Video Gamers Podcast - Silksong DOES Exist, Genshin Impact Troubles and Gaming Drama - Gaming Podcast

Episode Date: January 23, 2025

The Video Gamers Podcast is back with another incredible episode of This Week in Gaming. Gaming hosts Josh and Ryan are back chatting the latest gaming news. This week we get an actual honest to goodness update on Silksong, Genshin Impact gets slapped with a $20mil fine, and we discuss the Elon Musk gaming drama, plus more! All the video game news you need, each and every week from the Video Gamers Podcast! Thanks to our MYTHIC Supporters: Redletter, Ol’ Jake, Disratory and Gaius Thanks to Legendary Supporter: FitNerdJohn Connect with the show: Support us on Patreon: patreon.com/videogamerspod Join our Gaming Discord: https://discord.gg/Dsx2rgEEbz Follow us on Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/videogamerspod/  Follow us on Twitter: https://twitter.com/VideoGamersPod  Subscribe to us on YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCU12YOMnAQwqFZEdfXv9c3Q   Visit us on the web: https://videogamerspod.com/ Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

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Visit BetterHelp.com today to get 10% off your first month. That's BetterHelp, H-E-L-P.com. Hello, fellow gamers, and welcome to the Video Gamers Podcast. On this episode of This Week in Gaming, we finally get an official update on Silksong. We're told to temper expectations for the next Battlefield release. Don't worry, they're tempered already. Genshin Impact gets in trouble, and we'll dive a little bit into the elon musk gaming drama but first some introductions are in order i am your host josh and joining me he hates loot boxes but loves battle passes and you can hear him chanting to himself i will not get hyped for the next battlefield i will not get hyped for the next battlefield. I will not get hyped for the next Battlefield.

It's Ryan. When I read that article, it was like temper expectations. I'm like, don't worry, buddy. They were tempered a long time ago. Man. Well, yeah, we're going to get into that. And it's funny because I think you and I are on the exact same page. It's to the point where Battlefield is dead to me until it comes out and we hear good things about it. But we'll get into that story in just a minute. Ryan, we've got some more reviews that we need to catch up on. If you are a fan of this podcast and you

have not taken the two seconds to rate us five stars in your podcast app, please take a second to do that. You can do that on Spotify. It's a five-star rating. On Apple, you can rate us five stars in your podcast app. Please take a second to do that. You can do that on Spotify. It's a five-star rating. On Apple, you can rate us five stars, but you can also write us a review. And if you do that, there's a good chance we're going to read them on the show. I got two of them today. Oh, yeah. This first one comes in from Frogknight57, and it's titled, Josh, please read Best Gaming. And it says, I have listened to all of the gaming podcasts, and this one is the one that stuck out to me. It's amazing how they make new episodes weekly, and I don't have to be annoyed because they stop the podcast. They talk about great games, love all the games you guys talk about.

Also, Ryan, you're great too. Oh, that's good to know. I mean, you know, it's okay to be second place, right? It's not an afterthought, but you know, I'm still on the board. Now, when your name makes the title of the review, Ryan, that's, you know, I'll make sure that we don't ever read that one on the show. Yeah, that sounds about right. I'll never know.

And then this next one comes in from this is actually the name best podcast to listen to and it's titled best podcast ever i like this trend man you see a trend going on here i do i do and this one says i have been looking for a good podcast to listen to while practicing basketball or getting destroyed in eldon ring the amount of episodes are amazing. I will never run out. I have found a lot of good games from this podcast, like the Ghost of Tsushima, which is my second favorite game after Elden Ring.

Also, I don't know if you guys remember talking about this, but in the best game from each century, I think it was decade, but I have played Hero's Quest. Tributes to you paul dude hero's quest was my favorite game as a kid growing up until i discovered the joys of everquest that is but man hero's quest was the game that told me or taught me that i love rpgs i like combat in a game and uh yeah it was what a great game man there's like four people out there right

now that are going like oh a hero's quest mentioned me too me too old sierra game man dude sierra had the lockdown dude sierra was the bomb back then it really was we just had a a new member join our discord server we were chatting some leisure suit larry which was another hilarious adults only sierra type game but man yeah they were they were at the height of gaming for uh i think, I want to say that was like late 80s, early 90s, somewhere around there. Yeah, yeah. Probably, yeah, to like maybe mid 90s or so. But yeah, they were top notch.

Oh, man. Way to go, Sierra. Thanks for making some great games. All right, Ryan, we've got some news stories to talk about, man. Let's start with the first one. So, you know, the reason we bring Battlefield up on this show is you and I were absolute, just diehard fans of the Battlefield franchise. I know we have talked about Battlefield many a time. And unfortunately, it's usually with like a little bit of like,

almost disdain for Battlefield now. Is that fair? Yeah. Yeah. that's fair to say it's it's you know like love lost you know you you had so much passion and so much love for something and then it was just kind of taken away from you and uh and it just makes you mad now what what is the like when you think battlefield real quick like what's the number one battlefield to you that jumps to mind like your favorite uh battlefield four had battlefield four yeah battlefield four had to be mine that just i i played that till two or three in the morning and woke up at six in the morning to the

load music you know all the time uh it was one that i probably put the most hours in and then also probably i i played 42 when it first came out but vietnam i played so much of vietnam with paul um back in the day so that was a big one too for me yeah. Yeah. For me, Battlefield 2 is hands down the greatest Battlefield in existence, in my opinion. Battlefield 4, I will say I'm with you. I think that's my second favorite. I played a lot of Battlefield 4. I don't even know if I played Battlefield 3. I might've just skipped right over that one. But I do remember thinking 4 is like, okay, okay, this is good. It has a few issues, but this is good. And then it just fell apart, man. Yeah.

I know there's people that love Battlefield V and then it like rolled over like an odometer where it was like back to Battlefield I after that. And it's like, I tried that one too. Could not get into those, man. That was for me the downfall. What was the other one, like Hardline or something? Wasn't there another one that was? There's been some.

There's like bad company, which is really like a lot of people love bad company. I don't remember hard line. I didn't play that one at all. So yeah, there was one called hard line. I didn't, yeah, that was, you were like a cop in that one. It was like some weird, it was almost like COD like campaign, like cod campaign style. Oh, that's weird.

Yeah. I definitely never played that one. So, you know, all that to say is that we approach Battlefield as diehard fans of the series. I mean, I can't tell you how much time both of us have put into this series. Battlefield 2042, if you look at our leaderboard, it's way down there. It was a massive disappointment for us. And so when we get Battlefield news, I think there's a small part of our brains that still kind of tingle just a little bit. You know, they kind of go like, I'm not dead yet.

And we're like, shut up, go be dead. And it's like, no, but there's another Battlefield. Don't ask me what this voice is. It kind of went from, it turned into Dobby for a second there. I have another Battlefield, master. Dobby is free second there. I have another battlefield, master. Dobby is free. Oh, man. So the news that we got is a former DICE developer

kind of came forward and cautioned fans to, quote, temper their expectations for the upcoming Battlefield title as it will have a different philosophy and a new development team. So the thing here is that this person said, hey, the people that are making Battlefield now, it's like 98% new people. None of these people, whatever that 2% is, none of these people have been around since the glory days of Battlefield. They don't know what they're talking about. They don't know what they're doing. So don't know what they're doing you know so don't expect the battlefield that you're used to yeah it's the the the janitor's still there yeah that's the

that's the two percent make me wonder like who's the who are these two percent like why are they not involved i'm not leaving i'm not leaving i. Oh, man. And so the, of course, you know, the news on this is, is that because it's an all new team and because EA is the driving force on this next battlefield, we're just going to call it Battlefield 6 for right now, is in classic EA fashion, this dev is basically saying, hey, this thing's going to be monetized to the extreme. It's going to be marketed as a live service game from the get-go. And just temper your expectations on this. This is not going to be the battlefield that people are used to and likely the battlefield that people want. Now, they didn't say that that means it's gonna be bad they just said it's going to look very different than what a lot of people expect yeah i mean the thing is like yeah like you said different different doesn't always mean bad it

could be different and good but when you have come to love something a certain way and then they change it um you know you get frustrated like i even, okay, I know I constantly say Chipotle is overrated. The one thing I would get there when my wife would go, because she loves Chipotle, I'd be like, just give me a chicken quesadilla. They take a big tortilla, throw on a bunch of cheese, a bunch of chicken, fold it in half, put it in their thing, and it was like $5.50 or $6. It was cheap, it was easy, and at least I could get something,

and it was okay. Then they decided to change the whole thing to where it's like $5.50 or $6. It was cheap. It was easy. And at least I could get something. And it was okay. Then they decided to change the whole thing to where it's like a meal. And you get like a little thing of rice and tomato. And then it's like half the size. And it's more money. And I'm like, okay, it's still quesadilla. But this is completely different, man. Why did you change this?

It's the one thing. Yeah, I didn't ask for the rice and salsa in the little slots on the side of the container. I just want a big quesadilla, man. It's not that hard. I'm always like, you guys know the old way. Can you just make it the old way? And they always look over and they're like, I can't. And I'm like, all right, whatever.

And they know, though, too. They look at you knowingly like, yeah, those are the good old days. So I will say this. The one thing that the guy mentioned, too, is that they were looking into a sort of AI commander for the series. Now, I will say that one of my favorite parts, and I can't remember if you could do this in Battlefield 4, was being the commander. I feel like you could. I think you could, because then you could spawn in on him, right? Right. Well, no, that's your squad leader.

The commander was the guy that could see the whole map from like overhead oh yeah you could see which points and would actually direct you and they could drop supply drops and stuff like that i feel like the commander was a thing in battlefield 4 i know it was a thing in battlefield 2 yeah and it was usually like if more than one person wanted to play commander the highest ranked person like got the the role which i thought was cool too. So they mentioned things like different seasons of battle pass of war zone-like mode, definitely that it's going to be a live service game and stuff like that. There's rumor that it will launch in 2025. I don't know that I believe that either. I mean, honestly, as much as EA cares about money, I think EA, they care more about money than they do about this game being what fans want. But with the

disaster that was 2042, I do feel like they're going to be a little bit more cautious on this one. One would hope. Is that being hopeful like i i mean i think you're being i think you're being a little hopeful man i this this thing you come to find like they can uh do it the way they want to make a you know a buttload of cash and alienate some people that get upset about it and they make this amount of money or they can do it you know a love letter if you will and do it the right way the way people really would like it and they'll make less money what are you they're gonna go with you know they don't they don't care what you care they don't they're gonna soak this franchise for everything

they can and that's that's the that's the hard part like remember you know when you're a kid or you were playing these games like when you saw the developer logos and who made the game and stuff you never really thought anything about it and now all these dev companies we like cea and we see ubisoft and we see all this other stuff and you just you get mad thinking about them and how they take advantage of the people now and and you never thought about that before but they're just it's all it's all about the dollar now man dude there is legitimately a world where like like EA stop advertising that it's their game, and they start just marketing it. They just go like, hey, we don't know who's publishing this,

but check out this game from this new developer, everybody. And it's like, oh, we're smart. We'll figure out that was... But I mean, yeah, the press and the... I think the trust is just broken on Battlefield, to be honest. And I don't know that they can get it back. I would love for them to, because I know you and I would both love a really good Battlefield game to play. But the only other thing I'll say on this is before we move on to the next story is this is an ex-employee. So take a little bit of this with a grain of salt, because this guy might be just a little bit bitter and is trying to post this in a bad light. I mean, not that that surprises anybody.

And so it does seem rather believable, unfortunately. But I guess we'll have to wait and see. Wait and see, unfortunately. Yeah, that one's tough. So, all right, Ryan, on a better kind of news angle, Team Cherry. And everybody's going, who the heck is Team Cherry? Team Cherry is the team that brought us hollow knight people yes yes and who will eventually someday during this century don't

say bring us silksong but hey listen somebody posted a picture of a chocolate cake to their timeline on social media. And as gamers do, gamers lost their minds because I think it was one of the developers for this. I can't remember who the guy was, but I remember seeing this, like it was, you know, making waves on social media. And it was like, have you guys seen the cake? And we're like, oh, I've been playing Marvel Rivals. I've seen the cake. And they're like no not that cake the chocolate cake and i was like what are you talking about i'm like dude one of the devs uh from silksong or somebody related to silksong just posted a mysterious chocolate cake well everybody knows the cake is a lie but what if the cake wasn't a lie and the cake came on a day that had something

to do with like when silks song went into development or was announced or i don't know dude gamers do some mad digging man like so this just this rumor just kind of started spreading like crazy through social media and everybody said we're about to get a silk song update where it's coming it's because of the cake it's the cake we're gonna learn we're gonna know finally this guy might just really like cake he might have just been eating some really delicious chocolate cake it was like i'm supposed to cake i'm supposed to this cake this cake to my ex account so okay so internet rumor mill aside because of this hype somebody reached out to one of the developers and said, dude, I know you're not going to give us anything on this. I know that you guys don't give us

updates and stuff, but please just tell me you guys are developing this game still. Don't tell us that it's been canceled or forgotten about or it's in development hell or any of that stuff. And they literally begged and just said, dude, please. Well, lo and behold, Team Cherry's head of marketing and publishing responded and said, Silksong is real, it is progressing, and it will release. And that's it. Okay. That's it.

That's all we got and then the world lost its mind because they went to cake was a lie it was all a lie oh man i like why are we so enamored with this game but we are because it was so good but i'm starting yeah it's it's a thing it's a fine line you have to walk to build up that expectation and and get people excited and like oh man and have that expense you know it's building it's building it's building and then eventually it kind of boils over and people lose interest and get frustrated you start to get mad i'm getting to that point i am getting to the point of like this this kind of hidden in the shadows, a secret stuff. How long does it take to make a game? It's not super, super in-depth detail.

It's not top-of-the-world graphics with some crazy engine that you have to do. I mean, it's an amazing game that's designed beautifully. I love the art style, but does it really take this long to make a game? Apparently it does, Ryan. Like, come on. So Silksong was announced in 2019. It's been six years in development at this point. Now, I am of the mind that as much as I would love to play Silksong this year, take your time, which they obviously have been doing. So they've taken that advice.

Yeah. Oh, yeah. It's a hard. But one of the things with Hollow Knight was the environment, the music, just that feeling of the game. I mean, the combat and the movement were top notch. And it's one of those things where it's like, you can't risk any of that. If they rush this game out and the controls suck or that awesome music just isn't there, I think people are going to feel a little bit let down. Now, also, they did confirm that Silksong is actually going to be much larger than Hollow Knight, which is cool because it's like, not only are we just making another game, but we're making it much larger than the original as well so maybe that's why it's taken so long um but they did also confirm that the game will come with over a hundred different checkpoints and around 165 new enemies as well so this is the stuff that i like to hear because famously you know we we troll like borderlands especially the uh tiny tina's

wonderland where it just reused almost every asset in the game. And it was like, dude, come on. I can literally tell you guys put zero effort into this. So I'm okay if they're actually going to mix it up a little bit. New enemies. We have a new main character by the name of Hornet and all that. So we'll see. They didn't say it's not coming out in 2025. They didn't say it is coming out in 2025. The one rumor that a lot of people are really kind of saying, hey, makes a lot of sense is especially with the announcement of the Switch 2 is that they are going to try to time up the release of Hollow Knight Silksong with the release of the Nintendo Switch 2 as like a premiere release title.

I'm okay with that. I'm okay with that. So we have a timeline now? Does that mean we have a timeline? I don't know that it means we have a timeline, but it makes a lot of sense to people. I mean, I will be playing it on my PC, but I get that if you are a Switch owner or planning on getting the Switch 2, having Silksong as a launch title available for the Switch 2 makes an awful lot of sense for both the developer and Nintendo in that regard. So I think when a rumor makes a lot of sense, sometimes it's like, okay's there's a good strong chance of this too yeah i mean well like we were talking about with odyssey coming out with it or you know if silk song comes out you know that there's your kind of hit that's a launch title right that's your launch title and and i mean it would be nice you know playing uh playing you know it in your bed you know tucked in and just have the music going and falling asleep to silk song would be pretty cool you know on the switch but yeah i'm just i'm at that level where i'm just kind of annoyed now it's like come on man

just give me the game turned into annoyance yeah i mean that does happen let's be honest and maybe that's why they're not trying to give these like periodic updates and string people long as they just say hey silence is better than nothing you know we could be that developer that gives you you know all these these tweets or shows you, you know, 10 seconds of gameplay or a splash screen, or here's a wallpaper for your, for your desktop,

you know? And it's like, dude, what does this do me? Just give me the game, man. Yeah. So,

all right, Ryan, we're going to take a quick break and then we are going to come back and talk about a canceled live service. God of war. Womp. Womp womp. All right. We are back.

And honestly, listen, during the break, I felt really gross. I had to wash my mouth, man. Live service. God of war.

Oh, man, I can't get it out. So we did get news that PlayStation came forward and they did confirm that they canceled two live service games that were in development. A lot of people made the jump that this came as a direct result of the failure of Concord and Sony getting gun shy now about, Hey, we don't really want to do a lot of this live service stuff anymore if it's all gonna flop and the people are gonna get mad at us and i think part of that was we're gonna

axe these two games because we don't want to lose millions and millions of dollars on them now one game was a a kind of unannounced uh new ip by a company called or a studio called Bend Studio. Some were hoping that they were going to make Days Gone 2, but Sony just came forward and said, nope, this game, whatever it is, is done. And then they also confirmed that a lot... I can't even say it right. You say it. You say it. I'm not saying it.

I'm not doing it. Oh, come on, man. Live service. God of war. War. I got through it. Dude. Dude.

Listen. There's a lot of things in life that just because you can doesn't mean you should. Yes. I can probably rob a bank, you know, but you know what I'm not doing? I'm not robbing banks, man, because it's wrong. And you know what else is wrong? It's live service. I like how you just compared robbing banks to live service got him.

Yes. What are you doing, PlayStation? Like, don't. Just don't. What's funny is right after they just dropped the little expansion for Ragnarok or whatever. Valhalla? Valhalla for free, and they just drop it to everyone. And then they're just in the background.

They got a live service kind of churning. It's like, no, no, no, no. This is what we like. The Valhalla for free? This is very nice. We do not want live service. Yes. No, here's the thing.

There are certain franchises that you cannot turn into your little demonic money-making franchises. Yeah. You know? And God of War is one of those impeachable franchises. Number one, made you billions of dollars. I'm sure because God of War 2018, like took the world by storm.

God of War Ragnarok did very, very well. I mean, leave it alone. You can make money by just sales of a game. Yes. That's okay. And you made a lot of money by it.

Do not adulterate and corrupt God of War. Like we always say too, not every game needs to be a battle royale. Not every game needs to be open world. Some games are designed and developed

to follow this path and be this type. And just because this is the hotness that's making a lot of money doesn't mean you need to change what's over here. Go make something else, go make something different that you want to be your live service and leave this alone. There's a certain sanctity in gaming,

man, that should be upheld and taking beloved franchises and then trying to turn them into live service slop should be criminal. And so I'm hoping that PlayStation realize this. I don't think this was an altruistic move. I think this is we don't want to lose our shirt on another failed live service thing. So we're going to look at a couple that are going on right now and say, hey, we're probably done with this.

Another thing that Sony canceled, if you remember, was The Last of Us multiplayer. Remember when they were developing the multiplayer last of us and then they kind of came out and said hey you know this isn't working out so well um that happened back in uh december of 2023 and that was when we were like that probably makes sense like stop abusing these really popular good franchises, man. Did you ever play The Last of Us online? No. The first one? No?

So I did. Not a ton, but it was pretty fun because you can make those little kind of shrapnel bombs and toss them at guys and move around. And the movement is so great in The Last of Us. But yeah, to make it a live service, I don't think that would work. No.

Yeah, get out of here with that. So hopefully PlayStation has learned. Okay. I feel gross. So we're moving on. Yep. Move on. Okay. Now, I will say this. For this next story, if you guys notice, we generally don't ever get caught up in internet drama, drama between streamers, drama between people. There's enough drama in the world. We're grown men with families. Nobody wants drama at this point in life. It doesn't serve a purpose. So it's very rare that we ever actually cover any of these stories. But this one was just a little too good of a drama. And then we did actually get some answers from it as well. Um, and so anybody that was paying attention to social media probably saw at least something

where people were talking about Elon Musk, very, you know, if you don't know who Elon Musk is, you're living under rock number one, but number two, Elon Musk is a gamer. He has been a gamer for a very long time. He streams, you know, fairly regularly. He loves video gamer. He has been a gamer for a very long time. He streams fairly regularly. He loves video games. He's come out and said it. He supports them. He's friends with a lot of streamers and stuff like that. So Elon Musk is a gamer, but he's also Elon Musk, right? And so he's in the eye of the public. He's kind of a weird dude. We don't get into politics on this podcast. So all of this is apart from what you think of the man or political or any of that stuff. We are addressing the gamer. Okay. And so Elon is famously a very, very big fan of Diablo and recently Diablo 4.

He has posted videos of him completing these challenge runs on Diablo four. He's rated as like in the top 10 of Diablo four players in the world. Um, he's posted videos of that, whatever, you know? And then it's like, wow. Okay. Well, how does this guy have time to do all this, you know, and run all these companies and everything? Well, then Path of Exile 2 came out. Famously, very big fan of that game. Ryan, you're a stupid jerk for not even trying it. But Path of Exile 2 came out, and Elon, like a normal person, went, oh, you know what?

I love Diablo. Let me try this Path of Exile game. Because any normal person would do that if Diablo was one of of their favorite games and then this other game came out that it's like yo this game's way better than diablo you think a normal person would at least try that game especially a person that i don't know hosts a gaming podcast that can literally pick up the game on the dime of the podcast anyway oh wait i'm sorry what happened there yeah you started

drifting away you were so mad you're so angry back to this story hey listen dude i know myself i know who i am and i would probably not be recording with you and i'd be on path of exile i'm like i'll get to you later i'm doing this raid you know you know i'm i'm like an addictive personality man i've got sucked in all right how'll quit the pod for Path of Exile. All right. Now I feel like I'm just a drug dealer trying to push something on you, man. Yeah. Why are you peddling this to me, man?

Yeah. All right. All right. So anyway, Path of Exile 2 comes out. Elon starts playing it. And then all of a sudden, a month or two or however long goes by before this game has been out in early access a little bit. And Elon starts posting these hardcore runs of Path of Exile. And people are like, whoa, like, dude, how does this guy find time to do this? And then he streams. He goes live. He starts

streaming a playthrough of Path of Exile 2, and something doesn't quite jive with people that have played the game. And this is where the drama starts, okay? People said, hey, here's a top-level, hardcore Path of Exile 2 guy. We're watching him play live. He's kind of explaining a lot of things. He's chatting with people. But then people started to notice, he doesn't quite play the game the way that somebody has been playing the game would um he's running past valuable items he's having a hard time figuring out how to open the mini-map um he's saying things that he doesn't quite know what he sounds like he's talking about there was just some spidey sense tingling going oh yeah and then this started the internet into a tizzy into an uproar and the rumor

became that elon doesn't actually play these games that he pays people to play these games for him and he's been faking all of this the whole time yeah and the internet like the internet does lost their minds and it became this big conspiracy theory. And then Asmongold, very famous streamer, millions of followers kind of stepped in and said, dude, it's obvious you don't play this game. Elon kind of fired back and said, well, it's obvious you don't come up with your own content, blah, blah, blah. And it kind of became a little bit of a war. Thankfully, it didn't go too far. But what we got out of all of this, because there was a lot of conjecture from people that said, no, no, Elon plays these games. We've

seen his Diablo. It's him. You can literally watch him do this. He famously was a top-notch Quake player back in the day, was actually ranked in the top leaderboards for Quake and stuff like that. So his credentials as a gamer were not really in question. It was just, is this you actually playing this game? Yeah. And we finally got an answer because there were some texts between Elon and a guy that he is either buddies with or a streamer with or something like that, that published these text messages that was very direct and said, hey, regarding your path of exile too, was it your intention to take full credit for

leveling your hardcore characters? Because it doesn't look like that's you. And Elon said, no, I never claimed that it was me at that point that had achieved that. And so he came out and said it. He, you know, he did kind of clarify it and he said, Hey, the top accounts in Diablo and path of exile require multiple people playing

the account to win this race and kind of be ranked in the leaderboards. And that's kind of a normal thing is account sharing. He called it where, you know, you kind of need to just grind, man. Yeah. And one person can only grind so much. And if you want to be at the top,

you might have more than one person grinding on your account at that point. So this kind of became clear and people got their answers. All right. So let me ask you, Ryan, that's kind of the answers. He did say, hey, I don't always play my own account. When you see me streaming, it is 100% me streaming. He said, that is very true. But maybe I didn't level this guy all the way up. Yeah.

You know? So let me ask you, what do you think of that? If somebody is wanting to be top ranked, and this is a common thing in the industry to do account sharing and have multiple people leveling this character is that lame does it make sense like what are you like what do you think on this dude's a poser man he's a poser dude no i'm just kidding um the thing is i felt I feel like it was one of those things where he didn't come out to say it, but he also was hoping nobody was going to ask it. That's my thinking as well. I am, oh, this is my top rank here, blah, blah, blah. And it's like, look at me playing.

I'm playing right now. He didn't say, oh, yeah, man, it was a grind to get to this. I played this long, this many hours. He didn't claim anything like that. But also, he didn't let everybody know that he didn't do all those leveling, you know, hard grinding nights and stuff like that. So it's kind of a little weird, you know,

but he is a gamer, like you said, and he does play, he does stream when he plays. But yeah, you could tell like him trying to kind of fumble around. It's almost like you learn a new language when you're that deep into a game you you understand the keybinds and where to go with everything and what you call everything and all the terminology and for somebody else coming in you may know games you may get some of

it but but to be able to be that like fluent you know fluent in another language is different than being able to just speak the language so it's's just a whole different world and people picked up on it immediately. And I don't know what he was expecting, but yeah, it's kind of one of those weird things. I don't think it's really bad or malicious, but also he was hoping probably people wouldn't notice. Yeah, I agree. I think because it's his history with Diablo and his standing on Diablo, which is proven. He is a top ranked Diablo player. I think with path of exile, he probably went, I want to try this.

Let me see what the end game is like. I'm not defending like the actions by any means, but I'm saying I can understand from like a gamer point of view. This kind of gets more into that. Like if, if you have the means and you want to experience a game, is it lame or acceptable to purchase, because these things happen, a high-level account? If I'm playing an MMO, right? And it's like,

I don't have 400 hours to grind to level 60, but I really would kind of like to see what the end game and rating is like. I'm just going to buy this account that's for sale. I'll log in. It'll save me all that time. And then I get to experience the part of the game that's for sale. I'll log in. It'll save me all that time. And then I get to experience the part of the game that I want to. I know my brain has always gone, well, that's lame. Just play the game, man. Like some of the fun is the adventure and the journey along the way, not just the end game stuff.

But at the same time, like Throne and Liberty, for instance, right? Just played Throne and Liberty a good bit when it came out. And I found myself 100% just grinding so that I could do the end game raids because that was the content that I wanted to play. That was the funnest content in my mind. And all this stupid leveling and the story that didn't make sense and I could care less about was just keeping me from that. Yeah, exactly.

And so I can understand the mindset now. If Elon just went, look, I want to see what the path of exile two is. Sure, maybe I wasn't fully upfront with people. But when people ask me, I did come clean as well. And so I don't know. That's a tough one. People can make their own decisions on that one. But it was kind of a little bit of a fun internet drama

that happened that we did get a actual definitive answer on. And so we thought it'd be a fun little story to cover. Ryan, what do you think? Is it okay to buy an account if you want to just jump to end game? I think it is. I mean, how much is he making an hour, basically? Is he worth technically? You always heard the thing where if somebody drops like $100 bill, it's cost them more time to pick it up. Right. They would just keep walking type thing. He goes and pays some guy however many thousands and the guy's happy. I mean, he's creating jobs.

You know? Yeah. The only other point that I'll make and something that this podcast has always said is let people play video games the way they want to play video games. Some people like the very chill games. Some people like the hardcore games. Some people like multiplayer only, single player only, whatever. If you want to buy an account to experience the end game on a game, that's your choice. I think we can have opinions on it to say, hey, I think that's kind of lame. Play the game. They made the game with a start and they made the game with an end game. Have fun. So I think it's

okay to have an opinion on that. I don't think it's okay to slander people and make them feel bad because they have a gaming preference. And even with Elon, even with somebody like that, if it's his preference as a gamer to experience the end game and he has the means to buy an account or pay somebody to get him to that point, you can say what you want, but slandering somebody for their gaming choices is not something that we support that's the yeah that's the one thing i think you should have done is just kind of come out and headed it off and said you know like yeah i i run all of these companies i don't have time to grind this many hours i want to experience the end game i i play

this and i'm gonna play it so let's you know check it. So let's, you know, check it out, watch it with me, you know? And, but yeah. All right. One other story here, Genshin impact, man, one of the most popular games out there. Uh, I don't even know what the player base is,

but it's, I mean, Genshin is huge, man. Well, Genshin got themselves in a little bit of trouble with the, uh, the federal trade commission,

uh, in the U US because they got investigated. They got slapped with a $20 million fine because the FTC determined that they had predatory practices with how they handle their loot boxes for kids. And they got hit with a $20 million fine and ordered to stop selling loot boxes to children. Oh my gosh. I mean, now, anybody that has played, and I'm just going to classify this as a gotcha game. I think that's the right term for an old man like myself.

But my daughter loves Genshin Impact. She's tried Honkai Star Rail. There's another one, Wuthering Waves. I've heard of all these games. I'm vaguely familiar with them. My daughter loves Genshin. She plays it all the time. And she's come to me and she said, Dad, can I buy the crystals or the battle pass or whatever? Because there's some five-star hero I'm hoping to get. And I kind of go, not really a big fan of spending money on digital cosmetics especially for a kid but it's your money okay you know that kind of thing ryan we know you love you your luxury battle passes at this point one time one time oh man i love giving you flack on that because

it's literally like the only podcast money you've ever spent yeah i was buying gave my own dime for a while right i know oh that's funny by the way it is um they got uh an average uh monthly active active players of 60 million oh my goodness dude no no that's on okay yeah yeah 60 million yeah online active players as of an hour ago were 124 000 yeah okay so genshin ain't going anywhere it's a massive game it's pulling in buku bucks but they got in trouble okay and and they said that the the kind of thing was that genshin deceived children teens and other players into spending hundreds of dollars on prizes they stood little chance of winning companies that deploy these dark

pattern tactics will be held accountable if they deceive players, particularly kids and teens, about the true cost of in-game transactions. Part of the thing here was that it wasn't really clear when you were buying something or spending money on something or something like that. And this is something that they are cracking down on in video games. If you've ever gone to buy something off of Amazon and it defaults to the subscribe and save option, right? Because that's happened, right? And that's kind of the same thing where it's like, you didn't realize that it was on this option. You meant to purchase that option, but it's too late because online transaction completed. You bought a loot box.

You can't refund it. Too bad. You better open up that loot box and hope for the best. And so I think that's kind of this case that happened. It brings up the kind of larger debate. Are loot boxes a thing of the past? Are they gambling? Are they predatory? And are battle passes the safer option for developers at this point? Man, that's a tough one. Because I do see, I mean, with us both having kids and both, you know,

you can tell how much it targets them. And those little cosmetic upgrades or those little things that you can get out of the loot box and the chance of getting them, how excited they are and how much they want it. And so you can see. I mean, that's why grownups go to Vegas and gamble because that drive and that dopamine hit you get is something that's special. But when it's kids that don't know how to make those choices and be able to lay off, oh, I should probably not do that. It's a tough one. I do hope that loot boxes are kind of going the way of the past.

I'm not a big fan of them. I don't understand why you would... When I play a game, I want to play a game. Very rarely will I be like, oh, that thing or that item or that skin is really, really cool. And I'll think about buying it. But I'm just here to play the game and have fun. You know, all that extra stuff doesn't mean anything to me. But I know a lot of people it does.

So I don't know. I prefer the battle passes and going that route than the loot boxes for sure. I think the main thing with a battle pass is you know what your rewards are. You can see them ahead of time. You get them by playing the game. There is not a random chance involved. And with loot boxes, that random chance, that's the kicker. That's why so many developers are moving away from them. They're getting in trouble for gambling with kids, basically. And I do think we will see where loot boxes are just a thing of the past. I do think battle passes are kind of the future for monetization, microtransactions, that kind of thing. So I don't know everything about this kind of fine and legal thing.

But I will say that as a parent and as a gamer, I am a fan of being a little bit more clear with, if you're going to give us money for something inside our game, we are going to be a little bit more transparent about what you are going to get at that point. And so I think that's a good thing, especially for kids, because otherwise it really is just kind of gambling, man. Yeah, exactly. I tell my kids all the time, they are so into Pokemon cards right now, man. It's ridiculous. And I tell them, I said, dude, Pokemon is just gambling for kids. And I'm not trying to slander Pokemon, but it really is, dude. And I have seen the crushing disappointment in my own kids where they spend money on packs or a lot of money on packs. And then they get diddly squat.

And then they're so sad, disappointed. And as a parent, I hate that, you know, but at the same time, my daughter just bought some packs the other day and she pulled like an $80 card. It's the second best card in the set.

And she'd lost her mind. And that like joy was like kind of cool to see too. But that joy is much like rarer than the disappointment from that. And so I, as a parent, it's like, I, I don't like teaching kids to gamble.

That's true. Wait till you're an adult before you become a degenerate gambler. Like I did stupid stuff. All right. Well, we've gone long on this episode, but thank you everybody for joining us, getting caught up on your gaming news.

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