It's interesting that we had reverse experiences regarding the recent FF titles. I think for me, it was because I played them very close to each other, and I probably would have been fed up by halfway through whichever one I played second. My gaming buddy mostly really liked Rebirth.

But they both had a slightly different version of this same issue, and my tolerance was pretty low by the time I got to Rebirth.

I think you're hitting on a slightly broader problem. Any game where combat is the major mechanic shouldn't have a situation where you can't do any damage for any extended amount of time. The Yakuza series handles this well, enemies can block, but the moment they do you have attacks that can break the block immediately, and start damaging again. (Or you can skill up to that that attack.) As the game goes on, it gets more intricate, different enemies have different blocks that require different moves to break. The player character also has different fighting styles that have different block breaking moves that you have to keep track of, but if you know what you're doing, you can break almost ANY block with one move.

Far far too many other games decide to arbitrarily create a mechanic where you can't do any damage for a WHILE. It's either the invincible enemy that you just have to spend 3 minutes dodging, which is boring and miserable in both action and even turn based RPG battles. Or they have a shield that you have to do some elaborate and rhythm breaking routine to remove the shield. It's a miserable slog whenever they do that kind of thing. Back in the early 2000s The second game of the Xenosaga trilogy changed the entire combat design and added the thing I hate most, the RPG stagger. You can do no appreciable damage to any thing in the game until you figure out what combination of attacks cause a stagger. It could be a three move sequence involving two characters that has to be done in the right order, or woops! Start all over. If you didn't give one of your characters a specific ability or attack during leveling, screw you, you're basically fucked.

The players, rightfully, rejected that crap then and they got rid of it for the third game. Now, it's everywhere. Every RPG I've played recently has that crap. I finally just put down FFVII Rebirth half way through and said, screw this, because it was so exhausting and miserable. Every battle becomes the equivalent of getting on a non-working escalator and your body still jerks because you think you're going to start moving. I hate this trend and it's everywhere as developers think, "this battle isn't bossy enough." "Add a stagger mechanic to make it last longer" "Brilliant old chap."

I don't know what disease is moving through the game development community that boss battles, especially, have to be a certain length. Is this a marketing thing? Is this being handed down from the publishing execs? FFXVI had 20-25 minute battles towards the end that were just repetitive dodging and a kaleidoscope of flashing lights. I could have just had a gummy and watched an old screensaver and it would be more memorable and less annoying.

Okay, I'm done complaining, but the long battle for no reason other than to make it feel like a boss, is, I think, an extension of the collect-a-thon, open world, sandbox mentality that just adds superfluous crap so they can say "This game is 44% larger than the last game we made, and will take you 215 hours to complete!" Who cares if it sucks?

Sadly there is no loss for him real or on paper. He only donated his name and usage rights to the company, any actual value came from suckers, and other REP. grifters. Even if each share is a cent by the time he sells, it's still just profit for him.

Now, if other shareholders could come together and agree that he acted against their interests, THEN he could conceivably lose money in a resulting suit.

You mean "bell-end"?

Hah! Good one. They'll just fight to make it impossible to send a cop to prison no matter how many people they murder.

Look at it this way, Google stopped caring about their viewers as anything more than wallets to empty years ago. Now they're going through the same cycle with advertisers. They don't care if the ads land, or the targeting works, just that they can convince them to keep buying ad space.

Eventually the ROI will show as not worth it to the advertisers, but by then Pichai and the rest of the C-suite will be pulling the same scam at another company whose investors are more greedy and stupid than saavy.

Because the horrible truth of America now, is that CEOs and their ilk have stopped caring about creating value, or building a sustainable business model with long term revenue. Now they just look at witless investors as wallets to be emptied too.

As an old person, I approve this message. It's exhausting to keep screwing things up for everyone that comes after us.

Consider how the federalization of Student Loans has contributed to the price of college outpacing inflation by many times, and income by a magnitude.

That's still only part of the problem, of course, hiring university leadership from the for profit business sector, privatizing loan servicing, etc. have all made college tuition skyrocket, but the loan program is a major issue.

A better option for college would be to subsidize universities directly with the requirements that their tuition stay within a linear relationship to inflation. Somewhat like state colleges offering low tuition for residents.

Housing needs more federal controls, which, to her credit she has explored in her platform along with disincentivizing, exploitative investment in private housing.

🎼Tell me what happened...🎶

FWIW, I didn't read anything in BM's post that made me think he was arguing the incident was fake. I interpreted that (s)he was saying it probably was other debris or shrapnel, and he's insisting it was an actual slug to look like a tough guy.

Right on, this isn't about Ukraine's restraint, it's about Russia's psychopathy.

Sounds a bit like the Castlevania Prologue music.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-DpGq8XOKb8&t=3s

First chapter. Some of the other tracks on that video sound a little like a remix of some of those themes as well.

Yes and an sr-71 blackbird.

The Udvar-Hazy air and space museum annex near Dulles is actually the best part of that museum. Check it out!

"I think you're missing the point, they're pointing out a woman with a VERY comfortable life made up a racist lie to demonise those less fortunate than herself."

I wonder when her best selling children's fantasy book is going to drop?🤔

Was anyone ever able to see it as both like one of those perspective illusions? I can only see it as white and gold.

My dog wonders why I can't be more like him.

This puts the whole thing in new perspective. This sounds like conspiracy theory and delusion. I almost expect this from Insanepeoplefacebook.

If we had a cat, a loft would be a brilliant idea!

First, You rock. You changed the context of your actions based on new information and have decided to change your approach going forward, and you're honest about it. All political discourse should occur at this level of self-awareness and transparency.

And just so you know I commiserate....I volunteered for Blegojevich.