It’s the fact that you literally can’t that is the problem, not that anyone is paying to play just part of the game. They’ve literally put a level gate in front of you to prevent you from progressing.

There’s no depth to the game though, they use the grind and level up of RPGs, but none of the depth and interesting dialogue to flesh out characters.  It’s the shallowness of it all, not the system itself.

I mean, that depends on what you consider to be “grind” exactly.  If I just want to play the main storyline of Odyssey, it sounds like I either have to go and do a bunch of side quests or pay for an XP boost.  Given how grindy and boring the last game was, I’m more inclined to believe reviewers who say the game is…

Or just officially decommission the birds that haven’t flown in a while and turn them into parts.

I mean...we kinda already have. We don’t necessarily have troops everywhere, but we have bases around the globe and are able to hit pretty much any ground target from the air in a matter of hours of someone giving the order. It’s not the sort of conquest in which we get to shout “Your country is ours now, mwahahaha!”…

I mean, at least some racists can be reasoned out of racism:

I’m going to disagree here. There are numerous groups in the US that do change the minds of hardcore racists.

Except corporations have an outsized influence on what you have available to you as a consumer. If I don’t want a grindy, microtransactions laden experience and instead want a more focused, fascinating story with high production values...can I find it in the so-called “AAA” space? The answer is no, not anymore; at…

They give you a fair “amount” but do they give you a fair quality? Can you honestly say that every bit of content is really worth spending your time on?  Because based on my experiences with the last game, I’d emphatically say “no”.  Games are more than just “hours spent playing”, they’re about whether or not those…

Exactly. I think a lot of people who don’t see the microtransactions problem are confusing quantity with quality. I tried out the previous Assassin’s Creed game, Origins, after a long time away (last one I played was AC 3) hopeing for a truly interesting reboot. Unfortunately, I found it pretty boring; quite frankly I…

There was a time in this country where corporations didn’t just chase short term profits, but aimed for long-term growth.  Decades of “trickle down” economics has destroyed that, now it’s short term growth, now measured in trades made in a fraction of a second by super computers, that determines a company’s worth.

Erm sorry what?

If you can’t make money in your industry by making a product and selling it, then you shouldn’t be in the industry.  Let’s assume that AC: Odyssey was half the size but with a more focused story and no microtransactions, would that many people really complain about it?  Would it really hurt sales?  I’m skeptical that…

Well, it sounds like things weren’t on the up and up.  Apparently, the app doesn’t (or didn’t) promise that the therapist you spoke to has an actual license to practice psychology.  The app also has a deceptive pricing structure.

Depends on the person. Some channels are by an actual professional, chubbyemu is an actual doctor who talks about medical stuff or Leonard French of LawfulMasses is an actual lawyer talking about legal issues. Others, you might note, have become experts by sheer experience, such as Jim Sterling. That said, if you’re…

He’s got a ton of videos on this very subject, but this one is most “to the point”.

Violence, or at least violence outside of the confines of the competition (cause some sports are violent) are super not okay.  Getting pissed about a call or something else is understandable, I’m not okay when folks get violent with people.  This is kind of borderline to me.

I think it’s worth noting that her thinking may have changed over the course of some time, it may have taken her a while to get here. A friend of mine only recently switched allegiances, he had been raised in a very conservative family and was a Republican and conservative for all his life. At the age of 31 he…

That sucks, sorry to hear it. Good song though.

There’s tons of tech fees if you’re a games developer actually, even if you’re using your own graphical engine like Telltale was.  There are fees for 3D modeling software, fees for sound, fees for dozens of different little things that people don’t notice (except when they’re missing).  One of the reasons why 3D are…