TwinIon

I think the anti-trust issue is that YouTube itself is so dominant that while the YouTube TV / Google negotiations are pretty standard fare, Google is able to effectively sidestep the issue by putting YouTube TV into an app that Roku can't afford to ban. When it comes to YouTube TV, I think Google has every right to say "if you want our service on your platform, play by these rules," be that codec support, hardware minimums, or whatever. The natural position of Roku would be to respond, "well, we don't like those rules, and since competing services exist (Hulu TV, Sling, etc.), we just won't support your app." What makes this fight very different from the similar fights Roku was having with HBO, Peacock, and whoever else is the existence of YouTube and the way Google is using it here. As far as Roku as a company is concerned, I was all about them as a neutral platform provider, but their hard pivot to ad sales and the hard line they've taken with content providers makes their stuff far less desirable. No point in a neutral streaming device if I can't stream all my stuff, and their lack of desire to improve their UI makes their high end stuff far less interesting.

I'm glad a new season is coming, but I'm disappointed how little content there seems to be. I feel like with all the focus on "core activities" there shouldn't be a season that goes buy without a new Strike and maps for Gambit/Crucible. Last season we got three new strikes. I played VoG a couple times back in the day, but I hardly remember it, so that'll be a mostly new experience, even if it's largely the same. This last season I finished collecting all the exotics in the game, and if I'm geared up well enough to do GM nightfalls, I don't really feel like grinding for mildly better rolls on stuff I already have, so I expect my playtime will fall off considerably. I still enjoy my time in Destiny, but there's not much else for me to work towards at this point.

Played through a bit more and after my first completion the game feels significantly easier. One thing that I think contributes to that feeling is that I'm getting so much more stuff this time around. In your first runs there are all these areas that you can't reach, and they're generally not guarded, it's just free stuff for those who have gone through the game before. So I'm better at the game, making better decisions about what to pick up, the guns I find largely have better perks unlocked on them, and I'm getting more stuff per room I clear. I'm undecided if all that is a good or bad thing. I guess I don't want the game to be as hard as it was at first, but it does seem slightly off that I'm breezing through it so much easier now. Two questions for those that have made multiple full runs: -Is there a way to skip the third boss? -Is there a permanent upgrade that allows you to open the orange force fields?

Best part of all this for sure. A lot of it is stuff we already "knew" but could never be sure. Like Apple saying they didn't want to bring iMessage to Android for fear that parents would buy their kids Android phones or Microsoft saying they've never made money selling Xbox hardware. I'm also enjoying a lot of "how the sausage is made" kinda stuff around the App Store. Apple has this reputation as such a friendly company, but you don't get to be the most valuable company on the planet by being nice to everyone, and seeing how ruthlessly they ensure that they get their cut of every dollar that flows through the iPhone hammers that point home. Also, it's fun when a bunch of companies can just kind of air their grievances. Like MS not being able to put an Xcloud app on iOS or complaints about the App store review process. I've never expected Epic to win any real concessions in the end, but all these documents and details have been wonderful.

The best mobile SoC out there in both CPU and GPU performance is currently Apple's M1. Anandtech put's that a bit below a GTX 1650. If I'm reading this right, Tom's scores the 1650 at about half the 2080, which is probably the best comparison we have to a Series X, but slightly above the 1060, which is roughly PS4 Pro specs. This is all very rough equivalencies, but I think it's fair to say that a high end mobile chip could compete with a PS4 Pro or original Xbox One/PS4. Of course the cheapest M1 product is $800 and we haven't seen an updated nVidia ARM SoC that competes with that. The M1 also has a bunch of stuff that a gaming SoC wouldn't, like thunderbolt support, 16 cores of Neural Engine, and probably more CPU power than is necessary, so a gaming focused competitor might be able to compete at a lower price. If nVidia really wanted to, I think og Xbox One / PS4 like performance is possible, especially if they use some kind of DLSS like tech, but I'd guess we'll see something slightly below that.

The framing of it is pretty disingenuous. Sure, it was "CNN, MSNBC parent companies" that funded this fraud, which was done at the behest of Broadband for America, who counts among their members AT&T and Comcast, but also The Internet & Television Association, who's members include basically every cable channel or provider, including Fox.

After 23 hours total playtime I finally cleared the last boss. The later biomes went much more quickly for me. It took me a few tries to get to the third boss, but I cleared it in my first go, along with the fourth. That run I lost to an update, but my next run I was able to clear the final two biomes in my first shot. I had multiple revives and a bunch of healing stuff I didn't even end up needing. I think much of that was just finally getting the hang of things, both in combat and in what choices to make. I got better at dodging the enemies that get up close, was careful not to lose track of swarms of flying enemies, and made sure to use the environments to my advantage. I also was far more liberal with malfunctions. I picked up just about every infected (or whatever the word is) item, as long as I had fewer than two malfunctions going, and it never really hurt me too much, and I maxed out my health part way into the last biome. Finding guns with leeching shots helped big time, since I was generally able to refill health with that and then primarily use health items to increase my max. More that almost anything though it was just nice to have a run snowball. Finding a good gun let me clear more rooms to find more artifacts to become more powerful and take fewer hits, and on it goes. I barley scrapped past the second and third bosses, but after that by the time I was in a big fight I was almost overpowered. I was still quite stressed towards the end, feeling like the other shoe was going to drop any moment, but thankfully it all went pretty well. Given how much trouble I had to start, I'm kinda surprised I got through it. I'll probably play a bit more, but my desire to revisit has definitely lessened. Probably just need to take a short break. Still have plenty of stuff to unlock and new guns to try out.

I thought I turned off auto-update, but I woke up to find that an update had been applied and my game had been closed. Do you have to turn off auto-update on a per-game basis? Any tips on how to do so? Sucks because I was on a really good run. I'd decided I was going to focus on getting cubes and unlocking better artifacts in the first biome. I did that once, got to biome 3, and died right before the boss. Did it again, but got such a nice build together I was able to beat the third AND fourth bosses. Had just entered the fifth biome when I had to call it a night. I'll just say that I didn't expect what happens after beating the third boss and that I wish there as more variety in the boss arenas. I feel like the entire game is encouraging you to move and to use the environment to your advantage, and then you get to a boss and it's just an empty circle room and million orbs of death with nowhere to hide. The third boss mixes it up, but it still doesn't feel representative of the rest of the game.

The story only mentions her using the system to view grades and such. While I can understand why a stupid high school student might not realize the gravity of doing so, I have no problem expelling her for it. Firing the mother seems harsh, but justifiable. I imagine that this student probably help set her mom's password (that she probably uses for everything), so it wouldn't be difficult to imagine the kid doing this without her mother's knowledge. A felony however, seems ridiculous. When I was in high school we had this system where you could buy snacks on personal credit of sorts. You just wrote your name down on a piece of paper along with your order and the school would charge you for it periodically. Not exactly a high security affair. One of my classmates started buying himself and all his friends food under my name. He'd been doing this for a good long while when he decided to ask one of my good friends if he wanted free snacks, telling my friend that he was using my name. Turns out he'd charged hundreds of dollars worth of food to my account. It was easy enough to figure out how much was his because I'd never bought anything. He was eventually expelled after pooping in the sinks and I believe cheating on exams, but it would have been insane to charge him with felony theft and/or fraud, and in my case actual money changed hands!

Probably not something I'd use or play, but pretty neat. Like Dreams for kids.

The one episode a week schedule seems to be working for their high profile shows, but it makes sense for them to try different days out and see if it affects engagement numbers. Also, I wonder if there is other content they're scheduling around. Other shows that release on Fridays or sports or something.

It's probably too much to hope that this case ends up fixing things like that.

I took a break and ran through the first biome and this is pretty much it. You don't get a permanent buff, but you unlock new (and hopefully more powerful) artifacts for future runs. Still think they should set you to full health after beating a boss, but at least there is some benefit for repeating bosses.

I forgot you can heal at the ship after the first boss. What permanent buffs do you get for putting in data cubes? I searched and couldn't find a list beyond the rewards for beating a boss the first time. Though I did learn that there is always a data cube in the first biome.

I certainly see this with my immediate millennial friends and family. Most of them don't have kids and likely won't (including me and my wife). Most of those that do have kids will stick with the one. Of the folks that have multiple kids, one couple had twins, and one person had multiple unplanned pregnancies. Pretty much all of this group is well educated and making decent money. Even the contrast with the Gen Xers I know is severe, which seems to be indicated on the graph in the OP. I have a hard time imagining this being something that turns around too much anytime soon. I think the pandemic will be a downward blip, but the overall trend seems likely to continue bar some significant change.

You don't start off in the next biome after you die, you always start from the beginning. Often you can get to the second or third biome very quickly, but there is some value in staying a bit longer in an early biome in order to find better artifacts/parasites/consumables. As it stands, for myself there's basically no reason I'm aware of to re-fight an early boss. Maybe I find a better gun, but the odds of that aren't any better than finding the same gun in the next random chest. You do find a small health boost item after a boss fight, but odds are that if I survive it's going to be with minimal health. So the risk/reward just doesn't really exist. On the other hand, if I see a room with a star over the doorway in an earlier biome, These are rooms that guarantee a more difficult fight, with lots of small enemies and at least a couple big ones. If I find clear of those before the teleporter to the next world, I'll probably find a couple new guns at the very least. Hopefully I find a useful artifact/parasite, and since there are usually a few health items, even if I do take damage, I probably come out about even. If I fight well, I probably get to increase my max health a bit. So even for those rooms I know will be difficult, there's a good balance of risk/reward that doesn't exist for early bosses.

My biggest issues have been surviving boss fights. I just cleared the second boss for the first time, after dying on its "final stand" a few times. I've been trying my best to build up runs where I've got a high damage weapon and some kind of health restore or revive for when I get to the boss, but I've not found a lot of success. I usually end up with a single health item and die at the end. Other than that I guess I have the most trouble with lots of flying enemies. I lose track of them all and get a single hit in the back and things go downhill from there. Things can snowball so quickly. I lose a bit too much life in one encounter, so instead of increasing my max health, I'm spending my green pickups to restore health, which also makes me skip other potential upgrades because I can't afford the wrong malfunction, and on it goes. I do wish that there were more total health recovery mechanisms. I understand that's the whole challenge of the game, but you should really recover health after beating a boss if nothing else. Getting one small health item after beating a boss is a bummer. I'd even consider re-fighting an earlier boss if I knew I'd be at full health afterwards. For someone of my skill level, there's zero incentive to fight a boss again once you've beat it (unless I'm missing something). All that said, 12 hours in and I'm still enjoying it quite a lot. It's one of the few games that I feel ok about working to get better at. I'm starting to play a bit more loosely, and when a run goes downhill take bigger chances rather than fewer.

I generally favor Epic in these disputes because I think them winning is better for customers, but I think the question Sony brought up is a good one. So what if Fortnight is the biggest thing on Playstation? If cross-play isn't good business for Sony, then why should they allow it? All the Epic points were along the lines of incentives to make the deal, none actually articulated why it would be good business for Sony to allow it, and I have a hard time coming up with reasons it would be. Maybe allowing crossplay meant that gamers would spend more time in fortnight, which meant spending more money in game, and perhaps users tend to buy things on their "home" platform. If Playstation is the biggest platform for Fortnight, that could be an overall win for Sony, but that's a pretty big hypothetical since it would have to more than offset what users would buy on other platforms. This is also what I generally think of all of these issues Epic brings up. I'd be very happy if Devs got more money for their games. I'd be delighted if other companies could run App stores on iOS. I think it would be great if all platforms supported cross-play for everything. What I have a much harder time with is why it would be a good business decision for these companies to implement these things or further still, why the government should compel a company to give into these demands.

Decided to put in another run last night, had a decent build going, decent weapons, and critically, had a revive or two. Even spent resin on one. Couldn't finish the run, so I put it in rest mode. Woke up this morning to a notification that the game had been updated, so I lost my run. Really hope they add some kind of save in there soon. In the meantime I think I turned off auto installation of updates, so hopefully that will help. Had a very solid run going today. Finally cleared the first boss, but died on the second while it had only a tiny silver of life left. Real bummer. I took some of the advice I was given and have been more liberal with opening malignant stuff, and it's working out rather well. My last run I kept running across items that would fix malfunctions, but even after picking up basically every item, I didn't have any (some were cleared up via various other methods). While I was drowning in ways to fix malfunctions, I couldn't find an extra life or more HP. The more time I've put in the more I've been enjoying it. I don't know what this dev's history of DLC, expansions, or content updates is, but even though I'm no where close to the end, this really feels like a game that could evolve, even if it's just adding more stuff in.

Pretty mixed impressions from my first few hours. It looks great and plays great, so I don’t have many issues with the fundamentals. My first run I got to the first boss and died. My subsequent runs have not gone nearly as well. I’ve had multiple runs where I was playing at least 30 min without finding another gun, dying to rooms completely full of monsters. A better player certainly would have lived, but it didn’t feel great. Overall, I really wish there was more that persisted between runs. I wish I could level up some ability or equipment or something so that a long failed run didn’t feel so bad. For some reason I was under the impression that you could upgrade your pistol in a way that would be permanent, but if so, I haven’t found that. I know it’s the standard of the genre to completely reset, but just a little more permanent growth would make a huge difference to me. Of course, the worst run I’ve had, the one that ended my time for the night was one where I did find a decent weapon, had greatly increased my max health, had just cleared a big room and found another upgrade, and then the game crashed. Anyone have some good overall tips for opening malignant things? I’ve been pretty risk averse so far because I don’t feel like I have a great sense of the risk/reward. One of the few that I did open really handicapped me in an otherwise good run. It just doesn’t feel great to be passing up most of the potential upgrades, but maybe I just shouldn’t.

So I was waiting for the reviews before buying, went to pre-order on Amazon yesterday and they said it would be here on Tuesday, so I didn't order, thinking I could just grab it at Best Buy or something. As of right now Best Buy can ship it to me by the 10th, and no stores have it available to pickup. Gamestop is pretty much the same. Amazon now does seem to have them in stock, so it'll be here by tomorrow. Still. Just seems odd that a pretty big release is so hard to find physically. I wonder if they just won't be in stores until Tuesday? Is this a nudge to just get people to buy the digital version? This kind of game is the exact reason I got a PS5 with a disc drive. It's a game I'm happy to pay to play, but I doubt I'll be putting in hundreds of hours or anything. Being able to give it to a friend or get a few bucks in credit after seems like an easy win.

I can understand calling it the first "true" PS5 game. Demon Souls is a remake, and unless I misunderstood something about that game, it's very much the same game that came out 11 years ago but with very modern graphics. I feel like Miles Morales has a slightly better claim, but length aside it never felt terribly "next gen" compared to playing Spider-Man on the PS5. At this point I don't think that there's a bright line for whatever a "true" next gen game is, but something like Returnal that is a new experience, only available on the new platform, leveraging the new tech to some degree feels like as good a definition as any. As to the game itself, I'm slightly concerned with the idea that a single run can be ~90 minutes. Still, I don't really do anything else with my PS5, no media or anything, so I imagine I could pause it, put the PS5 in rest, and resume the game whenever if I really need to stop mid run.

I might have been a little consumed by some of the negatives while typing that up, because I do agree that it's pretty enough, I'm interested in the story and do want to see more, and the soundtrack is great. I might finish the other playthroughs if I find the time.

Exposing actual owners of companies? Auditing people who make more than $400K? Earning $700B by spending $80B? Yeah, those all seem like pretty excellent ideas. Add in free and automatic tax filing and you'd scratch off most of my IRS wishlist.

The MS store needs a serious overhaul, and I wouldn't buy anything on that store until they do. Especially with Gamepass I've had so many issues installing and launching games that in at least one case I bought the game on Steam to get out of the MS store hell. Good on them for reducing their cut, but it's not something that would make me use the store again.