Quoting: GuestFinally! First two are very good points. I mostly buy games on platforms other than steam, but they can't sell games that are also listed on Steam for cheaper. (Example: CD Projekt Red with *their* games on *their* platform (GOG))

I don't think we know this to be the case. It might be, and maybe something will come out in discovery. But it might well not be. It does seem like something a dominant platform would want to do . . . but it also seems like something a dominant platform might avoid doing, or at least avoid formally doing, for fear of legal complications.

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Quoting: finaldestExcessive Pricing, I don't see any complaints against MS, Sony, Nintendo.

From the article:

Represented by Milberg London LLP, it's worth noting this is not their first rodeo, as they're also going after Sony for £5 billion.

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Quoting: d10sfanThis makes little sense, 30% is pretty industry standard.

Some people think it's not a reasonable standard though. I think it basically comes from Apple setting 30% for iTunes--just a rule of thumb that got established as what the traffic would bear. Nothing sacred about it. And none of the people charging it have been very keen to let anyone get a look at their revenues and expenses to see if it's reasonable, so it's hard to tell if it is, in fact, a reasonable toll--or if it's reasonable in some industries and less so in others. iTunes doesn't exactly have to host everyone's saved games, for instance, or their mods, or do frequent version updates to everyone who bought some song, et cetera. So taking 30% for a music store may be much less reasonable than 30% for a computer game store.

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Well. Although the lawsuit is about more or less the same stuff, the relevant laws could be quite different so who knows how it will play out. Wonder what will come out in discovery.

I'm kind of neutral on the suit itself. I mean, I like Valve, but let's face it, they're probably doing some of that stuff. If we're going to have a functional monopolist controlling a very dominant platform, I'd rather it was Valve, but probably it would be better if we didn't have that.

I've been thinking lately, though, that Valve is really by far the best outfit controlling such a platform. Look at the music industry--there's a couple players controlling everything (spotify, Apple, Ticketmaster) and the landscape they have established has led to most musicians finding it impossible to even come remotely close to making a living doing music; the remuneration for musicians has imploded, literally a fifth or something of what it was just 20, 25 years ago. Google search is becoming more and more enshittified, as are all the social media platforms, Amazon cheats both its customers and the other vendors who have little choice but to use its platform, and so on. But PC gaming still sees plenty of surprise hits from indy developers, and Valve does not systematically shit on them. There is no indication that Valve is jimmying its game discoverability to favour anyone for payola. They collect the toll, but in return they still seem dedicated to providing a good platform that works--they don't always succeed, but I've never seen anyone claim that they're deliberately messing it up the way Google are deliberately messing up their search.

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Wow. That ship is more Studio Ghibli than Studio Ghibli.

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Quoting: basedWhat I really want is to be a crime lord (think of anything with drugs, prostitution, money laundering, holding people for ransom, etc etc etc...)

So, Crusader Kings.

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Quoting: melkemindIstanbul was Constantinople
Now it's Istanbul, not Constantinople
Been a long time gone, Constantinople
Now it's Turkish delight on a moonlit night

But, why did Constantinople get the works?

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Gotta admit, when I saw the headline I was thinking "Man, why they gotta put cards in my city builder?" but this looks intriguing.

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Quoting: PhiladelphusFinally, another odd-numbered Civ! Here's to being cautiously optimistic based on the pattern: I first played III and was deeply in love (it's what got me into modding), hated IV (where they made the utterly baffling decision to remove all ranged attacks until you unlock airplanes!), quite enjoyed V (where ranged units became first-class citizens and they went above and beyond on the leader voice work), and was so indifferent to VI (and its goofy leader art style) that I never played it. So simply based on the fact that this is an odd-numbered sequel I'm expecting to like it. :smile:

I played a bit of VI, and the goofy art style was goofy but whatever. However, the main innovation was this thing called "districts" that added a dimension to your city building, which seemed like it was going to be cool but in the end I didn't like it. Thing is, your city has a certain amount of territory in the hinterland that it's working, right? So, most of your buildings fit into "districts"; there's a district for research stuff and a district for commercial stuff and so on. And the districts give you extra stuff, and more extra stuff depending where you put them. And to have more people in the city you need to place housing districts. But the thing is, realistically enough, these districts take up the hex they're put in, and stop your people from working it. So just like a real city, once you've grown the thing a bunch your districts are taking up all the good farmland. But unlike a real city, you can't extend your hinterland much wider to compensate, so you end up with a weird balancing act in your best cities. When I think about the scale, it doesn't really make THAT much sense, because I think you're ending up with medieval cities hundreds of miles across. Plus, you generally can't make all the kinds of districts in one city, which I find annoying because I like my cities to have everything. Also at the beginning the district placement can have really pronounced effects--if you happen to have your first city near some mountains that curve, and can quickly put a knowledge-type district tucked into the curve so there's mountains on multiple sides, you can have like five times as much research. If you don't happen to have that, sucks to be you. It did have some good stuff too, but nothing really memorable--I definitely find myself going back for a game of V, not VI.

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I used to play Punch-Out! at the arcade . . . it was most of what I played, because with all the shoot-em-ups I tended to die after 30 seconds, but with Punch-Out I could get some serious value for a quarter.

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