"Toxic Positivity" is destroying Game Studios (Ubisoft, Sony, Bethesda)

[@Mugthief]

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[@Jan12700]

Don't support them, they sell stolen Keys!

[@Drophinoia]

IN your ad, Metaphor was listed as 25% off, which is great; only. once I was on the site, it was only 17% off (?) and ... listed with an 8 dollar markup from the Steam price of 69.99 to 78 USD? huh? The savings, is a little more than 5 dollars, or ... 8% lol. And that's not counting if you used another form of payment that then adds a payment fee on top of that. Very misleading, shady site imo. how do they offer sales at all? through buying in lower priced markets with weaker currencies, then reselling them in the major markets, with typically higher prices at it is.

[@100organicfreshmemes5]

Would heavily advise against this sponsor. InstantGaming is a grey market and not listed as a legitimate seller by places like IsThereAnyDeal or DealsGG.

[@100organicfreshmemes5]

Grey Market seller, they're shady and not a good place to buy from. IsThereAnyDeal and DealsGG are good places to look to see who is legit. IsThereAnyDeal only lists legitimate sellers, and DealsGG informs you of all the risks of buying from certain stores.

[@GenericInternetter]

instant gaming aren't sending out password reset emails, so i've been locked out of using them for months now

[@ParGellen]

Stop buying trash. Problem will solve itself.

[@kraosdadafusfus8034]

We're already seeing it as Ubisoft crumbles.

[@Saint_Wolf_]

The week Star Wars Outlaws came out I bought Black Myth Wukong, Pseudoregalia and Cultic.

[@bluehairedaigaming]

You never worked there. How do you even know that Toxic Positivity is destroying the industry.

[@SmashKing17]

I'm not buying them Spider-Man 2 was trash

[@JepperlyKlepperson]

problem is the surface level gamers will buy anything because they dont know any better or care to know

[@Icipher353]

There was a great comment made in a Japanese review of The Last of Us 2. It more or less said, "This is a story about right and wrong by people who think they're always right." Kind of sums up the prevailing attitude in the industry.

[@NecroMoz]

Wrong though, TLOU2 is a story about people who think they’re right, by people who understand right is a matter of perspective.

[@bapnap6218]

​@@NecroMoz wrong it's about mushrooms

[@nhanon67as]

I thought it was about revenge. Every story is about right and wrong. Such a dumb take

[@bapnap6218]

@@nhanon67as ya spongbob told .e alot of stories about right and wrong same with the fam guy

[@nhanon67as]

@@bapnap6218 yeah remember when SpongeBob figured out when it was wrong to make fun of Sandy living in Texas

[@HyperboreanPC]

Studios being full of toxic positivity would explain why a lot of community managers are hostile towards their communities when presented with criticism.

[@burningpipe2627]

It doesnt 99% of other cases where the vocal minority are entitled and have no real criticism.

[@arostwocents]

They believe anyone opposing them is far right 😂

[@HyperboreanPC]

@@burningpipe2627 hence why I said a lot and not all

[@sturmherooflance]

​@@arostwocentsthe whole "if you're not with me you're against me" is obnoxiously tiresome.

[@fishyfinthing8854]

@@sturmherooflance it should be "although I'm not always agree with you, we can continue to debate with respect until we found a good answer"

[@rogercastilho19]

Bad products need to fail. Regardless of the passion of the people who made it. This is good for consumers.

[@yumri4]

Lots of indie game developers know this it seems like the big publishers forgot it as they have been big for to long. They either forgot it for fired who knew it for being "negative" about where the new hire in management wanted it to go.

[@frogmastiff8198]

I spend much more on indie games now than triple A, don’t see that changing soon

[@DarkDyllon]

@@yumri4 it's what Mug was saying, the hubris behind them is making them fail in a sense. Bethesda for example has always been known for buggy games, but their games in the past like Skyrim were amazing. (still being re-released) then when Fallout 76 released they had nothing to show for it, they re-used the same engine again, heavily modified but they said it'll be fine. que in the buggy gameplay, glitches up the ass and probably best of all, hackers gaining 100% control ON CHRISTMAS the time where the entire studio is down and they can't do anything, literally putting the game in limbo for 3-4 weeks (and effectively killing it) Indie devs (in most cases) know they need to grow an audience to be successful, have a good relationship with the community. You got some outliers like when Epic was mass buying indie games, which then made those indie games flop because they pulled the rug from beneath the communities feet. but you also had some who stood their ground for the community and got a lot of attention (positive) because of it, it really shows that the public is willing to give you an attempt if you show that you got good will behind your product, that you're willing to improve and not go gaslight the community.

[@Wyqno]

It's not just good for consumers, it is good for the industry as a whole, particularly creative people with visions and ideas.

[@M3l_0N666]

Exactly. We shouldnt tolerate less, as we cant except a low bar, as future generation will benefit or not depending on how we act now. Let us not embolden the worst but encourage the best.

[@unclesam1756]

"Toxic positivity" is just a new term to describe the behavior of sycophants and yes-men. We've known for literal ages that surrounding yourself with these sorts of people is a bad idea, so any company that chooses to do exactly that absolutely deserves to fail.

[@davidmichael9275]

Yea but the difference is back then the people at the top weren't politically driven psychopaths.

[@EaglePicking]

Toxic positivity has been creeping in many sectors in the last 20 years, including politics. Kamala's "joy" is a good example, but anyone who works in a big company these days can probably relate.

[@Acacius1992]

@@EaglePicking Toxic positivity in general is a very big issue. Sadly alot of people still dont belief its real. Negative things and emotions exist! Its absolutly unhealthy to ignore or repress them. The important part is HOW to react to them

[@WanderTheNomad]

​@@EaglePickingThat's funny, cuz when I read "sycophants and yes-men", I thought of Trump instead

[@TheJewishAzovMember]

​​​@@WanderTheNomadAs a non a American, I always assumed trump was just a knee-jerk kick back from "Good vibes bro, we are making history!" Naive positivity that only wants to talk about the good of their actions and how people are different now.

[@vladline1882]

Even piracy refuses to pirate a crap games.

[@megasean3000]

They’re criminals, but they’re criminals with standards.

[@cisco5338]

@@megasean3000😂😂😂😂😂

[@M3l_0N666]

Bruh 😂

[@quantum5661]

honestly i wouldnt even play most ubisoft games if they were free

[@Itsfinebuddy]

​@@quantum5661kinda disagree, I would still play Far cry 1-4 and Assassin's creed till unity.

[@Neil.02]

Stop making games for people who don’t care about video games unless you want to lose money and your job. Should be common sense.

[@kurt9395]

I'd go one better: Listen to what game journalists have to say and then do the opposite.

[@adrianocs4]

@@kurt9395 i'm doing that, if anyone from mainstream media tell me a game is good, i open steam and block that game.

[@i_like_lemons]

Right? Crazy how they keep catering towards the non-existent "modern audience" while ignoring their real audience, then keep wondering why their products fail.

[@laoup26]

People who don't care ? Like who ? Back people and women ? Leftist ? What does that even mean ?

[@rgenc42721]

​@@kurt9395urinalists: "monkeman game bad" then monkeman game proceeded to sell dozens of millions. i keep checking out games they call "problematic" and keep finding good games

[@maugwei]

I’m soo glad you are calling out Bethesda Games Studios! Those blasphemous worms attacking the modding community, the community that made them relevant, by luring mod authors over to the platform to steal the free mods from the nexus, claiming that they are “Helping mod authors earn a living” while only giving them 30% and taking a whopping 70% off the top for themselves is soooooo egregious! Not even to mention the fact that if you want to get any of the Wabbajack mod packs like LoreRim, you will no longer be able to get them! And if you wanted to make your Skyrim mod list anything close to what Biggie_Boss makes for us, you will need to pay a minimum of 10$ per mod on their creation platform to get 1 mod! Now even if each mod was 1$, to make LoreRim equivalent on your Skyrim, that means you’re paying 3000.00$ to play modded Skyrim! Man eff BGS!! I hope theiy fade into obscurity like Ubisoft! Literally embarrassing mess Todd Howard has become and what low he has sunk to from being my favourite game developer!

[@qu1253]

Wait... did they patch out the ability to use mods outside of the creation club? I was thinking about downloading Skyrim Special Edition and loading it up with mods.

[@blockmasterscott]

Agreed. And I’m not going to buy ANOTHER version of Skyrim. I lost count of how many versions of the same game exists.

[@jase276]

@@qu1253 You can downgrade the Special Edition and use mods. That's what I did

[@maskedspartan7397]

Really hope shadows fails so the industry wakes up

[@jonmann4980]

It won’t matter if it fails because black rock will keep paying companies because they check their DEI score card

[@SK8Enjoii]

You can't wake up people that are already woke

[@mackybell14]

​@jonmann4980 Black Rock will likely send in their DEI loans..but that's what they are, Loans. You have to pay them back. Ubisoft is fucked regardless, big daddy Blackrock will move on to the next Entertainment company once Tencent buys Ubisoft.

[@TheJewishAzovMember]

​​@@mackybell14I searlously can not see DEI stuff being funded in 5 years in enough for companies to make changes for it. They took a HUGE hit with the supporters when DEI funded groups celebrated Oct 7th as a freedom fighters. Most of the biggest funders are Jewish billionaire activists who funded these groups to try to make a more inclusive society and therfore safer for jews. Jews feel less safe than a long time and feel betrayed by the people they supported turning on them in their eyes. Consirding what happened today, they are only going to drift farther away.

[@WhatisReal11]

it already has failed

[@reeanimationgaming1034]

I don’t believe you have to innovate your games all the time. It is perfectly fine to make a game with nothing new in it, if your game is just very well made.. Ghost of Tsushima didn’t really do anything new. It just did what it did extremely well

[@Peb02497]

Wukong and Stellar Blade arent innovative games either gameplay wise, but they are really good because they are very polished experiences.

[@reeanimationgaming1034]

@@Peb02497 Exactly ✊

[@connorstokes2672]

Except it did do some stuff new… it was also very familiar.

[@bobmcbobbington9220]

Except that doesn't actually work for long. You can't keep making the same toy and expect people to continue to buy it. One day Soulslikes will get old and people will move on. It's actually HUBRIS that believes that fall is never going to happen.

[@reeanimationgaming1034]

@@bobmcbobbington9220 I disagree. The reason why some genres are getting stale is because they can’t manage to make the games better than the next.. There’re SO many vampire survivors clones out there right now, and they all try to do things a little different than the other ones, and it just never as good. Look at lords of the fallen. Implementing some cool but annoying gameplay mechanics to avoid being just a clone, and in general just doing everything a little worse than dark souls.. and still having the same clunky combat system as dark souls. It’s just not good. Imagine if lords of the fallen did everything better than dark souls, now that would have been awesome.. But they didn’t, they chose to innovate instead

[@Sam-uz4iy]

Coddling is one aspect, but fear is the key reason how toxic positivity environments are created before the coddling happens. Look how people have to talk, to even SURFICIALLY approach topics like the recent Dragon age limited character creation. Full of hesitations, disclaimers and qualifiers. Whether is it top-down, or spawn from external sources, you can't critique anything that is against the company's direction - effective creating a bubble.

[@Arrestedrabbit]

Hyper realism tactics. It doesn't matter if it's bad if you're forced to agree that it's good, lest all your hard work fitting in be for nothing and find yourself thrown in with the undesirables. This grift has been going since at least 2014 (probably longer but it certainly becomes more pronounced here) they've never really cared about any social issue they aren't immediately affected by, they want to look good for the people they perceive to have power. I watched a review of Candela Obscura (a TTRPG made by Critical Role) the other day and the reviewer was basically scared to make any real points about material he disagreed with for both fear of getting death threats from their cult like fan base and because he didn't want to sound like a "right wing grognard". These people absolutely will not criticize things, especially vocally on their platforms, because they think criticism of works that signal their virtue well enough will have them marked as just another bigot. The worst part is they're right. That's how we've gotten here, through paranoia and purity spirals down until people are left with those scared to talk openly and their narcissistic overlords.

[@adamaccountname]

it's an illustration of how they pay lip service to diversity, but they only mean superficial diversity whilst it follows the cults rules

[@RRRRRRRRR33]

@@Arrestedrabbit It's a brilliant commercial strategy if you think about it. Companies and politicians taking advantage of the trend, using "minorities" as a literal shield (which is something vile, pure evil disguised as good), they can say and provide any kind of crappy product, discourse or whatever, because they know their cults are going to rage war on social media, even if they are small in numbers, the obnoxious loud noise ends up reaching the masses. It's pure gaslighting, if I criticize the "prince" redesign in Lost Crow, saying I would like him to look +- like Rashid from Street Fighter, for the jpegs on the internet (these are not real human beings, they "live" on the internet, social media is their "reality), that makes me either a racist, conservative, incel hero, truthsayer, fanboy, etc.. it's hilarious, I just think Rashid fits better to be the Prince, that's it, there's no "political" tone whatsoever... but here we are, when ignorant groups are presented to politics, the very basic concept, surface level to the extreme, they go wild lol and I kinda got vindicated a little bit because Rogue Prince of Persia features a prince who have some features from Rashid, I think that is a better design than a Killmonger wannabe, simple as that, but for the jpegs, this basic evaluation is something impossible to comprehend

[@cosmicspacething3474]

Fear of what?

[@noamias4897]

@@cosmicspacething3474fear of reprimand from colleagues and bosses

[@Mojaveknight17]

No criticism allowed! Our feelings first!

[@TheNapster153]

Then the money taps empty out and they go quasi-feral.

[@rezaruki3912]

Like Leshley Hardland the writter, director of flop SW Acolyte lol

[@personaignota]

Regarding the Starfield expansion, it's exemplary of a particular reaction corporations have that is at the same time tone-deaf and paranoid. They understand there is a complaint, and they can probably see it impacts their earnings. Their first thought is "what do they even know about games though" (I've been around high-level artists and engineers, most people have no clue of how much time they spend talking about "educating the audience" when something fails), but since they need to make a profit, they eventually surrender to the fact that changes need to be made. So... how are they going to implement that change? By trashing whatever they did before as if it never happened, while still doubling down on the premises that generated those results in the first place, doing something different but equally flawed, showing that they did not analyze criticism in depth and just threw more s''t on the wall hoping that something will stick. The most egregious example that comes to mind regards the lore of the 343 Halo games. First, they change a fundamental aspect of the story to gain more creative freedom (from forerunners being human to the two being entirely different species), then they introduce a forerunner elder as a villain. Most people didn't like the Didact as a villain, and they showed no particular appreciation for the Librarian or the genetic enhancement sub-plot. The co-op campaign they introduced was received poorly. So, what did they do to respond to criticism? The Didact is never mentioned again, the mcguffin of the co-op campaign becomes entirely irrelevant, and the villain is killed off at the very start of the game during a cutscene. Some fans were upset by the Covenant comeback, so now they're definitely losing the war! Some fans were sad about cortana dying, so hey: she's the new villain because she's gone full rampant! She calls all AIs to herself to conquer the universe. The story was poorly received once again, no one liked the new characters, and it felt like the story was going nowhere. The legendary ending was disliked because it looked like they were hinting at Cortana weaponizing the Flood. So, again, they responded by changing the goalpost entirely: no more villain Cortana, she kills herself offscreen and gives some sort of 4th wall break monologue, a very pathetic and corporate damage-controlly one at that, and she's substituted by a "fork-tana", so Chief has a companion once again. The new protagonist is absent, and even hinted dead (it was left ambiguous surely to test the audience's reaction)The Covenant aren't losing the war anymore, they were absorbed by the new Brute government, and they beat both the "AI republic" (it's unclear how, since they have promethean tech) and humans. They introduced a whole new superpowerful alien species that seemingly is capable of travelling through time, is immortal, or whatever. Three games, three unsolved misteries that go absolutely nowhere, with each successive entry moving the goalpost hoping to appease the fans while simultaneously not listening to criticism. And Microsoft just won't shoving money on them while shutting other more succesful companies. Magnify that for 1000x, project it into all the other areas of game design, and you've got the AAA(A) game industry in a nutshell.

[@qu1253]

This is why I'm glad the new Doom games exist. They could have easily turned out like the 343 Halo games (and nearly did before Bethesda made Id Software take the original Doom 4 back to the drawing board because it was too similar to Call of Duty), but instead they ended up being an incredible return to form for Id Software, a company that all but fell into irrelevance after Quake. They also kicked off a retro shooter renaissance that's given us so many gems like Dusk, Amid Evil, Ion Fury, Prodeus, Selaco, etc.

[@xMasterAssassin93]

I think the gaming industry has been rocked significantly by Ubisoft. Long considered to be immune to collapse, it is now on the verge of dropping off a cliff (most likely only to be saved by being bought out). 2024 will be the tipping point that redefined this next decade of gaming, hopefully for the better, but doubling down may no longer seem a suitable option for gaming companies who have gone or plan to go down the same route as Ubisoft, internally.

[@KoongYe]

Toxic positivity is the ultimate problem we are facing everywhere, let alone the work-culture at gaming companies. Things that sounds positive on the surface-level like "no racism" "more diversity" "no sexism" are used by evil people to do exactly the opposite of what they claim. It's the perfect weapon for these people because no-one can object to those vaguely positive terms, or if they do, they can just make them racists, anti-diversity, supremist, sexist and so on.

[@DFTNSHEXGRM]

Exactly. The Toxic Positivity folks are the same cancel culture keyboard warrior folks that dig up 10yr old tweets and try to shut down studios over nonsense false claims.

[@WeeG-bwc77]

What the nuSpeak actually means... ""Anti-Racism"" = Blatant anti-caucasian racism and/or discrimination, and sometimes anti-asian. ""Progressive"" = Regressive in execution. ""More diversity"" = Importing lower standards from lower hemispheres to work for cheap.

[@ledvapour6937]

I don't think racism and sexism are the best examples here. Both of these are very real and well defined.

[@dibby4482]

Well put, people hide evil intentions behind very vague, positive sounding ideologies all the time now.

[@GCheckCentral]

​@@ledvapour6937 he never claimed they weren't real, just that bad actors have used those groups as shields to cover their mismanagement and incompetence.

[@RedRabbit-ZA]

Next up: Dragon Age The Veilguard. The sewage just keeps flowing.

[@frogmastiff8198]

Don’t like it don’t buy it, best advice I ever got from a suit, saving a lot of money this year

[@Yarharsuperpirate]

I'm just going to say this now, Bioware have been trash since they finished mass effect 3.

[@jjc5871]

@@YarharsuperpirateThe way that game ended pissed me off so much it’s not even funny. I have probably played through the games of the Mass Effect trilogy maybe 25 times total and I could never bring myself to play through ME3 a 2nd time.

[@Bos_Meong]

Failguard will 100% flop and they will blame us "chuds"

[@PunkarellaOG]

Goodbye Bioware will miss your legacy 😢 not the same company.

[@weirdeurasianboy8091]

2024 is truly the fall of the giants. Mr Beast/Dr Disrespect basically losing their careers, Ubisoft at an all time low in terms of public image and stock prices Sony losing money in the 1/10/2024 server outage and Concord EA almost killed their golden goose (Apex) due to the Battle Pass changes 😂 C'mon Activision, your turn 😅

[@kagebunshinnn]

Gaben chilling and counting cash 💲

[@kraosdadafusfus8034]

It's more like Microsoft's turn now. The whole Recall mess was easily avoidable, yet they insist on devouring information at any cost. Activision is already gone as an independent company.

[@jaemotoo]

Valve the indomitable ​@@kagebunshinnn

[@kellevichy]

Mr. Beast losing his career? Where? he's still gaining millions of followers and hundreds of millions of views. He's fine. Wish he wasn't but he's fine.

[@MikaMikaMika89]

MrBeast certainly deserves his career ended, but all the sh** he's done he's still only "slowed down" growth, it hasn't stopped and probably won't.

[@Noxis07]

This is one issue I've seen far too often. Familiar names and past projects as a marketing ploy. "John Doe, the former director of John FPS Shooter, backed by his squadron of developers who previously worked on Jumping Plumber, God of Dad, Green Man Shoots, etc." Names and past experiences mean absolutely nothing if the leadership is incompetent. You can have the best sailors/crew and the most sophisticated cargo ship, but it will amount to nothing if the captain is asleep at the wheel, headed straight for the iceberg. I honestly find it more impressive when new blood enters the scene and delivers on their projects.

[@GREENWZRD96]

God of BOY😭

[@itsyaboiguzma]

Green Man Shoots goes pretty hard though

[@mrschizo2837]

@@itsyaboiguzma Yeah. But you can't forget how much inspiration it took from "He's green, and he's PISSED" That was the real grandfather of FPS.

[@lgtokyo2665]

Toxic positivity. A new term I’ve seen floating around.

[@Gamez4eveR]

it's not at all new

[@daeamiralis]

It may not be new, but im glad its use/awareness is spreading.

[@aquapendulum]

New term for an old culture. See Laura Flyer's video on the subject. It was the same kind of environment that botched Gotham City Impostors. A bunch of people in creative positions who make what they like and think gamers have the same taste as them (we don't), refused to listen to feedback before pushing a product out of the door.

[@DFTNSHEXGRM]

Toxic Positivity aka cancel culture. We’ve been dealing with this for a while now, Toxic Positivity is just the new term. It’s a form of authoritarian control with the veneer of social justice and do-goodery.

[@TheGallantDrake]

​@DFTNSHEXGRM it's an old term being more broadly applied. It used to be used to describe a psychological condition where a person represses their negative emotions and becomes irrational as a result.

[@johncra8982]

one thing to note is that while people on social media like to treat this stuff as mere content, and won't take long before demanding a "new season" of the content after getting bored of the backlash against these companies, the problems at these companies are as entrenched as they could possibly be. these rotten games we're seeing now have been in the oven for HALF A DECADE. even if these companies fired all the crazies and hired stable talented people instead, the stuff they've already got in the oven is already cooked and is in the process of being burned with their toxic condescending obsession with lecturing gamers. no matter how many people on social media get "bored" of people pushing back against this nonsense, people need to keep their wallets closed to these companies for years and make them feel the burn. play your steam backlog, play games from China and Korea, play indie games, but do not start to give the benefit of the doubt to these western companies and any other companies that follow their example just because the discourse gets "boring" after a while.

[@majid7925]

Its hard to balance corporate speak and shareholder sentiment and the gamers along with the marketing analysts and the last one is an interesting one that many miss since they focus on trends such as genz are okay with these games we need more and you dont need to listen to the rest

[@thebuddah1253]

Here the thing. Normies don't WANT to play old games or games that aren't that popular. They want the NEW BIG popular game so they can all talk about it until the next BIG thing.

[@noone12748]

@@thebuddah1253 Nah, they moved away from games actually, why do you think the sales of these games are finally tanking now

[@noone12748]

@@thebuddah1253 You call that subtle? Is that why GoW Ragnarok has low player numbers? Because it's more "subtle", you'd have a point if the DEI awareness group didn't exist

[@thebuddah1253]

@@noone12748 whoops I responded to the wrong comment. Thought you replied on something else. I'll delete that lol.

[@L1vv4n]

1) Players are gullible and criticism of games treated as a personal attack. That means that toxic positivity not only exists inside studios, but outside, too. Until it's too late, and communities flip into full-out hate, death treats, etc, far beyond your store-brand toxic negativity. 2) Toxic positivity are usually on top. It's star mangers and team leads who silence criticism inside. I never worked in gamedev, but I worked a lot in IT and IT support role for business. There are always people on the ground level, who see what happens and try to ask questions and rise concerns, but they are often ignored or bullied into silence. Instead of building a culture of productive criticism all criticism of higher-ups it treated as toxic. It's especially bad when team lead is actually very talented person who got their place by hard work, because they often fail to appreciate that they are not on the ground anymore and can't have same direct connection to current situation as their subordinates.

[@michaelh878]

I'm sure the managers and leads would like to criticise those below them but can't now.

[@L1vv4n]

​@@michaelh878 Do you ever work? Or even read the news? What do you men 'cant criticize'? Fire hundreds of people by SMS they can, but criticize they can't? Get a job, see for yourself.

[@michaelh878]

@@L1vv4n whoosh

[@sideshowmo653]

For some reason big companies think if they "make it; they will come" but if the make it is just a patch of dirt then even those that come will get disappointed and never return again. The worst part is when they assume its bigotry and misogyny is the reason why people are avoiding their games, but all they're doing is convincing players to just stay away. We have seen that people who do let politics drive their choices will support even mediocre products. I have no faith that ES6 will be any good.

[@michellestr8998]

ES6 and GhOY will not be that great.

[@MisterMonsterMan]

You have become a great addition to the videogame industry commentary community in a short period of time. Keep on the path, bro. You are killing it.

[@mcrosevtuber3056]

Finally someone who says it !! I have been in dev PR nights (indies and AAA) in Montreal and I can assure you.. The amount of egos in the place was sad. I always tried to focus on other devs that were just passionate and we had great talks ! But yeah... AAA AND hubris indies devs can be something. And the worst part is, they are not the majority. It only takes a few loud ass main character syndrome people and there you go.

[@ellyjockey6164]

Here's an adage: It's easier to convince yourself that you're right, than to let yourself be proven wrong. ...Well, you know what they say about good medicine tasting bitter.

[@Ilyak1986]

"Don't give us negative feedback inhouse!" Well, okay--squelch internal feedback, and receive it from the customers. And then everyone in gaming news will dance on the graves of failed studios :D :D :D

[@prisonerofthehighway1059]

Bethesda’s issues have very little to do with the creation engine. Clearly the talent to use it properly is gone. You can mod Skyrim and FO4 to get rid of most of the loading screens, enhance the character animations and add large numbers of NPCs to the empty spaces left behind by Bethesda. But even the stock version of Skyrim is better than Starfield in every way. Better storytelling, better dialogue, better animation, better character models. The whole nine yards. Starfield isn’t a bad game because of its failure to innovate. It’s bad because it’s objectively worse than the games that came before it.

[@Not.A.Heretic]

this guy looks like he walked out of the 70s and into a YT video fuckin love it

[@M3l_0N666]

Thought the same thing. 70s show came to mind.

[@JackXombi]

Activision/Blizzard might be an interesting addition because they've also burned all their fans of all their IP's. They killed Overwatch for Overwatch 2 which just added monetization to a game that was a best seller.. Oh hell their Hubris alone is a whole video worth.

[@crash1108]

9:20 "Including Ryan Ellis who was a director on destiny 2 who brought in a lot of that team" oh no effing wonder it blew cheeks. As an ex D2 player who was heavy into Crucible/pvp, I would hope any multiplayer for the rest of my life that I would play would NEVER have any of those devs working on it

[@MrMastrmonstr]

There NEEDS to be critism from people who understand and enjoy games no matter the type of game just look at Nitendo/gamefreak as well they have to be huffin their own farts and saying it smells good

[@megasean3000]

Nintendo survived one collapse of the gaming industry because of their competition’s hubris. The way things are going, they’re going to survive another collapse.

[@MrMastrmonstr]

@@megasean3000 yeah maybe if other fans can folow thru on not buying their products maybe they can force em to change but i doubt it seeing as its popular with kids and they care less about qaulity product

[@Helperbot-2000]

Uh did you not see totk? Total garbage dlc packaged as a full new game

[@MrMastrmonstr]

@@Helperbot-2000 strong disagree never seen a dlc more than X2 the play space... Whole new mecanic that programing wise must have been a nightmare to work out all the kinks. TotK has alot od flaws but its NOT fair to call it overpriced dlc

[@Helperbot-2000]

@@MrMastrmonstr they fixed none of the garbage of the first one, the combat is the exact same fundamentally broken mess, exept this time you also have to pointlessly use ANOTHER mechanic beforehand. the map is the exact same, the story has nothing to do with the first one and doesnt work because of its non linearity in the past which can completely ruin someones experience by spoiling what happens. still no real dungeon and just garbage shrines (granted, ever so slightly better than the first one) the underground is worthless, the sky islands are hardly anything.

[@Peb02497]

This and complacency is what EA did to kill slowly but surely Battlefield and The Sims.

[@garver5833]

Ships and civilization fell because of idiots ignoring the problems the people kept warning them about. Don't worry though, everything is just peachy, trust me.

[@Amokhunter]

Bethesda blew it for me when Toddyboy was on stage (don't know where) and said with the mother of all hubris "I've heard that our games are full of bugs, I've read it on the internet, so it must be true" and I just wanted to slapfight the crap out of him at that point. You know, open hand slap and he just spins around, then crumbles to the floor, the arrogant bastard. Because from all his demeanor, you'd have to be absolut tone deaf to take it at face value instead of the vicious mockery that it was.

[@elcambiollego]

Wait... did Sony screw Helldivers to benefit Concord in some way?

[@Lordbobomb]

Let's be honest. Nowadays, we wouldn't be surprised if they did. So yeah, it's likely.

[@WeeG-bwc77]

"Toxic Positivity"? Also known as Suicidal Tolerance...

[@obstuckuwu7995]

Never heard anyone say it like that, only heard it as toxic positivity.

[@hope-cat4894]

And known as Malicious Compliance. "Malicious compliance is the behavior of strictly following the orders of a superior despite knowing that compliance with the orders will have an unintended or negative result."

[@Anonihmus2567]

Criticism is always important if you're not willing to hear it then your not willing to grow and improve not all criticism comes from a bad place and ignoring or painting it as hate makes you just as bad as the haters

[@Saint_Wolf_]

I think we need to begin rejecting the "everything is political" lens to things. Because even "everything is political" though said by an Italian, took this weird "everything is American politics" lens to things. As a latino I hate it, latinos are tolerated at the everything is political circles because nobody keeps the gates like we do. Goku, Naruto, L from Death Note, Ryan Gosling, literally me.

[@TheBigBlueMarble]

It has become commonplace to politicize anything bad. Bad games are not being political. They are just bad.

[@noone12748]

@@TheBigBlueMarble Why do you feel the need to excuse their behavior? They made it political first, you should complain to them about this, not normal people reacting in kind

[@TheBigBlueMarble]

@@noone12748 You are confused.

[@noone12748]

@@TheBigBlueMarble Sure I am, corpo simp

[@adamjames8419]

@@noone12748 spot on

[@ReddAngry]

Thank you for being here to inject some much needed nuance into these discussions. It’s so damn difficult to find channels like yours that aren’t blinded by one extreme or the other. Much respect dude!

[@namishusband818]

Sometimes you just need someone in charge who says "no" to a bad idea.

[@TeamBobbo6326]

these are the most high quality video essays/commentary videos i've seen that have released in such short periods of time

[@tuliosan9399]

There's a very strong argument out there about how delusions of moral superiority is what killed the most in our history. That was a huge problem last century, and it's alive and well nowadays

[@EggEnjoyer]

Yes but you’re mistaken the form it takes and what that’s gonna look like

[@tuliosan9399]

@@EggEnjoyer If you say so

[@YdenMk-II]

The worrying thing about this is that we've been through this dance a couple years back when the public learned about the concept of Bioware magic. Anthem was a hodgepodge of ideas that the development team said would eventually come together because of the Bioware magic and as hindsight showed, it definitely did not. Even though it was widely talked about back then, no one internalized it and history keeps repeating itself.

[@yvindvego9404]

if there is a toxic positivity problem in some of the AAA companies then that is a problem. if the people who know certain features or games will be badly received, but are afraid to say anything in fear of being reprimanded by HR for being an "unfriendly person" or face harsh pushback if the wrong people are in high positions, then that is a problem. there seem to be a different type of culture in the videogame industry, when no one asks questions about concord's character designs (something the internet instantly noticed and thought looked weird in a bad way). you would think the companies who probably pay 6 figure salaries to people to do market research and find out what can make the most money, somehow overlook such blatant things.

[@RRRRRRRRR33]

About Jade Raymond, I will be brutally honest, it always felt to me she was highlighted, literally positioned in a pedestal because she is supposed to represent "female workers" on the industry. And knowing the "gamer" audience is usually toxic, the marketing teams of Ubisoft figure it out these toxic consumers would not complain about Jade being the center of attention because she is good looking. And it worked, people embraced her as the (pretty) "face" of Ubisoft at the time. She was the producer of AC1, if she indeed had a hand on it's creation, that deserves a lot of credit indeed, at the same the time she worked on AC Unity and Watch Dogs who proved to be small failures, badly mismanaged (AC Unity arriving broken, Watch Dogs had insane marketing that backfired), left Ubisoft and never worked as a producer again. So really, I am neutral regarding Fairgame$ even if it's complete failure is predictable, because this game will expose Jade really hard, the toxicity will be crazy, people will question her participation in every single project, maybe the casting couch was a thing, blablabla this will fuel the keboard wars even more. Which means more "content" for "youtubers", but a complete annoyance for people who just follow the news

[@advancedassassin2554]

I think its happening in entertainment in general, you can't even call a movie or tv series shit now without getting labelled

[@wombatillo]

Toxic positivity or delusional optimism.

[@stop-motion-verse]

The industries is all egos, I've been to many conferences where you see such developers and it is palpable.

[@Yodalemos]

I always defined toxic positivity differently. My definition was the stripping out of any negative emotions from games. Like Bioware announcing they wouldn't use slavery or things like the brood mother in future stories. Or banning people for getting angry in competitive games. Or removing stat tracking that might make people feel bad such as K/D ratios. Things that are done to foster a "positive"environment, but actually degrade the experience.

[@kranichkrone]

That's toxic positivity on players' end. This video is about toxic positivity on devs' end. Both are bad for games for different reasons.

[@nilpointfive]

People who can’t separate art from reality are anchored by it. This is why their creative endeavors consist of rehashing the work of other’s with a skin of whatever they feel is an important modern real world issue. They should get different jobs.

[@michellestr8998]

It's not that people need to separate art from reality. It's just that when people are not free to express themselves because they are forced to put in political messages, even ones they might not agree with, then you get a bad output. It's OK if people want to have real world things in their art. It's OK if they dont. But they should be free to do their thing, not have woeness forced on them.

[@GREENWZRD96]

Gotta leave a like just because the words "Shivering Isles" brightened my mood. Thanks Mug.

[@Scruffynerfherder10]

“Going to be coddled” they already ARE!!!!

[@james-s-smith]

I recognized the Hyenas clips, but based on how you were describing the game, I thought Fairgame$ was just a Hyenas reboot and didn't question it. You got me good.

[@MikaMikaMika89]

Toxic positivity sucks, we should be open to valid criticism. In the same vein of thought, we should also stop with bulls*** like calling things "woke" when they happen to contain somebody who isn't a straight white dude. That's part of why I love this channel, you are able to actually explain the issues on a deeper level instead of simply picking a side in whatever the latest "us v them" is and spouting the buzzwords linked to that.

[@noone12748]

@@MikaMikaMika89 Don't excuse their behavior dude, THEY caused toxic positivity what are you smoking, what group forced people to keep quiet or be supportive of these decisions in the first place, toxic positivity is another result of the actions of wokies

[@noone12748]

@@MikaMikaMika89 It's obvious to everyone to see that this is another result of their meddling, like cancel culture

[@Mithrevan]

This is not a Game Development problem. It's a Workplace problem. This falls on the leadership.

[@BigJcan07]

Pretty wild how ghost of yotei mirrors A-C Shadows perfectly. Seriously: Woke underlying message, Woke staff creating the game, unrealistic portrayal of history and completely spits on the Japanese culture during this time period. She's riding a horse sword fighting. Is this real life? **EDIT** : Don't get me wrong, without all the weird political crap the A-C game would have been perfectly fine, they ruined that by listening to consultants...

[@braydensearle]

It was always supposed to be a movie with unrealistic feats of strength. That said the constant failure to show anything that hints at the real dimorphism our species has is noticeable, and many are now seeing this as agenda driven.

[@kurosan0079]

The concerns are clear. People don't want the mocap actress's political views to infest the game. They could've been more professional by reassuring people that it wouldn't happen. But when they started blocking people for no reason, even ones who never even interacted with them, it started to become red flags.

[@walterk2598]

i don't think either game is a big deal, its just fiction more than anything really. SHADOWS isn't doing a single thing new that the series hasn't done before. its a campaign of prejudice, auto replies and crocodile tears or misinformed mudslinging. Yotei is more of a bigger joke, the lead acts like a man without a wang.. thats a fem powerfantasy right there.

[@RRRRRRRRR33]

That's dumb, Ghost of Tsushima is supposed to be unrealistic, literally Kurosawa open world, over the top samurai movie. It's like expecting realism from a Indiana Jones game. I admit it's funny how just the hiring of a "activist" voice actress can generate immediate skepticism, even more so after hearing her working on Mortal Kombat 1, she sounds like a nothing burguer... That gave me some flashes of that bizarre Lion King situation, netherrealm and sucker punch hired her because she is a "asian voice" or because she can act? idk about you people, but I am incapable of detecting the racial features of a voice, feels like a magic trick. But anyway, the worst scenario for Ghost of Yotei is the DmC reboot situation, Devil may Cry trying to be emo when the trend was at it's last legs, that generated tons of criticism, people hated "Donte", etc.. but the game itself, it was actually decent, pretty solid. Ghost of Yotei can be the same exact thing, the marketing is received with tons of scrutiny because they are following a dying trend, the actual game is decent enough (or even great, like Warrior Within, dated but great). I highly doubt Ghost of Yotei will be a bad game... but if it will check boxes or not? That is a real query, there's a high chance for either be or not to be (I went Macbeth all of the sudden)

[@BigJcan07]

@@walterk2598 you're right it isn't a big deal. the game was just marketed poorly. Did a black guy exist with nobunaga or whatever hundreds of years ago? Sure. Is it the end of the world? no.

[@kazekamiha]

Ever read The Death of WCW? As the author notes even as their product got worse and worse people kept coming for sometime. When you're hot you can do mothing wrong... But when you're not you can go nothing right.

[@archersterling6726]

Japanese devs tend to be more humble

[@megasean3000]

Hence why companies like Nintendo are doing exceedingly well without any BS or controversy. They innovate and never let their formula go stale. They make games based on what the customers would like, not placing their own biases in the game. If companies in the west followed that philosophy, they wouldn’t be knee deep in their own shit right now.

[@le_bandito]

They innovate and never let their formula go stale *glances at Pokémon gyms and the elite 4*

[@RobertFromEarth]

I just finished Resident Evil 4 a few days ago. I thought, wow this game is an example of great game design and gameplay. Then looking at the credits, I realized the game was made by japanese devs! I said to myself; "oh that explained why Leon can catch Ashley when she jumps"!

[@qu1253]

​@megasean3000 Yeah, no. Nintendo absolutely aren't the good guys. Not only are they weaponizing the Japanese legal system to kill off Palworld, they straight up sent guys to threaten the creator of Ryujinx (a Switch emulator) in person. The entire emulation community is in Nintendo's crosshairs and that is going to be a disaster for game preservation.

[@Mrhouse-k1x]

​@@megasean3000💀

[@pinkchckn]

While I understand the sentiment, I strongly disagree with the closing statement, for a single reason: There's more games being made today than ever before. Back when gamers were bullied for being nerds, the only people making those games had passion, they made it for the sole reason that they enjoyed it. Now that it's a billion dollar industry, of course a lot of people who never had interest in this would get in for the money and to usurp the industry for themselves, but the people that makes games with passion are still there, and they have better tools than ever to tell their stories. There's a lot of people who are apolitical, and just want to deliver good experiences. The only thing is that back then, these people started the companies that we know today (the ones that eroded with time and new "talentless freaks"). And now, these people are in much smaller studios, self publishing.

[@peckneck2439]

It's a huge problem. People keep doing stupid BS mistakes, but nobody is allowed to correct them because if you do you're (insert "ist" slur here) A generation of weak little snowflakes who believe they're saving the world and that they can do no wrong are incapable of facing reality, and throw a massive tantrum the moment you point out their behavior. This needs to stop. This doesn't help or improve anything, it creates this toxic environment in which everyone is allowed to make mistakes just so people aren't offended which results in games being worse for everybody.

[@pastaoleary3031]

Well said

[@Not.A.Heretic]

hard times create strong men strong men create easy times easy times create weak men weak men create hard times

[@firstlast3313]

It's being implemented on purpose by you know who. If you research you'll find the truth. It's not a natural occurence of human culture. It's not a coincidence that's it's happening all over the world at the same time. The people you meet who conform to this bizzare collectivism have just been tricked. It comes from the top on purpose. Their next step is mass censorship

[@bluehairedaigaming]

It's not a mistake to put 80% of the companies resources onto HR and 20% on the actual product.

[@TKUltra971]

Have you seen some of the bizzare racism concerning some of these games like AC Shadows? Its just a reason to demonize a group of people for confirmation bias about a fantasy game.

[@henryj5054]

5:47 that's a very interesting take. I think you're right. The idea that they feel they can make any old rubbish and we as customers will just suck it up

[@shadeblackwolf1508]

On the other end of the spectrum we have nintendo creative leads playing games, telling devs why it's shit and guiding teams to be better. at least their version of better

[@100organicfreshmemes5]

"Overconfidence is a slow and insidious killer" -Sun Tzu

[@ScienceDiscoverer]

Sun Tzu was famous dungeons explorers.

[@gamerkingdom1442]

“Toxic Positivity” Never thought that such a ridiculous term existed, yet this is the hubris monster the AAA GAMING INDUSTRY has created.

[@kellevichy]

lmao that term existed before this video my dude.

[@pikminologueraisin2139]

people have no vocabulary whatsoever it's a very old term

[@EggEnjoyer]

@@kellevichyWhere in his comment did he indicate that the term was even new? He just said he didn’t know it existed

[@Ali-e5h1b]

18:00 - I suspect they can't improve the engine beyond what the modders have accomplished. Instead of putting millions into research and development, Todd took bonuses and pay raises.

[@brokenlegoman]

The hypocrisy is amazing for all the b*ching and moaning about woke games. Ghost of Yotei is doing the same exact thing Assassin's Creed is doing and is just as disrespectful for the culture its attempting to exploit. Stunning, brave samurai woman weighing in at 105 lbs slaps around all the men and somehow isn't being stopped or questioned by the authorities. Can't wait to hear spin and excuses on this one.

[@juniorjunior5884]

Personally, I didn't even know about that game. Played ghost when it came out and never thought of it again. I had no clue there was a sequel. I might buy it when it's on sale only because I didn't love ghost *that* much.

[@1harrypotterfan100]

She’s not a Samurai donkey. Also we know practically nothing about the game yet. It could be like the first game in which she uses non traditional methods to even the odds (stealth, tools, poisons, etc). You’re also forgetting because of the 300 yr time skip, technology has advanced a lot, meaning more possible weapons and methods she can use to avoid direct combat. Many games have used a physically small character and incorporated them into the gameplay. For instance, in Last of Us Part 2 Ellie needs a life to stealth kill enemies cause of her weaker physique. She’s also far less capable at direct physical confrontation than Abby or Joel. So you need to use guns, bows, stealth, traps, etc. how about you wait to see some gameplay before you jump on the “woman woke ruin game” nonsense. I’m not saying that it’s impossible for them to mess up Yotei, but give it a chance. We’ve seen practically nothing yet

[@mrdecacko2809]

@@1harrypotterfan100 her being a "samurai" isn't the point, and that's not why there was such a hub-bub about Shadows. shadow got hate because the dude was black/negro and it shows how twisted everyone is because its the same crap in a different toilet here. A boss chick in the middle ages fighting and slaying men. tell me more about JP honor, culture and all that other bullcrap flung around

[@forsaken841]

I remember when Jade was showing off the original Assassins Creed when it was coming out. Cool to see she's still around.

[@hollowedboi5937]

No identity, too much pandering to be fair to EVERYONE instead of having a target audience. And terrible practices in house towards criticism and adjustment.

[@Houston_Smh]

Every single one of these new games feels like they’re trying to be unique but end up looking the EXACT same. It’s like I can’t place it. Helldivers being the exception. I wouldn’t even group it into the mix

[@GrumpyWolfTech]

This sounds like the ffxiv community. You don't dare criticize anyone's gameplay or you're "bullying".

[@Lordbobomb]

It is them described to a T. I stopped playing because of this exact behavior. They rather just stick their heads in the sand and pretend like nothing bad is happening, even though there is plenty to discuss and criticize including the community itself. And when you point this out to them you just get ex-communicated as if you committed some cardinal sin.

[@Falicon]

KZbin. I keep getting my comments removed if I mention the fact that there is too much Tencent investment. This is not a democratic practice. I am a European citizen and do not constent to have my comment removed 3 times. It's not profanity, rude or disrespectful. It's an opinion.

[@Mugthief]

Just to be clear, there's no filters set by me on the channel. It's all youtube. Also, I'll distrust Tencent when they give me a reason to. Baldur's Gate 3 earned them a lot of grace in my books.

[@Falicon]

@@Mugthief Well someone doesn't like it if an individual makes a remark and shows the relation between the current Chinese guidelines/restrictions to gaming and what's happening in US gaming. I do not consent to having opinions removed, hopefully we can continue like this.

[@noone12748]

Probably has something to do with election season, they turned up the heat to 11 recently, I'd argue it makes the commenting feature unusable

[@personaignota]

KZbin's been removing comments for no clear reason all the time recently. I was trying to have a conversation about game engines a few days ago and I saw that my comments kept disappearing.

[@blockmasterscott]

@@MugthiefThis right here. I’ve been having totally non confrontational comments getting deleted. It’s definitely something wrong with their algorithm.

[@GrumpyWolfTech]

I miss the days of good Ubisoft, back in the OG xbox days, games like splinter cell, ghost recon and rainbow six took over my life. I spent sooo much time in those games.

[@LordBaktor]

A big component of all this is that the current prevailing ideology in entertainment is opposed to the idea of objective quality. "Art is subjective" they claim, so telling a company their game is bad means nothing viewed through that lens. While there is an argument for beauty being in the eye of the beholder, there are also several millennia of inferable criteria as to what constitutes a competent work of art. And in the case of videogames, game design is also several millennia old and the programming side is actually a science where you either make the code work as intended or you don't, there's no "but I like it this way". Subjectivity is far from all there is to the appreciation of art as a whole or videogames specifically.

[@piscinaiv7937]

As well you could argue that 'commercial' art's primary subjectivity has to be gauged on whether a potential customer chooses to buy the product or not. (Social critique is also not totally verboten commercially, Warhol and Banksy still command top dollar.) Unfortunately for "the team" Concord it was an abject failure both aesthetically and commercially and their artistic message fails because it is not appealing to customers.

[@LordBaktor]

@@piscinaiv7937 Yeah, as soon as you intend to sell something you need to know who you want to sell it to and their taste becomes more relevant than your own. So the taste of the customer could be regarded as a "pseudo-objective" criteria against which to measure the quality of your work of art regardless of what you subjectively think of it.

[@themanicfiddler1152]

I really wish you hadn't said what you did say there at the end. I definitely understand the importance of letting it out there, and from an authentic point-of-view I do appreciate it... but, man does it bring me down to hear. The very thing that I, and so many, many, many, many others grew up appreciating and which shaped us as individuals, for it to be reduced to what you described... I don't even want to think about it. I can't, because even just the most remote of possibilities that it could, even that is simply too damn painful. But seriously, great video, only recently discovered your channel and I'm already impressed. Consider me a follower of your content from now on! 😊

[@JamesScholes]

The problem is that they're now hiring based on DEI metrics instead of the old merit based metrics, so that's an HUGE drop in quality right there. Secondly, DEI is basically a sneaky way of hiring far left activists so they can infest and eventually control these companies. One of the many problems here is that these activists generally despise their customer base (gamers) so they label any criticism as hate and harassment. They believe this gives them justification ignore customer feedback which creates echo chambers, or as you refer to it as... Toxic positivity. As a result, they can now create games full to the brim with their activism. Gamers obviously don't want this and this is why we're now seeing all these games flop or underperform at launch. Unfortunately, things need to get worse before they can get better so expect more games to fail and studios to close.

[@NecroMoz]

There’s no conspiracy. The right wing are so predisposed to conspiratorial thinking that they really think there is some sort of shadowy activist agenda spanning all developers and publishers. It’s just not true, and I wish we would examine these issues case by case.

[@TheJewishAzovMember]

They are basically the new age puritan Christians we grew up with but way worse. Remember when they said some heavy metal bands would turn you away from Jesus? Imagine if those guys got into the music creation process of those bands. These weirdos are way more puritan than the Christians as well, since they were only screeching on TV news. Now they are screeching on our games and movies now.

[@courier6640]

As someone who loves SEGA because of Sonic, Yakuza, and Segata Sanshiro's existence... I honestly knew nothing about any game named "Hyenas" before this video.

[@kranichkrone]

Of course you didn't because it was canned mere weeks before the planned release date.

[@BreakdownxD]

I only need to see a picture of the devs to know how a game will turn out 😂😂😂

[@MalMalWasTaken]

Sheer fucking hubris. Reminds me of what happened to CDPR before Cyberpunk got released. Thankfully they learn from that and now Cyberpunk is one of, if not my favorite game. Here's hoping other companies learn from this.... probably not but one can hope.

[@hammondOT]

"You may believe that the unqualified pink haired prononuner has no idea how to contribute to the project. You might even have evidence. But is it worth losing your job?"

[@skettinbutter3635]

Smartest 14 year old republican

[@hammondOT]

@@skettinbutter3635 "only republicans like to run companies that work"

[@TheGallantDrake]

They usually have brown hair because they're average. "Pronouner" lol

[@noone12748]

​@@skettinbutter3635 Smartest xitter user

[@kellevichy]

Hey darling. I hate to break it to you but you have pronouns.

[@MoonBunnyLovers]

Edit: glad KZbin recommended this channel I never, NEVER, saw an ad for Concord. I only know about it because KZbinrs talked about it die...

[@I39393I]

is that guilty gear back ground?

[@Mugthief]

Xrd Sign to be specific.

[@I39393I]

@@Mugthief yay im a jam player sad they didnt put her in strive for 4 years now

[@KurokishiOcelot]

As you mentioned Starfield and Shattered space and their hubris, I think it's important to point out that no only has Bethesda not innovated on what they can do, but they've gone backwards. People will mention the RPG mechanics and the writing, but it's not just that. AI, NPC routines, and world building as well as other elements, the things that made the previous games feel lived in despite other shortcomings like their tech or writing, just aren't present in Starfield. I imagine all of that was cut out to account for the processing power the game needed for its scale, but not only did it hurt exploration, it also hit one of the reasons I really loved BGS games. Immersion. Sure not everyone is going to be a named NPC with quests and personalities, but at the very least i expect them to do more than just stand there or walk a basic path, and stare at you when you walk by. Not everything will be as deep as a Rockstar NPC AI, but I expect better than pedestrian AI from the early 2000s. Starfield feels like a kid playing with action figures. The game tells me this person is a mechanic, or that they sell food, but they just stand there, in front of their prop. They don't move around, they don't interact, they just stand there, play a stock animation, and wait for me to open a menu, eternally, without the routines that made them feel alive in past games.

[@TheBigBlueMarble]

Toxic positivity is not exclusively found in video game companies. Many companies that have personnel problems (often of their own making) resort to encouraging positivity while actively discouraging any negativity/criticism as a way to deal with those personnel problems and never fully understand the horribly impact it has on their products.

[@michellestr8998]

Outlaws is NOT doing OK.

[@J33KXX]

Include gamefreak. Pokémon fans just smile and play whatever slop is given to them then actively berate anyone who gives constructive criticism

[@PassDaMethod]

Mug my man, this phenomenon isn't just relegated to the video game industry. It's infested every major institution in the western world... and it's by design.

[@jerromynolting1139]

truth is when a person has a complaint or suggestion you don't agree with dont mean its a bad thing. the people having these problems trying to point it out to you taken with a grain with salt comes from many who just won't to help. ignoring people an labeling a group as all far right or racist ectara does no good.

[@rigo7292]

I'm loving the fact that more and more people are waking up to these unfortunate practices taking place in some of our favorite game studios, and I'm so thankful for the way you put it into words to help people better understand these important issues. ALSO, instant-gaming is almost exclusively how I purchase games for steam lol highly recommend

[@HSG4meR]

Not just the game developing companies, the toxic positivity is also destroying the debate spectrum, where the minimum criticism is perceived as hate and bigotry.

[@PikaLink91]

I'm already subbed ... but dear lord I hate it when content creators ask at the beginning of the video instead of at the end. I mean, you introduce the topic of the video and then go "If you're new here, please like and sub" and I'm like ... on what grounds? In the first 2 min I have yet to get a reason to subscribe because I haven't seen enough of you to know if I like your content or not.

[@madaxe606]

No game devs dare to acknowledge that since May 2020 a certain demographic has been wildly over-represented in gaming. And that the demographic representing the traditional and continuing majority of Western gamers has had quite enough of it, and are automatically discounting games accordingly.

[@davidkern8689]

"Are we out of touch making bad and boring games? No, it's the gays who are wrong." Please go outside and touch grass my friend

[@dswig4868]

What demographic?

[@madaxe606]

@@dswig4868 What bait?

[@dswig4868]

@@madaxe606 that's not a response What demographic are you talking about?

[@madaxe606]

@@dswig4868 Sure it is.

[@skipperbentdk]

Concord developer had mossad demon star in their logo. Cursed sony got scammed

[@iancredible-]

There are actually two reasons big studios are failing. It only takes one of these two for me to completely go off of a game and not buy it. -The first reason is DEI and woke messages rammed into everything they dump out these days. If I see a pronoun, I'm instantly out. If I see forced diversity or ugly characters trying to pander to the woke brigade, I'm instantly out. I see a story focused on identity politics and LGBTHDTV garbage, I'm instantly out. - The second is their pricing is absolutely insane and they feel as though they are justified in releasing a game with multiple different versions like the basic version for $40, then the "founders edition" for $70, then the "ultimate edition" for $120 and then have the audacity to have microtransactions and season passes. (even after all these exclusions from me, I still have more games than I have time to play) Ubisoft is a perfect example why actually aiming to have these in is a bad idea and it's why they have consistently made losses over and over again, they thought they were too big to be criticised by their customers and now they are enjoying a very harsh wake up call but it's too late. Anyone reading this, if you want a successful game simply do these .two things to increase your chances of releasing something people will buy. -Remove all woke and forced diversity from your minds when creating it. -Price the game fairly and only have a single price and version for your game, none of these "pro" or "pro+" or "pro++" cashgrabs. If you respect your target customers they will reward you with their money.

[@ryanmuhm7584]

Elder Scrolls 6 and Fallout 5 are what we want. Not Starfield (376 hours played) and FO76 (close to 1000 hours played). Todd and his friends makes my favorite games lol. I am 50. I will die in time. I want ES6 and FO5 before then. Great vid as always man.

[@blockmasterscott]

I’m 57 and I’m wondering if I’ll ever see Fallout 5 and Elder Scrolls 6. I feel ya brother. You got me beat in Starfield, I have about 250 hours in it.

[@SpentAmbitionDrain]

There is no toxic positivity. There is only toxic fear of transparency. It's the same thing when you are talking about negatives and positives. It's the same. Exact. System. Of. Toxicity.

[@dirtperson1660]

The toxicity of our city

[@noone12748]

​@@dirtperson1660 Of the Society we live in

[@dirtperson1660]

@@noone12748 you, what do you own, the world

[@kellevichy]

Toxic positivity happens when people believe that negative thoughts about anything should be avoided. Thus yes - this is toxic positivity.

[@noone12748]

@@dirtperson1660 lol

[@mark.082]

This reminds me to those parents who coddle their kids with this very same toxic positivity turning them into entitled crybabies on the long run whenever something inconvenient happens to them.

[@SpaceHCowboy]

Yep, the world is overflowing with parasites like that. 😢

[@DreamingCactus]

The industry term for toxic positivity is Diversity, Equity and Inclusion (DEI/DE&I). Use that term instead.

[@kranichkrone]

This guy may be talking about hubris, but that is NOT going anywhere. Everyone knows how all the chest pounding about wokeness gets memory holed every time something derided for being woke makes big bux.

[@anzolomyer4584]

Very well-made video. Entertaining. And I just gotta agree with the thesis around "hubris". Making a beloved game that people play for years and years is really like catching lightning in a bottle. But more companies are pumping in a lot of $$$$ in attempts the manufacture that magic. And ultimately, the intention seems to be greedy and vampiric--they wanna make something that is guaranteed to vampire a lot of time and money over a long period of time. Even Todd Howard was all like, "After Skyrim, we now understand that people play our games for 10 years." So they made Starfield with that in mind. Looking back, that does seem really bad and misguided. The goal should have been, "We want to make the best space game we can make, even if people only play for it a week." I've been playing a lot of different games in the last year. And I started playing Starfield after Shattered Space again, and my heart just sorta sunk. I thought to myself--"Well shoot. Maybe hating on this game isn't just an entire grift."

[@ronnieronb73]

Good. Wokeness is dying.

[@michellestr8998]

Avoid Ghost of Yotei. That might be our last hurdle.

[@kranichkrone]

​@@michellestr8998 what will you do if it earns big? Have you ever thought about that?

[@michellestr8998]

@@kranichkrone Even if it earns big, it will earn less then if they kept with their original idea of starring Jin. That was what they were green lit for. Right now, every single franchise has their latest game with a female protagonist. That is not an accident. Zelda, Uncharted 5, The Witcher 4, GTA6, Last of Us, Resident Evil, Assasin's Creed, Star Wars outlaws and I could keep going. Besides Space marine 2, I cant even think of a male led latest game. Anyone with pattern recognition is going to see it. I want to know why this is being done. It's actually kind of sinister, because it's so obviously co ordinated. And what is the alternative? We pretend Ghost of Yotei is not woke? If it wasn't, they would have stuck to their original plan, and kept Jin. And not hired ab outspoken activist to front their game.

[@ceasarsaran8573]

@@kranichkrone She is right. Not sure this is posting, but no point in pretending Ghost of Yotei wasn't made after the dev who created Tsushima were driven off. And their most vocal employee hates males, and is happy to tell you that.