Silver Dust or pay with real money for a random drop of a shader that can only be used one at a time.

Vault to Weapon ratio. The vault only holds 200 weapons, gear, and inventory. We came from a vault that offered over 100 slots for each, including pages worth of space for weapons.

My god! This list could probably, go on and on….

It’s embarrassing, to invest into a game for years, to work month after month giving feedback and finally seeing it realized in year three of Destiny 1; only to see the majority of it taken away from you. What makes it even worse, what really rubs salt in the wound, Is the blatant lack of respect for the gamers that invested their money and time into the universe.  

I stated earlier that Bungie changed the focus of who their demographic would be for Destiny 2. (I’ll come back to this again later.) They wanted to make the game more accessible and enjoyable for the casual gamer. But, Why? They had already built and worked for a community for three years. Three years! it’s not like the community was going to abandon the series. Players had developed careers out of following the game’s story, plot, progression. All of the lore of the game was reduced to zero for a fresh start and a new experienced that had one focus…. MAKING MONEY FROM GAMERS.

It’s becoming more and more clear that Bungie is in the business of scamming people of their money. In a time when gamers are complaining about EA doing the same to their fan base with Battlefront II before the game was even released, Bungie decides it’s in their best interest to do the same to their audience that already existed!

Bungie is doing one thing and one thing only to Destiny 2. They are trying very hard, working almost endlessly at making a game that is automated and standard. Destiny 2 has become ordinary. It is a grind fest without an entertaining incentive with loot that was once the main incentive of the game, is now a gambler’s chance. It has become repetitive and stale. Shoot and kill on Planet A, earn a token so that you may pay to get something random. Then go to Planet B, earn a token so that you may pay to get something random. OR just pay for it in the main hub. Etc, etc Repeat, repeat.

Bungie has attempted to add a story that builds and expands from Destiny 1, without giving players any real reason to be invested in these new stories. With the stories and the game play, there is no real threat. There’s never urgency, or a compelling enough moment to keep players invested or wanting to come back to replay.

Another player told me he was having a hard time finding anything he wanted to replay or re-experience in Destiny 2. That’s when I found myself asking, “Is there anything I would want to replay in D2? Is there anything at all that I would want to re-experience?

The answer, was no. Bungie forces players to repeat missions or leaves the options to re-play quests and adventures. The thing is, Why would we want to? Why? There’s no incentive at all for doing it again.  They’ve created a universe where the story is a one time opportunity to experience a cinematic video that adds absolutely nothing to the world. At the same time, it doesn’t take away anything either.

Bungie has even ignored lore that they created. Players have pointed out the plot holes and inconstancies of the overall story arch. Yet, Bungie acts like it was intentional and that there’s a bigger story that ties it all together. However, they can’t get the content out in time for launch day because it isn’t ready. Plus, they plan on charging us for that content in DLC and Expansion packs.

We, the consumer of your product, understand that you have to make money as a business, but nickel and dime-ing, milking the wallets of players who have invested time in your product, stringing us along in circles is a slap in the face to every single fan.

The audience is changing in Destiny, and it’s not for the better. People are starting to catch on, they are noticing how they are being treated, and they’re rebelling, The once, tight nit community is beginning to raise their voices with their, wallets, time, and voices.

Big name, elite players of the game, are quitting at a rate that the comunity hasn’t ever seen before. These are players and channels that built their name and following on Destiny, and they are leaving the game because of the state it’s in. That’s not something people are doing because they think it will make them more money. That’s not something people are doing because they believe in the developer to make things right. To respect and value their audience. It’s something people do when they can not find a solution to a problem they can no longer contribute a positive attitude for.

Bungie might be shocked that their dedicated fans are jumping ship. But they couldn’t be further removed from the conversation that matters.

Destiny gamers gave Bungie three years to get it right. Bungie is acting like they’ve only been working on D2 for eight months.

Dedicated fans of anything aren’t stupid, and they won’t willingly be taken advantage of.  Some might quit sooner than others.  

See, Bungie is like that girlfriend you’ve had for three years saying, “We’re going on a break next week, Then starting over in two weeks.”  Then, just as before, she comes back after two weeks and is acting like you guys just met; and although she’s acting the same as before, she insists that she has changed and is changing. See, Now, she has a new wardrobe; but if you want to see the full collection —you’re going to have to pay for it with your time or with your money. See the difference? You can still do the same things as before, you can still have fun together, you can still get into the crucible. It’s just now, It’s all  on her terms with your money and your time.

I won’t subscribe to that and don’t expect you to do that either. I wouldn’t expect any self respecting person to commit to behavior like that.  Not one.

There are some positives that have come from D2, but they are very few, and none of them are an improvement on the previous three years of Destiny; rendering the confusion, baffled, and stunned looks on everyones faces when Bungie says, “Give us more money! For the sequel that never had to be made in the first place.”

See, that’s the thing about sequels. They’re supposed to be an improvement over the previous iteration. This is true for everything in life. TV shows, Movies, Video Games, Birthdays. Although we age, although somethings evolve. We become better with time. When we don’t, when we fail to, that’s when we feel disappointed.

But the reality is, for now, I’m still very torn on what to do. I like many, Pre-Ordered Destiny 2 for $100. Money I earned and invested believing I was going to get something, overall —better.

I feel forced into a contract that I don’t want anymore. I must play the game to get most of my monies worth. To be frank, I still have an ounce of hope left. A hope that Bungie will come to their senses. A Hope that they will give me back D1 options in D2. A hope that they will expand on D1 and continue to make it better. A hope that they will work hard at making a game worth my time.

The improvements I feel the Destiny’s audience wants, aren’t improvements at all. We just want what we loved back. Then they can add and tweak the mechanics to make an even better game.

Sadly, with the companies current focus of money being their first priority —I fear that this will either be years away, all over again! I fear that they will want to charge us for anything they do.

I keep thinking of a this analogy, “I pay a licensed and highly recommended flooring company to install new floors in my first home, so when it came time to buy my vacation house, I knew exactly who I would use. He had worked with me every step of the way in my first home and I knew the quality of his work was unmatched by anyone for miles.  Plus he knew now what to expect from me.

Well, day one of the vacation home and the guy tells me I need to remove the base slab before I install new floor. He tells me, it’s so the new floor will lay better than before. I say better than before? Wow! Okay, lets get started! He completely removes the old slab and lays the new one down; and it’s the same as before, except it’s blue now. In fact, it has some cracks.

I ask him, what’s wrong with the slab and why does it have cracks? He tells me not to worry about it, and that he will tend to it before he lays down the new flooring. So weeks go by and he’s about to pick up the new flooring to lay it down, when he calls me and says, “I’m here picking up the floor you asked for, but there’s another floor here that I think will work for you, it’s even better!

I’m blown away! I didn’t think there could be anything better than what I wanted!

So he starts installing the new floors when I arrive at my house only to see the exact same floor I chose but it’s green! GREEN! Can you imagine how upset I am? He’s installed a third of the floor already and I notice the cracks in the blue slab have not been fixed!

What is this? I yell. “I asked for these cracks to be fixed, and what made you think I wanted a green floor?

He calmly apologizes and says he’ll be back next week with a fix.

Next week comes and he shows up with a wood accent. It looks great, but it’s not what I wanted! He then Reminds me that I already payed a deposit and If I want him to finish it, the choices are going to have to stay. He also adds that unfortunately he can’t fix the cracks in the new slab but that the floors he’s installing won’t make it noticeable. He also tells me that the wood accent is going to cost me extra! He already laid down a little bit of it and he won’t charge me for that, but to finish the floor with the wood accent he’s going to have to charge me for it!

The furry in my vanes is approaching a boiling point. I can’t believe this guy!

I can’t back out now. I’ve already invested in the services and although It’s not what I wanted, It does look really great. I told him to give me another week. He’s coming back next week to finish what he started and has also offered to do the baseboards (at no extra cost) to complete the space he was working in.

I’m not sure what to do…..”

See that’s exactly where I am with Bungie.

They’ve strung me along with their mistakes and I’m paying for it. Do I continue with their service, get my moneys worth and then split. Riding on the chance that I may like what they do in the end. OR do I cut all ties with them immediately, find someone else and get exactly what I’m looking for.

[entergamingxp]

Deadfire Ultimate Edition Review — Rough Seas in a Tropical Paradise

January 28, 2020 12:00 PM EST

The console port of Obsidian’s Pillars of Eternity 2: Deadfire has the same great story, characters, and gameplay of the PC version but is marred by technical problems and load times.

Obsidian is finally making its isometric return to consoles with Pillars of Eternity 2: Deadfire Ultimate Edition.

Deadfire, originally released on PC in May of 2018, sees you back in the role of the Watcher, your character from the first game. A few years have passed and you rejoin your character in the aftermath of the destruction of their home with their life hanging on by a thread. Eothas, the God of Rebirth, has inhabited a giant stone statue that was below the Watcher’s castle of Caed Nua. His awakening lays waste to all around him, and in the process steals souls from anyone near, including half of your own. So great a threat Eothas poses that the god Berath, the Pallid Knight of the pantheon of gods, has returned the remaining part of your soul to your body in exchange for doing her a little favor. A simple task really: you just have to stop the giant god rampaging the world.

“Customizing your ship’s appearance, upgrading its equipment, and leveling up the crew became a favorite past time of mine in the Deadfire Archipelago.”

You will be taking to the high seas on board your very own ship, chasing Eothas around the Deadfire Archipelago. Along the way you’ll parlay with various factions, negotiate with traders, do battle with pirates, and recruit adventurers as you go. This new ship-based exploration is one of the defining features that set Pillars of Eternity 2 apart from its predecessor.

The Defiant, and subsequent ships you can purchase, add a new perspective and sense of scale to the world. You have direct control of your vessel as it sails through the waves. When you encounter other ships, you have a number of options open to you. You can board them and assault them with your crew, or you can keep the battle at a distance firing your cannons back-and-forth while keeping yourself in a tactically superior position. These additions make you have to think about how you are going to spend your gold on upgrading your party or your boat. Customizing your ship’s appearance, upgrading its equipment, and leveling up the crew became a favorite past time of mine in the Deadfire Archipelago. By the end of your adventure, your ship will be just as much a part of your team as any of the warm bodies you take ashore.

Deadfire Ultimate brings to consoles all the previously released DLC, including new story content and new modes. This includes the three story expansions, the super bosses, and much more. You also have access to the added combat mode which changes combat into a more tactical, turn-based affair. When all is tallied, you have yourself a pretty full package here.

My time sailing around the Deadfire Archipelago as Captain Jack VanderSmack was filled with adventure, friends, and fraught with danger and load screens. Prior to this review, I hadn’t yet played this tale in Eora. I’ve played and thoroughly enjoyed the first title. It was the first game in a long time that had scratched that same Dungeons & Dragons itch that other legendary titles had. I was excited to jump back in and see where this new story would take me. This time around, however, turned out to be much more of a mixed bag.

The ability to bring over your character from the first Pillars is missing from this console release, unfortunately. In its place, when you create your character you will be given the opportunity to select the results of important plot points from the first game. It’s not ideal, but it still worked well enough for me to create my own character.

From a narrative and gameplay level, the console port of Deadfire held me firmly in its grasp. The mysteries and lore kept me constantly excited to play more. I also chose the turn-based style of combat for my main game. This setting makes encounters much more tactical, giving you time to think and set up attacks and strategies.  Fans of the original style, the option to have everyone act concurrently but allowing you to pause time to issue direct commands, is still available. You have to decide which option you want from the start, as you aren’t able to swap back and forth in Deadfire. I started a second character just to test out the original mode, and it was just as I remember it from the previous game. Battles play out much faster, but in larger encounters, it can be difficult to keep track of everyone. In this mode, most players will have to rely on the competency of your team’s AI settings. Luckily though, the AI for all of your characters can be customized and tweaked, similar to Final Fantasy XII’s Gambit System.

“Unfortunately, with Deadfire, changing zones will lead to a static loading screen that will halt your questing for anywhere between 30 seconds to nearly a minute.”

The islands of the Deadfire Archipelago are tropical, littered with sand-buried ruins, caves with hidden areas accessible via underwater tunnels, and grand sun-bleached cities for you to explore. It’s a stark departure from the Dyrwood of the first game. You will be exploring all of this with either the unique characters you come across during the story or hiring pre-made or custom made characters in the various towns. I’ve always loved being able to make my friends in RPGs. The fact that I can now make them and pilot a pirate ship around Eora is even better. When one of my friends does something stupid in our weekly D&D campaign, I can simply assign him to an annoying task on the Defiant as punishment.

On the technical side, Deadfire fares far worse with the loading times being of particular note. The areas you explore in the Pillars titles are composed of various zones that are linked together. This approach isn’t uncommon for games of a similar ilk (Baldur’s Gate and Neverwinter Nights), nor is it bad. Unfortunately, with Deadfire, changing zones will lead to a static loading screen that will halt your questing for anywhere between 30 seconds to nearly a minute.

If you are hoping that returning to the location you had just been in would result in shorter load times, I have some bad news for you, friend. These long load times can result in you spending more time on the loading screen then it takes to explore smaller areas. Considering the large cities are composed of numerous shops, taverns, inns, and areas of interest that are only accessible via these transitions, it’s hard to get excited exploring when you know what you can look forward to.

I was also on the receiving end of some other, more game-halting, glitches during my playthrough. Numerous times I encountered a glitch where my radial menu simply wouldn’t respond, making accessing any of the game’s menus impossible. Once, while attempting to level up my characters, the cursor simply stopped responding, preventing me from selecting a skill to learn, locking me out actually leveling up. The only thing that would fix this issue was closing the game entirely and restarting it, which then let me enjoy a 2-minute long static loading screen before getting to play again. And on a few occasions, Pillars of Eternity 2 would simply crash. This happened most often after entering combat shortly after resuming gameplay after taking my PS4 out of sleep mode.

  “For as much I may enjoy the gameplay and story, I can’t deny that all the issues I encountered really marred my experience with Deadfire.“

For as much I may enjoy the gameplay and story, I can’t deny that all the issues I encountered really marred my experience with Deadfire. I also saw some other minor graphical glitches earlier on, but luckily, a pre-release patch released that addressed most of these issues. I’m hoping that Obsidian will continue to patch this game, focusing on reducing the loading times, ideally.

Sailing around and discovering new islands to claim as my own never got old. Whenever I came across unsuspecting pirates or merchants on the open seas, it was a thrill. It made for perfect chances for Captain Jack and crew to relieve some individuals of their wares…and lives. I constantly wanted to keep crafting new potions and poisons while scavenging for resources to enchant and enhance my equipment. My own Jack VanderSmack deserves nothing but the finest, after all.

There is a lot to love here in Pillars of Eternity 2: Deadfire. This release on home consoles may be stumbling out of the gate, but I remain optimistic that the issues mentioned will be fixed in upcoming patches. I’m still definitely looking forward to future playthroughs of my own in Eora.

January 28, 2020 12:00 PM EST

from EnterGamingXP https://entergamingxp.com/2020/01/deadfire-ultimate-edition-review-rough-seas-in-a-tropical-paradise/?utm_source=rss&utm_medium=rss&utm_campaign=deadfire-ultimate-edition-review-rough-seas-in-a-tropical-paradise

[eludiumofficial]

Rant #1: The brutal self-slaughter of my former favorite company and why I think comparing Electronic Arts to Bethesda Softworks is ignorant and irrational

Before I get started I’d like to make clear that my opinions presented here are subject to change, dependent on current events and my future beliefs. This post does in no way intend to manipulate the reader’s view on the situation or try and showcase my conviction as being the factual one regarding the topic, it only presents my personal reaction towards the statement featured in the title and should be treated as such.

I dislike rants. I dislike rambling in general, I find it to be a huge time-waster with little to no sense of rewarding. This is probably the first such post that I ever write, and I can’t say I’m quite pleased with my decision, but the subject at hand really provoked me. I feel that writing down my view on it, saving it someplace where I can see it later on in life (and remind myself of my past ways of thinking, as well as the reasoning behind them) is the best course of action. Regarding the second half of the title: I completely understand this is not a big deal, but making Electronic Arts look like the bad guy is something that I’ve seen mentioned for over a decade now in the gaming field, very few times being also backed up by solid arguments. I’m here to present it from my perspective.

Electronic Arts... a name as big in the industry as it is infamous. At least by common standards. Standards that (presumably) mostly come from reading the dumb, uninformed YouTube comment. Hell, I wouldn’t even be surprised if the vast majority of “experts” that comment defamatory remarks at EA's address have never touched any of the company's games. But how could they, right?! You need to pay, what, one hundred dollars for the Deluxe/Premium/Ultimate edition, which is in truth the actual content that assembles the main game... right?

Maybe.

This old company that the average customer loves to bash in ignorance is the same one who grants you complete access to full editions of over 75 of their titles, for €4 a month. It’s the same company who puts their game on sale for €10 one year after its release.. be lucky if you manage to score a €30 deal with other companies’ games in such a short time after launch (and in a sale). Not to mention, they actually have a working DRM *cough* Ubisoft *cough* and customer support.. *cough* Valve *cough*.

But enough about that. I'm not here to lick EA's boots, just pointing out how pathetic it looks to me when people keep complaining about this company 24/7 when there are much bigger culprits in the industry.

Culprits.. like Bethesda. Yeah. Something the old me would never believe he'd write. I wasn't just a fan of Bethesda Softworks. I loved Bethesda. I would read all the lore of their universes for hours on end, at school, at home, even before going to sleep. Hell, I didn't think The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim vanilla was a bad game at all to begin with, but when I discovered modding and found out that the Creation Kit, the godly tool that unlocked such a vast world (inside an already huge world), was brought to us by the developers, I went crazy for this team.

The introduction of paid mods.

Not only was it a global letdown when Valve + Bethesda announced paid mods on Steam back in 2015, it was unfortunately only the beginning of something much darker for BethSoft. Now, to be fair with you, I was willing to give them a second chance as customer after that absolute mess, more or less because I saw the partnership with Valve (a company that I stopped respecting since at least 4 years ago, for reasons that are now obvious worldwide) and I couldn't help but assume that they had the upper hand on here. It was downright difficult for a die-hard fan of Bethesda Studios to just drop all respect for them and accuse them at the fullest (or at least mostly) for the wrongdoing. Nonetheless they lost a big sense of meaning at that time, to me and many other fans as well.

When the "Special Edition" of Skyrim rolled out last fall I genuinely thought that was a bad joke. I went and read its system requirements, up to this day I cannot fathom how some improved shaders and lighting system along with some small improvements to textures require a NVIDIA GeForce GTX 780 as graphic processor. It's beyond insulting the way this company neglects any kind of optimization processes for their products.

One year later, here we are: Creation Club. What the actual hell, Bethesda? What the actual hell? Here’s the trailer, it should speak more than mere words can:

The best course of action here is to fight for what we stand for. Don't let Bethesda win this fight. They've lost it once already, but it seems they're coming back with a much, much greedier and more disgusting ploy.

Some more detailed information about this Creation Club mess, as I really do not have the mood to write more about it and ultimately ruin my state of mind:

Creation Club on Fallout Wikia

A very succinct description in video format, by Gopher:

It’sAGundam goes much less family-friendly into the topic, but his points are very valid:

An extremely flawed system explained by YongYea:

I don’t see how it could get worse than this... but I actually have a feeling it still will. At this point, Bethesda Softworks is not just an anti-consumer company, they're inarguably becoming a threat to the industry. They have the power to manipulate other companies' directions, they have the power to manipulate renowned modders into falling for their trap (as proved in the 2015 scandal). But I believe they don't have the power to treat us, customers, like some absolute fools, and to succeed in doing so. I believe we can take the fight to them. For a greedy company like this, where fan service means absolutely nothing today, money speak in totality. Bethesda does not deserve to be given further financial support. Not until they wake up and realize the damage they're creating.

If Bethesda really doesn't want to give up their unethical practices (and so far, it does indeed look like they're going to keep living in a dream), they have to be put down. The company that once held the crown for creating the best sandbox role-playing games, with unlimited modding possibilities, is now digging its own grave. But it won’t lay itself inside.

Nexus mods

Let's face it, Bethesda: you would never be where you are now — up there at the top, laughing in your customers' faces —  if it wasn't for your community. So many people still keep playing games that go as far back as The Elder Scrolls III: Morrowind, because of modding. As great as your games might initially be, in a vanilla state very few people would still play a 15 years old game on a regular basis. The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim is still up in the players' charts today thanks to the dedicated modders that spare hundreds of hours from their lives to expand the base game’s content. Not to mention the insane amount of bugs that every of your games has: you never fixed that, Bethesda. It was the community who did it for you. Free of charge.

I began this article by writing about Electronic Arts and never got around talking about its relevance to the topic. That’s simply because I wanted to make clear my thoughts about Bethesda Softworks first. You see, while searching up the community’s reaction to this whole scandal I couldn’t help but notice a couple dozen comments comparing the “new” Bethesda Studios to Electronic Arts. Mostly saying they've become just as bad.

I know, I know.. why do some meaningless comments matter to me? This post should be about Bethesda's fall from glory, not about this. And to be fair I did debate whether to write this in a separate post or not to write it at all. I understand it might not be a big deal, but it does really drive me nuts. I consider the society's uninformed opinions to be just as damaging as Bethesda's recent actions.

Because these uninformed opinions carry on. They influence people. They influence companies' rate of success. Paid mods were taken down in 2015, a few days after their launch, for the fact that the community made its voice heard. All the comments raging at Valve and Bethesda's poor attempt could be translated into a substantial financiar loss for the companies.

With the Electronic Arts case, things are slightly different: we aren't talking about a mass of hateful comments bashing at the team in just a few days' time, we are talking about the worldwide consensus that EA is a "bad" company. This consensus has been spread out in a wide variety of ways, mainly through chats, comments, forums talks etc. and in a very high amount of time (basically since at least ten years ago). It was initially based on the fact (among other things) that you often had to pay for the game's "Premium" edition in order to receive content that was classified by the standard gamer as mandatory for the base game. Later on the consensus was adopted by.. just about a lot of people on the Internet. And that's how it went viral, it basically became a "meme", so to say. Bad things happen in the gaming world, the community instantly associates it with EA. This is not only morally wrong, but it does affect the company as well, for reasons that should be obvious.

"So what? Let them suffer, it's not fair having to pay €100 for a game in order to get the full edition." While I agree that most of the DLCs for EA's games are somewhat mandatory (especially if you're planning to play online), one should not forget the points that I made in the initial paragraphs of this post. If money is indeed such a big issue, wait for a sale. Their games' prices drop by a lot even during the first year. At least you have the assurance of quality control. You pay for a game that... you know, actually works, it's not riddled with bugs.

"How does that still relate to Bethesda?" When people compare these two studios they do it just because they're trying to put Bethesda to shame, really. Most of the time they don't even think twice before hitting the "Send" button: "Just stick EA's name in the comment so everyone can understand I'm only trying to make Bethesda look bad. I might have actually never played an Electronic Arts game, I sure as hell have never read any documentation on them, but hey, they're a meme, everyone refers to them as the bad guy so it has to be true." Their comment/message might literally not try and say anything disparaging about EA, they probably just want to put the focus on Bethesda, but the fact that they're using the brand name as a means to make something else look bad is absolutely ignorant. You are comparing every single damaging event in the industry to one company's marketing unpopular opinion, how crazy is that?

Electronic Arts has made its fair share of mistakes in its time (I agree, buying smaller, good companies and later firing their staff is not cool at all; releasing a new edition of Most Wanted is still supposed to be a Most Wanted game, not a Burnout game), but comparing it to a company that tries and monetize a feature that has been globally free since 1980 (Castle Smurfenstein) is downright insulting. If according to the society EA  is “bad”, then Bethesda must be the devil itself. Unfortunately people will continue to bash at Electronic Arts without backing up any of the criticism with straight facts and/or proof.

The point of this section is not to make EA seem like the victim and Bethesda like the villain. It merely summarizes that if you’re trying to show your feeling of antipathy towards Bethesda Studios through a comparison with another company, then you should pick a suitable candidate. Don’t just rush at placing Electronic Arts' name in your post because you know that will draw attention and favoritism from fellow poor-informed members. It’s a shame that out of all the gaming companies out there, some with much higher rates of greediness, the community has crowned EA as the “greater evil”.

Times have changed, people. Maybe a few years ago the main problem in the gaming industry was indeed the high pricing and the necessity of purchasing a Premium pack in order to enjoy what the whole game has to offer, but if you think that’s still the main issue nowadays then I am afraid you are living in the past. Welcome to 2017, where we are greeted with microtransactions in singleplayer-exclusive titles, card games over card games with little to no difference between each other (except the company your money for in-game items will go to) and an actual increase in the game’s price during the sale, just so it can be “discounted” to very, very little below the normal price (yeah, I know that happened in 2015, but I trust you catch my drift as to what’s happening in the “new world”). While these things are happening and the industry is falling apart, people are still busy complaining about a company that gives you a full-fledged product for a higher sum of money than the “standard” one. And then offers it to you on sale during the next 12 months.

Bethesda has reached an all-time new low and no other company comes to mind that is as brain-dead, heartless and greedy as them, but if you really have to use a comparison to prove your point, for the love of God step up your game and stop mentioning Electronic Arts. There is Valve out there who keeps milking the same damn three games for years now instead of producing anything original, they have a barely functional DRM, their customer support is safe to be assumed AWOL at this point in time and now they’re releasing a card game to further milk money away from players. Take-Two Interactive literally tried to definitively shut down modding for Grand Theft Auto V. There you have Activision shooting themselves in the foot with the Call of Duty franchise, releasing pretty much the same game year after year, also charging the same amount of money for the Deluxe version as EA would for a game that is actually original.

But Electronic Arts is still “the worst company”. Ok.

To sum this up (because it’s getting late, I want a cup of hot chocolate and to play some good old Dragon Age):

Maybe EA is bad. Maybe it isn’t. But it’s certainly not the culprit of the industry anymore, considering all the petty/greedy attempts of other companies in recent years. To compare it to Bethesda, however, is a whole other story. It’s insulting. Bethesda Softworks is not just greedy, they have become a threat.

Bethesda Studios is the kind of wounded owner who kicks his own faithful dog with a club after it comes and licks its master’s wounds. That kick is painful and performed with a Creation Club.

I ran out of hot chocolate sachets.