Lurker > BakonBitz

He's a POS too, but he may not be the sole reason for the company's problems. So don't think things will get better if John resigns.

https://twitter.com/oleivarrudi/status/1702706966974362027?s=20

Quoted version if you need it:

In 2020 Unity went public, and a bunch of shit heads bought their way onto Unity's board of directors. Ultimately the CEO works for the Board, so when these new bosses tell him to do something self destructive, he does it.

Here are the names you should be talking about instead of John:

Tomer Bar Zeev
Roelof Botha
Egon Durban

Remember IronSource, that dog shit monetization company that absolutely everyone in the industry dumped and was circling the drain until Unity bought them for $4.4 billion? Tomer Bar Zeev is the founder of IronSource, and following the merger he became Unity's 3rd president (alongside John and Marc) ... yes, this is the asshole who sold a package of malware under the guise of monetization software & ultimately the the root cause of this install tax. Given IronSource's history of malware, it's safe to say that the Unity Runtime will likely start getting flagged by antivirus programs and casually request admin rights during installation.

How Unity got infected with IronSource is that Sequoia Capitol and Silver Lake pledged to invest $1 billion into Unity if the deal went through. Frankly, the math doesn't add up for Unity to trade $4.4 billion to buy a plague blanket of a company, only to receive $1 billion in return. Especially when a rival mobile monetization company offered to pay Unity $17 billion if they called off the IronSource deal and merge with them instead. Unless...that $1b was for the sake of C-suite bonuses, in which case all of this makes perfect sense. But who the hell are Roelof Botha & Egon Durban, and why are they important here?

Roelof is a Director of Sequoia Capitol, Egon is the founder of Silver Lake, and both of them have ties back to Elon Musk...which is pretty telling for how fast Unity has caught on fire. If Egon's name is familiar, it is because he was on Twitter's Board and pushed to have them accept the deal for Elon to buy it out. He was thrown off the board when they found out he was just spying for Elon during the resulting lawsuit. He also was the one who helped Elon with his fake "Taking Tesla Private" scam. Roelof was the CFO of PayPal before it got acquired and has a long history of being involved with mergers that result in a lot of money for some, but absolute shit deals for end users.

Looping back to the top...I think John is done with Unity, but not in the "Yay, we protested hard enough to get him fired" kind of way the internet wants. I think he was done in 2020 when he went from being the guy actually running the company, to the guy who answers to a room full of investment fuck heads (of the 13 board members, 11 are investment managers) and then gets to take the blame for their shit decisions. I feel like the reason why he secretly sold his stock is because he knew this was a shit idea that was going to tank the company, but the board wouldn't listen. So he cashed out his stock and will be announcing his retirement at the start of Q4.

Don't be shocked when Tomer Bar Zeev gets named as his replacement.

ViewtifulGrave posted...

In OG FF7 Nomura was responsible for Aeriths death.

More specifically, he's the one that pushed against the idea that half of the characters would just straight up get killed off in the Midgar revisit.

Cobra1010 posted...

Blame it on SE for calling the game Final Fantasy 7 Remake when it's not.

If they called it Final Fantasy 7 Remix, no one would be complaining.

I'll be honest, I always found it weird pre-release that they were just straight up calling it Remake when it was only covering the Midgar section. Nothing in the title that would show it's part 1 of a series. They were being coy in some details too, like teasing Sephiroth with a black feather, something he wasn't associated with until Advent Children, IIRC.

Revelation34 posted...

I fixed that for you.

Good thing Remake wasn't a bad game. It just had a weird ending.

Mario & Luigi Superstar Saga is good. Paper Mario TTYD is good. SMRPG is good.

And literally nothing about it online. Killer marketing, Nintendo.

DarkBuster22904 posted...

You aren't wrong.

This whole remake project is just one long, winding, long winded excuse for Nomura to Nomura it up all over the plot just so he can retcon (og ff7 spoilers) Aerith's death. Make no mistake, that is the sole purpose of this new story.

One of the singularly most iconic and recognized powerful story beats in early gaming, thrown out the window because Nomura can't fucking help himself and cannot let a death stick.. It's literally EXACTLY kingdom hearts all over again. Square needs to hire someone to just stand next to the man with a rolled up newspaper, and smack him with it every time he decides to write something.

Eh...they've been teasing the spoiler so much (Hamaguchi literally had a statement saying "I know fans are dying to see a particular scene") so they have to be keeping it.

ViewtifulJoe posted...

Do Nintendo games generally come with hard modes nowadays?

I know Xenoblade 3 did.

creativeme posted...

and it's f zero 99 of the snes game instead of a new game or even using f zero x as the game.

TYD honestly looks the same as the GC version. like sure it's gonna be HD but the art style doesn't leave much to improve it. really should have the 64 version packaged with it.

People are actually having tons of fun with F-Zero 99. I haven't tried it yet so I can't say from personal experience.

And there's a comparison video for the TTYD remaster. It looks way different than the original. It's a case of nostalgia kinda making us think something older actually looked that good. (Not that I'm saying the original TTYD looked bad, though.)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KMLAIGoCavw

mercurydude posted...

This makes Frasier seem like a space alien, being the only snob around a lot of normal people. I'll still give it a shot, but my expectations won't be high.

I actually thought that was what the original show was, lol. He just had his brother who was equally snobby to bounce off of.

I can't imagine how much easier the game would be on Easy Mode when they added "properly timed attacks damage all enemies" and powerful triple tech moves. Not unless Easy Mode is the original game's difficulty and they made the normal difficulty harder to balance out the new stuff.

Tyranthraxus posted...

Zack had about as much screentime as Rufus. Is Rufus a major character too?

I know you guys like to play coy, but it's pretty damn clear that Zack is going to be a major player in this one, far more than just being "the guy Cloud wants to emulate."

I'm personally not "mad" about it, but I can still see the writing on the wall, lol.

https://blog.playstation.com/2023/09/14/ final-fantasy-vii-rebirth-developer-interview-reveals-fresh-gameplay-details-as -new-trailer-debuts-at-state-of-play/

(take out the spaces after 14/ and as)

This interview has me hyped.

• All OG minigames are back and greatly expanded + brand new minigames tied to significant sidequests and exploration. "You might find yourself so busy that you won't make progress on the main story."
• Golden Saucer is improved with incentives to keep returning to it even to the end of the game, such as things constantly being unlocked there through progress.
• Exploration is a major gameplay focus for this title, you'll expect to find lots of interesting things and powerful monsters to fight. (Xenoblade-esque?) Not all areas are mandatory for story progress.
• Even more customization options for characters such as a bond system and skill trees.

itachi15243 posted...

Can I have a source for this? I don't doubt it, just wanna be sure.

The statement from Nomura on the pictures a few posts up.

Anyway, there's a new interview out now with details such as a new bond system and skill trees for each character, presumably on top of the weapon customization and Materia loadouts. They're going in on customization which I am so thankful for.

Also they keep saying there's a large, varied map to explore. It has to be open-world at this point.

Damn, I didn't want death threats, but they did make a very stupid decision.

Nearly 100 hours of gameplay? Holy fuck. That's something I wasn't expecting.

ViewtifulJoe posted...

I saw the spoilers.
Why does it need to be cut up and dragged out like this?

It'd be a 100+ hour game with a 15-year dev time if they did.

FUCKING HELL I WAS CORRECT.

"When the worlds merge, I will be waiting."

There's two timelines that will converge, one of them is one where Zack lived.

SomeLikeItHoth posted...

FF7 will be last.

Thank fuck.

Already hit the 20 minute mark and we've got Foamstars...that better not be the final game shown, lmao.

This feels like they're gonna spend a significant amount of time on HellDivers II...

So I saw the Mercenaries update was next week, but is Separate Ways also releasing that day? If so, that's huge.

Revisited posted...

Oh there actually is a game called balan. I just thought tc was having a stroke trying to say alice in wonderland or something.

Is that game like viva pinata, one of "those" types of games?

It's a very bland and boring platformer game that only has one button, with said button changing functions depending on the costume you put on.

solosnake posted...

Im pretty surprised there wasnt metroid prime 2 and 3 remaster announcements

Probably coming later. Rumor was they didn't have those planned until Prime 1 Remastered came out, so we likely won't see them until at least a year.

And yeah, I'm kinda baffled. I thought the Direct was alright but a lot of people are saying it's the worst one in recent years.

One of the big reasons I play Xenoblade...the series does a great job pulling at my heartstrings.

Even Geoff Keighley straight up told Unity that it was a garbage idea. Absolutely nobody likes them now, lol.

And their attempt at re-assuring people that this won't affect 90% of their userbase is faulty. Every aspiring game developer would love to get popular and make money from the kinds of things they create. How would that fact be re-assuring when there's a possibility you'll hit their threshold and get hit with their stupid new fees? Better to just use a different engine entirely at that point.

Also most people who use Unity are doing it for academic purposes and not wanting to make games. Most indie devs that people know about likely fall in the 10%. So yeah.

DarthDemented posted...

Kind of a shame that they used the SNES version in legacy collection. Oh well. They play the same

Tbh I sorta prefer the SNES soundtrack, but the anime opening in the PSX version was cool.

https://twitter.com/Theswweet/status/1702141483204464859?s=20
Man

TomClark posted...

Words to the effect that Silent Hill 2 - probably the most famous psychological horror game ever - is the first game they'll be releasing under their new ethos of ditching psychological horror in favour of "mass market" action games.

To be fair, Silent Hill 2 OG actually has more action than most of Bloober's previous games, lol. So I'm willing to wait for some actual gameplay footage.

Ar0ge posted...

I don't understand what Unity is exactly. What's going on?

Unity's just a game engine that people can use to make games with. Same with Unreal Engine.

ClayGuida posted...

Is there a crypt?

Seems like Invasions mode is similar, I think? You move around one of multiple maps and play various stages and minigames to unlock stuff.

obsolete posted...

How's this all on youtube already.

Someone probably got an early access code.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YMhRTGPKq78

TL;DW version:

• Single-player content is through Story Mode, Invasions, and Towers.
• Gear customization is back for both main fighters and Kameos
• You have a list of general milestones as well as character-specific unlocks. Each character has their own XP progression system that unlock various things for them per level, so you're specifically rewarded for playing the characters you like.
• There's two kinds of currencies. One you get from playing online matches and Invasions and is used to purchase seasonal rewards or the shrine to obtain randomized rewards. The other is a premium currency with (I think) no way of obtaining them other than through microtransactions. Specifically used for premium gear and costumes that gets rotated.

Killmonger posted...

What games were announced and are we getting a new DK game?

Hasn't happened yet.

If Square-Enix is going under and FF as a franchise may end, I actually hope they're able to complete the FFVII Remake project at the very least because that's practically the only thing I'm looking forward to from them. XVI was pretty good but it felt lacking in a lot of areas.

I do highly edited walkthroughs and lesser-effort blind Let's Plays on mine. I occasionally branch out into other kinds of videos (currently writing up the script for a video essay). The walkthroughs are something I wanted to do and are an extension of my old text-based FAQs on here.

I've hovered around 400-500 subs with very little views for the past couple of years, so no money made on it. Growth is probably dead, but I haven't actively been promoting it either.

Despite having wanted to do walkthroughs I also want to get into game design and I think I'm gonna have ro sacrifice one for the other because of time issues.

Can't wait to hope for a Metroid Prime 4 trailer only to be disappointed again.

VeggetaX posted...

Just saw this right now. If I'm understanding this correctly, Unity wants to charge gaming platforms such as Steam money every time a consumer installs a Unity game?

They're charging the developers, not the platforms.

They backtracked and said only the initial install counts (not sure how they'll determine that) but the damage has been done. I'm seeing a mass exodus of people switching off from Unity. The ones that are already deep in development for a game don't have much choice though.

Sounds like word is getting out that some significant developers who have used Unity are filing a class action lawsuit.

I know Nintendo/The Pokemon Company used Unity for a few of their projects, Genshin Impact was made with Unity, and there's bound to be a lot of Unity-made Xbox games.

CreekCo posted...

This is really bad

I guess its one easy way for the industry to kill indie gaming

Tbh there's easier engines like Godot that are rapidly growing. You just aren't seeing much impressive stuff with Godot because it doesn't have a large attach rate, similar to how Unity-created games started.

Enclave posted...

Holy shit, that's atrocious and the way I'd heard of it earlier today it was already bad.

100% developers should instantly abandon Unity.

For sure, even if they walk this back, the fact this was even considered (they even did weeks of focus testing and ignored all concerns about outrage and confusion over it) should be the nail in the coffin for a lot of devs.

https://twitter.com/ZFighterAmuro/status/1701653400285286448?s=20

Suda51 was warning us all along...

UnholyMudcrab posted...

Was poking through Unity's 10-K from last year and I found this

https://gamefaqs.gamespot.com/a/user_image/4/5/3/AAUFZqAAE1b9.jpg

Now that's funny.

Also, I noticed in the income statement that their R&D expenses alone last year were enough to completely wipe out their gross profit. They spent nearly a billion just on R&D. What the fuck

That's funny, I wonder why Unity is having such a problem being profitable when Unreal asks for far less in royalties and is not as popular an engine to smaller devs/indies?

Sir_Will posted...

Yeah, fuck that so hard.

"Fun" fact, the current CEO of Unity who made this recent decision is also the same ex-CEO from EA who unironically thought that players should have to buy bullets every time they reload in a shooting game.

So that shows you the headspace Unity is in right now.

Source: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZR6-u8OIJTE&t=1s