Of course they know them. That’s how Microsoft buys a multi-billion dollar company and expects to turn a profit - not by continuing to run the company the way it was, but by trimming staff from one or both companies.
Every time there is a massive capital investment, whether by a hedge fund or a bigger company, there is an unstated “and profit by making it worse” in the headline. Sometimes, a poorly managed company can yield profits just through better management, but most of the time it hurts workers which in turn hurts customers, but there is massive profit to be made while the coasting on the inertia of the former quality.
I can say from experience, if your company gets bought out your job is about to get worse if it even still exists.
I play single games for years with a bit of other games mixed in. I played Diablo 1, 2 and 3, World of Warcraft (already a sub, of course), Minecraft, and Skyrim for many years each. You could maybe put Team Fortress 2 in there but I didn’t continue going back to that well nearly as long as the others - I hate lootbox shit and I miss the days when skill and strategy was the only difference between players. I would totally play TF2 vanilla, though.
I’m sure I will continue to play Diablo 3 (4 does nothing for me) and Skyrim for years to come. So we do exist, however we are probably an unknown and unserved group since we don’t tend to pour a bunch of money and time into new games. I do have 800 hours into Baldur’s Gate 3. I’m going to regret having that on console instead of Steam, I’m sure. Probably wind up buying that one twice.
They interpreted it better than I said it. Who’s acting superior now? This is clearly a real sore spot for you. I don’t pirate but I also don’t go around telling people how immoral it is to pirate. Plus piracy is part of the business model for some companies and it’s how we went from cable to streaming (although thats getting all fucked up again).
So yes I have much less moral problem with piracy. But like I said I didn’t come here to get all morally superior, I spoke up because you clearly didn’t understand the nature of the harm you are doing since you took the wrong message away that someone was warning about being scammed by these companies.
I’m for piracy when the ones being hurt are massive companies who can cover it by lowering their quarterly bonus .5%. I’m not for knowing your neighbors bike was stolen and then buying one “just like it” from a pawn shop at a steal.
This isn’t about feeling superior, this is about having empathy for the people whose money was stolen and frustration that this business model is profitable because of people who support it.
Do what you’re going to do, but folks reading this thread deserve to understand the moral implications of taking part in this.
They aren’t taking about dupes that don’t work and you get screwed out of money. They are talking about legit keys bought by stealing money from other people. If you buy such keys (no way to know whether one is or isn’t), then you are splitting the profits from fraud with a criminal enterprise. You get a discount, they get laundered stolen money.
Your reply doesn’t address the core problem in any way.
I loved every other Diablo and went hard on 4. Then one day I just put the controller down and never picked it back up. I might play more later, but I’m so tired of games that are just nakedly obvious about being nothing but a grind and a job. I wasted so much money getting PSPlus for just this game. All told I spent about $150 on this and the only thing of value I got was a few hours playing with some old friends who also stopped playing and made me realize I wasn’t getting anything else out of it.
I’ve played a hell of a lot of BG3 and it feels completely the opposite. There is so much content that motivates me to do it for roleplay reasons. It doesn’t feel nearly as grindy. Some of the dialogs are a bit much to slog through after seeing them a few too many times, but they were all great the first time through, and it motivates me to try different options to get different dialog. But everyone knows BG3 is good.
Guess I’ll round out my list.
I really enjoyed Jedi: Outcast. Like BG3, the story is as good as the action, but there’s really only one storyline and if I recall you can get pretty much everything on a single playthrough so there aren’t really even mechanical decisions to make other than how to approach a combat.
Horizon: Forbidden West was pretty fun. I put it down for other games and haven’t gotten back to it but I will. Seems to share a lot with Jedi. Similar gameplay, similar linear storyline. It feels like mechanical choices are more meaningful and maybe you can’t do everything on a single playthrough but again I haven’t finished it.
Hogwarts Legacy: my wife wanted this because Harry Potter, but then it made her motion sick. So I felt obligated to play it to get our money’s worth and I didn’t make it very far at all before putting it down. Maybe there is more there further into the game but it didn’t grab me enough to find out.
Also if I pay for a mod and they release a patch that breaks it (seems unlikely but we’ve already gotten about two or three more patches than I expected), I would expect them to fix the mod or pay the creator to do so.
Oh and I would expect them to magically resolve conflicts between paid mods.
If a free mod breaks and never gets fixed, or a free mod breaks another mod, fair I have no expectations there. But once I fork out money that’s not a mod, that’s a product now. And if Bethesda is taking my money, they are responsible for the product.
Honestly Bethesda games are just a modding sandbox for me. I’ve played hundreds of hours of Skyrim and I’m not sure I’ve ever finished the main quest. I know I’ve never taken a side in the civil war. The built in story and quests are important but my fun comes from downloading mods and just roaming like a wandering monk doing whatever quests I run into. Sometimes OP, other times with immersive mods or alternative perks or spells.
I’m probably not a typical gamer as I’ve had hundreds on hours into BG3 and only made it to act 3 once so far and have yet to finish any of my runs before I decide to have a relationship with someone different or try a durge run, or evil, or realized I forgot to resolve some quest that is now closed. I’m not sure how long a full run is maybe 100 hours? But it’s a lot to invest before I get bored and want to try something new.
I also have a need to collect all the gimmicky items even when I know I have or will get much better stuff for the slot. I play Bethesda games the same way. Gotta run over and collect the book of arcane bow if I’m going to be an archer…
Anyway, mods are a core part of the deal for me. They should prioritize them more.
My favorite things were random PvP at Tarren Mill, getting a group together for UBRS, LBRS, and Strath back when that was all we could do, and some of the epic storylines leading up to dungeons and raids like the Drakkensryd.
I met my guild leader just out questing and we started roleplaying and it grew from there. Does anyone actually meet folks out questing any more? I haven’t played in a long time. I got back together with some friends for one expansion and that was the end of it.
I fondly remember my wow days and friends. But it doesn’t fit into my life any more. It’s too all-consuming. Plus, it feels less like an adventure and more like a theme park. Everything is so tidy and precise with carefully measured dopamine hits at regular intervals.
There’s no getting back the things I’m nostalgic for. Even if all the people came back and I got back into my guild, I have kids and obligations. I don’t want my kids to hear me say something like I can’t attend their play because it’s raid night, or watch me rush to finish daily quests before bed like any of that shit matters.
I’m still casual friends with some of the folks I met through wow. But I’m done with it.
Hey if a company making lots of money excites you, more power to you. But, of all the things one could get excited for about a game, this seems like pure spin. Is it fun? Revolutionary? Iteratively better than it’s precessor?
Diablo 4 sold like hotcakes and it is certainly not any of the above, so I’m pretty skeptical about the usefulness of this particular data point. But again, if this is what excites you about the game then have at it.
I don’t care how fast it sells - I’m not an investor. I care about whether it’s going to blow my balls off with how awesome it is. How many copies it sells on day one is more a function of marketing than quality.