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We, the gamers, have a problem. I don’t care if you’re a guy, a girl, an idiot in a blue hairy suit or something in between, we all have a problem. And that problem, is our relationships. No I’m not talking about your significant other, lovely lady, lad or inanimate object you’re dating or married to. I’m talking about our relationships with game designers and producers. I’m talking about the increasingly one-sided romance we have, until lately, been mostly, or at least somewhat, enjoying with the makers of our favourite titles. At first it was this crazy extended honeymoon period where we looked at them, eyes wide and full of wonder with Cupid’s arrow sticking out our ass cheek, now, we would rather grab a beer at the local pub after work to delay our inevitable return home to the dark, dusty apartment we share with our developer/producer, lit only by the 4k screen we bought 12 months ago to try improve the visual quality of our games. Where they will be waiting for us, right hand pulling out the PC chair for us, left hand outreached, palm open, waiting for us to place our earnings for the day into it. We know the relationship is probably toxic, and we don’t ever think we are gunna put a ring on it, but we go through the motions anyway, because, well… what else are we supposed to do?
Some of us are in a relationship with Blizzard. The spark in the relationship died along with the relevance of their biggest title. We stick around and tell our mother it’s because we can still see the good in our partner and want to try and stick it out to see if counselling will fix the issues, but deep inside we know it won’t. The fun has gone, and the sex is terrible and you’ve caught yourself multiple times now perving at that dev down the street with the crappy post-apocalyptic FPS game, not because it’s overly attractive, but just to feel something different for the first time in forever. Tuesdays were patch days and Wednesdays was business time, now Wednesdays is just 14 minutes of missionary before you both roll over and try to go to sleep, deaf from the awkward silence that followed. I mean World of Warcraft is old, the expansions are nowhere near what they used to be before they let kung-fu panda in and the graphics weren’t even amazing for their time, let alone 15 years later. But we’ve invested so much into it now that the subpar patching and monotonous additions to the game is enough to keep some of us engaged and still giving them that sweet, sweet subscription each month, money they no longer deserve to take. Starcraft 2, you know that one right? It’s the one that just went quiet. 100k were online when I logged in for the first time in 6 months last night, and I feel like that was a busy night for the servers. I noticed some sort of loot box thing going on, laughed and then got the hell out of dodge before I could even start a game. HoTS. Well, Blizzard lured HoTS out for a fishing trip. On the trip, there was a gunshot…. Only Blizzard returned. Sure, Steve Fakename McLovinYen, the bloke from the Blizzard mailroom, was given a $0 (because we are about cost cutting now at Blizzard) pay rise and told he has been promoted to lead HoTS content producer, but at every other desk the lights are off, and nobody is home. HoTS was a self-fulfilling prophesy that made it as far as it did, not because of Blizzard, but because of the players, but the players weren’t on that Sopranos-style fishing trip, and Blizzard wont even talk about it. It was like a cowards breakup over text message. The one that has no reasons or explanations, just an end. Only to see your ex a few weeks later with a Chinese businesswoman under his arm. Then there is Overwatch. People play that. But now, it just feels like an extra toon release is not enough to draw me back into playing it. I mean, Hanzo is still cool, Junkrat is still for noobs apparently and when I did attempt a couple of rounds the other night 2 people who sounded under the age of 11 both told me they had slept with my mother. I had to do a double take and check what game I was in. I thought those kids only played CoD. Then there is Diablo. So many hours spent on the game as well, but Blizzard isn’t interested in you any more, Diablo players. Oh no. It’s interested in the Yen. But who cares if you have a PC you spent at least *enter amount you don’t want you partner to know you spent on computer parts here* on, don’t you have a mobile phone? If Blizzard ever wants to get back into the relationship and actually try, a weekly horizontal folk dance just won’t be enough. It will need to be some mind-blowing metaphorical romp that rocks our world like the Blizzard we first got with.
EA. Producers of high end mediocre games who will put anything in them to please the shareholder and keep their nose nuzzled warmly against the brown rosebud of both them and the SJW's infesting games with politics. The relationship with EA is like when you have that partner who is just with you for the cash. Sure, you’re getting your jollies here and there too and it looks good on your arm at parties sometimes, but everyone knows your partner is a skank mate, only with you for the cash. Your ashamed, but you don’t mind that she has one hand in your pocket, while the other rubs your... You get the idea. The most recent Battlefront was fun to play, the micro transaction horror story they implemented within it though meant I didn’t buy it until it was $12 in an xmas sale. Because, EA, you greedy bastards won’t get a crumb from me unless its earnt and I valued the game at roughly $12, just so I can do the campaign. Sim City… Yup in case you forgot they released a new Sim City and it was… it was… well it just was. Battle-Gender-Social-Justice-Field V. Was supposed to have historical accuracies but severely lacked historical accuracies. Was supposed to subtly place women into a WW2 scenario where there were none to appease the equality peeps while not pissing on the memories of those who fought and fell fighting for their country. Failed at that, with a trailer sporting a bio-chick who likes to outrun tanks and plays cricket in her spare time. Failed at that by teaching a story about commandos who stopped the Germans from developing a nuclear warhead but replaced the Special Forces men who achieved this with a lady and her under-emotional teenage daughter who is clearly on some sort of drug what with how easily she overpowers grown male soldiers and all that. Oh, and did we mention the TTK/TTD? It’s a work in progress right? Anyway, sales were a flop according to multiple reports, it couldn’t even keep up with sales from BF1, let alone sales from some of the battlefield games that were actually GOOD. But hey, maybe we are all just “uneducated” and if we don’t like it, we shouldn’t buy it right? Well at least according to a representative of EA who won’t even score a name drop here. The Sims? Nope. Just… nope. In summary, Pack up your shit, move out and don’t look back. Let EA go and have a good hard think on how they treated you and let them see what they lost. I guess, EA will never appreciate what it had, until it’s lost it all.
Some of us are in a relationship with Blizzard. The spark in the relationship died along with the relevance of their biggest title. We stick around and tell our mother it’s because we can still see the good in our partner and want to try and stick it out to see if counselling will fix the issues, but deep inside we know it won’t. The fun has gone, and the sex is terrible and you’ve caught yourself multiple times now perving at that dev down the street with the crappy post-apocalyptic FPS game, not because it’s overly attractive, but just to feel something different for the first time in forever. Tuesdays were patch days and Wednesdays was business time, now Wednesdays is just 14 minutes of missionary before you both roll over and try to go to sleep, deaf from the awkward silence that followed. I mean World of Warcraft is old, the expansions are nowhere near what they used to be before they let kung-fu panda in and the graphics weren’t even amazing for their time, let alone 15 years later. But we’ve invested so much into it now that the subpar patching and monotonous additions to the game is enough to keep some of us engaged and still giving them that sweet, sweet subscription each month, money they no longer deserve to take. Starcraft 2, you know that one right? It’s the one that just went quiet. 100k were online when I logged in for the first time in 6 months last night, and I feel like that was a busy night for the servers. I noticed some sort of loot box thing going on, laughed and then got the hell out of dodge before I could even start a game. HoTS. Well, Blizzard lured HoTS out for a fishing trip. On the trip, there was a gunshot…. Only Blizzard returned. Sure, Steve Fakename McLovinYen, the bloke from the Blizzard mailroom, was given a $0 (because we are about cost cutting now at Blizzard) pay rise and told he has been promoted to lead HoTS content producer, but at every other desk the lights are off, and nobody is home. HoTS was a self-fulfilling prophesy that made it as far as it did, not because of Blizzard, but because of the players, but the players weren’t on that Sopranos-style fishing trip, and Blizzard wont even talk about it. It was like a cowards breakup over text message. The one that has no reasons or explanations, just an end. Only to see your ex a few weeks later with a Chinese businesswoman under his arm. Then there is Overwatch. People play that. But now, it just feels like an extra toon release is not enough to draw me back into playing it. I mean, Hanzo is still cool, Junkrat is still for noobs apparently and when I did attempt a couple of rounds the other night 2 people who sounded under the age of 11 both told me they had slept with my mother. I had to do a double take and check what game I was in. I thought those kids only played CoD. Then there is Diablo. So many hours spent on the game as well, but Blizzard isn’t interested in you any more, Diablo players. Oh no. It’s interested in the Yen. But who cares if you have a PC you spent at least *enter amount you don’t want you partner to know you spent on computer parts here* on, don’t you have a mobile phone? If Blizzard ever wants to get back into the relationship and actually try, a weekly horizontal folk dance just won’t be enough. It will need to be some mind-blowing metaphorical romp that rocks our world like the Blizzard we first got with.
EA. Producers of high end mediocre games who will put anything in them to please the shareholder and keep their nose nuzzled warmly against the brown rosebud of both them and the SJW's infesting games with politics. The relationship with EA is like when you have that partner who is just with you for the cash. Sure, you’re getting your jollies here and there too and it looks good on your arm at parties sometimes, but everyone knows your partner is a skank mate, only with you for the cash. Your ashamed, but you don’t mind that she has one hand in your pocket, while the other rubs your... You get the idea. The most recent Battlefront was fun to play, the micro transaction horror story they implemented within it though meant I didn’t buy it until it was $12 in an xmas sale. Because, EA, you greedy bastards won’t get a crumb from me unless its earnt and I valued the game at roughly $12, just so I can do the campaign. Sim City… Yup in case you forgot they released a new Sim City and it was… it was… well it just was. Battle-Gender-Social-Justice-Field V. Was supposed to have historical accuracies but severely lacked historical accuracies. Was supposed to subtly place women into a WW2 scenario where there were none to appease the equality peeps while not pissing on the memories of those who fought and fell fighting for their country. Failed at that, with a trailer sporting a bio-chick who likes to outrun tanks and plays cricket in her spare time. Failed at that by teaching a story about commandos who stopped the Germans from developing a nuclear warhead but replaced the Special Forces men who achieved this with a lady and her under-emotional teenage daughter who is clearly on some sort of drug what with how easily she overpowers grown male soldiers and all that. Oh, and did we mention the TTK/TTD? It’s a work in progress right? Anyway, sales were a flop according to multiple reports, it couldn’t even keep up with sales from BF1, let alone sales from some of the battlefield games that were actually GOOD. But hey, maybe we are all just “uneducated” and if we don’t like it, we shouldn’t buy it right? Well at least according to a representative of EA who won’t even score a name drop here. The Sims? Nope. Just… nope. In summary, Pack up your shit, move out and don’t look back. Let EA go and have a good hard think on how they treated you and let them see what they lost. I guess, EA will never appreciate what it had, until it’s lost it all.
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