Mister Jack

Damn he looks way too young now.

You made the right call, man. What I just witnessed was downright horrifying. I'm sorry I watched it.

Jesus Christ, this is the most unpleasant debate I've ever watched in my life.

Well I say that's bullshit and there's no reason the same judge should be in such a high position for potentially 50+ years. The fact they're trying to hastily push through a conservative majority when the writing on the wall says there is a good chance of a liberal shift in a few months shows that it's a busted system prone to being exploited. If Biden/Pelosi/Schumer et al. don't want to expand the court for admittedly understandable reasons then term limits are the answer. Republicans have appointed 15 justices since 1960 and Democrats have only appointed 8 and a lot of it just comes down to dumb luck. It feels like the future of our legal system is just based on RNG and it's a bad way to run things.

If they could at least push through term limits that would be something. Lifetime appointments are way too long nowadays because people are living to be older and older than they were back in 1789.

Yeah, a Supreme Court that increasingly looks like it's gonna have a 6-3 conservative majority for who fucking knows how long. I can't say I have any faith whatsoever in that institution anymore. Hell, even if Biden does win I don't think he has the balls to rebalance the Supreme Court so it'll probably be another four years of nothing getting done. I would love to be wrong but I don't think I am.

And now our president is openly saying on camera that he won't accept the election results unless he wins. When did we turn into Belarus? I'm watching democracy fail in real time and it has me depressed and stressed out on a level that is really starting to get to me. The only way I can see us getting out of this mess without an unprecedented crisis and possibly the destruction of the very concept of free and fair elections in the US is if Biden wins in a landslide so big that nobody but Trump can claim it's a fraud, and that seems like a remote possibility with where things stand right now. Jesus Christ.

Who could have seen this coming? Who, I ask?

I didn't even know they have a new game coming out

I feel like whether or not it can work really depends on factors that are outside of Microsoft's or Google's control. Internet is still shit in this country for a lot of people and there isn't much even Google can do about it on their own. The telecom monopolies have screwed over millions of people in this regard and unless something is done about that I don't see the cloud model being viable on a wide scale.

I have to agree with Ethan. Microsoft, for better or worse, is clearly looking into the future with their business strategy, anticipating a time when consoles and even physical ownership are obsolete. I honestly would not be surprised if there's eventually a day when Xbox hardware no longer exists and Microsoft just shills their subscription on other platforms, especially if the broadband infrastructure in the US ever gets unfucked and they can offer game streaming on people's phones and tablets that actually works.

It's an interesting premise. I like Wanda in the MCU but I didn't think I'd like her enough to watch a solo series about her. This is a good hook, though. I'm in.

I scraped up some money for this, although I'm buying it now mostly because there are only three more games I'm interested in playing this year (Cyberpunk, Crash Bandicoot, Yakuza) assuming they're not terrible. They're still a ways off though and I'm bored at home in quarantine mode right now so I need some shit to play.

I can't justify buying an Xbox for only two games (Doom, TES) and I can't play them on my PC until I get a whole new one because my current one is way out of date. This sucks for me. If Microsoft did this just for Gamepass incentives or even a timed exclusive then I can live with it, but if they bought Bethesda just to keep their games off of the PS5 then it's a pretty dick move.

Hey Mitch, you're a fucking scumbag hypocrite and I hope you die.

Digital consoles are always a mistake. There's all kinds of places where you could get a discounted disc. You can even trade with your friends if you want to. But digital? The discounts you get are entirely based on the whims of the company that makes the console. It might seem cheaper in the short term but in the long run the 500 dollar one will save you more.

Money is a little tight right now because I had a vet bill. I wanted to wait a bit to buy it until I recovered from that but Nintendo seems to think everyone has an extra 60 dollars to spare during the launch window and nothing else matters.

I hate this limited run shit. I want the collection but I bet more than anything I'm gonna end up having to get it digitally on Nintendo's crappy eShop with a terrible account system because I won't be able to get a physical one anywhere without paying scalper prices. God damn it.

Too many SKUs is always a bad idea. Even if they think they're giving people more choice, the vast majority just goes for the best model and the lesser ones end up collecting dust or getting bought up by confused parents and grandparents to give to disappointed kids.

Blasphemous This is the most metal game I've played in a while. It's a 2D soulslike/Metroidvania game with an emphasis on platforming, but the platforming is more about ledge grabbing than double jumping if you know what I mean. The sprite animation is some of the best I've ever seen and premise of the game's story kept me intrigued. Blasphemous takes place in a land called Cvstodia---which is heavily based on Spain---and the people who live there are hardcore zealots for their religion. Their religion is fictional but it's so obviously based on Catholicism that you'd have to be stupid not to see it. Before the beginning of the game's story, a supernatural event called the Grievous Miracle fell upon Cvstodia and transformed the people who live there into monsters based on their religious guilt and their desire for punishment and pain. You play as a former holy knight known only as The Penitent One who decides he's had enough of the Grievous Miracle's shit and sets out to find a way to end it once and for all, which puts him at odds against a country full of twisted, tortured people who want the miracle to continue at all costs because they see their own pain and suffering as penance for their sins. So yeah, pretty fucked up premise and totally up my alley. Most of the enemies you fight in the game are either hooked up to some kind of torture device, self-flagellating, or so malformed that every second they continue to exist looks like agony. This is also hands down the goriest Metroidvania I've ever played. The Penitent One has all kinds of gruesome deathblows that go from decapitation to disembowelment, with plenty of pixelated blood and guts to spare. It might come across as juvenile in another game, but in this one it fits the bleak and violent tone of the setting perfectly. Remember the Crusades? The Spanish themed soundtrack is also fantastic. A while back I actually would have had quite a few complaints about Blasphemous. A bad map system, not enough checkpoints or warp points, bad voice acting, and some game breaking bugs were all problems back at release. However, they have recently put out a free update that not only fixes pretty much all of these problems and more, but also adds a bunch of new game+ content. It also redubbed some of the English voices and even added a Spanish voice acting option. I haven't listened to the new English recordings, but given the setting and tone of this game I immediately switched to the Spanish dub, which is terrific and fits the game perfectly. The only real complaint I have about the game's current state is something that is inherent to its design. It has a lot of Prince of Persiaesque instant death spike pits. There are more shortcuts in the game after the update so you don't have to backtrack as much as you used to if you fall on some spikes, but boy does it still suck when one missed jump can set you back on 10 to 20 minutes of progress. I easily died to the spikes more than anything else in the game, including bosses. I still recommend Blasphemous, but that's something to keep in mind. Oh yeah, one other thing I really liked is that this is a Soulslike that gives you a more reasonable punishment for dying. As much as I enjoy Bloodborne and Nioh, losing all of your accumulated exp when you die really sucks and can lead to way too much frustration. When you die in Blasphemous, you get to keep your exp but your magic bar's maximum cap is reduced and you earn future exp at a slower rate until you can return to your grave to claim your "guilt". The more you die, the more guilt you have to retrieve. If you end up with too many graves to manage, you can get rid of them all by either defeating the area boss or finding certain statues spread through the map and paying them a fee with your exp to remove them. This feels way more fair than how most Soulslike games punish death.

I mean, both I guess.

I'm interested in that Super Mario Bros Royale, but why in god's name are they making it so you can only play it until March? That makes no sense to me. Finally Switch Online is getting good exclusive content and they are only keeping it for six months? WHY?

Can people stop doing this shit. It's not like human eyes are equipped with a Watch Dogsesque criminal history scanner. It shouldn't even be part of the conversation.

Shit, Black Panther died of colon cancer. I had no idea he was even sick.