Tag Archives: Video games

October 23, 2025 · 23:33

Never out of mind

That is the setting. I saw a trailer (I thought it was an AI fluke) but it had the stars and it reminded me of an old game. Wacky Races on the Dreamcast. I thought it was brilliant. SEGA had a competitor to Nintendo’s Mario Kart. Now, I have nothing against Mario Kart. I loved it on the N64, I also loved it on the Gamecube. And when I get the Switch 2, I will love it again. But the setting was that Wacky Races had an approach to counter whatever Nintendo had in those days. Wacky Races was it and as I loved the cartoon, I was instantly hooked. So I was surprised that Sony never bought the rights. So I don’t know what happened to that setting, but at present and especially with the movie apparently coming, Sony has a renewed option to get that title on their PlatStation systems. 

The game had several nice touches and the fact that every car had its own options, makes it a setting that will give renewed replayability. Set the game to several settings and as the game is played on ‘real roads’ the setting could get its own new lease of life. What is better than play your favourite character racing route 66? And that is merely the beginning. The cartoon gave us hilarious settings and that reflects back on the game and even now as this setting is transposed this game could have multiple settings. The famous ‘walks’ could now be the setting of Wacky Races. The St. Frances way (Florence – Rome), the Camino de Santiago walk (Saint JeanPied de Port to Santiago de Compostela) then there is the Nakasendo trail (Kyoto – Tokyo) And not to forget Lands end to John o Groats over the length of the UK. Now we can make the most of it and make it a cartooned version and we can add more. A setting never shown before and as I see it, you can race it eleven time. There were the Boulder Mobile, Creepy Coupe, Convert-a-Car, Crimson Haybaler, Compact Pussycat, Army Surplus Special, Bulletproof Bomb, Arkansas Chuggabug, Turbo Terrific, Buzz Wagon and who could forget the Mean Machine featuring Muttley. 

A wacky race and as the game gets more and more traction Sony could add its own set of tracks. There is no limit to the setting we could add and Sony had an advantage for the longer of times. There is even an option to add the Iceland ring road to these tracks. The quality of Deeper Machine Learning is almost perfect to add these tracks to their arsenal and Google Maps was kind enough to add these rides to the spectrum and now they only need to set the filters to adapt the tracks to a more cartoon setting. Was it that hard to think out of the box? 

But without fail there is always someone who can do better than me, that person (preferably at Sony) merely needs to raise his (or her) hand and start the setting and now that there apparently is coming a Wacky Races movie in 2026, there is an added reason to take up the baton of crazy gameplay on the PlayStation. There is of course a need to put it on the streaming systems too (Amazon Luna and whatever Tencent has). A setting we tend to forget about but the time is now to make that dent in the competitors. Should you see the need to add to this, my advice is to take a serious look at Fur Fighter (Dreamcast), the Playstation 2 made a mess of that game. Two titles and they were largely ignored. And with the stage of original games at a all time low, the need for quality gaming is now and the stage of these walks are a new ride, that besides the stage that you could also add tracks to this, perhaps Monaco, Francorchamps, Le Mans and a few other tracks like Daytona and the Gold Coast track. All options overlooked and now there is a larger setting to make it work.

Have a great day and when you go for coffee today, outside of the gaming world we do have speed limits, no matter how desperately you crave your coffee.

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October 16, 2025 · 21:27

Moments that came before and again

There is nothing much under the sun. My mind has been crossing into the language training setting and the setting that goes deeper has been ‘designed’, there is still the need to get Ubisoft on board, but there is a new setting, the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia bought EA and whilst it allows their population to get deeper into gaming. The setting is more than gaming, it sets two other IP’s directly in combination with this setting and considering that the Meta Quest Pro could be connected to this all, the setting would add more to what Saudi Arabia is achieving. The other setting is that it doesn’t need the Meta Quest Pro and that is the controlling situation giving a larger population and a larger consumer base to this all. 

As I said before:
AC Brotherhood – Italian and Latin
AC Syndicate – Classic English
AC Unity – French
AC Shadows – Japanese – Portugese
WD Legion – Modern English
AC Mirage – Arabic

The stages are different, but the ‘game play’ tends to be the same. You start in the smallest cabin (like in the game), but you are not an assassin, you play one of the NPC’s For example in Harbiyah where you start in one of the dwellings. As you go around the area and play ‘games’ like speaking names, counting and around a dozen other games. When you succeed and complete (and surpass the minimum score) you get a reward in Dirham, which allows you to upgrade outfits, spend money in shops and it allows you to do things. So as you continue in the game and complete assignments you get to an ‘exam point’ and when completed you get promoted to Abbasiyah with a better apartment, more lessons, more challenges and more linguistic skills. From there you get to Karkh and from there to the Round city. There you get to listen to Arabic poetry and read it. This setting applies to all languages. As the origin of Latin was promoted through Familia Romana originally published 200AD. That book could be translated to any language and as the IP rights have passed already (after 1800 years) but that setting could be seen in every language and those books could be translated to al other languages. Books on telling time, books on travel issues and we could go on. The setting that this setting could be translated to nearly all covered languages and that gives the wielder a lot of options. As I see it, the maps need to be ‘cleaned’, and the use of the NPC’s need to be altered, but as I see it, these games are already 85% done for the new functions as I see it, the speaking part (microphone and interpretation) is part of the biggest setting and when done once, the other parts will be easy. A simple setting that Ubisoft left on the floor, but now with the settings that Saudi Arabia opened up, there is more to be gotten and for the people who want a little more luxury, there is the Meta Quest Pro (Apple vision pro optional) and that setting would allow 35 million Saudi’s to get multiple linguistic skills and others to learn Arabic. A setting that I painted before, but as it evolves in my mind, the mini games came and the thought of how it could be applied to any language. Counting, days of the week, family, time telling, tally games, personal introduction games, giving a speech and as a lot of this is possible through Deeper Machine Learning, it is a setting that is already out there. I am also thinking that some of the customer service agents could suffice to do some of these parts. Now take in consideration that this could be replicated to nearly all countries, the setting for Amazon and Saudi Arabia reaches the top. So, why write this here? The simple reason is that this IP is owned by Ubisoft and as others get the idea to throw this into new directions, I might stand to prosper somewhat here as well. And taking in stride the fact that Ubisoft overlooked that part of their equation and the fact that I showed the same flaw in both Google and Amazon will give others the idea that they are talking to the wrong people. Just my sense of humor in action. 

And there is another setting as I see it, the ramification in combination with the purchase of EA gives them a few more options, something that people like Elizabeth Warren and Richard Blumenthal seemingly overlooked. They are ‘all’ about profound concerns, yet they never saw the opportunities that were given to Saudi Arabia and they overlooked those as well, because as I see it EA would have never taken the step to give it away to others *(but that is seemingly just me)

So as we take the setting that there is a new Console and gaming rule, right next to Sony and Nintendo the setting will uproot the gaming community and that is a community that gets another billion gamers soon enough, no Microsoft required (I just had to say that). Within two years the Saudi Console (which could be a Tencent Console) will achieve what Microsoft had not ever achieved. They would equal the Xbox 360 being the best-selling at over 84 million units within two years and Microsoft was at it for over 20 years. As I see it, in the previous setting there was a chance to get 200 million consoles, with this altered state, there is no telling how many consoles this setting could sell. And as Saudi Arabia has the near first option for 1.8 billion Muslims, they would all be interested in learning languages making my solution a 4th foot to the setting and the 3rd pillar setting would become a lot sturdier and more appealing to a lot of people. A setting the greats might never have considered, but their focus (Sony and Nintendo) was achieved by focussing on their areas and now that another focus is added the consoles will take a new turn to new consumers and as I see it META might be the initial bigger winner here. 

All because someone had an idea that the rest overlooked. So have a great day and I am taking two days of to let a few more ideas sink in and I need to focus on that (for now). So have fun and consider the thoughts you considered not good ideas, because some might be and some are ideas that others didn’t think of. Have fun exploring your hidden niches of your brain where the other ideas are.

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October 14, 2025 · 00:20

When a cigar is anything but

That is the expression as I see it. It is based on the freud premise of ‘Sometimes a cigar is just a cigar’ And it fits the setting. You see, on August 31st I wrote ‘The wave of brains’ (at https://lawlordtobe.com/2025/08/31/the-wave-of-brains/)

I set up a new RPG game, a new gaming IP and in a non-related issue I accidentally clicked on the ‘Grok’ button, which gave me a new setting on me. Now I did it intentionally and it gave me a few items, it also gave me an idea I did not have before. The idea came from my school days (my merchant navy school days) and it came to me that the idea could have multiple applications. 

So as I was ‘given’:

Based on the blog post linked in Lawrence Van Rijn’s X post, the envisioned Mars RPG game appears to combine survival, exploration, and narrative-driven gameplay with unique mechanics that tie into its sci-fi setting and real-world geopolitical commentary. Since the post outlines an idea rather than a fully developed game, I’ll extrapolate the mechanics from the described concepts, filling in logical details where necessary. Here’s a detailed breakdown of the potential game mechanics:

1. Survival and Resource Management
Core Systems Dependency: The game begins with the player as an amnesiac astronaut in a detainment center on Mars, reliant on self-sustaining systems for oxygen, water, and nourishment. Players must learn and maintain these systems (e.g., repairing oxygen generators or water purifiers) to survive. This introduces a tutorial phase where resource management is hands-on, with limited initial supplies forcing prioritization.
Energy Constraints: Power is a scarce resource, with the fusion reactor offline due to a crash-induced brownout. Players must restore solar panels or alternative energy sources (e.g., a larger energy dump mentioned in the post) to expand operations, creating a strategic layer where energy allocation (e.g., to life support vs. droid activation) impacts survival.
Time Pressure: The narrative hints at a finite water supply (a few days’ worth), adding urgency. Players must balance exploration and repairs under a ticking clock, with failure leading to resource depletion and potential death or mission failure.

2. Exploration and Droid Interaction
Open-World Exploration: The game features multiple domes, starting with a detainment center linked to retail and civilian areas, each with unique challenges. Players explore deserted landscapes filled with corpses and debris, uncovering lore through environmental storytelling (e.g., identity tags and mail from deceased colonists).
Droid Reactivation System: A key mechanic involves reactivating droids—janitor droids to clear junk and maintenance droids to repair infrastructure (e.g., the first tower for power restoration). Players choose which droids to prioritize, with each type offering different benefits (e.g., janitors clear paths, maintenance droids fix systems). This could include a mini-game or skill-based challenge to reboot them, inspired by the “Paradroid” reference.
Progressive Unlocking: As droids restore power and systems, new areas of the domes become accessible, expanding the playable space and introducing new survival tasks (e.g., inspecting oxygen points or water supplies).

3. Character Progression and Identity Mechanics
Amnesia and Identity Acquisition: The player’s amnesia allows for a dynamic identity system. By collecting identity tags from corpses, players can “become” deceased colonists, gaining access to their skills, memories (via mail and conference logs), and clearances. This could function like a skill tree or perk system, where each identity unlocks specific abilities (e.g., engineering skills for repairs or security access for restricted areas).
Sanity and Morale: Drawing from the post’s mention of supporting 10,000 people’s sanity across three domes, individual colonists (or the player) might have stats like sanity, comfort, and health, affected by isolation, resource scarcity, or horrific discoveries (e.g., mass corpses). Managing these stats could involve crafting morale-boosting items or completing narrative-driven tasks.

4. Narrative and Lore Integration
Mystery and Event System: Inspired by games like Surviving Mars, the game includes “mysteries” tied to the crashed Earth ark ship. Events such as alien contact, AI revolts, or rival corporate interference could trigger dynamically, requiring player decisions that shape the story (e.g., negotiating with an AI or fighting security droids).
Geopolitical Lore Updates: The post suggests real-time news integration via a “NIP (near Intelligent Parsing) system” to reflect events like U.S. debt crises or BRICS power shifts. This could manifest as in-game news broadcasts, colonist dialogues, or mission objectives that evolve with global events, making each play through reflect the current date (e.g., October 2025’s economic tensions).

5. Combat and Security
Emerging Threats: The post hints at security and battle droids as future hazards, suggesting a combat mechanic. Players might craft or find weapons (e.g., from the shipwreck) to defend against rogue droids or environmental dangers (e.g., dust storms), with combat tied to resource costs (e.g., ammo or energy).
Strategic Defense: As the colony grows, players may need to fortify domes against external threats (e.g., the crashed ship’s survivors or alien entities), adding a base-building or defensive strategy layer.

6. Crafting and Customization
Ship Repair Goal: The ultimate objective is to repair the broken ship parts scattered across Mars, requiring players to gather materials and craft tools or gadgets (e.g., a flashlight for night exploration, as seen in similar survival games). This aligns with the post’s focus on self-reliance.
Equipment Upgrades: Players can customize their character’s gear or droid capabilities, enhancing survival odds in harsh Martian conditions (e.g., radiation suits or enhanced droid AI).

7. Multi-Dome Ecosystem
Interconnected Domes: The three domes (detainment, retail, civilian) form a network where actions in one affect others (e.g., restoring power in one dome boosts water production in another). Players must manage this ecosystem, balancing population needs (up to 5,000) and resource flows.
Population Dynamics: If the game includes NPC colonists (martian-born or revived identities), their traits and morale could influence productivity or trigger events, adding a social simulation layer akin to Surviving Mars or Tropico.

Potential Challenges and Balance
Complexity: Balancing survival (resource timers), exploration (droid management), and narrative (lore integration) could overwhelm players. A phased difficulty curve—starting with basic survival, then adding combat and geopolitics—might help.
Replayability: The real-time news integration and multiple identity paths could encourage replay, but random events (e.g., meteor storms or AI revolts) would need to be varied to maintain interest.
Technical Feasibility: Parsing live news into a coherent game narrative via NIP systems would require robust AI, potentially straining development resources unless partnered with a news aggregator.

And there was more, but this gave me a few ideas. In the late 70’s there was something called RADAR scan transmissions. It used a RADAR to send communications around, I never saw it myself but I heard of it. Now consider that some use display software to use it in another way. Like the setting of images that are used (through personalised filters) to create art. That setting can be used in two ways, to rely on the art to help you find stuff, or the camera and filters to see other places. For instance scanning a picture might give you location data, images could given you personal references. That might be used in higher skill levels to make the game more challenging. For example the image of a droid hight give you the Droid Identification Number (DIN) is a unique 17-character code used to identify a specific droid, similar to a droid’s fingerprint. These are some of the settings that can be used to find other places and other (not in THAT dome) places. Certain cameras now have identifiers and some of that can be embedded in images. It allows for scanners to identify elements and we can use that to gain access to some places in a dome not considered before. 

These are some of the ideas that bring a stronger presence of gaming IP and when the IP is powerful enough, you get a new following and a stronger franchise. A stronger franchise was not my idea as a game needs to have an end and going on and on is not my way, but a stringer presence for any IP is always welcome and I found that setting as I was researching the Grok output. I had actually not anticipated that idea. Whatever will I think of next? 

Yet the setting of a larger technology presence was always my plan as I see that when too much of the SciFi becomes Fi, Fiction leads to fantasy and I am not against it, but I feel the need to adhere to a larger input of science and as my grandfather used to say, there is no place for science in Tartarus. Grandpapa was probably right. There is also a need for weapons, but not essentially personal weapons. The need to set traps might make a better droid killer than anything I could think of, but how to do that? Well, there are a few settings and only needed for security and military droids, the rest is basically harmless. The benefit of that, is that you will need to play strict rules with the stuff you find. And as the astronaut (played by you) might be a dunes in this regard, the need to create books or instruction discs that can be put into a viewer so that you gain these skills. For that I have a setting of multiple helmets (sprayed all over the game), some are mental and other helmets are suit connected systems string the knowledge to your body. In context (speculatively) Microsoft took years to launch a reboot of Fable (which was an awesome game) I wrote in months the setting of an entirely new RPG, so there. And should you doubt this (that would be a fair call), I have done this 4 times already. So where it there non existing AI now? 

So as they invaded the sanctity of my gaming life, I gave my gaming IP to everyone else, so where are their billons now? Whilst they aren’t getting it done, all the others will get a head start to gain momentum. That is how I roll (I am a vindictive bastard at times).

So back to the game. As I see other avenues to thwart detection, I am also setting the idea to make you viral into the security offices to set your ID to a ‘allowed and safe’ setting. The other systems will allow you to go outside the dome to repair and connect solar panels and as Mars gets a mere 44%, more panels are needed. In the later stages you will have to repair a fusion reactor (with a little snag or two). Oh, that reminds me, there will be a setting for survivors (a salute to System Shock), but that will take a little more time.

All this and more are now settling in my brain and as the ride between the domes gets to be repaired, I just thought of a new setting for the third dome, there is no absence of energy, but a massive abundance of energy which gave that dome its own problems and as such so will you. But that will be for another day and that is all for today ( the new day just started 11 minutes ago), so have a great day and I will snore and think of new gaming IP if possible.

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October 3, 2025 · 21:23

Falling Cards 

That is what happens when you piss of a gamer. And the setting that we see is given to us by the BBC. The story (at https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/ckgepkwpkg4o) gives us ‘Xbox Game Pass price increase angers players’ where we see “The company announced that the most popular tier of its Netflix-style video games system – available to PC and Xbox players – would rise by more than 50% from £14.99 to £22.99 per month.” That implies that the Game Pass is setting a gamer back to £276 per year. An annual fee of £276? That’s A$565 that comes down to a PS5 console a year. So what is the issue of pricing ones self out of a market? The Xbox is well over A$700, but this is starting to look ridiculous. The setting of Game Pass was pretty brilliant, but as it is showing to be a new form of gaming suicide. We are given “Reacting on social media, loads of fans said they had cancelled their Game Pass subscriptions, with some reporting the service’s cancellation page had crashed due to demand. BBC Newsbeat has asked Microsoft if the outage was linked to a surge in visits.” And in other news we were given “Ultimate – the most expensive tier – allows players to access new games from Microsoft-owned studios on the day of their release. These titles, which include series like Call of Duty, can retail for about £70 if purchased individually. As part of the changes, blockbuster games including Hogwarts Legacy and various Assassin’s Creed entries have been added to the Game Pass library. Microsoft said the new system would “offer more flexibility, choice, and value to all players”. But not everyone sees it that way.” I reckon that pretty much no one would see it that way (except for Microsoft sycophants). Consider that most people buy 1-3 games (to own) for about £200, as such the £76 to play ‘all’ the games? With what is released on Microsoft systems? There is still some appeal if you have both the PC and the Xbox, but I partially fail to see that. 

And there is another setting. You see, Activision was bought for $100 billion. And a few others for a lot less, but the setting is that Microsoft needs to make at least $4 billion to just pay for the interest and that is no longer happening and it is a lot less likely with these changes. Microsoft will be bleeding money for decades because of this. And as some are dropping Microsoft (Denmark and Austria) there will be a much larger setting that Microsoft needs to move on. I never saw the particulars, but I saw this and I saw the implosion within Microsoft at the end of 2026 and that is seemingly happening at this very moment. The fact that “the service’s cancellation page had crashed due to demand” is setting the shift out of gaming for Microsoft, because if that system cannot meet demands, there is a chance that millions might be dropping that system, good news for Sone and Nintendo. Gamers need their space and these two remain. I had seen a new system with a starting set of 50 million subscribers and that is now looking very appealing to the new players Amazon and the Kingdom Holdings. I reckon that renewed contact might become essential. 

As I see it, Microsoft eyes on their ‘price’ became too big and now they end up with a nearly empty eggshell. 

So how much of this is set in stone? I reckon that the pressure of the borrowed $100 billion is driving the upper echelons of Microsoft nearly insane, they bought into this and now their bottom line is drained (as I see it) and that is perhaps the saddest thing of all. Their setting that Don Mattrick started in 2013 would be the undoing of Microsoft, after the run they had with the XBOX360, they threw it all away. more than that. Fable was really big and after Fable III, Fable 4 was announced, then delayed and delayed which is now set to 2026. Chances are that this too will be canceled. An Amazing setting that started in 2004 saw massive flocking by the RPG community, then Fable 2 and Fable 3 (2010) and the people were sold on the Fable story and it was quite a story, but some come in and likely state that it could be bigger, and bigger and now it is as I see it gone, because if the Xbox community vanishes, the need for that game vanishes. The PC world alone will not maintain it. So as I see it the cards for Microsoft are falling and not in a good place. This is exactly why I put some of my Gaming IP out there for non-Microsoft developers. As I saw it, they could grow and whilst I am not a programmer, I do see gaming as the power it is. It can invigorate people in many ways. And now as Microsoft is about to fail, if they took up the setting of the games I offered, they could set out their new terrain in gaming. There is still Bethesda, but as I see it, it is part of Microsoft and as such their games get delays too and the new players will get to carve their name in stone in the vacant places of that stone. 

So whilst we see “Microsoft Gaming revenue was $5.5 billion” And that is great, but the Nintendo revenue is set to be approximately $13.1 billion, as such Microsoft is a mere small fish in gaming, no matter how they slice it. And others are about to carve up a piece of Microsoft in the process. Because Microsoft still has to deal with the $100,000,000,000 invoice. So where will this money come from? And whilst their arsenal of gaming outlets is diminishing, the appeal for their products goes the same way. As such, we might seem to think it will be okay for Microsoft, what products did it actually release? And on what systems were the returns given for the Remaster of Oblivion? 

It might have taken some time, but after 10 years I get to laugh deriving howl of laughter. Microsoft took on too big a chunk of arrogance and they are not turning it into dollars, merely into delays and canceled games and canceled subscribers. All the way until Microsoft gaming is canceled. 

Have a great day and If you are on a PS5 have fun catching the ghost of Yokai and on the Nintendo feel free to Kart around the world. Those victories are the moments you will cherish as long as you live.

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September 15, 2025 · 11:54

Cracks are showing

That is the setting of this day. In under 5 minutes three articles passed by my eyes and it is a clear sign that cracks are showing. I will give you an article first. The article (at https://www.cbr.com/xbox-game-pass-end-of-era/) gives us ‘It’s Officially the End of an Era for Xbox Game Pass’, I am in the meddle of that settings. I cannot disagree and I cannot completely agree. We are given “Game Pass might be a great deal for players, but unfortunately, it comes at the cost of devaluing developers and their work. If the system keeps running the way it does now, it’ll only get less sustainable over time, and if Game Pass crashes, a lot of people are going down with it.” Yes I agree with that statement, however “it comes at the cost of devaluing developers and their work” is a little validating what a fool hands for their games. Consider Hogwarts Legacy, the devoted Harry Potter fan goes ‘Take my money…now!’ whilst plenty of other gamers go ‘Not in 999,999 years, 11 months, 30 days, 23 hours, 59 minutes and 50 seconds’, as I see it ‘Not in a million years’ sounds so crass (big smiley). So the statement is out there and lets be clear Game Pass was a great idea. But it comes at a cost. You see, Microsoft needs the game pass to give validation of the Blizzard/Activision deal, together with Bethesda they spend a little over  $100,000,000,000 and as it stands and as I see it, to cross that deal they have to make over $6.5 billion dollars a year just to make the interest go away and last year it merely banked 5 billion an change. This is a loss of well over a billion a year just for the interest of this caper. I thought it was a bad deal the moment it was announced and I wrote about it in 2022/2023. So with the end of game pass this deal gets to be the sour apple that gives Microsoft indigestion. But like the infomercials say “There is more” and there is. 

You see we are also given ‘Microsoft Is Axing This Android App. You Have 3 Weeks to Find a Replacement’ (at https://au.pcmag.com/hosted-email-providers/113075/microsoft-is-axing-this-android-app-you-have-3-weeks-to-find-a-replacement) and you know, there is and there has always been a replacer ent from the day that thing was called into service. It is called GMAIL. It has always worked well and it is not riddled with hidden Microsoft snags. So whilst we are given “A year ago, Microsoft celebrated 10 million Outlook Lite downloads. Effective Oct. 6, however, Redmond says it’s being retired ‘so we can focus our investments’ on the main Outlook app.” I will counter that that this setting was in play since 1998, so the investments should be there and in order. But when you see “so we can focus our investments” and consider the previous article, we see the beginning of cracks in the armor of Microsoft. Cracks in its spin settings and telling the world how great it is doing as a 3.79 trillion company. You see, there is a lot more bad news ahead  for them and none of it is great. Yet that is beyond the third article and it comes with speculations.

You see, the third article is one I have issues with (I’m on the side of Microsoft here). The article (at https://www.gamesradar.com/games/the-elder-scrolls/after-4-months-oblivion-remastered-falls-to-mixed-reviews-on-steam-after-reports-of-poor-and-unstable-performance-on-pc-it-is-still-well-and-truly-a-bethesda-game/) gives us ‘After 4 months, Oblivion Remastered falls to “Mixed” reviews on Steam after reports of “poor and unstable” performance on PC: “It is still well and truly a Bethesda game”’ There are a few issues here. I played it on the PS5 (as one should) and I believe it was a truly great remaster. I found one glitch (optional a bug) and I got around this. Whilst we see that Cyrodil is massively shown in the greatness that it deserves and better than the Xbox360 edition, I got the same feeling of amazement here as I did in the original. And I have a few issues with the “poor and unstable” side of the matter. Yes a steam system and most PC’s do not allow for a NVIDIA GeForce RTX 5090 (and neither does the wallet of these gamers), as such they are playing with the overclocking left, right and centre. And not every application allows for that and becomes ‘unstable’. But the term overclocking sells systems and as long as the warnings are there, they allow for it, but software tends to be tricky and I believe that this is shown here. I never did that and I found one glitch (optional bug) in my PS5 edition of Oblivion and I think that this is amazing quality. So there is a larger audience who will ‘convict’ Microsoft in falsehood. 

As I see it, these settings will optionally call for Google to bring back to life the Stadia and I have a setting that will nearly guarantee a starting setting of 6 billion a year and past that stage one an increase to $10-$15 billion annually. I merely don’t want Microsoft to get that part, they tinkered with the freedom of gamers, so they are out. Amazon had the inside track for over two year and they didn’t take me seriously (my speculation of them seeing my idea) and now as the Microsoft cracks are showing we see a larger workspace of gaining over 15 million gamers and a whole lot more in other places. That warrants a new look at the stadia. I thought it was a great idea for the Kingdom Holdings to gain the hand on the Stadia, but as I see it, they seemingly lacked vision there too. As such Google now has a new upper hand and as I accused them of leaving billions on the floor, it is their turn to pick this up, fair is fair.

So whilst the cracks are showing others can gain the leverage of Microsoft (and make it fall at least a third in total value and the would make buy words golden too (and I get to hand a wooden spoon with gold engravings to Phil Spencer) as such my ego is at present a little unbearable to me as well. 

A setting that was foreseen at least two years ago and now there is a new stage in that setting, or better stated a remastered setting of the same stage and that is a nice touch on silly old me.

So have a great Monday, which at present feels like a new Friday to me.

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September 4, 2025 · 13:19

Revenue ignored

That is the setting I see. It is likely that others do not see it that way and that is fine. I and referring to Ubisoft. I got their product AC Shadow last week. At present I can only afford it as a preowned game, that is life. But as it is one of the first preowned games I am getting in that way, I am now ‘devoid’ of the initial codes for cosmetic extras. That is fine, I get that these codes are not transferable. That is the benefit of the full game purchasers. However considering that this game was as such 50% cheaper, Ubisoft is also out of revenue. So, I am guessing that Ubisoft has the option to ‘reclaim’ additional revenue.

As such I now do not have:

  • Thrown to the dogs bonus quest
  • Claws of Awaji expansion
  • Yasuke Sekiryu Character pack

I am not complaining on this, codes are not transferable and I think that is fair, but then I thought that these codes might be optionally bought for $3-$5 after a while. So lets say that there is a delay to buy these codes by months up to 12 months. So those who bought the full codes get these ‘extras’ for up to a year and after that Ubisoft can get sales from these codes. It could bank them millions. Optionally you could earn them through the Ubisoft store for exchanging these Ubi-coins. That is up to them, but I reckon that this solution is something that could bank them millions. This is set to the dozen of so games they released and for the millions of people who bought a preowned game. I am actually surprised that no one bought this to the attention of that youthful young scoundrel called Yves Guillemot (apparently the CEO of that place). It is not that CEO’s walk away from revenue, as such I wonder why this was decided. I get that there should be an advantage to the buying population, but after 6 month or a year? I reckon that there is a case t be made for that revenue.

And that is after the setting where Ubisoft is walking away from millions. Ah well, some people can afford to walk away from that amount of money. What a luxury.

As I see it, there is now an additional reason to add a Japanese language model to the idea’s that I already spouted and Ubisoft has another reason to reconsider some of the ideas that re out in the open. And as I see it, Apple is dragging its feet as well. But then they decided to call themselves innovative people (lacking innovation that is).

Anyway, from my point of view AC Shadows is a magnificent product. I was a little upset by the 140GB is had to download and it took hours to do this. But then no one is perfect (almost no one).

So whilst you consider the impact of all that material that could now be downloaded to enhance your playing ability, consider the impact of all these games getting a second stage and what additions could now spice up their wallets in addition to issues they forgotten they had. 

Have a great day, Vancouver will join us in this Thursday in a little under 4 hours.

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August 23, 2025 · 11:28

Monster of creativity wakes up

Yup, that ghastly monster called creativity is rearing its ugly head again and it is merely 10:20 in the morning. On a Saturday no less. So I already have the drop on DARPA in at least three military inventions and one of them is a stealth system. But after I had a novel idea on taking Russian airfields, I now have another thought. What if we change the collective to another field? What if we push the Russian forces to deploy differently? Consider that Russia has around 61 airfields and we push them to ‘overpopulate’ 61 of them. They would require to seed around 31000 soldiers who are set to try to keep them safe. And it is safe to say that they will fail. That will jump the stress levels in the Kremlin by a lot. So as I thought this through I have to say that I am pretty proud of myself. As I see it I was leading DARPA 6-0 in this endeavor and now I am adding at least three field goals to this setting. I would need to confer with the Ukrainian consul general on this setting. And make it known that the Commonwealthian people support them. I might be too old to go into the field, but my brain works quite well. And I tend to like to show some people that they missed the target on me by a lot. And in the setting that I could optionally show these Russian courtesans that there are people who use their thinking caps to support the Ukrainian people (and I have a really good friend who will appreciate that too).

So off I am, trying to make Russian lives a little harder as President Trump is doing little to nothing in that field. Oh, he might act in 10 days (which is a deadline he gave three times over) so as such I am leading there too. So with the naval stealth system and now with ‘optional’ drone collaboration, we have a new premise. The Russian army will have to support the hind sites by a lot more than they have space for, isn’t that the nexus of non-violence? A teaching moment on how you can promote nonviolence by blowing up violent machines. It’s a brand new day. Anyway. I came to it via another IP and that is a lovely setting. The pass through method in creating abilities. 

In other news, I also gained the insight that might help dwindling down the number of Helicopters they have. According to news sources, they only downed 340 of these suckers. So I came up with a few methods to add to that dastardly low number. Same invention with a slightly different approach to doing the deed. 

Well that is my support to the next setting and I reckon it is time to give gaming a new vibe as I was continue to play Hogwarts Legacy to get 1 of them (in this case a Slytherin) person to 100% on everything I had a few thoughts that could be used in the sequel to this game. So in stead of having one battle achievement, have at least two. One stealth option one general option. I like to sneak up to my adversary and blow him away (or petrify the opponent) and in that case my last battle outfit becomes available. There were a few other things that bugged me, but as it is not a bug or a glitch, it is a little in the open. What does matter is that  the game should be 100% perfect. Now this is a large call and I am not faulting the makers of Hogwarts Legacy of anything, as far as I see it this program is near perfect and I have been playing it off and on since its release in 2023, so I have had two full years of joy. As I see it Avalanche Software should be proud of its achievement. Whilst I truly believe this, I also think that games can always be better, but this is often found whilst playing the game. And that is where people like me come in. The developer tends to be too close to the source and it requires a little distance to upgrade something good. I already mentioned 4-6 upgrades to this game making it a next game issue. And I have more to offer at present. I added jobs to the setting, careers that differ per house and after that I considered and planned the upgrade of any location to a new living space and you cannot convert them all, but you can create a living space for any character you create and a setting for any house to have a Gryffindor, Hufflepuff, Ravenclaw or Slytherin theme. And they all have settings. And as you optionally create 4 houses in the total of regions that you open up where each location has a Clevian portal to access the houses. Like the mirror in Hogwarts Legacy. A mirror space that creates a space to the other house. In that instance you have a setting to leap into other places. But this doesn’t happen automatic, the ancient magic required is massive (like three bars per creation) it stops doing that from level 1 and it allows the game to evolve the player as needed. Then there is the idea that some of the achievements done in the first game (like stargazing) now open up secondary missions. As such you need to interact with the NPC’s in more ways then one. As such there are more influences coming. What was done in HL1 was great, but now it is time to hand the game more leniency in distinguishing. As such the dark spells could also be a hindrance to gain access to alternative settings (unless other professions are chosen). It makes the game a lot more of a moral compass and it sets the wannabe wizards apart from the real ones ;-P

This makes me think of another setting. I met a man in the Epic Universe, some dodgy dude names ‘Jackal’ and he looked nothing like a jackal. He called himself E. Redmayne esq. He was wearing the most amazing cosplay lookalike of the man, the legend, Newt Scamander. You might think this is a ruse, but it is not, it is a hint, The same could be said for some youthful young sprout named Meg March. So take this setting and set it across the nightmares these Hogwarts candidates face when going into the thoughts of some creatures they face. As any Wizard (Witches too) have dark sides, we get a new setting. One that could optionally give us mini games. I am hesitant to set that setting, because not all mini games are good, but it is an option to consider. In that same setting I created a ‘magical’ version of Ice Hockey and that too had a few sidelines to consider (I wrote about it earlier). Now consider that we have another option beside quidditch as a sport to consider. Taking all this to the stage does not mean I created a better Hogwarts Legacy, it is just a few ideas for these developers to use and there is no charge, whatever I wrote to the game is now owned by Avalanche software and JK Rowling. I just did away with the hassle of greed that some see when they face these thoughts. I just handed it over to the makers of the connected IP. Im the kind of guy. I have enough IP to cross over a dozen times. 

So monster of creativity, get back to bed and consider using this to emphasize gaming IP, or IT IP, not merely weapons based IP. It gives me the creepy crawlers.

Have a great Saturday.

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August 13, 2025 · 17:48

The story script of lore

Yup, nice and confusing, isn’t it? But that is the setting. As I was playing Skyrim (yet again) the thoughts of lore went through my head. And RPG players might remember this. You escape the large lizard (aka Dragon), you go to Riverwood and then to Whiterun where you join the companions. Linear in extremity. Now, this is not critique. This is how RPG were played in 2011 and the hardware pretty much set you up for that. So, remember Richard Garriott who gave us the ultimate RPG in Ultima. I got introduced to his master skills in 1983 with Ultima 3, Exodus. But his idea were not used to the largest extent. Now I don’t want to copy his sewing, but the idea that every person has the ability to evolve their choice. Perhaps through an intro story where you have to make choices. So, to connect this to Skyrim, the choices will set you to a setting that will push you to Riften (thieves guild), Whiterun (fighters guild), Winterhold (Mage Guild) or Falkreath (Dark Brotherhood) there are a few other options (but I don’t want to give away the plot for others) There you get the option to get into the Stormcloaks or the Empire forces. Now we have to allow for a few other things, but the setting that you end up going to Whiterun to get to Bleak Falls Barrow, so that need not change, but the setting to give variety to this introduction is an option, and it could happen AFTER to evade that initial sneaky lizard. This could also be the first companion you get. IT doesn’t seem much, but the setting to avoid linearity tends to be massive in RPG’s. In addition to this, finding books, not just for skills but also for quests is a second. I wrote about this and it requires a more dynamic version of books. Skyrim is already doing this, but not with a dynamic pre skilled setting. 

In addition, there is the setting to adjust the game by alternative skills. Skills that are given to you by your parent (an intro choice really), so as that story evolves, you get skills in art, smithing, archery and magic. So as you start of with two of them. You get more pronounced maps, you get the option to see more in your surroundings. You might get a better view on ores and smithing, you get options to see more in shopping, which normally comes from personality. And over time you get the others too, but it shapes you more in the way you get through the first 20 levels and it is important to have balance there, so that people will try other things, not try the same thing at the start and then adjust the choices for the game.

This allows for the setting to own a shop and a trainee that tends to the shop. This opens up a new cog in managing the game and nowadays it is doable and has been for a while. I set that up for the game IP I created last year (might have been 2-3 years ago). The issue is not on Bethesda, they did a good job, but it is now in our hands to push this envelope higher. You cannot relay on one game maker to see it all through. That is where we are required to push new levels.

One of these things is the need to create your OWN journal and shape it through playing. Not just the expected quest things, the setting that you get to a cave and you cannot see how to continue, or a door that is locked. It makes sense that you make notice of this and optionally a tab to remember that you have to go back to this. The idea I had (for streaming games) that this journal could be exported as a pdf. A novel idea for RPG gamers (the novel part was the pun). An additional setting was the art setting, if you did not get this skill in the beginning, the art in your journal might be ‘lacking’ until you do get it, the same could be said for mapmaking. 

As I see it, the current approach is not wrong, but a little ‘vanilla’ (I actually hate that term). So as we see the additional cogs in the game we make the RGP more of an adventure. And whilst some titles in books are a given (also magical skill books) but some could have similar or a dozen settings for the title, so you can stop looking for a certain title. It is just an idea, but it could give the larger setting to non-linearity (and I am all for that).

So this was what I came up with yesterday and then I forgot it. My mind is flaky and weird, I know.

But these are things that could invigorate the desire for RPG games and I took Skyrim as an example, but this could equally done to the Fallout series. Anyway, that was the setting I was confronted with and even as I typed parts of this in the past, I saw this setting to see to the larger evolving stage of RPG’s.

Have a great day and don’t be a silly hero, when you see a dragon in your path, be like a mouse and let the police take care of that sucker.

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August 1, 2025 · 23:28

The Nintendo Charge

Nintendo makes another blitz record, it is not the first one, but this one is one for the record books. The story (at https://www.videogameschronicle.com/news/nintendo-has-sold-6-million-switch-2-consoles-and-almost-the-same-number-of-mario-kart-world/) gives us ‘Nintendo has sold 6 million Switch 2 consoles and almost the same number of Mario Kart World’ as for my excuse not being part of that cluster is simple. I just don’t have the money at present. Nintendo played a near perfect awareness game. They went global with the teaser, they followed up with YouTube video’s and gave online presence. When Zero-hour was here. The streets were aligned around shops who sold it with people. We all wanted one, even the ones that couldn’t afford one. And there was a lot of interest. The expanded memory, larger screen, higher resolution, snap click controllers with magnets and the controller was also used as a mouse. 256GB against the 32GB of the original Switch. Basically everything was stronger. One exception, the battery life seemingly is not. I run my Switch on the TV, so I won’t ever see this one issue. And on the TV, you now get 4K. Cheaper than either Xbox or PS5 (not by that much) Nintendo made the record books yet again. In the first 7 weeks the Nintendo sold 6 million Switch 2 consoles and the real screamer is that nearly all of them got Mario Kart World, it sold 5.63 million copies. That is huge. I saw the videos and I would get that as my first game too. 

So when we se all this we tend to think, what is next? But that is it, this setting will hurt Sony as well as Microsoft to some degree. People can no longer afford it all and when they get a Switch 2, their coffers are nearly empty as such, no direct sales for either Sony or Microsoft. Microsoft with its Game Pass will have an advantage over Sony (for the first time) and it will not be as hindered by Nintendo as Sony is, but they too will feel the pain. I reckon that this will continue straight through Christmas 2025. Because those who can not afford it at present, will work harder to get one before or at this Christmas (hopefully me too). 

So whilst we get the quote “Despite being a launch title and being constrained by its user base, Mario Kart World is the series’ second biggest launch behind Mario Kart Wii.” And that makes sense. I see the improvements and the plusses that Mario Kart World is bringing and I reckon that this game alone is the largest push to get the Nintendo Camera as well. It goes further, As of June 30, 2025, the Nintendo Switch has sold a total of 153.10 million units worldwide. This makes it the third best-selling video game console of all time and now add the 6 million Switch 2 systems and we see that Nintendo is overtaking Microsoft by storm. Consider that at present Xbox Series X/S (2020): Estimated over 28 million units as of June 2024. This implies that Switch 2 is already at 21% of Xbox Series X/S lifetime sales. And the Switch already surpassed that. This sets the  Microsoft systems in third position and should Amazon agree to my terms Microsoft becomes the 4th player. Not bad after spending Activision Blizzard for $68.7 billion. That was money well spend wasn’t it? And should Amazon agree to surpass Microsoft too, that 68 billion dollar anchor will weigh harshly on their actions. The funny part is that neither Sony or Nintendo had to pay that much for anything they bought (as far as I know). And there is more (there always is) Nintendo is should of breaking its own record of the Nintendo DS which sold 154 million consoles. The Switch is now less then a million away from that record. It is anyones guess how far the Switch 2 will make it, but as I see it the numbers are in favor of Switch replacing a lot of systems within the next year. Nintendo said there were no changes to its financial forecast for this fiscal year, which is to sell 15 million consoles by March 2026. I tend to think that this number will be broken in several ways by Christmas 2024. That is before we consider the pleasing notions of all the Harry Potter fans who will be driven to this game on the Switch 2 as well. Yes, Nintendo is about to break record and this is the first time that I am saying this, but Nintendo is now approaching the pole position that Sony holds, as such they will have to up their game considerably if they do not want to be taken over by Nintendo, because that is no longer impossible. I don’t think Sony was ready to see the Switch family as a threat to their number one position, but that is the setting that they face in 2026, as such I wonder what Sony will come up with next. 

The armistice race on consoles tends to be a fulfilling one and there is the second step. When Nintendo get that done, it will find more gamers switching to their side. Although I have always stated that the Nintendo is the system you get next to your usual console, I still believe that and as such Nintendo tends to have great options. I merely wonder when Hogwarts Legacy 2 is released will it be released on day one for Switch 2 too? You might think that this doesn’t matter, but it does. It will be the first moment when Nintendo will have surpassed Sony and that is the kind of news that is massive in its own right. Sony released its PlayStation on December 3, 1994, it went straight to the top from the start and it will have taken Nintendo 32 years to overtake Sony and that is not something to think lightly of. I certainly am not. 

So, I merely have this to say “Well done Nintendo”

Have a great day today 

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July 19, 2025 · 22:54

Creating a new stage

That is what happened to me. In a near instant I created a new kind of RPG (all developers make that claim) and what triggered it was an image of a futuristic building it looked (largely) like the imperial city in Cyrodil, but it wasn’t. This set my brain on a side trip. What if the main character (the person you play) has two sides? A waking stage and a sleeping stage and in that instant we could ‘complicate’ matters. So in one setting you are in a renaissance setting and you get to start there. Story like any RPG, and it is the setting that matters. And whilst you are going through the intro, you get to embrace how you work the game (nothing spectacular). And as you go through the working of the game, you get introduced to some of the background of where you are. There are multiple stories in line (unexplored as of yet). But the kicker comes when you are at the fatigue point and you need to get to sleep.

This sets up the second stage, in this setting you are in a different place. A very futuristic space. Centuries ahed from where you were and if the first place is the 14th century, the second place is a thousand years later. It also comes with ‘issues’. The game will set the new hurdles. If you favored the bow in one, you become a sniper in game in the other. The several blunt weapons will make you a cop in the other and so on. There is the idea that tomes and scrolls open missions and storylines in the second game and visa versa. I am still working out the settings in my mind, but the idea that you ed up with two games at the same time and they are connected is something new. The idea is to get the storylines will also set you in doubt of what part of the game is you awake and where you are asleep. It doesn’t really matter, you could be awake in both, but the setting that one triggers options in the other is basically new and not always useful and you play, but there is a novelty on the setting you cannot avoid. The second setting is on how it works in the other direction. In the future we have memo’s, mails messages and other means of interacting, but they would open missions and quests in the first game. There are still a few issues to think through and I feel good about it, but would it work? It has never been done before, that is for sure and I feel good about the idea, but it is not about me. It is about the IP and getting new IP out there in the gaming world is (as I personally see it) important. More important we see all these ‘big boys’ like EA, Ubisoft and Bethesda ‘dragging’ their feet for years and in under 8 months I placed at least 4 new games in my blog and handed ideas for Ubisoft to expand their arsenal using their old games. As such I wonder who the actual game drivers are (I believe it is me). 

Still, this idea has merit and I will need to see through a few more iterations of this idea before it is even close to ready for development, but I will keep my head high and struggle through the ideas I have. 

Have a great day and enjoy this Saturday.

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