Hey I was that weirdo that down voted this, and I assure you it was by accident and I changed it now. I actually never got the chance to play Apocalypse and hot damn, I had no idea it was a whole sequel, I thought it was an expanded release in the same vein as a bunch of the Persona games have (P3->FES, P4->Golden, P5->Royal).

So, amending my statement, play SMTIV and then play Apoc.

Also, excuse me, I have some shopping I need to do.

but it would be an incredibly stupid thing to do.

So we can pretty much bank on it definitely happening, got it.

Leave Pokémon behind, play some Shin Megami Tensei, thank me later.

There’s a pipeline of former Pokémon fans thinking “Huh, these games have kind of gone to crap, I wish I had this same monster-collector style game but with a real plot and interesting characters” and then SMTIV falls from the sky like manna from heaven unto them.

I don’t think IV is actually the best SMT game, I think that honor goes to Nocturne - which is available on the Switch - but SMTIV is a good showing of the series that is available for 3DS. If you have the option, pick up SMTIV-Apocalypse, it’s an expanded “GOTY-style” re-release of IV, but the base game is also fine.

Um, there is more than one type of anticompetitive practice? Amazon uses predatory pricing to drive companies out of business, Microsoft uses tying to sell Teams, Google uses self-preferencing for their own services in search results, Facebook acquired Instagram rather than compete with them, etc.

None of which are related to Steam nor has Steam done anything resembling any of these examples to my knowledge.

One of Valve’s favorite anticompetitive cudgels is requiring “most favored nation” clauses in their contracts, prohibiting devs from selling for less on other storefronts (which Amazon also has used).

Valve prohibits people from selling steam keys for less on other storefronts which I think is perfectly reasonable. You can list your game on Steam for $20 and distribute it on Itch for $5 or even free and Steam has zero problem with this, so long as you aren’t distributing steam keys via that storefront. This is to try and prevent a developer from leveraging Steam for advertisement purposes but making all their actual sales off-platform.

Can you describe where Steam has done anything even approaching that, ever?

EA and Activision stores didn’t fail because Steam bought them out and bullied them out of the market, they failed because they were trash products. Steam doesn’t buy “default placement” in anything. They just have a good product that people want to use over alternatives.

Point out a situation in which Steam has acted anti-competitive and I might agree that you have a point, but I can’t think of any situations to call out here.

You can sell your game for different prices on different platforms, you just can’t sell steam keys that way. If you purchase a game on Itch and it gives you a steam key, that’s still a steam purchase and is subject to this restriction. If you purchase a game on Itch and it hands you an installer then you can buy that game at whatever price they want to sell it at.

Failing to make a product that doesn’t suck shit does not make a monopoly for your competitor.

In fact, Steam is de facto not a monopoly because of the very existence of GOG. EA and Activision tried to break in to this arena but failed to provide a product that actually switched people off of steam, because they failed to provide a comparable experience to steam. GOG did, and they’re doing fine.

The relationship between supply, demand, and price has been fundamentally damaged.

Very carefully

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Whoa, back up there. Nobody was talking about CSAM until you brought it up.

Repacks are sourced from the scene, and the scene cracks video games. The fact that you get free video games out of it is a side effect.

Could you explain what you mean by this? Are the cracks just done for fun / for clout? I do admit I have wondered what keeps people so reliably cracking new games. Seems like a thankless job.

The oligarchs use VPNs to make their corporations function. They won’t be made illegal. Blanket banning all VPNs in America leads to an instant grinding halt of all commerce.

A lot of it deals with the fact that Roblox doesn’t pay you out until you accrue some critical mass of value. If a kid makes an app and puts it on Steam and it sells 2 copies, they’re getting paid for those 2 copies. Not so for Roblox. You require 30,000 Robux to cash out - which seems to be quite a lot, actually, considering the documentation I’m reading on their own webpage advertises this with photos that show 97,493 total Robux earnings from this presumably rock-star developer that you want to be like, and buyable items costing between 80-600 Robux.

It should also be noted that I cannot locate any mention of a dollars-to-Robux ratio without an account, which I do not have and am not making, so God only knows what rate they actually pay you out at once you do manage to acquire your 30,000 Robux. The primary use case of earned Robux is to then invest them back into the in-game shop to purchase content that other users have made. Robux actively doesn’t want you cashing out and makes it as difficult as possible to do so.

I’m personally not too upset about a game primarily made from user created content, I think it’s kind of cool, but the way they’ve tied real money into the process feels very icky and scumbaggish to me. My particular issue with Roblox is the rampant pedophilia and sexual grooming that the devs are either unwilling to alienate (since, presumably, this population makes up a not-insignificant percentage of their user base) or else actively in cahoots with, because this has been a known problem for many years but approximately zero steps have been taken to address it.

All armed forces members are required by oath, and therefore by law, to refuse unlawful orders.

Shitty reward??

Excuse me, Dawnbreaker is the coolest looking useless sword in the game. That’s not shitty, that’s home decor.

My Steam Deck doesn’t serve me ads. Not even the on-boot sale pop up that desktop Steam gives.

She in awe of my 'tism