Same thing happened to me recently with their stupid BOGO sale, I bought Xenoblade Chronicles DE and Skyward Sword “New” and they sent me both packages with no plastic wrapping whatsoever, the pre-owned stickers very obviously ripped off and lots of damage to the cases. I went to a brick and mortar to return it and they didn’t reimburse my shipping fees, I had to call customer support for them to give that back to me.
I tried to just buy them new in store and they told me they “don’t carry rare games like that anymore.” I said fuck it, and went to my local Walmart for Xenoblade and Target for Skyward Sword and it cost me less. What a fucking joke. GameStop is trash.
My most recent gripe is with Amiibo, Nintendo literally announced some new ones recently and yet none of their supposed retailers carry them, aside from Amazon who have ridiculous upcharges on them. Went to GameStop and the employees didn’t even know what the fuck I was talking about. So if you can’t buy them directly from Nintendo you’re shit outta luck cuz good luck finding anyone that sells them for retail price.
Yup. And none of this is a surprise or new revelation - they’ve been trash the whole fucking time. Some folks just got so into their ‘big short’ fanfic that they thought keeping this company alive would be fun and profitable.
hopefully they had fun. it’s gonna crater sooner or later thanks to their business practices, and thank goodness. Mom & Pop shops like Pink Gorilla are way better any day.
So if you can’t buy them directly from Nintendo you’re shit outta luck cuz good luck finding anyone that sells them for retail price.
This is par for the course for basically any physical Nintendo product. Ninty is categorically allergic to manufacturing enough supply to satisfy demand and the resellers figured this out about 10-15y ago. Any limited production run product is almost immediately bought out on Amazon and the other big retailers websites and relisted at a markup on Amazon/eBay. If resellers smell blood in the water around a manufacturing run of a popular game (ie: Nintendo is close to selling through the available physical cartridge supply) they’ll buy that up and resell it too. Nintendo would rather their products be unavailable for however long it takes them to decide to manufacture more (usually somewhere between two and six months) than have excess stock on hand.
GameStop went to shit a long time ago and should have gone out of business and folded their assets. Instead because of some redditors they think they still have a valuable business with loyal customers.
Once they hard focused on NFTs I knew it’d never get better
That’s the horrible thing about online services. You never really own it, it can be taken away from you at any time. If you want to preserve something, you need physical and/or offline access.
And in addition to that sentiment, compression from moving or sending a copy of a copy is known to very slowly degrade digital media, so physical is almost always preferred.
Sure, it’s possible, but it’s unlikely. A properly kept laserdisc compared to, for example, a YouTube Video isn’t even a competition. Physical media not exposed to radiation or impact can last decades if not centuries. Don’t even get me started on Vynil.
Literally every seeder is part of that archive. You can look at individual trackers in the microcosm as individual archives and indices, but it’s the culture of piracy that causes the wide scale collection and preservation of media.
We’re actually at this kind of interesting cross-generational point of guerilla archival where it’s become easier to find certain obscure pieces of media history. I suspect this is in large part due to things like bounties, where suddenly a forgotten VHS of a 35 year old HBO special that aired once or twice could be a step toward a higher rank and greater access to a wider range of media.
Modern piracy has a strong incentive toward finding lost material that’s no longer readily available. Zero day content is great, but have you seen the RADAR pilot or both seasons of AfterMASH?
They belong in a museum. Indie would be proud, even if Harrison wouldn’t. Not that I know his perspective on piracy.
If you use most digital formats for media and compress them with something like .7z or Winrar, then it might take years or decades to noticeable degrade, but it is still a matter of when not if.
Holy crap. File compression is not the same thing as lossy media compression.
File compression uses mathematical algorithms to create definable outcomes. Meaning it doesn’t matter how much you compress/uncompress a file, it will always be exactly the same.
5 X 2 will always give you 10 and 10 ÷ 2 will always give you 5.
Compression and transmission of data causes loss of parity. We lose or flip some 1s and 0s. Over time the effects become very noticeable. The best visual example I can think of are experiments where YouTubers downloaded and reuploaded their own video 100 times, it very quickly degrades. In a more reasonable scenario, near lossless file types and compressions would degrade much more slowly.
You’re referring to a video codec degrading as it keeps rendering the video again, not just copying and pasting the bits. There is no degradation from copying and pasting a file as-is.
And when you download the processed video and reupload it, it’s a 1 to 1 conversion of the same video codec, and every generation it gets worse. That example is a low hanging fruit, but the concept applies to everything.
Literally every file distribution method compresses the media first. A better argument was that YouTube re-encodes the video during the re-upload with a particularly lossy method to save on bandwidth and server space.
That 1:1 conversion through the same codec is very likely lossy. However that’s not a straight file copy which is what you originally said causes degradation.
Imo, an easy way to remove YouTube’s postprocessing from the equation would be to copy a video file to and from a nas or other computer several times and compare it with the untouched file.
experiments where YouTubers downloaded and reuploaded their own video 100 times, it very quickly degrades
That just means Youtube’s software uses lossy compression, that is a Youtube problem, not a digital media problem. Are you familiar with the concept of file hashing? A short string can be derived from a file, such that if any bit of the file is altered, it will produce a different hash. This can be used in combination with other methods to ensure perfect data consistency; for example a file torrent that remains well seeded won’t degrade, because the hash is checked by the software, so if anyone’s copy changes at all due to physical degradation of a harddrive or whatever other reason, the error will be recognized and routed around. If you don’t want to rely on other people to preserve something, there is always RAID, a 50 year old technology that also avoids data changing or being lost assuming that you maintain your hardware and replace disks as they break.
Here’s the fundamental reason you’re wrong about this: computers are capable of accounting for every bit, conclusively determining if even one of them has changed, and restoring from redundant backup. If someone wants to perfectly preserve a digital file and has the necessary resources and knowledge, they can easily do so. No offense but what you are saying is ignorant of a basic property of how computers work and what they are capable of.
It’s the most obvious example of a digital media problem. Computers might be able to account for every bit with the use of parity files and backups with frequent parity checks, but the fact is most people aren’t running a server with 4 separately powered and monitored drives as their home computer, and even the most complex system of data storage can fail or degrade eventually.
We live in a world of problems, like the YouTube problem, compression problems, encoding problems, etc. We do because we chose efficiency and ease of use over permanency.
Computers might be able to account for every bit with the use of parity files and backups with frequent parity checks
Yes, and this can be done through mostly automatic or distributed processes.
even the most complex system of data storage can fail or degrade eventually.
I wouldn’t describe it as complex, just the bare minimum of what is required to actually preserve data with no loss. All physical mediums may degrade through physical processes, but redundant systems can do better.
but the fact is most people aren’t running a server with 4 separately powered and monitored drives as their home computer
It isn’t hard to seed a torrent. If a group of people want to preserve a file, they can do it this way, perfectly, forever, so long as there remain people willing to devote space and bandwidth.
We live in a world of problems, like the YouTube problem, compression problems, encoding problems, etc. We do because we chose efficiency and ease of use over permanency.
All of these problems boil down to intent. Do people intend to preserve a file, do they not care, do they actively favor degradation? In the case of the OP game, it seems that the latter must be the case. Same with Youtube, same with all those media companies removing shows and movies entirely from all public availability, same with a lot of companies. If someone wants to preserve something, they choose the correct algorithms, simple as that. There isn’t necessarily much of a tradeoff for efficiency and ease of use in doing so, disk space is cheap, bandwidth is cheap, the technology is mature and not complicated to use. Long term physical storage can be a part of that, but it isn’t a replacement for intent or process.
I wouldn’t describe it as complex, just the bare minimum of what is required to actually preserve data with no loss. All physical mediums may degrade through physical processes, but redundant systems can do better.
I think you didn’t read correctly on the statement about the most complex system failing. I’m not saying that is the most complex system, I am saying the most complex system will fail.
It isn’t hard to seed a torrent. If a group of people want to preserve a file, they can do it this way, perfectly, forever, so long as there remain people willing to devote space and bandwidth.
LMAO at the idea of comparing every bit of every portion of every seeder’s copy with each other simultaneously and then cross referencing every parity file to be doubly safe, and then failing to see the chance of loss of parity during transmission of said files even after that. I will admit it would take a lot longer for a torrented file to degrade than some other forms of file distribution, but it’s not going to last for a thousand years, mate.
And I am saying complexity has little to do with it and also that a system can exist that will not fail.
it’s not going to last for a thousand years
Specifically why not? What is unrealistic about this scenario, assuming enough people care to continue with the preservation effort? All nodes must fail simultaneously for any data to be lost. The probability of any given node failing at any given time is a finite probability, independent event. The probability of N nodes failing simultaneously is P^N. That is exponential scaling. Very quickly you reach astronomically low probabilities, 1000 years is nothing and could be safely accomplished with a relatively low number of peers. Maybe there are external factors that would make that less realistic, like whether new generations will even care about preserving the data, but considering only the system itself it is entirely realistic.
The best visual example I can think of are experiments where YouTubers downloaded and reuploaded their own video 100 times
This has nothing to do with copying a file. YouTube re-encodes videos whenever they are uploaded.
A file DOES NOT DEGRADE when it is copied. That is something that happened to VHS and cassette tapes. It does not happen to digital files. You can even verify this by generating a hash of a file, copy it 10,000 times, and generate a new hash and they would be 100% identical.
No I won’t be, because I’ve done this before for various reasons, but not a single but was changed.
Let me put it this way. A computer stores programs and instructions it needs to run in files on a drive. These files contain exact and precise instructions for various components to operate. If even a SINGLE bit is off in just a couple of the OS files, your computer will start throwing constant errors if not just crashing entirely.
And this isn’t just theory. It’s provable. Cosmic rays have been known to sometimes hit a drive and cause a bit-flip. Or another issue is a drive not being powered on for a long time causing bit-rot
At this point I’m starting to think you’re a troll. There’s no way someone believes what you’re saying.
Then you’re not a troll, just completely deluded and frankly stupid. You’ve been getting so many genuine responses trying to help you learn, but you keep digging in your heels and doubling down on being confidently wrong.
Believe whatever you want, just keep it to yourself.
They want to “help me learn” that a form of media storage invented and refined within a couple of decades will outlast all other forms, because they’ve deluded themselves that the things they rely on are perfect and that failure is impossible.
What you’re talking about is 100% unrelated to what the discussion is about. The media the files are stored on are irrelevant. USB flash drives are known to die within just a couple of years in some cases. But when the storage media itself fails, then the data on it is more is less lost. And that includes degradation of the medium itself. That’s why both spinning hard drives and solid state drives need to be powered on and “refreshed” every so often (about a year for solid state and roughly a few years for magnetic). And degradation in this context means beyond the point where each bit can be reliably and accurately read from the medium. Once you go past that point you end up with corrupted data. And that includes pictures and videos. A raw picture probably won’t be affected too much with a single bit flipping, but a jpg for example, will visibly look corrupted. This is what a corrupted jpg looks like. And it can occure with just a single bite or byte being incorrectly changed/saved jpg1jpg2
All it takes is a single corrupted byte in either the b-frame or i-frame in a video and it will cause that momentary glitch. That’s what happens when data “degrades”. Digitally copying a file absolutely does not “degrade” data each time it is copied. The idea is just laughable. We aren’t talking about copying a VHS tape.
That’s a 700 ml bottle of 89.9% alcohol. Alcohol is 9 cal/gram (similar energy density to fat) and around 0.78 g/ml making the right close to triple the fried food and beer in calories (~4400)
At first I thought “yeah but you’re not polishing that off in a weekend” but that’s basically the equivalent of 2 fifths of booze which isn’t really a ton for a alcoholic or a hard partying college kid
2 fifths of liquor is absolutely ludicrous except for the absolute hardest of alcoholics.
Not to mention that while the alcohol might be equivalent, the more concentrated alcohol gets the harder it works on your body. You’ll have a much worse night/morning if you drank 6 shots of whiskey instead of 6 beers.
I know I associate with a few degenerates, but some of my heavy drinking friends could absolutely pound 2 fifths in a weekend. They’d be goddammed miserable on Monday but honestly that’s par for the course. One of my buddies in college used to put away a case of beer over a weekend which is 30 beers, not much less than 2 fifths which is about 35 drinks
I suppose it depends on how one defines the weekend. If you start the weekend on Friday night then it’s way more reasonable, say 8-10 on Friday, 12 on Sat/Sun is an intense weekend in Vegas. But if you drink 1.5 drinks per hour for 12 hours on Saturday/Sunday that’s 36 drinks. Which I don’t think is crazy for either a hard partying college kid or an alcholic
Correct. 60% of the alcohol consumed in America is drunk by 10% of the population. Honestly most people fall into 1 of 2 categories: non/light drinkers, and heavy drinkers. For heavy drinkers this is not crazy and I don’t think a light drinker is purchasing 90% abv absinthe
A fifth of what? It isn’t bad enough you people measure distance in football fields now you measure volumes in undefined fractions? What is a fifth LOL
A fifth used to be a fifth of a gallon. Stupidly as the world became more globalized bottle sizes followed and so the bottles we still call a fifth are actually 750ml. What’s worse is that the next unit up is a handle which is 1.75 liters! So it doesn’t even follow mathematically
This is what worries me about Dyson Sphere Program. They “technically” have a finished product right now, and are still in beta. Hopefully they get the Dark Fog implemented before they have to kill the project.
The patents on the Game Boy hardware expired years ago, so that’s what gives Analogue the right to do what they do. As for these Switch emulators, I have no idea, but I’ll guess it’s just Nintendo trying to scare people without their own legal departments into complying.
IIRC, part of the argument is that Switch games are encrypted, and the emulator uses real Switch keys to read the games. So Nintendo claims that by using official Nintendo Switch keys, it is violating Nintendo’s copyright and is subject to DMCA claims.
The argument is shaky at best. But the problem with DMCA is that combating it actually requires taking the claimant to court. So that’s a prohibitively long and difficult process, just to be able to go “hey Nintendo doesn’t actually have any claim here. Restore my repo.” Especially when Nintendo has a known history of drawing out long legal battles to exhaust defendants’ time+resources.
From my understanding the repos wouldn’t include the keys (or if they did then they definitely shouldn’t). But yeah I understand the long legal battle thing.
Right, Dolphin had an encryption key in there for the Wii that was hardcoded in. That is apparently the one bit of legal leverage Nintendo has to keep it off Steam, though being Nintendo, they would likely fight it, anyway.
In any case, the key could be a user provided configuration option, or tools for ripping games could do the decryption on their own. Either should keep the code safe from Nintendo being able to win a case. Though again, doesn’t stop Nintendo from trying and exhausting your ability to fight it.
Repos wouldn’t include the keys, but they’d include instructions on how to obtain them. Those instructions (according to Nintendo’s legal team) are enough to say that Yuzu violates the DMCA.
Just legal bullying. Good luck fighting an army of lawyers that are also lobbying the system. That being said all of that would be civil suits so if emulator creators don’t earn money they don’t have much to lose but the ability to continue the work.
They threaten a crap ton to scare devs into not entering court, but tbf I’m pretty sure the guy they got was for actual piracy, and the court ordered the millions in alleged damages to be paid in $40 installments to Nintendo per month for the rest of his life.
Edit:
It was set at 20-30% of his salary so yeah I guess that’s still a pretty hefty chunk of change.
I really enjoyed Driver: San Francisco. Then Ubisoft introduced UPlay and I couldn’t play it anymore. That was the last time I installed anything from Ubisoft.
I tried to reinstall it recently and it complained that you can’t install 32bit software from Steam anymore. I guess I’ll never play another Ubisoft game.
Or, the private-equity shell company that bought the name of the original studio from the company that bought out the company that bought them and shut them down 17 years ago.
This was an absolute scourge on gaming in the 2000s. I remember when gears of war came out on PC and the most popular mod simply removed post processing effects from the game. It instantly went from poop brown to James Cameron Terminator 2 judgement day Blu-ray edition levels of teal.
I think the teal was better TBH.
Remember when uncharted came out on the PS3 and there was a feature in the menu called “Next-Gen mode” that just put a brown filter over everything?
That’s a bit heretical if you consider the context in which SMB2 came into being. It introduced many new concepts not present in the first SMB and stands on its own. It isn’t just another side-scrolling platform, it was also way more vertical, way more scene transitions within a single level, the ability to move context between intra-level scenes, multiple playable characters, each with different abilities. It certainly influenced future SMB games (SMB3 implemented a similar-if-you-squint slot machine mechanic at level end). Similar to Zelda 2: The Adventure of Link which was also dramatically different from the first Zelda and it too influenced future Zelda games.
It’s the “2nd” game. And it’s just an iteration on SMB1. You can say SMB1 isn’t like the previous Mario games too, like Donkey Kong and Mario Bros. on the arcade. Those aren’t side-scrollers, there is no “ending” to them, they are actually different.
I’m just going to say it, Adventures of Link is objectively a horrible fucking game with apparently no direction. I’ve sunk 50-100 hours on the original Zelda. Maybe 5 on the sequel? 4 of them trying to find a silver lining.
I think Adventure of Link could be fixed. There’s a lot of shit that’s “Nintendo Hard” aka unfairly punishing. I think the bones of the thing are okay, but there’s a lot to repair.
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