"Over 1M people have bought our favorite open world game of 2023 so far"

I despise articles like this.

It's like

"Oh? That sounds interesting. I'll go check it out.

"*checks Steam*

"Huh...? ...ah, I see. The game hasn't actually been released yet. It's still just in its 6-12 month paid public beta phase. They even mentioned that at the end of the article, but I didn't read that far at first. Oh well, I can wait. Or else not bother at all, as that usually ends up being the case in similar situations. *shrug*"

"Microsoft's Phil Spencer candidly admits the company lost the console wars to competitors"

"Microsoft 'lost the worst generation to lose' with Xbox One, says Spencer."

Well, gee, I wonder why?

"Because of this, and languishing in third place, Microsoft decided instead of fighting a console war, it would instead focus on the cloud and subscription services like Game Pass with its new generation of consoles."
(Emphasis mine.)

Oh, right. That's why.

Yeah, even rumors of dumbshit like that is what forever killed any interest I may have had in the X-Bone, even if they may have ended up backpedaling on (at least some of) the dumbshit. I have, at least, considered getting one or more of the competing consoles (e.g. PS4, PS5, Switch, etc.) in the years since I got rid of all my older ones (even if I haven't actually done so yet), but not once have I even entertained the very remote possibility of buying another Microsoft console, nor will I ever do so, all because I was so soured on even just the concept of the X-Bone, along with this continuing dumbfuckery about "the cloud" and "subscription services" being baked into their later consoles or whatever the hell.

May Microsoft forever continue to languish in third place. Or, even better, get out of the console business entirely and spare us all their stupid bullshit.

"Jedi Survivor, Redfall: That'll be $10 Extra for Your Bad PC Port | Castle Super Beast Clips"

Watch on YouTube

This video is entirely ranting about Star Wars Jedi: Survivor. Aside from the title, I don't think they mention Redfall at all. And... I've heard some bad things about Jedi Survivor, but if even half of what Pat and Woolie say in this video is true, then it's far worse than I was aware. I'm not surprised or shocked by that in any way, mind you, it's just that I haven't really been keeping tabs on the game at all, outside of stuff like this. And though they're mostly focusing on the horrendous PC port of the game, they mention at several points that the console versions are just as fucked up broken in their own ways as well.

And on top of all of that, which Pat and Woolie don't even mention at all, the game is contaminated with the malware Denuvo on PC, because of course it is. (Which, yet again, is not disclosed on Steam [outside of the warning from the third party "Denuvo Games" curator, which wouldn't be seen by anyone who doesn't follow that curator], because, for whatever asinine reasons, Valve continually allows EA to get away with not doing that.) The Denuvo infection, in and of itself, is probably a not-at-all-insignificant part of the reason why it runs like dogshit. It's also reason #1 as to why I have zero interest in buying it, even ignoring the fact that it's still a broken piece of shit otherwise, regardless.

I bought the first game in the series, Fallen Order, back in December, when it was on a 88%-off sale, i.e. for $4.79 USD, a while after they wisened up and removed the Denuvo malware from it (because if it had still been defiled by that shit, I wouldn't have bought it for even $0.479 USD, let alone $4.79). It runs okay on my 10-15 year old PC. It's pretty fun. Mind you, I never finished it, but still. If and only if they ever get this new game into a working, optimized, non-Denuvo-infested state will I even begin to consider maybe someday getting it possibly in perhaps three to five-plus years or so.

In any case, at this point in time, Star Wars Jedi: Survivor is like a textbook example of everything that is wrong with the modern video game industry.