Incomplete

   A preface, dear reader; Because I'm about to go off. But before I do, let it be known that I admire and love all of my friends who contribute and work tirelessly within the parameters I'm about to diss. You are talented, hard working, diligent, and it's very clear that ultimately, none of the issues I take are yours to blame for. The blame. It's not yours. So don't take it, qorl. Just sit back, and read the mad ravings of a neurotic, over-analyzing potato. And enjoy the... wordy show.


"Free DLC" they said.

This was the first thing I saw that immediately like, annoyed me. Because I'm seeing a pattern. Standards are changing. Which is fine. But now it's....
Launch an early access unfinished game in increments and refer to the unfinished portions as "DLC" even though you're charging people full price for.... an unfinished game.

But that's not my only gripe.

In order to sell a shit ton of your product, you have to have a monster marketing campaign. Hype. Get people really excited for something. And what better way to do that than to aggressively push PR and pander with celebrities.

Fine. I don't like pandering. But from a marketing standpoint- ok. Gross, but I get it.
But then... release something, broken, and then drop that there's "free DLC" coming soon. Which only tells me that obviously your game isn't finished. You dumped all your resources in pandering, and now you're charging people full price for an unfinished early access game.

Is that what's happening? Are studios now releasing stuff incrementally under the guise of "bonus content?"
It bugs me because... games are releasing buggy as hell, when this wasn't a thing years back. We would get one final, polished, completed product. And it was great. And if there was more stuff, it wouldn't come 2 months after. It would take time. Because it was new content lol. Does that make sense?

It's not just this game, but this is a tiny thing I'm noticing. If you're gonna charge people full price for a game, make sure it's not a flaming dumpster of bugs. That's embarrassing. At least, it used to be. Bethesda used to get so much shit for teh bugs they had- have, in their games. But they weren't game-breaking. Or even bad. They were aesthetic and funny. But the standard now with launching games feels like just ship it, we'll patch it later

Authenticity is important to me as a consumer. So this shit, this whole marketing over experience shit just... it's disgusting to me. And insulting.

But then, while expressing this, Chicken kindly had me sit the fuck down and check myself. I like being checked beyond argument. Reader, this is why I'm marrying him.

"Finished, polished games came at the sacrifice of people doing several months of overtime"

I shut my mouth. There's no arguing that. Crunch culture is horrible. And I felt awful for not having considered that. Naughty Dog is notorious for it. But it made me question why development times aren't extended instead of catering to public demand. Angry fans demand urgency. And water is wet. Like, what else is new?

then Lifa added;
"There's also poor time and project management from higher ups"

When Lifa said that, it kinda validated what I felt, because yeah- absolutely. If you're gonna promote aggressively, and dump a shit ton of money into making something LOOK good enough to sell, then yeah production better be just as good. Instead, games get rushed, and employees suffer for it. The end result is an insult to everyone.
This last big launch was in development 9 years. It got announced last year. And still got delayed a few times. It wasn't ready. But because they had a big mouth, they shipped an early access game.
I mean I guess 9 years is better than 1 year.

You can't make a baby with 9 women in 1 month.- Homdray passing along the wisdom of something he heard long ago.

Then, during the game awards, we got into the topic of marketing again. Damn, what an entity- that marketing. How much can you make people talk about your product? Not even buy, but talk about.
What if... your product had a low bar of entry? So much so that if streamers played it, it'd be cinematic and narrative heavy enough that onlookers would feel as though they don't even need to play it. They can watch the entire thing- and experience the narrative in its full complexity- which is what carries this winning title.
Play a game with a controversial narrative.. without playing it.

Voila.
Conversations, heated debates, hype, memes and everything in between about the duality of sympathizing with revenge, murder, and hypothetical what would you dos?.

Last year's winner came up. But the bar of entry for that title was unforgivingly high. How does that work, then? I was unaware that that it didn't even sell that many copies. It was streamers that carried it to the win.

So here we are.
"i didn't play it but i watched _____ play it" = award worthy (?)

Several arguments were made in contrary to this year's winner. But it no longer matters. None of this matters, really. Because.... the 1.2 update for Genshin Impact is gonna be out soon and I'm ready.

Note: Genshin Impact is a free to play game. The option to spend money on things offered in the game is there. But it can be played completely free if the player so desires. I am not that player. I was once upon a time. But this game took me by such surprise; the scale, the charm, the story, the game play, the art, music, characters... they are all well worth rewarding. So I probably bought at least 3 AAA games worth ... just on Genshin. Willingly. Happy to support development and a product that is delivering without forcing itself into my life with mindless gimmicks.


That was a whole opinion. Can be totally wrong. To me, it feels justified. That's the beauty of opinion, it doesn't have to carry the weight of anything other than how one feels. BUT LOOK. CHOCOLATE
Welcome to the picture segment of this post.

 So this was from one of Chicken's sisters'. I didn't... idk... chocolate isn't my favorite, but these are really good? Gourmet chocolate! The eggnog one is my favorite :3

Family dinner ^_^

It'd been a while since I had beef noodle soup. Hnnnnngggg so guuurd

And uh, a lot happened this week. But can't talk about it.
We did have lots of yummy food and fire pit time tho

Lifa prepared some yummy steaks with caramelized onions. And I prepared a stewed beef thing my mom would make.

It was a day of celebration. For several things.

Remember this face. And how not shiny it is.

Cheers to good things in the future ^_^

Salad Fingers is still up there. I added christmas lights to his ugly tree. Makes the barren land seem a little more jolly.

And I'm happy to say that Lifa now dove head first into Genshin.
This fool.... likes Amber.
He loves her lmao.

He got some stuff and rolled. We were talking about how funny it'd be if he got constellations for Amber because he loves her so much. Or Keqing.
HE PULLED AMBER

I screamed. He was so happy lmao

It's a good thing too because I told him if he pulled Qiqi, I'd probably have to strangle him in his sleep
Amber is goofy and pretty much useless, except for puzzles. But he genuinely loves her. This was pretty enjoyable to watch lol.


And yesterday, a gift arrived for Chicken and myself. I said to put it under the tree with the other presents, but today he looked at me with that face. The "can we?" face.

It was a gift from his cousin in Boston!

Lol, I was just mentioning to them how we should get monopoly! We've been playing some board games and this is actually perfect.

An engagement gift!

Very sweet gesture. I hope to one day visit Boston. Lotta cool stuff there. Like tea. I like tea. But I want Boston tea specifically. Like, we could go and shop for it in the little shops with his cousin and fam. In the winter. All bundled up and stuff. omg. uwu.

That was nice to start the day with. This week has been exciting. Lots of stuff to look forward to. And! The semester is finally over! Good grades all around. I'm a happi potato.

Support your passions and stuffs that make you happiiii
I still gotta play Hades lol
Stay safe
Wear a mask! Happi Friday!