Top Ten 2023 FAILS

It's finally here! In this video, we'll be taking a closer look at some of the most egregious mishaps, controversies, and blunders in the video game industry over the year of 2023. From disastrous game launches to questionable business practices, we've got it all covered.
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[@Guyinthehat]

You know it was bad when EA gets the "Not as terrible as you could have been" award this year

[@saiyanscaris6530]

and ubisoft didnt even make the list

[@DarkFrozenDepths]

Yeah, Ubisoft and even EA of all companies both didn't make the list. That's a certified "Pepe Cross" moment.....

[@xcellentcreations3312]

Not gonna lie, EA is pretty good in comparison to Activision!

[@MrChaotic4]

The worst thing that EA did this year was having Jedi Survivor release kind of buggy at launch. But they instantly fixed that with free patches.

[@saiyanscaris6530]

man even if they didnt patch it if thats the worst they did they stood no chance in making the list@@MrChaotic4

[@Volcanoran3]

"AI CAN be used ethically, and should be used ethically." In a better world, Josh... In a better world...

[@Ramsey276one]

*Some people* are making it very attractive, you know?

[@videogamerNattie98]

Its a tool and the problem that is shown here is the fault is the people abusing that tool. AI doesn't scam people out of things PEOPLE scam people out of things and then other people go onto complain or use the bad position as fuel to the fire to further the fight aggainst AI but the problem with that is its not because of the people, scammers for instance have existed for the longest time and people complain about it outside of that sphere. And here its the same cause with other points but they blame AI instead and my assumption to that is because they don't want AI to exist in there sphere as a tool out of overzealous fear of it replacing them not because of it being misused otherwise they would blame the people like any other sphere that they have before. That's why Josh emphasizes blaming AI and taking down a tool because it has bad people abusing it is a bad way to look at it, that's like saying guns/cars cant be a thing because bad people exist. Leading by example such things are tools and the people who misuse them are the ones at fault blaming the tool for such use cases will see you running into the same argumentative walls that people who challenge the 2nd amendment or more generally the use of cars constantly bang there head and fail at.

[@lozangekitten-gamer7626]

Unfortunately, ethically has been loooooooooooooooooooooooong ignored, those guys didn't watch enough shows that represents the threat of misused AI

[@TrueBuddhaCat]

Exactly And none of these people seem to know the warning and meaning behind works like Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep/Blade Runner, Ghost in the Shell, the two Terminator movies, Robocop, and freaking Wall-E!! Heck, even I-Robot is somewhat of a warning as well even with Will Smith

[@AzureMoebius22]

​@@TrueBuddhaCat Need we also mention The Matrix series? "Hand over your flesh and new world awaits you. We demand it."

[@dmj9798]

One more dishonorable mention: Larger game devs panic when gamers praised Baldur's Gate 3 and essentially telling them to "not have those high standards"

[@MelonTartVA]

Wish we could’ve included how Wizards of the Coast *yay*ed over Larian among all the layoffs resulting in any planned dlc for Baldur’s Gate 3 getting canned

[@323starlight]

@@MelonTartVA Wait what?!

[@MelonTartVA]

@@323starlight yeah

[@thefiresworddragon927]

@@MelonTartVAWell that's fucked

[@thefiresworddragon927]

Thing is, that was already kicked out because Baldur's Gate 3 absolutely destroyed at the Game Awards, so the game companies lost their argument. Then again, they lost it the moment they started it

[@seanretro2930]

If you hire someone who was a CEO from EA, then you're just asking for trouble. Unity learned that the hard way.

[@alvaroperez2349]

That’s like adopting that one kid who kept getting sent back because of how rotten he is.

[@franknova987]

Sadly, the CEO was a scapegoat so they can secretly try to find another way to squeeze the money

[@thefiresworddragon927]

Thing is, there are some EA CEOs that are good, but you have to look REALLY far back; hiring John "pay a dollar to reload" Riccitiello was worst case scenario among EA CEOs. Others would've made people pay multiple dollars more each year. He would make you pay your life in a day and demand twice as much in 5 more hours.

[@thefiresworddragon927]

@@franknova987Yup, the goal they got after they got the backlash for the 20 cent fiasco was their real goal all along, they'll be wanting the 20 cent after they try to push a 50 cent one

[@Parto5]

All the recent awful Unity decision suddenly make sense

[@tokubrony9447]

I love how you didn't even need to talk about Number 8's entry normally, and just used a Simpsons clip to demonstrate and dramatize the whole Redfall fiasco. No joke, it was legitimately funny and greatly executed.

[@michealforguson5317]

I also loved that! Using Mr. Burns as the Executive and the Doctor as the Development Team was comedy gold!

[@thewielder3445]

He probably also had to cut down somewhere due to time constraints, as this video was pretty long and he usually only spends about 2 weeks making them

[@TommyDeonauthsArchives]

"Wow! Great Simpsons joke, Josh!"

[@joshshrum2764]

Austin eruption talked it’s head off so you have him if you want discourse.

[@valsang2350]

Just goes to show that just because something is on time, doesn't mean it's gonna come out good

[@TheNekoGentleman]

About the Unity thing, I have to talk about ONE response in particular: the one from Developer Mega Crit, the guys behind Slay The Spire. Which concluded their official statement with this gem: "We have never made an public statement before. That is how badly you fucked up."

[@DaWillstanator]

Me & my wife can both speak as people who were a part of the SAG strikes. While the AI protections we won weren’t “great”, we will concede it was at least better than nothing. It’s an important stepping stone in the right direction so we can renegotiate for even better protections in 2026 when this contract expires. Also if the new deal we got ended up not being ratified, then we’d be going back to the 2020 deal which included literally NO AI protection whatsoever, PLUS losing all the other wins we got in terms of compensation, streaming bonuses/residuals, etc. While what we got after the strike in terms of AI isn’t perfect, what we could’ve lost was objectively worse.

[@Lunacorva]

Still 100% behind SAG

[@ejelecflametails6657]

I wish you both the best of luck since you both are amazing actors and I'm sure that the future can always change. Let's hope AI won't be like the borg and assimilate normal life. And yes I recently became a Trekkie.

[@MasterZebulin]

I'd honestly want to sue the dumb bastard who brought AI into this greedy, corrupt, lazy world that I so despise.

[@ocarinaplaya]

Can't really sympathize with the amount of social activists in office spaces and writers rooms. If your work can be done by AI are you really bringing something original to the table? No one really cared about the strikes since the reasons were petty on both sides.

[@WILIZIN]

Hard to have sympathy for SAG when it promotes the worst writers that make failure after failure. I'd say your better off bucking the union and making a seperate group of new talents.

[@kingvideogames]

To add onto the moral greyness of the whole Gary Bowser situation, he was pretty hated within the emulation space, including making people pay for hacked/jail broken consoles. The team he was on used already free hardware that was used to get homebrew working on it, attached DRMs to it and claimed it as their own. Even if that these were unreliable as they kept on constantly bricking switch consoles, with him even enforcing a monthly fee to keep them from bricking. And in comparison to others, he and his team weren’t shy at all that they were pirates and making money off it. He even was boosting about it and how he made tens of millions of dollars. Sure, you can make an argument saying the fine was too high, but he definitely wasn’t just an innocent pirate wanting to preserve Diddy King Racing. While yes the Pokémon and tournament fails are bad, The Pokémon Company is more to blame for the Pokémon fail than Nintendo, at least IIRC. If we are still bundling them, I would bump Nintendo down about one or two spots.

[@saiyanscaris6530]

niantic who also works with pokemon was on mentioned a few times too. pokemon had it rough this year with everything

[@toumabyakuya]

@@saiyanscaris6530 I mean, you get that when people only care about themselves instead of trying to think why a company would take decisions they dislike. Maybe they had good reasons for some of their actions?.

[@DarkGamer-co1hx]

I don't know, from the context you're giving, it's sounding a lot more clearly black and white on someone not associated or affiliated with Nintendo who has their permission to sell stuff making profit off of their IP makes it sound pretty clear cut that Nintendo is pretty much overall in the clear here both legally and morally speaking. The Wii U and 3DS Eshops were inevitably going to close. Also, even assuming they would want to, does Nintendo even have the right to sell some of the games on there on either a third party service or Switch, considering they'd of been made for the 3DS/Wii U hardware that Switch explicitly lacks? I admit I'm not aware of how games and game consoles work in the nitty gritty, but it'd make sense in my mind. And yeah, Pokemon Fails should be contributed to GameFreak, who are the ones who actually make the games, or Pokemon Company which Nintendo is only a part of, not the whole shebang.

[@xcrackervolleyx]

From what I heard, Bowser was actually just a marketing specialist who was placed as a scapegoat while the leaders are currently hiding in their home countries, namely France, who isn’t willing to extradite the head honcho to the US.

[@4wheal]

@@xcrackervolleyx Bowser was the fall guy he was basically set up to be it while the actual leaders can disappear

[@doctoromega009]

To be fair with Nintendo, Gary Bowser wasn’t only imprisoned for emulating, but for selling modified switches that basically scammed the buyers, forcing them to pay a certain amount of money every month to keep using it (not to mention he was also a part of a pretty infamous hacking group). Still great video

[@Marcelelias11]

Still, forcing him to pay a part of his salary to Nintendo is BEYOND scummy. He should have just been arrested for a few years.

[@doctoromega009]

@@Marcelelias11 the money wasn’t only for Nintendo, but for the people he scammed

[@toumabyakuya]

@@Marcelelias11 Dude, he hurt a lot of people with the consoles he sold, are you really saying that it is wrong to force him to pay up all the money he stole?.

[@4wheal]

@@Marcelelias11 That money is also going towards his victims and other businesses he hurt. To be fair, I think it was the courts that decided that and not actually Nintendo

[@Marcelelias11]

@@toumabyakuya That sounds more like indentured servitude to me. If what you guys say is true, he's a bastard who deserves to be punished, but indentured servitude is too far.

[@JunkJester6131]

I agree 100% with your take on AI. It's a tool, neither good nor evil, and should be used ethically. Mindless hatred won't get us anywhere other than a Skynet Scenario.

[@starmaker75]

Or worse a AM situation

[@DarkFrozenDepths]

Yeah, I see too many rating/review bomb the crap out of AI generated art for no valid or logical reason.... just 99% assumptions. And that's just the tip of the iceberg.

[@descrates3545]

The best way to use AI is to make images like gangsta Daffy Duck and SpongeBob riding a motorcycle

[@DarkFrozenDepths]

@@descrates3545 too bad gansta Daffy thlammed his penith in the car door

[@swishfish8858]

​@@DarkFrozenDepthsMost of the time, it's just not great art. Kinda like a frozen meal versus a home-cooked one, it'll do in a pinch but most people will agree in a blind test that the latter is better. Of course, part of that is definitely coming from this fear of AI, and the scare tactic industry taking advantage of the general public's lack of understanding of how these systems actually work.

[@WolfDB]

It just doesn't feel like the start of a new year until Josh starts tearing apart the games industry for all the garbage decisions they've made from the previous one

[@jameslawrenson1208]

It's cathartic to see him tearing into the fails every time!

[@cherrypopscile3385]

"I'm not smart enough to talk about this" I respect that.

[@voidastralbirth]

2023 was a year with some of the highest highs of gaming… but also some of the absolute lowest lows of gaming failures. Let us all pray that this happy new year of 2024 will be a much more stable one for the gaming industry.

[@lozangekitten-gamer7626]

Stable, but favouring the good over the bad might I add... with NFTs crashing and burning, it's already a plus as is in the good direction. Hell, even EA... actually "behaved" for once, also never expected Nintendo to be an Elite 4 of this list, ActivBlizz/MicroBlizz will always be the Champion of the Yearly Fails League

[@captainseg]

Considering that Hogwarts Legacy is in dishonorable mention or Joshscorcher not wanting to talk about it despite having passion in gaming just goes to show how MESSY this game was on all sides. And I respect that.

[@WILIZIN]

He didnt do it because a lead writer threw a hissy fit and was threatening josh and ari, and this is when ari was pregnant and it made her so overstressed that it put the babies at risk. This was back when the drama was happening mind you.

[@captainseg]

@WILIZIN Oh, that's horrible. I know Hogwarts Legacy has a bad rep (both in and out) that couldn't wash off but I hate it when people threaten others when it comes to the game itself.

[@SnipingIsFun]

Except it wasn't messy on all sides. The crazy people against it for stupid reasons are 100% on the wrong. The game was fine. The Harry Potter IP is fine. And Rowling did nothing wrong in terms of the last few years. They made a big deal out of nothing and normal people called them out.

[@captainseg]

@SnipingIsFun Even then there were no winners. Hell I was curious on the game since I was done with HP after the first Fantastic Beast film and even then I got attacked. Yes I heard the controversies and I didn't give a shit. JK Rowling will still do her bullshit like "Hermione was always black" (BULL FUCKING SHIT) and make an LGBT hot take in order to be in the spotlight. Sadly... due to the outrage of the game itself (which I applaud the developers for a massive success especially when they delayed it 3 times) it made me not buy the game or enjoy much Harry Potter without getting harassed (and I'm a Star Wars fan so that speaks for itself)

[@SnipingIsFun]

@captainseg Stuff she did years back like the Hermione is black, Hermione is in a wheel chair, the creepy things like Hogwarts used to not have plumbing so people would just go and use magic to make it disappear, and the whole Dumbledore is gay thing were stupid and forced. She has said stupid things for years to appease woke weirdos. But what she said about men being trans women are not actual women is not wrong. That is biological fact. And the fact she pissed people off for saying something so true is both awesome and hilarious.

[@ivanbluecool]

You know it's gonna be huge when you see the trailer

[@samflood5631]

About the whole AI thing, voice actress Erika Lindbeck posted on Twitter that she doesn’t approve of AI using her voice without her contest. This resulted in her being trolled online which caused her to quit both Twitter and Instagram all together.

[@psychie8625]

...Why...

[@Canadiansamurai]

I love Erika, and screw all the people who harassed her!

[@samflood5631]

@@Canadiansamurai It's a miracle that I didn't have a Twitter account, and I never will.

[@davidtimmer596]

@@samflood5631 Me either. Twitter's a cesspool of the worst scum of the earth degenerates you will ever find on the internet.

[@jonathanbarr9764]

Is anyone else tempted to sneak onto the stage at a game award show and hand the people at Activision/Blizzard an Razzie style award for being terrible three years in a row?

[@andrewgifford1007]

Not gonna lie Kinda

[@efad3215]

Yes.

[@jonathanbarr9764]

@@efad3215 If anyone does please do not mention where you got the idea or Josh and his channel are going to be in a lot of trouble.

[@the24thcolossusjustchillin39]

I’d just hand everyone rotten tomatos

[@jonathanbarr9764]

@@the24thcolossusjustchillin39 I like that idea, it's a classic sign of disappointment, as far as I know it's legal and if everyone does it you're less likely to get caught unless you're the one giving them away.

[@Greil9]

Glad to see the Escapist exodus got an honorable mention. That really was a company sawing off its own foot and then wondering why walking is so much harder now. At least now we have Second Wind with nothing being lost. Everything either got carried over or they started/will start a new thing with the serial numbers filed off. Biggest loss to me used to be Adventure Is Nigh, but then in December we learned that Second Wind acquired the rights to it so the adventure goes on.

[@baronkarza2939]

oh my god its sarda the sage the wizard who did it

[@legomaniac213]

Based on how quickly they were able to launch Second Wind, I have the sneaking suspicion that it was in the works for a while as a "when the new owners inevitably fuck us over" option.

[@Takisan111]

By the time Escapist imploded, I was really only still watching for Yatzee. All their other stuff just wasn't fun or interesting enough to keep up with. Some of the new series on Second Wind seem to put a bit more effort into how they present their topics. I think this split was the best choice for everyone that mattered.

[@TW-dh5rg]

Ngl. I thought he was talking about the game series for some reason.

[@Toksyuryel]

@@TW-dh5rg I only figured out myself about a week ago that the game series had absolutely nothing to do with them. Finally picked them up because they were dirt cheap and have been having a ton of fun with them.

[@4wheal]

You do know that hacker was a part of a much larger group that did a lot of scummy stuff right, and it was the courts that fined him that much, not Nintendo. Also Nintendo dosent have control over Game Freak and is only a part holder over the IP and have no influence over game devopment.

[@Yinyanyeow]

If anything, Nintendo should have hit 10 with this kind of mess. (Considering what kinds of a mess was with things linked to them.)

[@manuelalbertoromero9528]

I feel they really should have more of a say in the development part though. Like, they can't just say no to releasing games in that state?

[@4wheal]

@@manuelalbertoromero9528 The entire IP ownership is kind of a legal mess, and it's probably just not worth the hassle to try and force the issue. The Pokemon Company is the main party and the one pushing for yearly releases. Basically, Nintendo might just not want to push the issue and lose some of the rights they have with the games, so they are basically just yes men.

[@Yinyanyeow]

@@4wheal aka a hands tied issue?

[@thunderspark1633]

I have to disagree they have no influence on thé development. Nintendo places thé deadlines and constraints on thé development process. Look up the story of what happend to Sonic Origins because Sega did not allow the devs to fix up some clear issues.

[@alijahaskew4644]

Seeing Josh roast Cinder during the live services segment was extremely cathartic to me. Animal Jam was one of my favorite games when I was a kid, and to see Wildworks scrap Fer.al in favor of that NFT disaster Cinder hurt me to my core.

[@s.p.d.magentaranger1822]

I was so looking forward to Fe.ral because I loved Animal Jam too...

[@riverofmadness4996]

yeah, I was waiting for Fer,al to get done and finally checked after forgeting about it for a while, only to see the flaming crater of Cinder. I will never not be mad about this.

[@matttheaquaflame4626]

When I heard that Nintendo's Patents in Tears of the Kingdom didn't go through, I sighed in relief, smooth move Nintendo you tried to drop the hammer on the competition and failed at it miserably!

[@franknova987]

They did with Eternal Darkness on the GC preventing games to have a Sanity system so, this wasn't a surprise for me

[@matttheaquaflame4626]

@@franknova987 Wasn't that during the GameCube Era?

[@franknova987]

@@matttheaquaflame4626 yeap, they ended up keep paying to extend the patents when it was gonna expired...

[@ZX-Gear]

We really need to abolish the concept of intellectual property since like law enforcement,it is too rotten to fix.

[@swishfish8858]

Filing patents for game mechanics isn't just something Nintendo does, remember. It's a wider industry problem. WB owns the rights to Shadow of Mordor/War's nemesis system, which is a HUGE disappointment to me.

[@StickMaster500]

No other Top 10 compares to this annual Top 10 that I've always looked forward to every year! It's going to be interesting with how the 2024 Fails is going to look 🤔

[@MasterZebulin]

**scoff** If we even LIVE that long...

[@greatsageclok-roo9013]

Didn't expect to see you here, mate. Feels weird seeing a comment by you that does *not* start with a PokéMon and end with *Piss* after the 'Read More' option. (In joke, everyone; don't ask.)

[@lozangekitten-gamer7626]

I like that 2024's beginning of the gaming industry that Both Bobby Kotick of Microsoft and John (former EA guy) are out of the picture. What a cleansing start to 2024

[@chocoberryvanillacake4297]

Another fail of 2023 in my opinion is the Tighnari VA scandal. Trigger warning for anyone sensitive to this topic cause it includes the involvment of minors. When Sumeru was announced and showed the characters one of them was Tighnari the most sassiest fox person you can ever meet. And the person who voiced all that sass was Elliot Gindi. Now he seemed funny and overall pretty chill. However it was one day that a person on Twitter came out saying that Elliot is a sexual predator. And has screenshots of their conversations with him on Discord and the stuff he was saying is...disgusting. And most of the fans he chatted with are MINORS! Even some of the VA's spoke up about his weird behavior when they would do recordings. So obviously he tried to defend himself saying that "I didn't mean to hurt anyone." Yeah Hoyoverse didn't took it well and immediately kicked him out and the went to work to find a new VA for Tighanri. Yeah we had many dark moments in the Genshin community but no matter how divided we are we all agreed that whole thing was a sh*tshow.

[@BJGvideos]

I want to know why, if people KNEW this and had actual evidence, they didn't report him IMMEDIATELY. Why did they wait until he got some press to do something so basic?

[@DarkyLonewolf]

​@@BJGvideosBecause some people, even if you have as much evidence as possible, will find a way to not believe you at best and victim blame at worst.

[@ZX-Gear]

@BJGvideos I dunno. I would ask John K. how he got away with all that he did just cause he made Ren and Stimpy.

[@chocoberryvanillacake4297]

​@@DarkyLonewolf Exactly!!

[@ilyasbasuki3207]

That doesn't really seem like a gaming fail. Maybe if Hoyoverse didn't take appropriate action, it could be a dishonorable mention. But as it is, they did the right thing and fired him.

[@KodenX]

I personally don't blame Josh for not wanting to touch the Hogwarts Legacy and NickMercs controversy. That's a dumpster fire that will have you lose friends regardless

[@DarkFrozenDepths]

A wise man (or a few) literally did say to pretty much pick and choose your battles... That's a hill I wouldn't want to die on either so I don't expect others to.

[@neoxthegamer4930]

​@@DarkFrozenDepthstake it from someone who is a fan of one of the streamers who played it on stream...it was a CLUSTERfuck

[@legomaniac213]

Really, Stephanie Sterling said all that needs to be said about Hogwarts legacy over on the Jimquisition.

[@jurtra9090]

​@@legomaniac213what do you mean?

[@legomaniac213]

@@jurtra9090 James Stephanie Sterling is a member of the community disparaged by JKR and can give a much more informative and educated perspective on the controversy surrounding the Wizarding World.

[@ArcCaravan]

Kotaku comparing their situation with Nintendo as WW2 makes me think of plundered art in that era.

[@silverflight01]

I consider proper use of AI to be like measuring the dimensions of a building. You let it just determine the initial area of the building you want to build, and you can worry about modifying things later as you build on this starting foundation. In terms of game development, I'd say it's like making a template Misuse of AI is letting it do everything for you, walls, floors, windows, circuitry, everything, while you just watch and decide "This is good enough," even though the building is unstable and can cause problems. That's what corporations are approaching AI is to simply help, not replace.

[@saiyanscaris6530]

wouldnt be surprised if corporations replace everything with ai cause they see that as a way to save money

[@e1iteyoshi998]

That's the thing though: we know there are people that are gonna misuse it. I mean if you saw all the news with the VAs having their voices being used in youtube videos of covers of fan songs and others without their consent they had a right to be upset.

[@ZX-Gear]

@e1iteyoshi998 To be fair,most companies have a very tight grip on their VAs so even if they gave consent,the red tape would prevent even some dumb fun as Claude from Fire Emblem Three Houses interrogating Jeritza by being himself.

[@gamerkingdom1442]

That intro song was so, CATCHY, and fair. And yeah, this has been one of the best and WORST years in gaming. And I’m afraid, 2024 maybe worse…

[@Takisan111]

Man, it's been a long time since I've actively thought about Ultimate Showdown. Considering how this year was a competition for even spot 10, it's very fitting.

[@ChrisX_212]

Ultimate Showdown has always been great.

[@LordTyph]

Regarding 2024, we already have a contender for the next list that crosses boundaries from games and into anime and manga (by insulting one of the late greats of the manga world). I'll be surprised if it doesn't even get mentioned by the next fails video.

[@shadowlinkbds]

If there's one thing we can appreciate in these fails lists is the great parody songs. They're great and creative as usual Josh! 👍

[@TheTyranex]

What was the original song again. I heard the parody and just got hit with nostalgia

[@Booksher]

@@TheTyranex Ultimate Showdown of Ultimate Destiny. Which was released in 2004 😮

[@mysticmind4563]

"If I had a nickel for every time Larry the Cucumber made a quote that would age greatly, I would have two nickels. Which isn't a lot but it's weird it happened twice."

[@antonhagbox02]

I'm guessing the other one was "In the future, comedy will be randomly generated."

[@ArcCaravan]

22:45 That bit was great.

[@SuperGoker64]

If anything, I'm surprised that it's not _more_ than twice at this point, and this is coming from someone whose only watching of Veggietales comes from the hairbrush song being played at Chuck E Cheese's

[@BaxterAndLunala]

Dude, if Viv would call it gratuitous, then that shows how much more swearing there is compared to Hazbin and Helluva.

[@FillmGeekOfDoom]

Ok, why all the Vivziepop bashing? Helluva Boss is a fun show and I'm excited for Hazbin Hotel? Whining about all the swearing and gore is bullshit, since Rick and Morty and EVERY OTHER MODERN ADULT ANIMATED SHOW does it to! And it's not like her work overdoes it either, so WTF?

[@SnazzyjazzBro]

​@@FillmGeekOfDoomit's also behind the scenes drama that may or may not be justified. Can't tell you what it is cause I don't trust internet videos. You're gonna have to find them yourself.

[@BaxterAndLunala]

@FillmGeekOfDoom I'm not whining, I'm just saying that only Trey Parker and Matt Stone should be capable of outdoing Viv in any amount of strong language.

[@jaketucker2559]

Yo have the right to unironically hate it just like we fans have the right to unironically like it, just dislike it for legitimate reasons instead of hating it because it’s apparently cool

[@BaxterAndLunala]

@@jaketucker2559 I don't hate it, I really don't.

[@JoshioE110]

I know that I’m beating a dead horse at this point, but it still needs to be either on the list or at the very least an honorable mention. Sony Censorship Policy has been Sony’s biggest thorn on their side for 6 years. To those who don’t know, Sony’s censorship policy was made in 2018 when they moved to California. As the name suggests, the policy requires Sony to censor games from Japan. And some people would say, 'Oh they’re just censoring Japanese games, what’s the big deal?' Just wait, because this causes a sales flop to third party games on Sony’s platform console. Still not convinced? Well, how about the time Sony abandoned the Japanese marketing all together by shutting down their Japanese division. This resulted in many people being layoffed, including the creator of Gravity Rush. And if you are 3rd Party developer or a Indie developer outside of America and you want your game on their console, it can get infuriating. You need to have a meeting with Sony’s head hancho, at their Time Zone and if you can’t speak English then you need to have a translator with you, because if you don’t have one with you, their not going to allow your game onto their console. I know Nintendo has been called out for their actions and rightfully so, but when Sony has a fail that has been ongoing for 6 YEARS and no one has bothered to bring up how self destructive it can be, I really have to question not just gaming critics and journalists, but gamers as well.

[@lilsunny7399]

It's even funnier when those same games get onto family friendly Nintendo's own Switch, completely unchanged.

[@kawikamyers7320]

Shit, I didn't realize that the Gravity Rush creator got hit by the closing of the Japan office. I love those games!

[@Chaos89P]

​@@lilsunny7399I frequently enough "joke" that Sony and Nintendo "switched sides" in regards to prudishness.

[@franknova987]

And don't forget them paying extra to not make some games touch Xbox or steam

[@bluestreaker9242]

Naw, I'm with you on that. This is something that ABSOLUTELY needs to be talked about at some point. This feels like the SEGA in-fighting debacle all over again. Those who fail to learn from history, amirite? O.o

[@jcam5]

American McGee's Alice franchise demise was a hard blow to me. I loved the games

[@amirgarcia547]

It’s especially egregious when EA is doing practically nothing with the IP nowadays despite still owning it. And if that’s the case, then why won’t they just sell it back to American McGee???

[@jrhamari]

God that just depresses me. Alice: Asylum actually looked really promising, and as a fan of the series, I was excited to see American trying to revive it. But of course, EA is EA and refuses to let anything be done with the series despite doing *NOTHING* with it.

[@elemomnialpha]

Hot take, Jirard deserved to be on this list WAAAAY more than Nintendo did when at the end of the day your getting mad at them for the reason a large chunk of artists are mad at AI, they don't want people taking their work without their permission to make money off of them or use it to support platforms they don't support And the Pokemon stuff is Pokemon Company International, not Nintendo themselves

[@jmaster4941]

Yeah while Nintendo is far from perfect, they're practically saints compared to everyone else on this list. They didn't really do anything as nearly as bad as these actual vile companies and individuals. Jirard especially.

[@franknova987]

Sadly about Pokémon International spending all their money on merchandise instead of their own gaming side, they have less than 200 people working in Gamefreak

[@s.p.d.magentaranger1822]

The Completionist scandal crushed me. My grandmother died from Altzimers, so hearing he was supposedly raising money for research made me admire him. Plus I genuinely liked his content. I unsubbed instantly and probably won't ever watch a video from him again, which breaks my heart.

[@ArcCaravan]

My guess is the Jirard stuff only being a dishonorable mention is because it's technically still allegations without absolutely undeniable theft. Compared to Nintendo who's a company with more concrete actions and wanting to not appear soft on it. Regarding Pokemon, it definitely feels like an association thing and the idea Nintendo should be more directly involved. Granted it does feel like Nintendo's placement feels flawed with worse acts being less focused on due to technicalities.

[@e1iteyoshi998]

@@ArcCaravan idk. The more Jirad opens his mouth about the situation the guiltier he looks.

[@nathanblackburn1193]

It's not really Nintendo's fault that The Pokemon Company screwed up Pokemon Scarlet and Violet, like seriously people stop blaming the wrong people for Gamefreak and The Pokemon Company's mistakes

[@Yinyanyeow]

Thank you. People keep attaching Nintendo to this makes me hate Game Freak and the Pokémon Company more.

[@Takisan111]

Nintendo still promoted it and allowed it on their system. They could have called GF and TPC on their laziness but they didn't. They deserve a little blame.

[@PRT95]

I've seen their downfall coming for a decade, I'll be honest with ya. I can pinpoint when it started, which was their foray into 3D with XY.

[@Yinyanyeow]

@@PRT95 At gen six there was a chance to turn the ship. Seven was it more than six really.

[@beastycool]

@@Takisan111its more complicated than that tbh it's an ownership issue smh

[@developingopinionmedia2909]

Josh, Bro in Christ. If my 29 years on Earth has taught me anything and feel free to use this in future rants: "Never underestimate the power of STUPID."

[@joshshrum2764]

And never go full stupid to be fair.

[@developingopinionmedia2909]

@@joshshrum2764 In my experience when you think full stupid has been reached the stupidity always seems to go deeper

[@Rediscool9]

Blaming purely Nintendo on the issues regarding Pokémon Scarlet and Violet feels kinda disingenuous. Im definitely not gonna defend them on any of the other shitty things they’ve done this year, but the whole Pokémon thing is purely the Pokémon Company’s fault. Nintendo may own the Pokémon IP, but they ultimately don’t publish the games nor are they behind any of the decisions surrounding Pokémon like the NFTs thing, it’s all the Pokémon Company. The whole reason as to WHY Nintendo is patching in a lot of bugs and glitches for a lot of their games like TOTK, but not Scarlet and Violet is because they’re not the ones in charge with the development of those games, it’s purely The Pokémon Company and their lack of regard for patching issues and glitches with games. TL;DR Don’t purely pin the blame on Nintendo regarding the issues with Pokémon, blame the Pokémon Company. Especially since it allows the Pokémon Company to get away with THEIR scummy and shitty business decisions.

[@spydersoup8447]

Many people do this a lot, like I've seen people put the blame on the bigger corporation even though it's really the studio's fault, like for example Rare, I swear, I am sick and tired of Rare fanboys claiming that the things they've worked on like Conker: Live & Reloaded or Banjo-Kazooie: Nuts & Bolts is the fault of Microsoft and Microsoft was the one to demand these, but if they had even bothered to do any research on the making of these games or have seen any of the Rare Replay videos, they'd learn that actually, Rare was the one responsible for those and they were the ones who came up with those ideas and Microsoft had no involvement in the making of them, especially since with the former game, Microsoft have actually had another game on the original Xbox console that's very similar to Conker's Bad Fur Day in terms of style of humor, which was Whacked (If you don't know what that game is, it's a party game where you play as either the 7 playable characters each based of the 7 deadly sins), and yet Microsoft allowed that game to be the way it was, especially since the original Xbox was marketed towards the teen/young adult market, so the statement that Microsoft was the one to censor the Xbox remake of Conker makes zero sense. Though one thing I will say that there is something in my mind that finds it irking that ClementJ64 tends to blame things like Sonic 06 being the way it was purely on Sonic Team, even though a lot of that was actually the fault of SegaSammy, though I agree with the choices they made for the game were pointless and the game would be much better without them, even though I've seen plenty of people saying that those bad choices would've actually been better if they were given extra development time, but that isn't always necessarily true as I've seen games that were fully completed and finished and yet had bad and infuriating decisions and gameplay designs that upset a lot of players, and I also agree with the statement he made about how games can be rushed and still come out as good, since there have been many games that were universally praised, and yet they were actually rushed out the door.

[@beekbeek8535]

Lemme guess what will show up: -Community fail (most likely being The Completionist 100%ing his career and then New Game +ing himself with the scandal) -Square Enix is a definite show-up, but perhaps an opportunity to talk about the problems with AI -A couple of games that dropped the ball very hard, such as Gollum and Kong -Naughty Dog, this is the 5th time you've worked on Last of Us these past years -Bobby Cocktik may be gone, but his crimes will never be forgotten -But in spite of what's been going on at ActiBlizz, I get the feeling that the whole Unity debacle will raise number one, especially with how many games have been affected by this (including Among Us)

[@mix3k818]

You were almost correct at every single one of these, but alas, ActiBlizz have once again earned their #1 spot for the third and final year in a row. You know, considering how 99% of Kotick's management is still there, you're free to believe that last year's Activision Blizzard's behavior will continue into this one as well. Hell, now that ActiBlizz will be replaced with Microsoft/Xbox, even if all other parts of Xbox are pristine, I'm willing to bet the next year will still land Xbox at least a #2 over ActiBlizz's erratic behavior.

[@danielkells6021]

Jirard just about dodged it, and I'm assuming it's because the money did eventually get donated and because Josh wanted to keep it a top 10

[@e1iteyoshi998]

@@danielkells6021 Something tells me that the issue isn't over though. The money was donated yes, but only after the issue was brought attention by Mutahar and Karl. Jirad didn't exactly make himself look better with the response video he put out either.

[@moonlighthunter5421]

Ah, what better way to start the new year than with a list of the Gaming Industry’s blunders of last year

[@TheDimensionalArtist]

In other words, AI isn't Evil, it's the people who used it for Evil

[@starbit5065]

Also another thing I’ve noticed. Even though John Riccitiello and Bobby Kotick are out from Unity and ActiBlizz respectively, even then it’s still not necessarily that big of a win in the end. Riccitiello may have been one of the main people behind Unity’s abysmal decisions but at the end of the day he was only one of several executives who all corroborated on that plan and he effectively served as the fall guy for the whole situation while the other big wigs try to fly under the radar. And while it’s great that Kotick is finally gone, he still left with a massive severance package and basically nothing more than a slap on the wrist, despite all of the horrible things he did and allowed to happen within the company.

[@sytherwusky]

While bobby is gone (thank Christ) I am a bit nervous about the whole micoblizz thing

[@KGKSkull]

Josh, we can turn your top ten series into a drinking game with how many time activision is on the lists

[@kobemarion1137]

Take a shot when we get a dragged out intro that tries too hard 🤪

[@Sumi_Yoshizawa]

please take care of your liver

[@LunaP1]

Are trying to get people killed?😂

[@MoostachedSaiyanPrince]

No thank you. I kinda need my liver.

[@geekymetalhead5112]

No thanks, I choose keeping my liver intact 🤣

[@ivanbluecool]

Hollywood: spoils the entire movie in their trailer. Utube: wanna see what happens? Watch the video

[@ShadowEclipex]

You didn't mention Hasbro/Wizards of the Coast. Not video games, but still gaming, so worth a mention. They started the year with their D&D OGL that tried stealing fan content and got massive backlash (similar to the Unity scandal), an artist used AI art which got printed into physical books, and ended the year with a massive company layoff before Christmas. Just to name a few of their missteps.

[@legomaniac213]

Their whole OGL decision apparently came from them allegedly wanting to find new ways to monetize D&D. Aside from the fact that it's already a fairly expensive hobby, they're overlooking the obvious fact that D&D IS OWNED BY A TOY COMPANY!!! Follow the advice of Yogurt and merchandize that shit! D&D: The Coloring Book, D&D: The Lunchbox, D&D: The T-Shirt, D&D: The Breakfast Cereal, D&D: The Staff of Burning Hands (kids love this one)!

[@ShadowEclipex]

@@legomaniac213 Main motivation is simple, greed. They wanted free labor and to legally steal from their fans. (The OGL they tried passing let them take any ideas you made with it without credit or compensation.) Habro is already trying to slap D&D on everything. Toys, brand deals, the movie, books, I think you can even find D&D underwear. They are trying to wring the IP dry. Milking it for all it's worth and then some.

[@kiilgore806]

I mean, they were mentioned with Unity. Because 'gaming' in this context based on the rest of the list is referring to video games, that's what gaming would mean in this context as well, and as such would not be applicable to the video.

[@ShadowEclipex]

@@kiilgore806 To clarify, Hasbro isn't connected to Unity as far as I know, it's just the D&D OGL and the Unity debackles had a very simialr feel. A company taking advantage of it's userbase, trying to gouge the for profits. Also I already did aknowledge it was seperate from Video games, but the sevarity of their mess ups are on the same level of some of the stuff on this list.

[@delphoxhoopa7289]

Half the time I love being a Pokemon fan, and other times it *REALLY* hurts... 😫

[@KritoSkywaker]

Happy New Year to all of you guys. And to make a context, Josh. If you not feel comfortable enough to talk about the Hogwarts Legacy Controversy, we will humbly accept it. No pressure into it. But I am not surprised how Activision-Blizzard once again took the Number 1 spot, thanks to all of that BS they commited.

[@KrimsonKattYT]

He's scared to talk about trans people either because he's transphobic and doesn't want to be rightfully cancelled or he thinks his community is majority transphobic and he'll get cancelled by his toxic fanbase for speaking out in support of them.

[@geekymetalhead5112]

What is the controversy anyway?

[@crystalwings4520]

​​@@geekymetalhead5112Ya, know, some 'internet activists' who got mad at that wizard game because it's related to JK being transphobic (it's actually not, she said something about only biological women who could give birth) and the goblins portrayal being anti Semitic (some actual Jews didn't mind it, anyway)

[@geekymetalhead5112]

@@crystalwings4520 So angry multi colored hair having, loud voice wielding angry tweet making unattractive things (I don't call those people women) are calling their biggest ally a transphobe, and making the asinine assumption the game is supporting her? I swear as I get older humanity keeps evolving backwards

[@KritoSkywaker]

@@crystalwings4520 And let's not forget about what they did other than attacking streamers. 😞

[@AzureMoebius22]

Lets be fair to Nintendo. Pokemon Gen 9 being a mess seems to be more attributable to Game Freak than Nintendo themselves. And yes the company can make stupid decisions, but we can at least say that overall Nintendo has a pretty clean record compared to certaub other companies.

[@M64bros]

Exactly!

[@Rediscool9]

It’s all the Pokémon Company’s fault really. They’re the ones making all the shitty decisions regarding Pokémon recently and are clearly crunching GameFreak to develop games as quickly as possible in unfinished states.

[@4wheal]

@@Rediscool9 Actually the head of Game Freak Actually said that no one froces deadlines on them and they work at there own speed so they release this games in this state because they want to

[@AznOmega]

​@@4whealif that's true, that's even worse. They should be able to make a game that works well. They shouldn't have these memory leak issues or glitches that ruin the game and still can't fix them for reasons if there is no real deadline.

[@recentteen14]

Nintendo is honestly just a sad case - when it comes to their first party games, they'll consistently pump out some of the best games out there (Even though Gamefreak dropped the ball on Gen 9, that's more of a fail on their part rather than Nintendos), but they'll always do something else to screw things up - usually when it comes to screwing over older titles. Say what you will about the culture of remakes and remasters going on now, I doubt anyone would be mad if Mother 3 finally made its way over to the rest of the world. If Nintendo would just find a happy middle ground that let them do their thing and not screw over gamers in the process or abandon older titles forever, I'm pretty sure they would become untouchable in the gaming landscape.

[@thequester8271]

I would like to nominate a fail regarding the black-and-white use of AI: The backlash against "Scooby Doo, Where are You? in... Springtrapped". A fantastic crossover between and tribute to Scooby Doo and FNAF. The creator, Eagan Tilghman, was a college student who made the video on little-to-no budget and so had to resort to using AI voices for some of the characters. This ended up catching the negative attention of some people on KZbin and Twitter, who would then go on to inform Grey Delisle, who had previously voiced Daphne in a few animated series, who then threatened to BLACKLIST Eagan from the industry for using AI in the video (this despite the fact that the AI voice for Daphne was based on her 60s actress, NOT Grey Delisle 🤦‍♀️). MANY people called out her unprofessional response and behaviour regarding this matter and defended Eagan's decision to use AI, as he literally could not afford to hire any voice actors at the time. He has since released a version of the video that is completely AI free, but it still stands that the backlash was unfair and unwarranted (and Grey Delisle would get hit by karma soon after by accidentally commissioning AI art just a few weeks later 🤣).

[@Angel-yg6su]

He could've just had subs for the lines that the character's voices or even read them himself with a few friends/family; there, that's how he could've gotten it done without using AI

[@DarkOverlord96]

Wait, where was the Skullgirls controversy? The one where the new developers retroactively censored stuff in the game for no reason, including Kickstarter goals and an art book people paid for? And did Josh really skip Hogwarts Legacy to not talk about Vtubers like Pikamee and Silvervale getting harassed for playing a damn game and thus calling out bad people from the LGBT community?

[@ForrestFox626]

Small potatoes

[@redphantom6921]

Sadly, even though I'm disappointed, I also understand why. So many of those LGBT activists have made it so that any criticism levied at them is an attack to the community as a whole. Hell, even Viziepop got some flak a while ago just because she had an antagonistic character say she doesn't "touch the gays." Thankfully, more and more people are becoming aware of these unhinged bad actors in the community, primarily from incidents like these.

[@poweruppikawho9007]

Josh has gotten threats in the past over relatively mild takes. Given how far people proved they were willing to go over the Hogwarts Legacy fiasco, well, he's got kids to protect now.

[@MasterZebulin]

@@redphantom6921 Chances are those are Anti-LGBT moles in disguise and doing all of this to make them look as bad as possible. You know, to "justifying" their war against them. They're THAT vile.

[@WILIZIN]

​@@MasterZebulin dude, just admit that mentally ill people who think cutting their gebitals off are most likely crazy enough to want other people dead for even disagreeing with them.

[@rageldith9600]

I’m legitimately struggling to think of any flops from Nintendo this year. Shutting down the eShops? They were on life support anyway, plus hshop exists for 3ds. Everybody 1 2 Switch? I doubt a mediocre game no one bought counts as a fail

[@aneeshsrinivas9088]

Yuzu and especially citra’s shutdowns are a big fail this year. Especially if it spirals out to kill emulation entirely. This just killed off a lot of games for the 3ds that I wanted to play. Plus IMO emuparadise’s shutdown in 2018 was one of nintendo’s worst fails during that year

[@aneeshsrinivas9088]

This had better not expand out into another incident like that

[@andrewhaase1826]

"Imbeciles! Fools! Nincompoops! Can't you idiots do anything right?! According to THIS, your track record is PATHETIC!" -Uka Uka, Crash Bandicoot: The Wrath of Cortex (2001) [Note: I intentionally left out the "for spreading evil" part of that quote for comedic effect.]

[@Doctorolivercook]

Also a fact about Riccottamo... Ricketyelmo... Whatever, the ex-CEO of Unity... Suda51 has quite the VERY personal history with the guy. Why? He was EA's CEO around the release of Shadows of the Damned. A game made by Suda. Which was UNFORTUNATELY published by EA. And the Damon character appeared first in Travis Strikes Again as Travis' punching bag. Play the game, and you'll understand the context.

[@ChiefMedicPururu]

Yeah, Suda dealt with the grudge as best as Suda can.

[@amirgarcia547]

There’s actually a bit to the Gary Bowser situation that isn’t touched on in this video and makes it a bit less of a gray area. Being that not only was Bowser part of an infamous hacking group, but sold modded Switches that ended up becoming bricked if you didn’t pay an expensive monthly fee. Which was definitely beyond scummy due to him both directly profiting from pirarcy and taking advantage of his own customers. Was Nintendo’s penalties for his actions a bit too harsh? Idk, that’s up to the individual to decide, but at least in this scenario it’s somewhat justified due to him not just being some poor random hacker, but a predatory leech. Other than that, despite 2023 being one of the best years for game releases, it was simultaneously the worst year for actually working in the industry with all the massive layoffs and boneheaded decision made by the greedy, out-of-touch executives. I can’t say if 2024 will be any better, but at least it’ll be truly hard to make it worse.

[@BaxterAndLunala]

Sometimes, I think Press F to Pay Respects will never die. Later shows a clip from Red vs Blue to emphasize the horse armor in Diablo IV costing money being similar to Oblivion.

[@LocalTorchwoodIntern]

Still pretty upset that Mcgee's Alice 3 plans didnt work out, I loved those games and honestly one of my favorite alternate versions of the story and its characters. I've been a fan for a while now and have followed the development since almost the beginning?? The fact that even if there were people interested in a 3rd installment and all the concept art was gorgeous (the dress concept based on the original colored illustrations were Alice's dress was yellow is one of my favorites!) but it still got turned down saddens me.

[@toumabyakuya]

Eh, Josh, I recommend you to watch Moon Channel's multiple videos on Nintendo because he explains why Nintendo felt the need to pull certain actions from the perspective of the law (a perspective that Nintendo would take into consideration when deciding to go with these action). Examples of his videos include: Explaining Ninteno's newest tournament rules (and why they aren't as bad) and explaining why Nintendo sues so often.

[@Guardian-of-Light137]

Can I get a link to some of those?

[@toumabyakuya]

@@Guardian-of-Light137 Sorry, but I can't, the comments get deleted automatically if I do.

[@Guardian-of-Light137]

@@toumabyakuya Ah well then can you tell me the titles of the vids instead? Or the channel name? Or do those get deleted to.

[@toumabyakuya]

@@Guardian-of-Light137 (Let us see if this one goes through) *"Ah well then can you tell me the titles of the vids instead?"* Here they are: A Lawyer Analyzes Nintendo’s Tournament Guidelines - VG Law Review Why Are Emulators Legal? Dolphin vs. Nintendo, and the Fate of Emulation Nintendo's $14 Million Pirate Hunt: The Tale of Gary Bowser A Lawyer Explains the PointCrow Takedowns and the Legality of Mods Why is Nintendo so Overprotective of its Intellectual Property? *"Or the channel name?"* I already did. Is called Moon Channel.

[@Guardian-of-Light137]

@@toumabyakuya Ah ok it seemed like you said Moon's channel so I assumed that was their name and they had a different channel or something. (Idk who they are as was probably obvious.) In any case thanks.

[@williammerwin1850]

To add onto Nintendo taking things down; the creator of Wapeach apparently had to hide all of the concept art he had been showing after Wapeach made the rounds online EDIT: Unless it caused him to break NDA. In that case, it was his fault.

[@KrimsonKattYT]

At least Wapeach can live on in the NicoNeko cinematic universe, especially since one of my favorite long time artists is finally going mainstream with comic dubs and everything.

[@Rediscool9]

To play Devils Advocate, I do find it weird how he randomly decided to just reveal concept art of a scrapped character on a random day on his Instagram account likely without Nintendo’s permission.

[@saiyanscaris6530]

good thing the internet saved the picture

[@toumabyakuya]

Dude, that is what is called "breach of NDA", he should have waited till he was allowed to talk about her.

[@williammerwin1850]

​@@toumabyakuya OK fair

[@peachymiku6432]

I knew the Unity debacle would be in the top 5. I was worried at first about Cult of the Lamb being pulled as I had yet to play it then, but glad they didn't really plan to! With the new crossover and DLC, the future for Cult of the Lamb is bright! But good grief, that was a really bad move Unity. It's like Josh said, you know you failed when both customer and creator come together.

[@movespammerguyteam7colors]

The point you made that EA actually behaved itself this past year actually had me thinking. Unfortunately I realized you are correct, they somehow managed to not do anything scummy this year.

[@crystalwings4520]

They managed to not making L after L like ActiBliz did, like wow.

[@johnockershausen3951]

Seems like they haven't done much of anything lately.

[@lunatic0verlord10]

0:23 Well, to be honest, this looks less like Nintendo's doing and more like The Pokémon Company's doing. Remember, The Pokémon Company and Game Freak tend to act differently from Nintendo. For better and especially for worse. For example, TPC rushes games a lot.

[@gamerhero9559]

Jesus... Activision Blizzard has been busy in 2023 of being the worst game company of all time, debunking EA from that spot.

[@saiyanscaris6530]

ea AND ubisoft

[@Cure_Hana]

Not sure if this counts as a Fail, as it was a more personal matter, but in April 2023, a Konami employee was arrested for the attempted murder of his boss via fire extinguisher to the head. It was supposedly due to longstanding issues of harassment and power imbalance between the two. Given what we know about Konami’s abusive and suffocating work culture, it was only a matter of time before someone finally cracked.

[@saiyanscaris6530]

so the thing from the konami fails years ago is true all along

[@MasterZebulin]

If only MORE employees cracked like this...

[@e1iteyoshi998]

Didn't know that this even happened.

[@Cure_Hana]

@@e1iteyoshi998 There hasn’t been much coverage on the incident since April (heck, I only knew about it from a small news channel). Not even any updates on the suspect’s trial. He originally tried to report the abuse to HR, but Konami publicly denied any harassment or bullying taking place between the suspect and his ex-boss. They likely tried to sweep the case under the rug as quickly as possible. Though hopefully we’ll learn the outcome at some point.

[@derrickhaggard]

It was only a matter of time before a employee at Konami cracked and tried to murder his own boss.

[@cofagrigusfan24]

i know people have those Pokémon SV glitches and yet, in all the times i played the game, pretty much not a single one... idk what i am doing differently, but something is different

[@timmyreobed5043]

Something that probably won't make the list but is at least worth a mention is the Undertale music situation. Basically, a fangame called Undertale Yellow made a bunch of remixes of Undertale music and the publishers are throwing a hissy fit about it. A hissy fit that could result in the end of Undertale music being allowed to be used without obnoxious copyright claims.

[@starmaker75]

And keep in mind toby fox encourages fans to use his music on essay and videos

[@yazmenakamura6750]

Hoo boy, Inverted Fate is gonna be having a Bat Time, isn't it?

[@LuccianoBartolini]

Ok, I'll give some thoughts over the list (not mentioned means that I have no problem with it): 9.- Any claim that PC games are more expensive now MUST include an inflation calculator, because this is easily disprovable, especially when old games came at different prices even back then. 6.- I think it would be nice to read development stories, because I don't think S-E pulling good games and bad games could be because the heads up had absolute control nor is as simple as "it failed for being a live service". I'm fairly certain it is far more complicated, especially when we're talking about a Japanese Company that tries to cater to two different continents. Like, S-E dumped A LOT of money on Sleeping Dogs, (I think it was that one that is considered "the Best GTA" in existence) and S-E still lost money and this is the same company that dumped money on Yoko Taro and Drakengard until we got NieR: Automata. So, again, I have a feeling that corporate S-E isn't as simple as we think, or at least not comparable to US or even other Japanese companies, because most companies just don't dump money into a failing IP until it works (Nintendo doesn't count, Miyamoto just has a lot of influence over there) 5.- Oh yeah, "Nintendo doesn't want to preserve its games", sure, the company that has done a better job preserving the source code of even third party games (though that's a licensing issue if Nintendo wants to rerelease it) and has always managed to bring back games people thought forgotten (according to the internet) and even ported almost all their first party Wii U games to the Switch "doesn't want to preserve games". Calling it, in a couple years we'll see Nintendo 3DS games either on Switch or in Nintendo's next project. Unlike companies like EA, Activision and Sony, Nintendo does values its IP. And if this is the starting of the segment, boy, I think I'll actually write it on the comment section on the youtube video. The hacker was reviled by the hacker community itself. He was scummy, Nintendo was on the right here. 16:32 This is false. Nintendo only controls distribution and world wide publication (32% shares, the rest belongs to Creatures and GF). Nintendo doesn't control the Pokémon Company and has no ownership over GF, living in the same building isn't evidence of that. We're talking of the company that decided to buy Next Level Games over Luigi's Mansion and Monolith Soft over Xenoblade but has never bought GF. There is no evidence that Nintendo ever threatened Gamefreak or the Pokémon Company over the quality of Pokémon games. That was just internet rumor that was never confirmed. And I'm stating this because it gets very frustrating how people blame Nintendo over what Game Freak does when (1) Nintendo very rarely intervenes in the affairs of the companies it owns (not counting Nintendo branches) and (2) if Nintendo had any control over Game Freak or Pokémon the whole franchise would be looking very different today. If anyone wants to mention the apology letter from Nintendo earlier this year over Scarlet and Violet, that was only worldwide, since NIntendo publishes Pokémon games worldwide. In Japan, the one making the apology was Game Freak. As for the Patent, I'll first explain Warner and why it is justified: For a patent to happen, you must show that there's a really impressive level of skill, not easy to copy, and that require refinement for it. This is why "Platform" cannot be patented or even a fighting game mechanic. They aren't complex enough to be patented, you can try to file it, but it doesn't mean it will. The Nemesis System IS that complex to the point that, if other companies want to apply it, it must be just as detailed or complex or else it fails apart, not even something easy to implement into other games. So Warner is justified here. If the mystic ancient magic applied to Tears of the Kingdom is just as complex (and from what I understand, it is) then it is also worth, at least trying to patent it, because adding so many layers of physics into the game isn't as easy as one would think. I won't comment on the tournament part because I don't have enough information about it. I think Nintendo is way too high on this list. 2.- Massive lay offs should be taken with a grain of salt. Companies usually have temporary workers or employ people working from other areas just for that game alone and, once done, the partnership ends, which leads to lay offs. Also, before jumping to "corporate greed" or "bad business practice" I think we should try to look at the situation of the company and where did the lay offs came from. Loved this list.

[@JCDenton205]

the fact that acti blizzard made it number 1 on the fails list 3 TIMES IN A ROW is just.............wow there's no saving this company is there

[@DarkyLonewolf]

I smell an eventual merge happening

[@merchantziro4285]

I'm calling it now, Capcom with shit like the X Dive NFTs are gonna be at least an honorable mention

[@toumabyakuya]

Suppose they simply couldn't make the list in time.

[@averyseldin8485]

Graphic designer here! One of my professors actually brought up that thing you mentioned with AI-she said we could use it as a reference and she would have no problem. She only had an issue if we tried to submit it as our own and it would get us failed for plagiarism. We actually all agreed it was fair.

[@Rusticabcd]

3:22 - Number 10 5:09 - Number 9 8:34 - Number 8 9:46 - Number 7 11:22 - Number 6 14:09 - Number 5 18:51 - Number 4 22:40 - Number 3 29:22 - Number 2 32:43 - Honorable Mentions 34:50 - Number 1

[@Yinyanyeow]

You forgot HM and the #1 for this.

[@Rusticabcd]

@@Yinyanyeow Don't worry, it's there now.

[@Yinyanyeow]

@@Rusticabcd Thank you.

[@Rusticabcd]

@@Yinyanyeow You're welcome.

[@joeyshadeslayer9792]

10 seconds in and I'm already loving the video. Josh, you've got a great taste in music.

[@joshshrum2764]

I was shocked to learn lemon demon is that one that did ultimate showdown I didn’t know.

[@DarkyLonewolf]

Also, on the dishonorable mention regarding that one dev getting doxxed: The reason for that had nothing to do with the game's themes or any behind-the-scenes stuff... But because some weirdo from 4chan thought said dev was trans and tried to "out" them. So yeah.

[@Angel-yg6su]

I'm sorry?? That's the dumbest reason I've heard (not that there's any reason for doxxing); of course it was from 4chan. what behind the scenes stuff you mentioned in your comment?

[@DarkyLonewolf]

​​​@@Angel-yg6suThe "behind-the-scenes stuff" mention in the context of that comment was mostly a broad term for whatever else would be presumed as the reason for said doxxing happening, admittedly.

[@AutisticPhantomOtaku]

I think my favorite part of your annual fails lists what have to be the songs that you come up with. This one really cracks me up!

[@TF2Fan101]

Calling it now: Suicide Squad- Kill the Justice League is going to be on the 2024 Fails list.

[@Popplio3323]

I'm surpised the whole Game Awards Pizza Tower debacle wasn't talked about.

[@datalphalion]

I always look forward to these musical intros. Good shit Josh.

[@entityproductions830]

"EA BEVAHED, YOU HAVE NO EXCUSE!!!" words id never thought id hear Ever

[@mix3k818]

I hope you had a fun New Year's Eve, Josh!

[@nickelsmart2787]

While it did receive a dishonorable mention, I want to acknowledge that 2023 was the 90th anniversary of the original King Kong film. Not only was it barely celebrated with the game and a mediocre Netflix anime, but every other major Kaiju property released installments that have received immense amounts of praise with Ultraman receiving a very good show in the form of Ultraman Blazar, Gamera finally returning after almost 20 years with a fantastic anime on Netflix (shoddy animation aside) and Godzilla receiving a well received Apple+ show revolving around the world of the Monsterverse and the best film in the franchise since the original in the form of Minus One

[@jessepeterson6694]

All I can say is that if I don't see: 1. How Twitter failed to stop sales of Hogwarts Legacy and resorted to harassment to get their way. (Poor Pikamee) 2. The Day before turning out to be such a big scam it makes nft's look feasible again. And/or 3. LOTR Gollum being such an absolute disappointment. (Or that one Kong game that came out some months back. Dealers choice) It will be the worst list I'll see so far. (Bonus points if Josh mentions how Limited Run fired their communication officer for having an interest in Hogwarts Legacy) Edit: Didn't realize you were getting swamped with DM's about Hogwarts. Understandable you didn't want to talk about it but I will certainly say it was an absolute headache at the beginning of the year, especially if you were a Vtuber.

[@timmyreobed5043]

Gollum and Kong are probably going to be lumped in with the Avatar and Walking Dead games to talk about Game Mill as a whole

[@KrimsonKattYT]

Hogwarts Legacy isn't a bad game or a transphobic one. The problem was where the money was going, directly into the hands of the world's most famous transphobe who spends the overwhelming majority of her money these days funding active hate groups and terrorist organizations and frequently hanging out with Nazis. I 100% support people pirating HW, buying used copies, or buying keys off 3rd parties and enjoying the game for what it is, a silly unproblematic wizard RPG. But if you buy it new? I won't go out and harass you, but if you do that you are actively funding hate groups indirectly and that is a very bad thing to do.

[@orangeslash1667]

@@KrimsonKattYT Bad news, my Mother is a huge Potter fan and doesn't know about any JK Rowling controversy!!!!

[@timmyreobed5043]

​@@KrimsonKattYT Pretty sure that the only money that Rowling got out of Hogwarts Legacy was the initial royalty fees the dev team had to pay. Either way, what this should have been was an opportunity to teach the public about the kind of person Rowling is, maybe point people towards some charities and activist groups that fight for trans rights. But instead, the people of Twitter and Reddit turned it into an ugly harassment campaign that resulted in nothing but the further demonization of a group that's already horribly marginalized. The trans community deserves better support than what Twitter has to offer.

[@floridamark96]

Do you have even a little bit of proof of such claims?@@KrimsonKattYT

[@michaelblaylock3773]

I always love these vids. Props for using an opening song that doesn't lend itself to easy lyrics, yet still smashing it.

[@dojelnotmyrealname4018]

Honestly replicating PLAYER'S voices in games can be really effective in horror settings and other games where distrust is a key factor.

[@antonhagbox02]

Hell, there's a mod for Lethal Company that does that fittingly called "Skinwalker"

[@bensko5821]

Thank you for your hard work and thanks to the editers and other staff too

[@isenokami7810]

To give Square the slightest bit of credit, that murder mystery with the AI sounds like a worthwhile experiment. One that failed horribly, but from that perspective, even that could give valuable data on how to make the idea work. That is, assuming that A) Square saw it as such an experiment, and B) that kind of adaptive AI won’t be harmful to the industry in the long run. I’m pretty split on the latter: a visual novel that uses AI to change the story itself around your questions and decisions sounds cool, but it could also devolve into the same reasons not to hire actual writers that caused the strikes this past year. Edit: of course you addressed the AI issue later on. To restate my point then, while Square’s serial murder case game was an absolute train wreck, in large part thanks to the crappy AI, that failure is still valuable data if anyone wanted to try something like that again. Something I’d be interested in seeing, but ONLY if the AI was used ethically. Have the AI be a creative choice to have the story evolve according to the player’s decisions, do not use it as an excuse to not pay people to write the story.

[@pichuzap6476]

Seeing EA just being a honorable mention in this video is the most unlikely thing that ever happened if it happened 5 years ago but here we are

[@VPalamedes25]

Honestly I can't say I expected ActiBlizz to get #1 again, but I didn't not NOT expect it. Also I'd pin the $800 tickets as BOTH malice & incompetence, malice b/c they KNEW that they weren't gonna give people special treatment (& not give refunds) & incompetence cause it just kinda feels like it, honestly it wouldn't be surprising if they thought that people would just be fine getting nothing for the extra 500 I definitely expected the Unity stuff though, I mean c'mon, tons of people use it to make their games, you're not losing money cause people will still need an easy to access software. At that point its genuine greed.

[@ethanxpsp2770]

Same i wasn't aware of the 2023 activision controversies (aside from mw3, but i figured that game was shat out faster than a speeding bullet. With no time as to put out one more thing before the Microsoft buyout was finished) I actually thought the unity shit show would be number 1

[@starterking]

I only found out about the ultimate showdown of ultimate destiny this year, so the fact that the opening was a parody of it was just amazing.

[@DespianGrimmPaldea]

Nice that we're getting a trailer for the new fails video, because this is going to be a interesting insight as to what is considered the top 10 biggest flops of 2023 in the gaming industry. Because I can name two that are probably going to be on the list, if not mentioned. The first being Unity's unnecessary payment for installs, the other... being the 1100+ layoffs from Hasbro. Well guess we'll find out in about 14 hours (At the time of this comment). Edit Note: As expected, ActiBlizz somehow managed to dig themselves an even BIGGER hole this year. If there's one thing I can say before they fade into nothingness, it is this; ActiBlizz, for these past three years, you have been spiraling down a staircase of madness. You decided that you wouldn't stopped descending until you reached an all time low that trounced everything else on the list, eventually reaching the light that is Microsoft's door, where you got bought by them, because you just didn't know how to be honest, how to stop being predators, or cared about the consequences that followed. So to celebrate the new year, I say one last thing to this company; Thank you.... and good riddance.

[@SerpentHashiraObanaiIguro]

I can name a few as well. The Elliot Gindi sexual harassment allegations, literally everything involving Hogwarts Legacy...

[@lordpyron3934]

I know this is more tabletop gaming but I hope the OGL debacle with WotC is on there.

[@silverflight01]

The mass layoffs thing is really disturbing. All those years of work just thrown away because your higher-ups are too egotistical and would rather send out pink slips than pay you properly. Honestly, it makes me wonder how the gaming industry will recover from this, because that's way too many people for recovery to be easy. Heck, we might never recover entirely.

[@MusicFan752]

Maybe being a part of big companies for now isn’t the best idea and probably better to be a smaller organization. I get it’s not the best idea but considering the lack of getting payed, slammed with forced deadlines, and just doing nothing innovative or entertaining, it may be best to form their own small groups and organziatons while making sure to keep themselves in check to not end up like other flops such as the infamous rooster teeth.

[@saiyanscaris6530]

yeah considering roosterteeth is basicly done and warner bros discovery is planinng on merging with paramount yeah@@MusicFan752

[@saiyanscaris6530]

@@MusicFan752 though theres also the other problem which was mentioned with the merge square enix had. most companies are trying to merge together to survive cause they see that as the only way financial wise

[@MusicFan752]

@@saiyanscaris6530 sure not because of the financial blunders, kind of like what caused activision blizzard to become activision blizzard. If it’s smaller groups coming together and again keep themselves in check, I think that would be a good idea instead of just going for these big companies that are starting to pop up more red flags than NFTs. As the saying goes, the bigger they are the harder they fall, so for now at least it’s probably better to be smaller.

[@saiyanscaris6530]

@@MusicFan752 k-mart and sears, square enix with that one company. roosterteeth with warner discovery

[@Blahblahblah28504]

I'd give an honorable mention with the fiasco with localization, but that's more in anime rather than video games. Though I imagine it's spilled over into video games. Fire Emblem Fates is one example I can think of.

[@RavenStarMedia]

Great song at the beginning! Also, regarding the "tiny loophole called exemptions to consent" at least that wasn't in the writers guild mentions so they writers are thankfully protected from AI. The Screen Actor's Guild on the other hand, yeah, definite reason to worry. I also see AI as being a tool that's good or bad depending on use, but it should never be used to replace people. I'm glad the writers got proper protection from it, and I only wish the SAG actors did as well.

[@niceguyofgames9490]

What sucks about Redfall being on this list is that it had an AMAZING premise.

[@Ramsey276one]

Please explain

[@niceguyofgames9490]

@@Ramsey276one come on. Fighting Vampires with guns and magic powers? Tell me that’s not interesting at least little. When we all saw Redfall announced, we were fascinated by the concept.

[@UnderTheUmbrella_]

Predictions: - Obligitory ActiBlizz - Rise of AI voices/images - Leaks and data breaches - Notable bad games (Redfall, The Day Before, Gollum, etc) - Indie Land donations scandal - The death of E3 - Layoffs

[@poweruppikawho9007]

Unfortunately the Indie Land story broke just as the script was being finished and we wanted to see more details come out and the facts of the matter established before potentially slinging mud at an innocent man.

[@UnderTheUmbrella_]

@@poweruppikawho9007 Fair enough. It's always a good idea to get all the facts before making your final judgement.

[@JordanAdventure1]

I wonder if rockstar will be there too.

[@javelinmaster2]

Let's not forget the rare community fail of the year. And the community fail being the whole Hogwarts legacy kerfuffle

[@xeda787_]

That opening unlocked a core memory, loved it, loved the video and I hope 2024 will be epic for you

[@Ramsey276one]

I First remembered Warioware (WHY) but then the CHORUS...!

[@DarkOverlord96]

07:54 Isn't Jason Schrier the guy who said Dragon's Crown was made by pedophiles because the Sorceress had big breasts? If anything, he should've stayed, he's clearly at home in Kotaku.

[@Ardhamon5000]

I think I remember hearing that he had kept quiet about the abuse at Activision Blizzard for years too

[@yepaxle1111]

Wow, that was an amazing top list. But at the same time: oh, what a smorgasbord of madness the gaming industry brought us this year. The last five entries especially, is where I had a hard time watching without getting simultaneously disappointed and exhausted. At this point the industry seems to digging deeper and deeper into a rabbit hole that seems to never end. Anyway, have a happy 2024 everyone!

[@MarioMasterProductions]

At least Hogwarts got an Honorable mention

[@WILIZIN]

He didnt do it because a lead writer threw a hissy fit and was threatening josh and ari, and this is when ari was pregnant and it made her so overstressed that it put the babies at risk. This was back when the drama was happening mind you.

[@MarioMasterProductions]

@@WILIZIN Wait what?! I didn't know this! 😨

[@WILIZIN]

@@MarioMasterProductions yeah people within his team are kinda being held hostage by very specific people in the team and friend group. And using the classic "If you dont do thing our way, you want people to die!!!!!"

[@MarioMasterProductions]

@@WILIZIN just what I need, another reason I hate politics

[@WILIZIN]

@@MarioMasterProductions dont hate politics, hate the subversive activists who use emotional manipulation to force their degeneracy as a morally good thing.

[@aquaticseraph692]

I was looking forward to seeing what you would do for a music parody this time around, and as soon as I heard Ultimate Showdown of Ultimate Destiny, I knew it wouldn't disappoint. Well done again Josh, and Happy New Year!

[@LeahLovesNature]

I don’t recognize the song you’re spoofing, but this might be my favorite Fails list you’ve done yet because of how on point it is. 2023 really was a wonderful year for games (not since 2017 have so many great ones come out in a single year) and a terrible year for the gaming industry, and I wouldn’t have been upset if you had made this a Top 15. Happy New Year to your and your family, Josh!

[@Jazzer995]

Song - The Ultimate Showdown of Ultimate Destiny - just make sure you get the correct one (there's an 18+ version out there).

[@LeahLovesNature]

@@Jazzer995 Thank you! (I’m almost 30 years old and don’t have kids, so I think I can handle it either way.)

[@Takisan111]

@@Jazzer995 Ultimate Showdown

[@Jazzer995]

@@Takisan111 - Edited

[@EnerKaizer]

Honestly, Gollum could've easily made this list properly according to your criteria. That game was made by daedalic - the one German developer who actually was both known and beloved for the games it made (mostly point&Clicks, with the big one being their Deponia series). When the first reviews of the Gollum game came out and it turned essentially into a meme it basically destroyed what little of a game development scene we had in Germany. Many, many companies pulled out because of Gollums commercial and critical failure, and basically threw Germanys game developer scene back by at least 20 years. And while this was the nail in the coffin for Daedalic itself, it also had a domino effect on other studios thanks to the forementioned companys essentially leaving Germany behind as a country for game development.

[@1003JustinLaw]

It took me 15 minutes just to get through the opening musical intro because I needed to see all of the references, and by the time the number 10 entry rolled around I realized that I have no idea what the entire song sounded like. So I had to go back and listen to it in full all over again haha.

[@Ori_Kohav]

God damn, your opening song for this list is just so addictive!!! Even more so than your previous ones!!