I’d appreciate if Kotaku started adding captions/better alt text to pictures! It would be good for accessibility reasons, of course, but there are also occasions where it’s not clear if a picture is there for flavor or if it’s an example of something in the adjacent text.

While my attitude is usually,“if you aren’t having fun, drop that shit immediately!”, I’m glad I stuck with Bloodborne past the first few tough hours. Once you figure out the progression rhythm, and you start “seeing” the patterns in enemy behaviors, it’s really addicting. It stops feeling grindy or “git gud,” and…

No, I agree with you. Especially as I’ve become more socially conscious over the years, I’ve become less comfortable with games focused so much on destruction/conquering/etc., especially where you’re “punching down,” so to speak. Vikings vs English kingdoms is getting into the territory where I’m not feeling great…

I don’t have much of a problem with the viking raids, but it is getting closer to colonization. Like, in the past you were generally the less powerful party against the more powerful party (when it came to expanding territory, etc.), but here it’s closer to... conquering?

I mean, the flip side is that these interfaces are all intuitive and easy to use, and that organization is part of why they feel so similar

wait

Count again? The Xbox was faster getting into a match from the main menu in 2k, but the PS5 was faster in 3 other tests

Yeah, I don’t think they were really going for rigor, more a casual comparison. I’m waiting on Digital Foundry to get into the nitty gritty

I mean, some games still don’t let you save wherever you want to, so that’s one factor

The handles are a bit smaller and the D-pad is better, and it has the share button, but otherwise it seems very similar.

Be sure to thank the Xbox One games for sparking joy in your life first.

A lot of TVs coming out this year support 1440p, so while I understand where they’re coming from, it seems kind of short sighted.

Like I said, if you don’t want any politics in your gaming criticism, Kotaku probably isn’t the best site for you. Kotaku has been pretty clear about its politics for years and isn’t afraid to talk about it when they think it’s relevant.

I think there's generally better ventilation behind people's TVs than in other places they might put consoles.

How... incredibly out of touch.

They’re his employer, they can impose whatever penalty they want to within reason. I think it's appropriate.

It really isn’t. Kotaku regularly talks about social issues in pieces that aren’t primarily about social issues. Maybe you just didn’t notice it before, but if you pay extra attention I’m sure you’ll start to see it.

You can use the Switch Parental Controls app to get really granular playtime data. You need to turn parental controls on, but if you allow all content it really doesn’t affect your experience at all.

Fun fact: if you set up Parental Controls on your Switch, you can see really granular playtime data in the Parental Controls app (on iphone or Android). Like, exactly how long you played a game on any given day, cumulative time per game, overall play time per month/week/etc. Here’s the best screenshot I could find:

Yeah, definitely, but MS is definitely making strides with all the studios they’re buying up. It’ll probably take a few years to see the biggest payoffs (IE, major Bethesda exclusives), but I think we’ll see much better exclusives on the Xbox fairly soon.