Veraxus

I can’t believe how this guy just keeps opening his mouth and telling us how Starfield used to be fun and interesting, but that they removed all that stuff until all that was left was this sterile Far Cry clone that feels more like a chore than a game.

I’m already mad at how unbearably boring the game is, and the more Todd Howard talks about the development, the more angry I get. It’s callously just rubbing salt in an open wound.

Everyone: “Games are getting WAY too expensive.”

Out of touch executive: “Games are too cheap! Why are our sales going down? I promised the shareholders infinite growth!”

Yes! This is why the hate I see for Epic (or non-Steam in general) bugs me so much. Epic has done nothing but right by developers. While they could definitely make their storefront/app better (and they claim they are working on it) for the customer experience, I have nothing but respect for them as a company.

I will still buy games on Steam first, given a choice, but that is only because I am now a staunch acolyte of the Steam Deck, and installing via Steam is much easier than trying to get EGS games running on the device.

Not a chance, and definitely not time soon.

There are certain indicators for enshittification, and Epic (like Valve) doesn’t meet any of them.

1. It is a privately held company with no plans for IPO and no dealings with venture capitalists. Conversely, Unity made their IPO in 2020 under the auspices of a notorious EA villain.
2. It is still lead by one of it’s founders.
3. Said founder is very famously big on equity and pro-developer & pro-consumer policies.

Now, you may not like Epic for some reason, but they are currently a very stable, reliable, and trustworthy company that is focused on sustaining their business through dedication to quality and reputation. Personally, I respect & trust them every bit as much as I respect Valve.

One of the big reasons to have picked Unity over Unreal in the first place was because Unity was royalty free. Unreal Engine, despite being absolutely amazing, is not.

To preserve your existing business model, Godot just makes the most sense for many former Unity developers, and I say that as an unapologetic UE zealot.

I only charge my phone via MagSafe… and the roadside emergency feature is coming to iPhone 14 as well, so I will probably sit out this upgrade cycle.

Honestly, this refresh was so unimpressive I’m surprised they bothered to have an event at all.

UE5 is great. Honestly, it would have been the better choice even before Unity decided to curb-stomp their entire community and customer base.

But then, what did we expect after Unity merged with a company known for malware. Predatory practices are their whole business model.

This is where tools like Slack Huddles or Zoom come in handy. Need some face time? You are a click away. Need to collaborate on one screen? That’s one more click. Need to pair program? That’s a click.

There is nothing that is done face to face that can’t be done faster, better, and more efficiently using readily available digital collaboration tools.

I am so sorry.

Do these people know that Slack exists? Because that is why Slack exists.

“I’m old, stubborn, don’t know how to manage remote teams, and have no interesting in learning.” - Todd Howard

Every time this guy opens his mouth, it sheds so much light on Bethesda’s decades-old problems.

Edit: I’m looking forward to seeing what Ted Peterson, Vijay Lakshman, and Julian Lefay do with The Wayward Realms. These three are the actual fathers of The Elder Scrolls. Todd has been shitting on their legacy since Redguard.

I hope these are used against them in court. Something tells me that complete lack of respect for the charges and lack of remorse for the crimes is not going to go over well with a jury.

Political parties exist for the sole purpose of rigging politics by disenfranchising the public. Their entire existence is a kind of corrupt, elitist caste system.

These organizations need to be treated the same way as corporations that get too big: they should forcibly split up. Force parties to form coalitions to get anything done, like in other parliamentary systems. Take away their corrupt levers - like FPTP voting (force RCV instead) and dark money, and return power to the people instead tolerating it in the hands of a couple private, invite-only cabals.

“Controversial”? WaPo, this was brazenly illegal and unconstitutional. “Controversial” is not the right word.

Ohhh, I hadn’t thought about it like that. I do really like the idea of having more granular mixed-use zoning control.

What do you mean? I thought the first one was one of the most “grounded” city builders ever made. Do you mean specific mechanics or maybe visual styles?

I used to be perfectly happy with Paradox’s “slew of DLC” business model… until they raised their prices.

Before that, I would buy everything as soon as it dropped. No biggie. Now I only buy DLC when it eventually gets those deep discount sales. I’m open to their experimental “subscription” & “seasonal bundle” models, though… so long as they include everything and they don’t get cute with exclusions.

This is Paradox we’re talking about. There will be 2,000 pieces of DLC for $10 a piece.

If you want the file to be directly human readable/editable:

1. TOML
2. YAML

If you never need to look at it or edit it manually:

1. JSON

This is pretty basic math. Just think about Monopoly (yes, the board game).

Housing is a finite resource. You can buy it or you can rent it. When you buy, you build equity. When you rent, it’s pure expenditure.

So what happens when nobody can buy? They are forced to rent. Demand for rentals rises, which allows landlords to raise their rents.

So how does someone with very deep pockets turn this to their advantage?

First, starting one metropolitan area at a time, you buy up everything you can. If you coordinate with other investors, all the better. The goal is to strangle supply for buyers and prevent anyone who can’t pay cash upfront from making a purchase. When people are unable to buy, they are forced to rent. So for buyers supply is down and costs are WAY up, and being locked out of buying means demand is up for rentals.

Now, renters also aren’t building equity; when means it is perpetually more difficult for them to buy in the future as long as they kept away from that equity-building opportunity.

So as an “investor” you can now have a lot of different levers for manipulating both the supply and demand sides of the housing market. For example… what happens if you have more rental property than people willing to pay your asking price? Won’t you be forced to lower your prices? First of all, that rarely happens - because as an investor, you target places that already have reliable, consistent demand (e.g. big cities and metropolitan areas). If you have to occasionally let a property go unoccupied for a few months, it’s still no biggie… you keep those prices high and do not, under any circumstances, devalue the market (for your own sake as well as your investment cronies). Now, if there were competition, prices might be driven down… so how do you avoid competition? You collude. But that’s illegal… so to avoid accusations of collusion and price fixing, you farm out your rates to a third party service that all your cronies also use: RealPage. It’s not collusion or price fixing if you use a middleman. So now you are making bank on rental rates that will see a full return on your (higher than the properties value) investment in 15 years or less.

This has been going on for well over a decade, and these “investors” are now printing money on some of their earliest purchases, with no intention of EVER putting anything back on the market.

TL;DR; Buy all the supply, force plebes to rent, control the prices, profit. Just like Monopoly.

To be fair, the right half just looks like a traditional Dutch breakfast.