Game News 2.0

If this was a made up story, you'd say Kojima was behind the character names.

That's a prime example of cruel and unusual punishment being handed out simply because a rich corporation wanted to make an example out of him and had the money to buy this kind of "justice".

Like are we supposed to feel sympathy for this lad. He got caught breaking the law and was punished or am I missing something.

Do you genuinely think his punishment is fair?

20-30% of his remaining disposable income after all his bills are paid. You could certainly argue it's disproportionate but it's really not the difference between poverty and not. It sounds like it's health issues and stupidly expensive north american medical care that's driving him into poverty, along with choosing to spend his life engaging in illegal activities instead of partaking in a legitimate career with health benefits etc.

It's also hard to say if there's not more to the story, it just briefly mentions him having some possible prior involvement in selling pirate movies and a brush with the law before moving to the Dominican Republic, which doesn't necessarily sound like the back story of someone who just accidentally fell into pirating software by innocently working on the website of the true masterminds without realising they were doing anything wrong. They weren't some little mom & pop outlet either - they accrued tens of millions of dollars in sales during his time working with them. The Guardian prefaces a lot of the statements with phrases like "as he tells it" which do a lot of heavy lifting, simply telling his side of the story rather than engaging in any deeper investigative journalism.

I mean I don't disagree that it's certainly harsh and it's not like the money he's repaying is worth anything to Nintendo, they certainly care more about the message it sends, but I don't have that much sympathy for pirates and the damage they do to creative industries. It is most definitely not a victimless crime.

Not surprising.

Definitely unsustainable the way they've going.

What would be really cool is if Sony said great idea lads, here's the last of us and the 2 just made their exclusives available to each other and everyone lived happily ever after.

Yeah I can't see the reverse happening of PS throwing their exclusives over to Xbox. Xbox need PS's userbase more than Sony need the extra sales, especially as they're releasing their games on Steam already.

My reasons for considering getting an Xbox get smaller and smaller every day. I have HiFi Rush on steamdeck (haven't started it yet though), and the main Xbox exclusives I want to play are the Gears games. Starfield and Indiana Jones don't particularly appeal to me. But if some of the newer Xbox games are going to end up on PS5 anyway, might just get the Gears games on PC/steamdeck.

I'm sure overall though, MS have done the maths and see more benefits for them in the long run here, so kudos. If nothing else, more games for everyone to be able to play. Never a bad thing.

Microsoft need to address these rumours fast.

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I would see it as an even bigger push into gamepass as a service.

I reckon they will become a 3rd party publisher more or less. Still have a console/streaming box of some sort and go that way.

I'm guessing the "sell" is that you can get all these games and others on gamepass for €X a month or you can buy them individually if you want wherever you play your games. And probably exclusive for 6-12 months too.

All guess work obviously but I'm sure they know the numbers and what direction will make them the most money.

Unless this all comes with a massive investment in game pass then that's dead too. Because without a console to download it to it is useless. I don't see how they can keep a console just for game pass because that console would still need to compete with playstation. There is PC of course, but the console market is far bigger.

GP is in dire need of investment with the current Series S profile, low bitrate and mainly 30fps games making it an awful streaming option that can in no way be taken seriously as a console replacement option.