The Losers: Starz, Apple TV+, Hulu, and Disney+ Are Bleeding Subscribers While Redbox Dies And YouTube TV Possibly Plateaus

As economies across Europe, Asia, Africa, and the Americas experience a slowdown or recession, a global trend of people reassessing and terminating their streaming subscriptions is emerging. Hulu saw a drop of slightly more than half a million subscribers from December to the end of May. Disney+ lost approximately 300,000 subscribers in that timeframe, continuing its downward subscriber trend reported earlier this year. Surprisingly, the most significant subscriber decline comes from Starz, whose streaming application lost 800,000 subscribers in the first half of 2024. You would be wrong if you think things are better for streaming services connected to popular hardware. Apple TV+ lost over 500,000 subscribers and is now hovering at only about 17 million paid accounts. Even YouTube TV reportedly lost 150,000 subscribers in Q1 2024, a further signal of a global and worldwide trend that people are simply growing tired of managing multiple streaming accounts. It is important to note that many reports of subscriber losses come from Moffett Nathanson, an independent equity research publisher for the telecom industry. Their models foresee a total loss of 2.37 million customers in the United States for cable, satellite, and live TV streaming providers and approximately 10 million by the end of 2024. To underscore why these numbers are not a random divination, cable and satellite companies lost almost 7 million subscribers in 2023.

The company most likely to hit the panic button is The Walt Disney Company. It operates Hulu and Disney+, which steamrolled trends of people trimming their streaming subscriptions from a half dozen to just two to three. Worse, Disney's streaming platforms have been losing paid subscribers since late 2022, with Disney+ and Hulu finishing 2023 with a net loss of total paid subscriptions. In the first quarter of 2023, Disney+ lost 1.3 million subscribers, likely due to a price increase and multiple programming cancellations on the platform. However, as far back as 2022, Disney's corporate leaders had to concede to shareholders that the rapid growth of Disney+ didn't generate enough money to offset the cost of developing hardware to support its streaming efforts and fund original programming. For the last THREE YEARS, Disney's message to shareholders hasn't been about profit but narrowing losses, which, in 2023, it proudly exclaimed it had narrowed by $300 million. Apple TV+'s mistake continues to be that it is only useable via streaming devices that are far more expensive than the rest of your options AND require an investment into Apple's OS ecosystem, which many people are unwilling to make. Starz is an unmitigated disaster right now as Lionsgate attempts to spin it off as a separate enterprise while shutting down its UK division. In short, Starz is a tire fire after Lionsgate management favored Lionsgate during its spin-off from Starz, which has infuriated bondholders and left the streaming service in an incredibly challenged and compromised position.

This makes the only real "surprise" of these streaming subscriber dips YouTube TV's drop. Previously, Industry insiders were prognosticating that YouTube TV would eventually become the cable channel distributor of choice for most Americans and Europeans in the next five years and that cable TV would opt to stream content on YouTube versus dedicated apps. It's far too early to view a single-quarter loss after seven years of growth as a sign that interest in YouTube TV has plateaued. YouTube remains the thorn in traditional media's side that will not disappear, and the industry continues to fight it like an existential threat along with Netflix. Nonetheless, YouTube's attempt to create an alternative to Netflix and Hulu seems stuck at around 8 million subscribers despite YouTube funneling ads for it non-stop. The other issue with YouTube is that people need help to name original programming on YouTube TV outside of Cobra Kai, which it dropped and is now a Netflix property. So, is under 10 million subscribers enough to generate a profit on YouTube TV? Judging from YouTube's pay television competition not managing that with triple those numbers, probably not. Yet, like the rest of the streaming field, YouTube's aggressive expansion plans will continue.

And now let's talk about Redbox and Crackle! They're dead! The odds of ever seeing a functioning Redbox kiosk grace the ends of your local grocery store or pharmacy seem unlikely after Redbox's parent company, Chicken Soup for the Soul Entertainment (i.e., CSSE), got official approval in a bankruptcy court to move from Chapter 11 to Chapter 7 bankruptcy. That means all of CSSE's employees, which stands at around a thousand, will be out of a job and not entitled to any form of benefits or compensation. It is worth noting that Redbox had an independent streaming arm and that its finances and profitability peaked as far back as 2013. Likewise, Chicken Soup for the Soul Entertainment maintained another streaming division beyond Redbox, Crackle, which it bought from Sony. Chicken Soup for the Soul Entertainment bought Redbox for $375 million despite knowing that Redbox had a mounting debt problem and bought Crackle under similar circumstances from Sony. Furthermore, financial mismanagement has been alleged at CSSE, which reeks of gross negligence more than anything else. Still, its failure does speak to a growing trend of mid-tier streaming services struggling within the current landscape, and the demise of Redbox is a massive blow to those who prefer physical media for movies.

The Winners: Netflix, Crunchyroll, Paramount+, Peacock, and (Maybe) Max

To say Netflix has bucked industry trends in the streaming market would be a MASSIVE understatement. Netflix has done everything insiders and consumer advocates have told them not to do and has seen continual growth and skyrocketing revenue regardless. After initiating its password-sharing crackdown, not only did it NOT experience the wave of subscription cancellations many thought was coming, but new paid memberships jumped in its first financial quarter following the policy change. In late 2023, 39% of Netflix subscribers indicated that they would cancel their subscriptions if Netflix increased prices, and then that did not happen in 2024 after price increases launched. Netflix's new ad-based tier, which was initially mocked online, has gone on to become one of the primary reasons why Netflix continues to spurn forecasts that it will see declining subscription growth. Disney+, Apple TV+, Starz, Hulu, and more have all been denounced for canceling original programming and suffered from subscriber cancellations as a result. Netflix is NOTORIOUS for canning shows that show initial promise but do not meet their sometimes lunasensical streaming targets. And yet, they have NOT faced as much blowback from their audience for their penchant for cancellations. That's not to say Netflix is your friend. Since scaling up its business, it has been repeatedly accused of exploiting tax havens and making deals with totalitarian dictatorships for the sake of increasing its international footprint. There's also the fact that it has repeatedly been a platform for pseudoscience and transphobia. And yet, many of us are still subscribing, and when push comes to shove, we show a sense of brand loyalty to Netflix that other companies would kill for.

When you look at what Netflix has done over the past four to five years, its streaming dominance should be fracturing, as it has done everything wrong theoretically. And yet, that's not the case. Despite the growing signs that people are less satisfied with Netflix than ever, most people have overwhelmingly cited it as their most desired or #1 streaming app in theoretical streaming bundles at 81%. It has original programming that people want to watch, and that's international and not just limited to the United States or Western Europe. Despite all of the consternation, Netflix has an easy-to-use streaming player that works for all ages and languages, and its technical backend is indisputably the best in the industry. However, Netflix's greatest asset is its incredibly successful international expansion program. Unlike its competition, it's still viewed in many markets as a newcomer with no cable presence, which means it is not tied to long-standing traditional telecom media agreements and regulations. Its ability to introduce its streaming service has been incredibly rapid, with Russia and China being the only "major" markets it has avoided due to political or regulatory reasons.

Crunchyroll's rapid expansion while avoiding too many subscriber revolts in response to price increases should also be no surprise. For many, it's the only option on the table to watch anime programming. With the demise of television networks carrying anime shows beyond the most prominent names, Crunchyroll is it, and the service knows it. Despite some relaying monopoly concerns, it shut down Funimation after merging with it. And even in light of a not insignificant price increase, Crunchyroll now sports a 13 million subscriber count. That number is small compared to other services listed in this blog, but it is nothing to scoff at, and there's no disputing that it is bound to grow even more despite the struggles of more prominent names in the streaming application market. The reality is that Crunchyroll is inheriting a world in which anime is the most ubiquitous it has ever been, and that's a worldwide trend. It can snap up thousands of new subscribers by simply announcing a new anime that is exclusive to its application or the renewal of programming that's already there. Its only immediate threats are Netflix and Hulu, as well as smaller services like HiDive. The more meaningful threat is a growing body of anime producers who are more open-minded to alternatives. The amount of legacy anime you can legally watch for free on YouTube with ads is shocking. Furthermore, if Netflix wasn't so one-sided with its relationship with anime producers, it could probably make a stronger push in the market.

Peacock and Paramount+ might seem like the oddest streaming services to post subscriber gains, not losses. However, consider these three key items. First, Paramount+ and Peacock joined other major television networks in carrying the Super Bowl and have live-sports coverage, with a MASSIVE advantage going to Peacock with its service having the most comprehensive sports coverage of any streaming service thanks to it having NBC Sports, Telemundo Deportes, and WWE. A similar advantage goes to Paramount+, which has CBSSports in its streaming package. However, while it has NFL coverage, its edge increasingly stems from its in-depth buffet of international association football games. Live sports might seem like a "boomer issue." Nevertheless, it is moving the needle for older demographics that traditionally have hesitated to jump on cable cutting. It should come as no surprise that CBS, NBC, Netflix, and Amazon have placed bids to buy more live sports matches on their streaming platforms and not less. Yes, Disney owns ESPN, but for a variety of reasons, ESPN has long been the sick puppy of Disney's live television networks. Costs for running the channel and its services are skyrocketing. Likewise, it is bleeding talent and editors, relies increasingly on the "talking heads" format on the television programming it does have and continues to see a drop in subscribers to its ESPN+ service. Finally, Paramount+ has one "X Factor" many people aren't giving it credit for, and that's getting the endorsement of Walmart. For those unaware, Paramount+, despite all of the uncertainty regarding the future of its owner, National Amusements, is now bundled as part of Walmart+, Walmart's attempt to create a competitor to Amazon Prime. Much like Prime Video, there's concern about engagement as most are using Walmart+ to reap monetary benefits from purchases that have nothing to do with streaming films and TV shows. However, being bundled this way has boosted subscribers and opened a floodgate to a new source of income for Paramount+, allowing it to sign new sports licenses and secure additional original programming.

Speaking of Amazon, I will dismiss them from this blog section for a few reasons. One, their video streaming service is lopped into their all-encompassing Amazon Prime subscription, which many people join for the monetary discounts and advertised shipping and handling benefits you get on the Amazon marketplace. Most people are not interested in interacting with Amazon video services the way the company wants them to, and the data shows that only around one in ten Amazon Prime users are interested in upgrading their Prime Video subscription beyond the basic one they get via Prime that doles out ads during movies. So, when Amazon says they have the second largest video streaming subscription user base supporting them, they're technically correct, but only partially so when you factor in engagement.

Likewise, Max is equally guilty of cheating. Warner Bros. Discovery believes that by the end of 2024, it will be able to crack the 100 million subscriber threshold, and it probably will. However, they are shy about admitting that they are lopping current and legacy Discovery+ users and legacy HBO and HBO Max subscribers who still need to transition into Max. The numbers might look great on paper, but Warner Bros. Discovery's streaming community lacks cohesion, and there's no guarantee that its users will universally jump from their old services to Max. And there's one final note about Max that I wish to share. Recently, Warner Bros. Discovery announced it would be rebranding its marquee and IP-based television productions as "HBO Originals," suggesting that they are beginning to realize that ditching the HBO name might have been a bad call.

The Other Streaming Platforms And Prognosticating About The Future

The lesson that studios with streaming applications are discovering is that while the audience for streaming TV and film content is aging, they are also becoming increasingly fickle. Despite the streaming user base growing older, two things are starting to happen. Streaming users are cutting their accounts immediately when their favorite shows get canceled, something Disney and others are trying to address by always having this "buffet" of legacy content to complement original or exclusive programming. Unfortunately for them, this strategy isn't as effective as it once was and the usage of film, TV, and music piracy websites is increasing. You might have this mental image of Disney+ or Hulu being this platform your mother or uncle uses to relive their memories, but something is happening with your mom. She's becoming knowledgeable on how to use the internet and is as frustrated with our current streaming future as you and I are. Also, our generation is getting older, and while we would prefer our services to be easy to use and legal, we still remember our early internet experiences from yesteryear. Finally, with all of these streaming platforms seemingly thinking the solution to their problems is to raise prices, complimented by the stagnation of wages, people worldwide are reassessing which streaming applications are necessities.

The countermeasures to limit losses are familiar cable television battleaxes. The first is live sports. Almost every significant streaming outlet is attempting to close deals to secure long-term sports programming for terrestrial airwaves AND streaming. This past month, the NBA has been at the center of jockeying between NBCUniversal (i.e., Comcast), Warner Bros. Discovery, Disney, and Amazon to see which one will be without basketball games, with NBC estimated to be paying $2.5 billion per season and Amazon shelling out $1.8 billion per year to nudge out Warner Bros Discovery-owned TNT. Now, "program fortification" is a favorite among networks when steering audiences toward their streaming platforms. Nevertheless, the data on how effective it is regarding licensed live programming is mixed. Fox notoriously lost millions on its deal to pry Smackdown from the USA Network. Yet, Amazon's Thursday Night Football deal has net significant gains and might warrant credit in popularizing the sport to younger demographics. The second countermeasure is far more annoying but has been immediately more cost-friendly for media companies: free ad-driven streaming services. Joke all you want, but Tubi and Pluto TV are the fastest-growing streaming services. While most people suspect that this is due to Tubi and Pluto TV slicing away a more substantial share of traditional TV watchers through the growing proliferation of Smart TVs, there's no doubt that there are people who prefer streaming but don't want to open their wallets to ANOTHER monthly subscription. Similarly, these ad-drive platforms have been consistent money-makers, and advertising partners seem to love them.

And then there's the "p-word." Piracy website use is increasing. Now, I want to make it CLEAR that sharing this information is not an endorsement of piracy and circumnavigating copyright laws. If something is legally available for viewing and consumption on the internet, that should be how you do things. However, the push and pull factors that explain why people increasingly turn to piracy today are interesting to discuss. The push factors stem from customers fed up with exclusive content being locked behind apps they are not subscribed to when they already are subscribed to two to three. The second most noteworthy push factor is the worldwide shift in mobile data costs. We sometimes need to remember that there are countries where most of their population relies on their phones to access the internet. The growing trend of these streaming services ratcheting prices doesn't help either. The pull factors are fascinating as they highlight how big of a game changer it was when piracy sites switched from being download-based to streaming-based. I'm not going to get into details about this, but it should come as no surprise that people are more comfortable with clicking a "play" icon to start a stream than playing the game of "Which of these flashing green buttons is the download I'm looking for that doesn't get me malware?" Now, that sounds bad, but the music industry is where this is hurting major labels more than TV and film. However, the need to compete with free is why so many in the entertainment world turn to free but "state-sanctioned" ad-driven streaming alternatives.

But the big looming trend for the future is bundling. Apple has realized that its attempt to buy into the TV and film industry will only take it so far. Its solution was to enter into negotiations with Paramount to begin bundling Apple TV+ with Paramount+. However, those talks have halted in light of Skydance's pending purchase of National Amusements, the owner of Paramount. Nonetheless, the scuttlebutt from film and TV insiders is that bundling is likely the "play" these studios are exploring to hedge their losses and regain subscribers. Bundling was a massive nuisance back during the days of cable. Still, most consumers are open to it when it comes to streaming if it results in tangible price decreases and account unification. Paramount+ is already one step ahead of the pack by signing a licensing deal with Walmart, and who's to say that Costco or an international retailer in Europe or Asia doesn't try to follow suit? Likewise, the industry moving towards bundling means you might see MORE niche and network-specific streaming apps rather than fewer. Hallmark+, helmed by The Hallmark Channel, might sound ridiculous until you consider it a minimal effort to meet requirements to be packaged in a bundle with far more appealing applications, thus netting a dividend that pays off the investment.

All that considered, there are clear winners and losers in the present TV and film streaming world. Bundling was a nightmare back in the day, but if it allows me to merge my half-dozen streaming accounts into three, I might sign off on it. Nonetheless, the cost of these services is the real driver for my streaming use and consumption. I'm cutting bait if things continue getting more expensive for the same goods and services. However, you may be in a different boat, and this blog has a slight North American bias. So, feel free to share what you think is happening with non-gaming streaming.

The Long-Awaited Game Pass Tier Consolidation And Price Increase Has Finally Arrived!

Goddamit. I said I would take a break from blogging about Xbox and Microsoft's gaming ambitions, and yet, here I am, writing about the recent news this week about Xbox and its video game divisions. In my defense, we have some significant news items to talk about today. The first stems from Microsoft retooling its Game Pass tiers, including the not-insignificant price increase on PC Game Pass and Game Pass Ultimate. The other notable point of contention is how Microsoft has taken its recent partnership with Amazon, in which Xbox Cloud Gaming is playable on Fire TV, and running with it in the form of a new national advertising campaign that signals to some a complete lack of investment and care in moving their hardware. On top of that, we have console hardware sales that paint a mixed future for all future video game hardware, but with a few insights on what Microsoft and others might be thinking about for their next moves for a new batch of consoles.

However, let's jump into the news that most people are discussing related to Xbox: the Game Pass tier consolidation and price increases. Before I review the details, let's not joke ourselves. We knew these changes were coming, and everyone, including your grandmother, knew that some form of a price increase on Game Pass Ultimate was all but assured before the end of the year. Most of the tier and price changes are not genuinely surprising and are, instead, items we have heard about in some capacity on the rumor mill. But what are the changes? First, all Game Pass Tiers are jumping up in price. For the United States, for example, Game Pass Ultimate is increasing in cost from $16.99 to $19.99. In Canada, the price increase for Ultimate is by four Canadian dollars; the UK is seeing a two-pound jump; Eurozone countries generally see a three-euro price increase. PC Game Pass is seeing a two $/£/€ increase, and Game Pass Core, formerly Xbox Live Gold, is only seeing a price jump if you buy the service annually, from $59.99 to $74.99. Its monthly cost is still pegged at $9.99 for the US, and it maintains its regular monthly subscription price worldwide. All of these price increases are effective starting September.

Now, you might be asking about the cost of Xbox Game Pass or Console Game Pass, considering I detailed the price increase for Game Pass Ultimate and PC Game Pass. Well, Console Game Pass is on its way out. Starting sometime in September 2024, Console Game Pass will no longer be available for new subscribers. Instead, new Xbox Series X/S owners will be prompted to subscribe to "Game Pass Standard," which starts at $14.99 monthly, a notable jump from the old Console Game Pass monthly fee of $10.99 per month. Worse, Game Pass Standard will NOT feature day-one game releases moving forward. For new Xbox Series X/S owners to be able to play hotly anticipated titles like Doom: The Dark Ages, Indiana Jones and the Great Circle, or Perfect Dark at launch, your only option is Game Pass Ultimate, which in most countries is simply two units of currency more. In summary, the Console Game Pass tier is being renamed, will become more expensive, and lose a key selling point. Now, if you already have a Console Game Pass subscription for your Xbox Series console, you're safe and will even continue getting day-one game releases on Game Pass. However, as reported by Windows Central, starting on September 12, 2024, you can only re-up your Game Pass for Console subscription for up to 13 months, meaning you will have to remain vigilant to keep your subscription active, or else Microsoft will likely opt you into Game Pass Standard or Core should you lapse. The days of buying Game Pass redemption cards on sale and having the service at a discount for years are dead.

We often joke that Game Pass seems to be Xbox's "future," and it appears that there needs to be a slight addendum to that. Game Pass Ultimate is the future. To Microsoft's defense, current users aren't losing features, and the price increases are generally below what some feared (i.e., as high as $5). Likewise, when Game Pass first debuted, everyone in the gaming hobby joked about being able to re-up subscriptions to the sky at a massive discount and that even the non-discounted price was too low for what you got. Correspondingly, all of the tiers of Game Pass that you care about still have backward compatibility support, and there's no denying that Microsoft is taking note of every other streaming subscription service that raised prices this year. But, still, all of this news sucks. Creating a new "Standard" tier that does not have day-one game releases is a slight red flag that Microsoft is starting to realize that maybe streaming and AAA game development do not go hand-in-hand. Previously, with AAA games like Starfield or Call of Duty, Microsoft created specific pathways and one-off additions to your Game Pass subscription to play them on day one or early access without gutting Console Game Pass entirely. Likewise, I'm still shocked Microsoft hasn't bit the bullet on their long-rumored ad-driven "free tier" of Game Pass. Its ad-driven tier has been a massive boon for Netflix's revenue and has been credited with reversing previous predictions that Netflix would experience a subscriber contraction.

If I am being entirely generous to Microsoft, their new business decision here might be their attempt to bring more third parties that are skeptical of Game Pass back to the negotiation table. If Microsoft pushes people to a more expensive tier for day-one game releases while allowing developers more freedom to limit the pool of Game Pass subscribers who can get their more significant projects, you could get studios like Capcom back. Now, that's IF Microsoft is using its Game Pass price increases to provide moderate to AA third-party game studios a more substantial "cut" of its pool of Game Pass money. EA, Sega, Ubisoft, and Take-Two are already on board, and indies generally rely on contracts and the "pitching" process to get their ideas off the runway. Nonetheless, it is hard not to remain pessimistic about that being glass-half-full thinking. When Netflix cracked down on password sharing and terminated its most affordable ad-free tier, we didn't suddenly see a glut of new programming on Netflix. Instead, Netflix pocketed that additional cash and boasted that they were one of the few streaming platforms that didn't lose subscribers last fiscal year.

Microsoft's Commitment To Their Amazon Partnership Has Caught Many Off-Guard. It Should Not Have.

Who would have thought that Microsoft would go all-in with its new partnership with Amazon? Or did it? For those unaware, Xbox Cloud Gaming was announced for Amazon Fire TV devices earlier last week. To clarify, Xbox Cloud Gaming is NOT Game Pass, but it still offers a deluge of video games on mobile devices, Smart TVs, and Amazon Fire Sticks if you have a Game Pass Ultimate subscription. Days before unveiling its new plan for Game Pass, Microsoft debuted a new advertising campaign to get owners of compatible Fire Stick devices to sign up for Game Pass Ultimate and use their TV streaming device to play Xbox games. The ad was a playful parody of the starting scene from the first Scream movie, which is a reference I don't know holds a ton of cache these days, and is as follows:

Now, only the 4K Fire Sticks are compatible, and that makes sense considering the system requirements for most games playable on Xbox Cloud Gaming. However, Prime Day is right around the corner, and Amazon has already discounted most of their Xbox-compatible streaming sticks to as low as $24.99. Even if you decide to give things a shot after Prime Day ends, a Fire TV Stick 4K Max retails for just $59.99. That's considerably less money than any video game console on the market. It's worth noting that on Amazon's end, they are and are not matching Microsoft's excitement for this push to get people to use Xbox Cloud Gaming on their 4K Fire Sticks. One reason for Amazon's hesitation is that they already have their own game streaming service, Amazon Luna. When you search any of the Fire streaming devices that are Xbox Compatible on Amazon.com, while you do see mentions of third-party applications like Netflix, Max, and Hulu+, there's no mention of Xbox Cloud Gaming. Instead, the Amazon storefront steers you towards Luna. It also bears repeating that Xbox's cloud gaming service is locked behind Game Pass Ultimate and has already been made available on Meta Quest headsets and Samsung Smart TVs.

And to those Xbox console purists who view Microsoft's decision to push cloud gaming on Amazon Fire devices as a "betrayal," I have some good news for your intolerable fanboyish. Early reviews signal that the latency on Fire Sticks is worse than it was on Samsung's Smart TVs. And even with those Smart TVs, most people came to view Xbox Cloud Gaming on those devices as less of a replacement for a game console and more of an additional part of a streaming ecosystem in a household with multiple televisions. However, hearing from a DigitalTrends editor that they found playing Doom (2016) on a Fire Stick to be a generally painful experience with "plenty of noise," it seems clear that none of this remains a replacement for console or PC hardware. Hell, that very editor noted that they couldn't even play Celeste without a bit of latency, resulting in them having to modify how they timed their jumps. For most of you, myself included, that's a non-starter. What we have here is another example of Microsoft casting a wide net and continuing with its plans to get as many people to become normalized with Game Pass and its services as it readies a new batch of consoles, with one possibly being a dockable handheld-like device. And Amazon signed off on it because they get another valuable perk, while Google and Apple refuse to play ball with their devices. Will this pay off? Only time will tell.

More importantly, to the right consumer, the prospect of playing a batch of Xbox games for as little as $60 for a device and $17 per month to get the streaming service side of things settled sounds like a deal. The problem is that it feels like a dated stopgap to most people who are in the gaming hobby. Before the advent of the Steam Deck, playing AAA games on your smartphone or streaming stick seemed like a boon for anyone who could figure out how to make it happen. Today, the idea of paying more than $15 for a mobile game, regardless of whether it is a quality title or not, seems untenable. Why opt into a singular application on a smartphone when there's something like a Steam Deck whose digital library is hardcoded to something tangible? Furthermore, last week, Xbox saw a nearly seven-hour-long outage that essentially rendered all its streaming devices and platforms inert. That's why I think there's more to this than Microsoft knowing its console hardware situation isn't improving. Microsoft is looking for a broader adoption of Game Pass and for it to become as normalized as Netflix, Hulu+, and Disney+ as it readies itself for devices that rely entirely on Game Pass to do gaming. And that includes hardware that doesn't come from Microsoft.

The Hardware Picture Doesn't Look Great For Xbox, But That Depends On How You Look At It

Mat Piscatella of Circana (formerly The NPD Group) has become a de facto force in reporting on console hardware sales now that practically no one in the industry shares their hardware sales with the public. This week, they relayed how the PS5 is still leading monthly hardware sales, with Nintendo at second in terms of units but Microsoft at second when you adjust for dollars. Overall hardware spending in May was down by 40% as the PS5 and Xbox Series consoles reached the 43-week mark. When taking notice of the latter point, the consoles compared remarkably differently to their predecessors. The PS5 exceeds the PS4 by 8% in sales, whereas the Xbox Series X/S is trailing the Xbox One by 13%. Regarding games, Microsoft will likely continue to view its multiplatform strategy as a success as Call of Duty: Modern Warfare III (2023) remained the best-selling "premium game" on PS5, with Sea of Thieves at the #3 spot. On Xbox, the list was largely the same, but Piscatella made a special note about Senua's Saga: Hellblade II. It ranked 37th on the May Xbox engagement chart, and when adjusted to include Game Pass, it bumped up to 12th. So, Game Pass is important to specific mid-tier first and third-party game releases. Still, putting your title on Game Pass will not represent this massive change of fortunes, especially for single-player campaign-focused games.

Suppose there's something positive to be said about these numbers. In that case, we genuinely don't talk enough about the Xbox One managing one of the most significant turnarounds in the gaming industry short of Final Fantasy XIV. The console went from persona non grata to regaining much of its lost ground and carving out major non-North American niches where it was the number two console. Nonetheless, the facts remain clear: Microsoft's endgame is making money on individuals on Xbox and Game Pass. The barometer for a sustainable business is not tied to moving hardware and, instead, is more oriented toward a profit-per-consumer model. When judged by that metric, Microsoft is already doing well. This direction is also not new to Microsoft. Microsoft has, culturally as a company, ceased putting value in market share for decades. Take, for example, its Surface division. While everyone has seen a Surface tablet or laptop, they might be surprised that even among tablets, the Surface division has long been hovering at 2% to 5% of the market. Likely, they see declining worldwide console hardware sales as a need to reimagine things to match what they are doing with the rest of their computer hardware divisions rather than make a daring push like some want them to. Sure, you can blame this decline in console hardware on people knowing that we are reaching the end of what most would call the "ninth generation." However, grouping consoles into generations remains increasingly tenuous at this point. What would we consider the "start" of the next generation of consoles?

The question then becomes, was everything leading up to this point necessary? Did Microsoft have to spend billions on Activision-Blizzard and then billions more to fight to keep that purchase on the table? Did they have to sign dozens of deals to get mid-tier developers into their gaming division, only to shutter studios like FASA, Lionhead, Tango, and Arkane Austin? Did they have to gut completely having console exclusives to their gaming hardware? Was there a better way to get to this point where you're still in third place between the "big three" while continuing to be a stable profit-making enterprise? Plenty of essayists and video bloggers have been out there drawing comparisons between where Xbox and Microsoft stand right now and Sega leading up to the launch of the Dreamcast. That comparison is complete histrionics. Game Pass and Call of Duty alone represent more than anything Sega had past the Genesis, and they will continue to exist for decades. The point for debate is how much of a fixture hardware will be in those coming years. It will not be 0%, and Microsoft already has shown with its Surface division that it can be content with having a hardware market share that is in the single digits. So, which future is the big green house lurching towards?

Let's Recall, Recall!

A few weeks back, I wrote an essay on why I found it impossible to be enthusiastic about the future of Xbox consoles and the Xbox ecosystem. Since publishing that blog, I have felt even more resolute about everything I highlighted in that essay. Not only have I been infuriated to see Phil Spencer be named the upcoming emcee of PAX West, but at the same time, he continues to fumble the ball on how to respond to scrutiny on the closure of Arkane Austin and Tango Gameworks. However, overall, Microsoft is quickly becoming one of the least defensible tech companies in the world. Maybe Spencer's inability to give solid answers about anything speaks to his company's growing culture of dysfunction. The clearest example by far has to be its ongoing Recall debacle. For those unaware, at a keynote address, Microsoft's CEO Satya Nadella revealed a new feature for Microsoft software and hardware called "Recall." Recall promises to help it improve Microsoft's Copilot AI system, already embedded into Windows 11. In the reveal, Nadella explained how Recall would take a snapshot of your device's screen, generally speaking, every five to ten seconds, which would inform its Copilot AI on your application preferences and OS usage habits. The conference in which Recall was announced took place Monday, May 20th, 2024, and Recall was meant to be available in a preview form the next day. That never happened, and Microsoft has even limited its future initiatives with Recall's preview build to its Windows Insider program.

t keepingTo suggest that shit hit the fan after Recall's announcement would be an understatement. Privacy experts around the world sounded alarms, and their concerns were justified. For one, the preview build of Recall, which people could play around with briefly, was discovered to be hosting the images Recall took in an unencrypted database. Within days, white hat hackers publicly disclosed how to compromise that database. Likewise, the UK's data regulatory agency announced it would formally investigate Microsoft's Recall feature to determine if it violates privacy laws. Microsoft is neither the first nor the last tech company with a stake in AI applications or systems facing growing scrutiny over privacy and copyright concerns, so none of this is surprising. Still, it is phenomenal work from its CEO to have kicked the literal hornet's nest and then have to do damage control in real-time. The fact that no one in Microsoft's upper management thought it was a good idea to make Recall an opt-in feature until AFTER THE BACKLASH speaks volumes on the lack of foresight from Nadella and his cronies as well as their inability to have the consumer's interest even the slightest bit. Sure, expecting as much is a fool's errand. Still, considering how shit of a job Microsoft has been doing keeping national security information under wraps, it bears repeating that there's no way Microsoft has figured out the "secret sauce" on how to do this while guaranteeing an acceptable level of personal security. This company literally just let Russian hackers take their entire source code.

The unfortunate consequence of Microsoft's perpetual fumbling with Recall is that it has completely overshadowed its admirable rebooting of its Surface Laptops. The devices meant to showcase Recall and a new version of Microsoft's AI, Copilot, are widely accepted to be good pieces of hardware even without Recall. With Recall on the back burner, the laptops launched without one of Microsoft's promised "core features" while also sporting state-of-the-art ARM-based processors. Nonetheless, the Copilot-focused laptops are being met with nearly universal praise, though reviews highlight the half-baked AI features as negatives. That hasn't stopped competitors like Apple from actively taking the piss out of Microsoft. Likewise, while the moderately rebooted Surface division has debuted well-made hardware under incredibly stressful circumstances, please don't take it as a sign that they still aren't under a massive pro-AI/Recall mandate. Microsoft just this week debuted a new onslaught of advertisements for its Copilot laptops, and guess what? Although Recall is still operating under a heavily limited preview filter and is delayed indefinitely, the ad shows people using it without a hitch.

I will concede that there have been some that have come to Recall's defense. Ed Bott of ZDNet made the fairly cogent point that with the ability to opt out altogether, Recall is not that different from tracking cookies. Nonetheless, their point that "There are still risks, but they're limited" is one I completely disagree with. Microsoft deserves less wiggle room with your personal information than most tech companies. At the start of the year, they publicly admitted that their Azure Team allowed a massive attack on classified information. They even admitted that publicly reported shortcomings about their security team were valid. That resulted in an ex-White House cyber security policy director declaring Microsoft a national security threat. The start of July marked another failure on their part to prevent those same Russian bad actors from hacking their database to access customer email information. That rap sheet only builds marginal confidence that Microsoft can secure screencaps from your desktop or laptop.

Nadella's Appointed AI Boss Cannot Dig Up

We have been talking a lot about Satya Nadella, but today, I want to introduce a name you will likely see a lot of in the coming years. Mustafa Suleyman is Microsoft's AI boss, and he recently had an interview with CNBC's Andrew Ross Sorkin, which set off some massive red flags. When pressed about the issue of large language models (i.e., LLMs) and AI systems like ChatGPT possibly violating copyright and profiting off of written, oral, and illustrative works without regard to the original author, Suleyman advocated that AI was above the law. Do you think that's an exaggeration? Here are his exact words to Sorkin on cable television:

"I think that with respect to content that's already on the open web, the social contract of that content since the '90s has been that it is fair use. Anyone can copy it, recreate with it, reproduce with it. That has been "freeware," if you like, that's been the understanding."

AND:

"There's a separate category where a website or a publisher or a news organization had explicitly said, 'do not scrape or crawl me for any other reason than indexing me so that other people can find that content.' That's a gray area, and I think that's going to work its way through the courts."

Consider what this means for you and me if Suleyman's ideas of fair use were the law. Every forum post, blog, review, and comment on this site you have made is "freeware" to help educate Microsoft's AI systems and chatbots. Sure, there's such a thing as "fair use," but that's something granted for recreational use and not to help billion-dollar enterprises unpin the entire field of journalism as we know it. That's not how that works. The good news is that you and I are not alone, as The Center for Investigative Reporting, the producer behind Mother Jones and Reveal, has announced a massive lawsuit against OpenAI and Microsoft. They claim that the auto-generated answers that ChatGPT spouts use their paywalled content, and that's not exactly shocking—The New York Times alleged as much when it opened a lawsuit against OpenAI and Microsoft. These lawsuits don't seem too frivolous as EU regulators are throwing in their lot on the side of the print publications. On top of that, it sounds like Suleyman's CNBC interview will be used as evidence against Microsoft in these lawsuits. Incredible. Amazing. You love to see it.

However, for slightly different reasons, the EU is interested in Microsoft's relationship with OpenAI, the outfit behind ChatGPT. Remember when OpenAI's board of directors tried to oust Sam Altman, which backfired spectacularly? Satya Nadella and Microsoft played a massive role in ensuring Sam Altman returned to his position. Besides a brief spike in their stock value when it initially seemed like Sam Altman was jumping ship to their company, Microsoft's reward was a non-voting position on OpenAI's board of directors AND Sam Altman back in the top position at OpenAI. The problem is that while this cozy relationship isn't an official "merger," regulators worldwide agree that Microsoft and OpenAI are collectively erring toward defining a monopoly in some critical areas of commercial AI. The funny thing about this is that while Nadella helped create OpenAI with an investment of $10 billion in cash and computing credits, OpenAI is seemingly not reciprocating what he has given to them for free. OpenAI reportedly pursued a deal with Apple and granted it a position on its board without Microsotf's permission, with Nadella seemingly finding out about it while casually surfing the internet.

Nadella's Decision-making Is About To Result In A $20 Billion Fine!

$20 billion. That's the amount of money CEO Nadella is looking at as Microsoft readies itself for one of the most significant penalties in the tech sphere from EU anti-trust officials. EU tech regulators signaled that Microsoft and Apple would face steep fines for not following the EU's Digital Markets Act, which stipulated that software companies could no longer bundle services with essential software (i.e., OSs) without such practices being deemed anti-trust. In Microsoft's case, its insistence on including its Teams networking and conferencing application in virtually every copy of Office 365 was declared anti-competitive even if alternatives like Zoom, Webex, and Google Meet exist. For Apple, the EU has repeatedly sided with Spotify and Epic in declaring Apple's "steering" tendencies on its App Store towards Apple-made applications for game or music streaming as anti-competitive. In Apple's case, they have already been fined approximately €2 billion, though they are appealing this fine and have responded to its warnings from EU regulators by completely ignoring them. Microsoft has done something similar with its bundling of Teams and will likely act as a case study to the rest of the industry on why EU regulators do not like outright non-compliance.

So, how did we get here? Also, didn't Microsoft comply with the EU's request to stop bundling Teams with Office 365 licenses in European countries? The answer to the latter question is, "Technically, yes, but that's not going to cut it anymore in the EU." Indeed, Microsoft did cease including Teams in Office 365 in Switzerland and all members of the European Economic Area (i.e., EEA). However, much like what it found with Apple, EU regulators found rampant abuse of application "steering" on the Windows Store and stated, "Microsoft may have granted Teams a distribution advantage by not giving customers the choice whether or not to acquire access to Teams when they subscribe to their SaaS productivity applications" and that its "conduct may have prevented Teams' rivals from competing, and in turn innovating, to the detriment of customers in the European Economic Area." And because EU regulators have the teeth and tools to make companies like Microsoft listen to them, their penalties can reach as much as 10% of a company's annual worldwide turnover, which is how we get to Microsoft's beefy $20 billion penalty.

There's no guarantee that EU regulators will impose the harshest penalties against Microsoft or Apple. Still, all insiders indicate they are "done" with Microsoft and Apple completely ignoring their orders. With Microsoft also incurring the wrath of EU watchdogs with its AI software, there's no way they will get the benefit of the doubt when it comes to Teams. This debacle represents a massive failure on Satya Nadella's part. First, with AI vastly inflating Microsoft's company-wide value and revenue, there's something poetic about Nadella's AI-driven pivots resulting in his company's anti-trust penalty ballooning. Second, Nadella was primarily in charge of ensuring his company followed the EU's stipulations after their first warning, and he ultimately failed in that core regard. Instead, he directed his software team to see if they could circumnavigate the EU's mandate by using steering techniques he KNEW he wasn't supposed to use; it's a classic case of getting caught with your hand in the cookie jar. What does any of this information have to do with gaming? Microsoft will likely fight and appeal their regulatory forfeiture tooth and nail, but the likelihood of their appeals working is low. This inevitable scenario means that Microsoft is bound to stomach a massive fine, resulting in cuts to its ancillary divisions rather than having its leaders held accountable.

If only this screw-up meant the death of Teams. That will never happen, considering Teams still nets Microsoft heaps of cash and is currently only facing regulatory scrutiny in the EU. Microsoft is unlikely to let Teams go because it has invested billions into the application. Nonetheless, there's no doubt that if Microsoft is forced to make people pay to use Teams, it will not be nearly as enticing to other businesses that use it as a default, and that would represent a blow to its near-universal ubiquity. That's a problem for every division of Microsoft because if the company loses one of its golden geese, there'll be Hell to pay. Less money from Teams means Xbox and Game Pass have less discretionary spending. Worse, because there's no precedent of Microsoft holding its leaders accountable, any ding to its gross revenue will lead to even more studio closures or layoffs. A minor conspiracy theory whirling around the internet posits that Microsoft might dump its hardware, Xbox included, to lower its company revenue and asset valuation to lower its penalty. Even as an Xbox pessimist, I find this idea patently ludicrous. Microsoft is not forgoing Xbox to reduce its liabilities. Nonetheless, there is something to be said about the fact that it is willing to fight to the death for one of the most universally reviled conferencing apps.

Spencer's Embarrassing Victory Lap

A friend of the site, Lexi, recently took to Twitter/X to share Phil Spencer's salary for the last fiscal year, which recently ended for Microsoft. Spencer made $10 million before stock options. After letting approximately 1,900 employees go, he pocketed millions while avoiding formal repercussions from the Xbox Series S/X's dwindling relevancy. Instead of holding himself accountable, he took to the internet to reveal that Microsoft would have a massive presence at the upcoming Gamescom gaming convention in August despite Nintendo and Sony announcing they would not be at the event. Spencer has stated to various publications that Microsoft's Gamescom booth will be its largest yet. It will also have many titles shown during its showcase last month, as well as "new" titles it has yet to reveal to consumers. Spencer and Bond have also told Xbox enthusiasts such as Parris Lilly of Kinda Funny that their showcase in June was only some of what they wanted to share. I like Parris; he seems nice and has guested on the site, but I don't entirely buy what he's saying. Could some games have been cut from Xbox's recent showcase that deserved to be there? Sure, but does that mean the company was "holding back?" No. Regardless, this hype-mongering reeks of Spencer and Xbox attempting to do a victory lap after they held what many consider their best summer conference in years. They don't deserve to take a victory.

Remember that the layoffs are still coming at Xbox. In one case, they laid off a senior member of the Xbox team while they were vacationing with their family! On top of that, all of the Xbox divisions and their supporting game studios have curiously seen paperwork that offered voluntary severance agreements (i.e., golden parachutes), and most of these passive-aggressive attempts to off-load senior producers have been targeting ZeniMax. What does any of this mean? Despite Phil Spencer's posturing, everyone and their grandmother know that more layoffs are coming, and we will continue to get these mealy-mouth responses from him, Matt Booty, and Sarah Bond on why they were done. Now, this next wave of layoffs isn't altogether targeting designers and underperforming studios; instead, it is trying to move high-paid senior management positions off the books. It also appears that Microsoft is moving internal Q&A in Activision-Blizzard to third parties, which has been a move predicted by many as it represents a trend seen across the entire gaming industry. Nonetheless, Microsoft can barely form a coherent message about its previous studio closures, and that seems to be staying the same for a while.

Those concerns aside, the enthusiast side of the industry hasn't strictly held back in its praise for what some consider incredible Xbox gaming titles shown during the 2024 Xbox Showcase. This fanboyism is part of why Phil Spencer was announced as the keynote speaker for PAX West 2024. Now, PAX has dabbled in the console wars before and even had Reggie Fils-Aimé do a panel that was just him shooting the shit and telling stories. That said, it feels gross seeing someone who recently approved of the layoff of thousands of employees get another chance to dodge criticism while spouting propaganda. Reggie was given the opportunity to headline a panel because it took place shortly after he retired from Nintendo. Spencer continues operating under the shadow of closing down Tango and Arkane Austin. Conventions like PAX are no stranger to needing to take sponsorships and money where they can get them. I get that, but this feels different. With Xbox transitioning from its moderately successful summer showcase to Gamescom and then to PAX, it seems they are using gaming conventions to wave away their growing problems.

Xbox's Amazon Deal Is Big, But Not As Big As They Think

To briefly act as a devil's advocate for Microsoft, they need a big event like Gamescom. They have been teasing new AAA games that were not announced at their summer showcase for ages, and some significant open questions about their hardware and Game Pass warrant a more prominent stage or platform. Speaking of Game Pass and Xbox's increasingly streaming-oriented future, they recently launched a new partnership with Amazon that's bound to make higher-ups happy. Xbox Cloud Gaming is now going to work on Amazon Fire TV devices. For those of you with a Game Pass Ultimate subscription, this game streaming service is bundled in your tier and allows you to play a selection of Game Pass games on compatible devices. It is a service that works remarkably well on Android phones even though the number of playable games is far from that on Game Pass.

I am not against more people being able to play games wherever they please. While this is terrific news, it is not groundbreaking and is unlikely to do anything to change the trajectory of Xbox's gaming fortunes. Samsung Smart TVs and Smart Monitors got Xbox Cloud Gaming support in 2022 and Meta Quest VR headsets in 2023. There was no gaming trickle-down economics for Xbox to gobble up after making deals with Samsung and Meta. Likewise, while Amazon is undoubtedly happy to approve Microsoft's app, they already have a preferred video game streaming service that they VERY CLEARLY steer all Amazon Fire users to use, and that's Amazon Luna. Yes, Luna is a joke, and it is embarrassing how Amazon is convinced they are a relevant figure in the game streaming sphere. Nonetheless, people use it, and Amazon's devices constantly communicate the existence of Luna the minute you boot them up or when you use Amazon Prime. The number of Amazon Fire Stick users navigating Fire OS and thinking, "Man, I could go for some Halo right now," is not 0; I will give you that. But is this a game-changer? No.

Do these streaming initiatives on third-party platforms make the money you think they do? Next week, Netflix is ending its basic ad-free plan as it continues to buck predictions that its password crackdown initiative and price increases would gut its growth. However, think for a minute about Netflix admitting that its cheapest ad-free tier wasn't as viable as they thought it would be. As a thought experiment, consider how much content you can get on Game Pass without ads. Microsoft's incredibly affordable Game Pass tiers with massive, fluctuating libraries with no ad breaks are an anomaly. Disney+, Hulu, Max, and more all have shitty ads that break up your experience. Playing games with ad breaks makes me want to throw up, but Microsoft has pigeonholed itself. Game Pass has become its future, but they debuted the service at such a low price that it is wild to think about these days. The enshittening of Game Pass will get here. I know it; you know it; your father's uncle knows it.

Nonetheless, their target remains "growth," and you can't have that growth if you announce a new batch of price increases. However, we all know price increases to Game Pass are coming; it is simply a matter of when. That uncertainty and the need for clarity on Xbox's hardware ambitions, especially if they genuinely want to bite the bullet on making a Steam Deck-like device, makes things immediately and uncomfortably murky with Xbox. The gut-wrenching studio closures that stem from management having clear buyer's remorse is the next part of what makes me a pessimist about Xbox's future. And my lack of trust doesn't just extend to Phil Spencer. The bones are rotten at Microsoft. While they are figuring things out with hardware at its Surface division, what its CEO has cherry-picked to be the company's future presents a dire and depressing future.

And I swear to God, this will be the last time I write about Xbox and Phil Spencer unless something massive happens.

Let's Take a Trip Down Memory Lane: A Recap of My Previous VR Insights & Recent News

Two months ago, I penned an essay in response to multiple reports that Sony was ceasing the manufacturing of new PlayStation VR2 devices in light of recent struggles shipping and selling them. However, during Sony's May State of Play, the company not only revealed that new titles were still coming to the device but also said that we should stay tuned to see what the future might hold for it. Sony later revealed what many thought was coming: that the PSVR 2 would be usable on a PC and would gain the ability to play previously PC-only VR titles. Most notably, in the marketing images of its new dongle, which we will discuss shortly, Half-Life: Alyx is prominently featured. However, this route requires you to use an attachment, and this adapter will demand you to shell out $59.99. Also, the PSVR 2 will operate in a highly reduced fashion when streaming on a PC instead of a PS5. What Sony has announced is better than nothing, but it reeks of a company with no idea what it's doing. More importantly, this is the final sign that console-based VR gaming is dead. At this point, Meta is running laps around Sony. If you want to continue to follow the consumer-grade VR scene, your best bet is, BY FAR, Meta.

And what about the claims by those following the evolution of the VR market, like myself, that Meta's dominance in the industry was approaching that of a "monopoly?" Well, we are not alone. The FTC has opened a probe about this topic and is exploring whether Meta meets its current threshold for violating antitrust laws. Nothing will likely come of this probe as the VR industry is such a minuscule fraction of any tech sector you group it in. All signs point to Meta sticking around primarily because it's the only major titan willing to take the financial brunt of researching new technology and putting goods into consumer-oriented stores, even though the market for such wares continues to be small. Meta being one of the few players in VR remaining is not due to them pushing people out; there's not enough money to be made in VR on the consumer end, which is why most people with skin in the VR game have pivoted to enterprise applications (i.e., HTC, Magic Leap, Microsoft, etc.). But hey, if Meta is a monopoly, they must make money on VR, right? Well, no. Shortly after my first piece on the shaky ground VR gaming finds itself, Meta announced it lost approximately 3.85 billion dollars on its Reality Labs division during the first fiscal quarter of 2024.

To summarize how bad things are for Meta, during Q4 2023, which saw Reality Labs generate an industry record of $1 billion, its VR investments still came to a net loss of $4.56 billion! That's now two quarters in a row in which Meta's VR division generated a loss of $3.5 billion or more! That's NOT GOOD! And it's no different for new names jumping into VR as well. There was hope that ByteDance's $3 billion investment in the VR firm PICO would lead to a new line of consumer VR headsets to challenge Meta's dominance. The PICO VR headsets are quality products, and the brand maintains a 59% market share in China, which amounts to just 700,000 units sold in 2022 and ~194,000 units in 2023. Think about that last sentence for a minute. ByteDance spent billions to fund their VR headset partner, and they have yet to surpass 1 million units sold in China in two years. IN CHINA! A country with a burgeoning middle class that traditionally has snapped up comparatively expensive consumer hardware to express one's growing social class and status. It should come as no surprise to any of you that Pico and ByteDance are scaling back their efforts, and for all of 2024, we have yet to see any new products or product revisions from the Pico brand. So, if Meta and the CCP-sanctioned VR headset company are not making money on VR, there's no way in HELL Sony is! This struggle signals that Sony is not necessarily incompetent about improving PSVR 2's fortunes and is more self-aware that there's no saving this sinking ship.

Examining Sony's Strategy: Is A Dongle/Tether The Best You Can Do?

What did Sony announce with the PSVR 2 during its May State of Play? During the event, it first gave ample room for Skydance's Behemoth, which has been under radio silence since it was delayed until late 2024, eight months ago. Notably, Behemoth is NOT exclusive to the PSVR 2 and will come to Steam VR and Meta's Quest devices. In hindsight, I find it HILARIOUS that Sony even gave the game a presence at their event, considering Skydance just outbid them to buy Paramount Pictures. The other VR title of note during Sony's conference was Alien: Rogue Incursion, which, much like Behemoth, is NOT exclusive to the PSVR 2. Furthermore, Alien: Rogue Incursion has been a substantial advertising point for Meta as it is one of the more significant upcoming VR titles for the Quest Pro and Meta Quest 3, but not the more budget-friendly Quest 2. Overall, as impressive as these titles might have looked, they are not exclusive to Sony's VR ecosystem. With the shuttering of London Studio earlier this year, it's unlikely that there will ever be any AAA PSVR 2 exclusives at any point.

However, maybe allowing PSVR 2 to access previously PC-oriented online marketplaces like Steam may make more sense to Sony diehards or VR-curious consumers who want to avoid giving Mark Zuckerberg money. Let's discuss the PlayStation VR2 PC adapter if that statement describes you! For the price of $59.99 / €59.99 / £49.99, starting on August 7th, you can buy and play VR games from Steam's library! Here's the deal: this adapter is effectively a tether, even if Sony claims it isn't a tether. While Sony's dongle doesn't look immediately intrusive, the fact you need to plug something into your headset to access something as basic as Steam's marketplace is absurd. Likewise, while Sony has been forthright about announcing that this adapter will allow you to peruse Steam, there's no news about Google, Epic, or Meta's VR titles having seamless compatibility using this attachment. Finally, this point is the real kicker: PSVR 2 on PC will be a compromised experience. As Sony has since clarified on their website, "HDR, headset feedback, eye tracking, adaptive triggers, and haptic feedback (other than rumble), are not available when playing [PSVR 2] on PC." For reference, the PSVR 2 is $549.99 and if you want to use Steam on it, you have to fork over the price of a new video game. In contrast, the Meta Quest 3 is $499.99, but has all of those features that Sony has decided to block when using their headset on a PC!

I'm one of many who say this, but this is a non-starter for most in the PC VR gaming arena. Meta's portfolio of VR headsets offers far more bang for your buck, and its devices are far more feature-rich than PSVR 2 on PC. With so many prominent players providing better and cheaper products with fewer limitations, I have no idea why Sony would think this adapter strategy is their way of expanding the audience for the PSVR 2. This new pivot might benefit a handful of people who already own a PSVR 2. Nonetheless, even they don't deserve to be railroaded into interacting with technologically hampered and inferior versions of Steam's top-heavy library. I made this point in my previous blog, but while VR gaming enthusiasts love pointing to Steam's VR catalog as this large or impressive "get" for Sony, its best sellers overwhelmingly date back to the peak of the Pandemic, AND Steam's sorting tools are THE WORST. The amount of dreck you must wade through to find one or two gems is a nightmare! I genuinely take no joy in saying anything nice about Meta, but I have to give them credit. Not only do they have exclusive software, but getting recommendations and using their marketplace isn't an immediately terrible experience.

And I cannot stop bringing up the price tag with this week's news. The PSVR 2 still costs $549.99 / €599.99 / £529.99. Now, you need to shell out an additional $60 to get the thing to steam stuff through a PC, and poorly, at that. Even if Sony hadn't curtailed the PSVR 2's feature set, at $550, that puts it up against the Meta Quest 3 which retails for $499.99 / £479.99 / AU$799.99! The Quest 3 is an utterly tetherless device with a smaller and more comfortable profile, way better wire management, and controllers that don't die on you after three to four hours of use! And I'm sorry, the PS5 homepage is shitty on a VR headset. The Quest 3's UI highlights all your preferred apps on the home screen AND has a far more in-depth marketplace! But here's the real kicker: do you want to know what the Quest 3 has that the PSVR 2 desperately needs? The Quest 3 is backward compatible. If you bought anything from the original Oculus Rift or Quest 2, it is there and ready to go! Every major limitation associated with the PSVR 2 could be forgiven when it was an exclusive console accessory. Now that it is trying to hang with the PC VR field, it's just embarrassing.

Also, why are the PSVR 2's PC system requirements two steps above those in the Meta Quest Link family?

The minimum requirements for both are reasonable. However, the PSVR 2 requiring a DisplayPort 1.4 output is a massive annoyance. Don't get me wrong, I prefer DisplayPort on PC monitors over HDMI or USB-C, but Sony's going to require you to use one without providing a cable, which is complete bullshit. We are slowly losing this war against tech companies' corner-cutting where some smartphone manufacturers don't even include phone charges because they tell you to use whatever USB-C plug you already have. Nonetheless, with Sony already having a credibility deficit in the VR community, passing the buck on consumers in any regard leaves a sour taste in my mouth. I'm happy that a non-zero number of people can now play Half-Life: Alyx, which previously couldn't. But that's the thing. This new adapter and PC linking system are likely not moving the needle and shipping new units because other VR headsets are downright better and doing that out of the box! Maybe some PS5 owners who didn't already have a PSVR 2 will pick one up now, but are there enough of those people to turn things around for Sony's entire VR division when Meta has more than triple that number of owners and still isn't making money?

Wait, What Happened To Xbox VR Devices?

So, Sony's PSVR 2 seems doomed, but not immediately. If Sony abandons VR gaming, it will be a slow and drawn-out failure. Nonetheless, at least they got off the runway at some point! The same cannot be said about Microsoft, which of the three console manufacturers has brought the least amount of VR support to its console ecosystem. At least Nintendo had its Labo variety kits! Xbox has been teasing a partnership with Meta for DECADES, as they were rumored to be a partner with Oculus back during the Xbox One days before Facebook bought Oculus. Some may recall when the Xbox Series X was called "Project Scorpio," Phil Spencer went around the press circuit affirming that their next console could support VR. And then, like many things Xbox and Phil Spencer promised back in the day, nothing happened. Curiously enough, the Oculus Rift did ship with Xbox One controllers instead of custom-made ones. But hey, things are different now! Past failures aside, a Meta Quest device will finally have Xbox branding!

Sure, it's not much, but at least Microsoft will finally have something to show for the billions they spent on VR! Back in April, Meta listed Xbox along with Lenovo, Asus, and Qualcomm as new partners in their plans to promote the metaverse and help its VR division turn a profit. Regarding Xbox, Meta stated, "Xbox and Meta teamed up last year to bring Xbox Cloud Gaming (Beta) to Meta Quest, letting people play Xbox games on a large 2D virtual screen in mixed reality. Now, we're working together again to create a limited-edition Meta Quest inspired by Xbox." Mark Zuckerberg clarified what advantages such a partnership would have by posting on Instagram, "[it] comes out of the box with Xbox controllers and Game Pass, so you can immediately just start playing on a big screen anywhere you go." Admittedly, a VR headset that runs Game Pass out of the box sounds good, even though you can fairly easily get Game Pass running on a Quest headset. If anything, this device might be the first hint that there's some credence to rumors that Microsoft's current approach to its hardware is licensing the Xbox name to others and having them create SKUs that address specific and niche audiences as long as the third-party hardware can still run Game Pass. Ultimately, Xbox is doing something clever: it relies on a third-party partner, Meta, to make the VR hardware, which allows them to avoid losses when the headsets don't sell, which Sony can't do because their device is entirely in-house.

Even so, when you review much of what was promised regarding VR and AR during the early phases of the post-Mattrick era of the Xbox One, you realize what Microsoft failed to deliver this generation. For one thing, you aren't getting consumer-grade HoloLens. HoloLens 3 was canceled as early as 2022, and the recent news surrounding Microsoft's Mixed Reality division doesn't build confidence. Microsoft is not making internal investments to further VR for the benefit of Xbox. Not only has Microsoft discontinued Windows Mixed Reality, but massive cuts have hit the HoloLens team, while Microsoft continues to affirm that it will continue to sell HoloLens 2 to businesses. The weird addendum to HoloLens is that it is turning its financial fortunes around because it makes gobs of money selling AR devices to the United States Department of Defense. What started as a consumer device with possible gaming applications has narrowed into a low-cost way for military training and improving battlefield awareness in combat soldiers. That shift in priorities is possibly why HoloLens is laying off staff. Not only do they require fewer people, but the people they need must fit a particular niche. So, unless Nintendo magically revives its Labo line, no one other than Sony seems primed to do anything significant related to console-based VR gaming.

Apple's Entry: A Catalyst for New R&D in the VR Industry? Not When It Costs $3,499!

Is there any hope of someone shaking Meta from its vice grip on the VR industry? If change isn't coming from Sony, Microsoft, or China, who else could be willing to throw billions of dollars into VR to develop better internals than Meta and have a chance at making a dent in market penetration? Well, why not Apple? The Vision Pro is an incredibly futuristic device that mixes AR and VR with one of the best VR OLED screens ever. You also have Apple's diverse marketplace, which blows Sony's current VR marketplace out of the water. Likewise, Apple can get third-party multimedia companies to play nice with their closed ecosystem excluding Epic and Google. That must mean the Vision Pro was met with the universal praise from the tech press that we all typically expect of an overpriced product from Apple, right? Well, no, again. The Vision Pro certainly got heaps of compliments for its intricate hardware. Still, at $3,500, few reviewers openly recommended it, and many more criticized it for its buggy software and clunky feel.

And how much of a deal breaker was that $3,500 price tag even to Apple's most ravenous fanbase? TF International Securities Group analyst Ming-Chi Kuo, whose specialty is following Asian tech supply chains, disclosed in February of 2024 that Apple had revised its year-one sales target for the Vision Pro from 800,000 to "a number between 400,000 and 450,000." Kuo's report also indicates that Apple has cancelled a hardware update planned for 2025 which throws a wrench into anyone hoping for Apple's regular commitment schedules to its hardware. Likewise, as reported by Fast Company's Michael Grothaus, mainstream interest in the Vision Pro peaked like a bottle rocket. Market research on enthusiasm and interest in the Vision Pro only lasted 72 hours after its release. And as they also point out, this news is not something Zuckerberg is jumping for joy about. While Apple might be a competitor, the fact that they are struggling to excite even their most diehard defenders to strap a device to their face to watch Netflix or listen to music means the novelty of VR is dead for most people. It does not matter if it is Sony, Meta, or Apple. People are not running out to buy plastic boxes to strap to their faces.

To Apple's defense, there are already early signs that the Vision Pro was never aimed at staking a claim in the consumer realm. Citing the device's novel mix of AR and VR displays, Lowe's Home Improvement put in a massive order on the Vision Pro as it attempts to use them to provide interested customers with the opportunity to explore kitchen redesign options. The Vision Pro is also making inroads in the healthcare sector after Microsoft abandoned it with the retirement of its enterprise line of Kinect devices and HoloLens pricing them out. Obviously, this is only in a trial run phase. Still, it's an early indicator that Apple always knew that their pricey VR headset had limited appeal with everyday people and that enterprise applications were the real money maker. Likewise, don't entirely count out the Vision Pro's consumer-oriented future. Not only is Apple signing some big names to its closed OS and VR ecosystem, but we have been around this block with the tech giant before. As they did with the MacBook, iPod, iPad, iPhone, and Apple Watch, Apple has this habit of introducing new product lines at astronomically high price ranges that slowly, with later revisions, become more palatable to mainstream consumers. They have always done this, and they will continue to do this. Nonetheless, Apple's focus has NEVER been on gaming. Furthermore, while their technology seems solid and is rapidly improving, they will never budge on their closed ecosystem to make way for a console-based partner.

Meta Is Already Slowly Retiring The King Of Consumer VR, The Quest 2

We end this addendum on virtually the same note I did last time. If you are interested in getting into the world of VR, whether for work productivity or gaming, you likely should buy a Meta headset. They are the only company still making a family of SKUs that each address different consumer-oriented markets. They are the only company still standing that works with third parties to bring a plethora of software and apps into a multitude of operating systems. Despite their MANY faults, they never release an adapter that kneecaps the usability of their devices. Likewise, early signs point to Meta taking notes from Microsoft and Xbox. There are rumblings they may even license the Meta name to Asus to make a line of entirely gaming-based VR headsets that meet some Meta-mandated minimum requirements. The problem facing the general acceptance of VR in both households and workplaces demands that someone, anyone, get the install base up an order of magnitude, and that's going to cost billions of dollars. Either Zuckerberg knows something the rest of us don't, or he's wallowing in the dregs of the sunk cost fallacy because Meta continues to be completely happy to spearhead that effort.

Nonetheless, Meta is making progress. They have at least one SKU, the Meta Quest 2, that is affordable, which means that they have done a decent job of driving the price down of its competition. At one point earlier this month, the Meta Quest 2 was on sale for $100, and those devices didn't wallow away; they sold out within days of the sale being announced. Meta is also doing other things to keep the entirety of VR alive. In May of 2024, Meta announced that it would make its Meta Horizon OS available to any third-party headsets that pay their asking price. If Meta can get others to play ball, it will be easier for software creators to get their apps across multiple devices without redesigning things for multiple VR OSs. It also announced a VR/AR roadmap, laying out its plans to invest in AR and a new line of affordable and enterprise hardware. Meta's visible commitment provides some peace of mind to those making software for their headsets and those who have bought one. That level of stability does not exist with any of your console-based VR devices. Sony knew it had to give people its best shot, but it did not deliver. Likewise, Microsoft is floundering, and Nintendo practically wants you to forget they ever sold the Labo box sets.

However, we have a problem. Meta and every other major VR company is butting up against a looming technological cliff. This cliff has taken down some of the biggest names in technology. It's time to convince people who invested in older VR headsets to switch to more up-to-date ones as applications and software get more complex than when the first VR boom happened. Everyone who bought a VR headset when the Pandemic first happened? That's ancient news, and most third-party partners, like Netflix and Epic, loathe keeping these older devices up to date. Just this week, Netflix announced it is retiring support for multiple older generations of the Apple TV. Streaming companies are cutting bait, and there's no doubt they are looking at some of these older generations of VR hardware if they are already dropping support for multi-million unit-selling streaming boxes, which is part of the reason why it should come as no surprise that VR developers are unofficially dropping support of the Quest 2. New software is already drawing a line in the sand that you need at least a Meta Quest 3 or above to run the latest generation of VR games or applications. In the gaming community, we are accustomed to upgrading to a new generation of hardware. The problem facing Meta and the VR development community is that the Meta Quest 2 is estimated to be over forty percent of the entire VR market. Worse, all of these people who were curious about VR have loudly told the industry about their financial limits with consumer headsets, and everyone, whether it be Sony, Meta, Valve, or Google, continues to ignore them.

If Meta does retire the Quest 2, there's growing doubt they will introduce an alternative at a similar price point. This next point might be a shocker, but people want VR headsets to be at most $400. This unofficial preference is why Sony's decision to add an additional cost to something that already commands a $549.99 price tag is all the more ridiculous. If Sony cared about their VR fortunes, they would have introduced a new SKU at a lower price. However, they likely know what everyone else knows about the VR market. People aren't as interested in the novelty anymore, and there's growing pushback with the technology as it begins to crop up more in workplaces due to new meeting mandates. And with the model in the VR realm involving constant hardware revision, until you strike gold, Sony's hope that a dongle will open things up for their long-ailing VR device seems all but doomed.

The Gaming Industry Narrative That Will Never Die

For those of you who follow me on social media, you know this is a point I have been belaboring for literal years. The minute a game studio announces a fresh batch of layoffs; I publicly repeat the same bit about not wanting to see people in the video game hobby and press repeat the publicly perceived "sacrifices" Satoru Iwata made when he faced declining company revenue in 2013 and took a pay cut in response. Hundreds of others have joined me on forums, online chats, Discords, and social media platforms to repeat a similar sentiment. I do not wish to take credit for pioneering this "hot take." Nonetheless, no matter what, whenever a big studio or publisher fires even a tiny portion of its staff, a move I in no way support or applaud unless the targeted person or persons are guilty of workplace bullying or harassment, I still can expect to see someone posting a picture of Iwata either holding a device or bowing with a factoid about his pay cut without any context. Some within the press still answer to this public choir by reposting articles from when Iwata took his lumps, further perpetuating what I consider a reasonably nasty, artificially inflated narrative. According to this narrative, Nintendo is this seemingly friendly version of all the corporations we encounter daily, and it presents a far kinder and more humane pallet swap of the flavor of capitalism that seems unassailable in an industry dominated by EA, Embracer, and Activision.

Before I discuss why that's not only a falsehood, but a dangerous one, at that, it's essential to acknowledge Iwata for who he indeed was. He wasn't just a figurehead but a man who genuinely loved the industry and cared deeply about games as an art form. Revisiting some of his E3 presentations from back in the day, it's evident that he deeply admired video games and the people who played and made them. His premature death was a significant loss, and the anecdotes that continue to surface even years after his passing paint a unique picture of an important figurehead and a company whose current leadership loved the man and held him in reverence as much as many of you do. Like many in the gaming hobby, I watched the unpublished 2004 video interview with Satoru Iwata. In it, he shared his initial thoughts about the PSP, Wii, and his predecessor, Hiroshi Yamauchi. It is a genuinely enlightening and humanizing interview I strongly recommend. No matter, this hobby, and its remaining critical press sources have presently accepted that more layoffs are coming in the future. As such, conveying these Iwata anecdotes in conjunction with people losing their livelihoods continues to feel wildly inappropriate. While these stories of Iwata are excellent for dulling the numbing nature of the wonton brutality of capitalism, they also denounce the realities of this incredibly dysfunctional and abusive construct we call the video game industry, and Nintendo is not your friend. It is the system.

Let's not forget there's more to this "person smiles to the camera and makes you feel warm inside" narrative. Iwata might have been brilliant. Iwata might have cared about the games and consoles his company put out. Iwata might have deeply appreciated games as an art form or a source of expression. All that aside, he was a suit, and as a suit, if he could have cut workers and laid people off as freely as large corporations in the United States, Europe, and most of the world can, he would have during Nintendo's darkest periods. It is not just Nintendo that often gets preferential treatment because one CEO or company president made a nominal financial sacrifice ten years ago or benefits from its association with products of our childhoods. People like to paint companies like Nintendo as being extremely "pro-worker," but the reality is just that the law demands that they be "pro-worker." Worse, in the case of Nintendo, their reputation as a titan in their industry allows them to get away with some pretty heinous infractions that seemingly never get the attention they likely should. Those are the reasons I am entirely "done" with seeing Iwata's blessing to his workers crop up as a cudgel to absolve Nintendo of scrutiny in the industry. With MORE layoffs at Microsoft, Sony, Warner Bros, EA, and Embracer imminent, I swear to God, if I see someone else share the Iwata anecdote as a rebuttal, I will go insane. Also, you're a goddamn fool if you think Japanese corporate culture is entirely "kinder" or less brutal or corrupt than the corporate systems you live under.

Credit Workplace Layoff Regulations And NOT Iwata For The Lack Of Layoffs Amid Nintendo's Wii U Failures

I have made a big deal about this topic on the Giant Bomb Discord and often met criticism for continually bringing this issue up. The "Iwata Myth," as I like to call it, seemingly has permeated the gaming press and community. And it is not just in gaming. The mainstream news media is now attaching itself to the "Iwata Myth" in light of recent events. When the first batch of 2024's mass layoffs hit, CNBC THIS YEAR repeated how Iwata, having "faith in his talent," knew how to weather the storm, abide by long-term thinking, and avoid laying off staff as a knee-jerk reaction. It's "culture," they say! According to this article, Iwata valued the Japanese concept of "hansei" or self-reflection and knew that through failure, the teams that worked on the Wii U could still create something both commercially and critically successful in the industry. Some of that may be true, but do you want to know what none of these social media posts or this CNBC article mentioned? The G Word. Government. At no point do any of these talking heads and clickbait articles or Tweets mention that the post-World War II Japanese constitution guarantees all workers in Japan the right to unionization. I shouldn't be too surprised that CNBC is hesitant to credit government regulation for slowing or stunting what industry likely would have wanted, but HOT DAMN! At no point does this article say that labor laws force Japanese companies to establish in writing they are facing a dire economic situation, offer voluntary early retirement to EVERYONE, and have a pecking order based on seniority to protect most employees from mass layoffs before they can cut a single soul. And to be slightly self-reflective about the state of video game journalism, why is the gaming press utterly incapable of recognizing that Iwata was likely abiding by his country's strict regulations, which starting in 2018, put a strict cap on overtime, rather than his internal humanity? Considering how labor-friendly and socially proactive most of these press sources are, it's shocking how rarely any of that gets mentioned.

We know that Iwata's "selfish act" is mainly due to strong and consistent labor laws that value workers and NOT his internal altruism because you can see evidence of how Nintendo operates outside of Japan. Just this very year, Nintendo of America announced it was restructuring its testing department and laid off hundreds of contractors in their Q&A department in response to the delay of the Switch 2. Much like the cuts by Microsoft, Sony, and Embracer, these cuts were sudden but primarily targeted independent contractors. Worse, Nintendo steadfastly refuses to provide full benefits to these workers because there's no legal requirement for them to do that for non-full-time employees. Kotaku uncovered what life is like for independent contractors at Nintendo of America, and it painted an incredibly bleak picture. Nintendo employs an army of temporary staff that they cycle through on 11 to 12-month contracts with brutal performance reviews to determine future agreements and only a two-month break between work assignments. Those breaks between work reportedly last much longer than the promised two months, and this being the "gig economy," Nintendo doesn't provide health benefits to these workers and instead redirects them to file for unemployment and state insurance programs.

Oh, and then there's the matter of Nintendo of America at one point being the subject of a National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) complaint for union busting and withholding pay. Yes, Nintendo of America, with its staffing agency, settled this matter, and the staffing agency took the blame for the house of Mario. Still, both admitted that the complainant was owed $25,910 in back pay, damages, and interest. Now, there is a point here that what Nintendo is doing in the United States, East Asia, and Europe is the same as what every major tech giant does. Its reliance on 11-month independent contractors is a business model pioneered by Microsoft after it lost a $97 million labor lawsuit after repeatedly refusing to provide temporary workers with any ability to gain company stock options, pensions, and health coverage in compensation for their labor. My point is not that Nintendo and Iwata are, or were, bad actors. Rather, you cannot credit Iwata's altruistic moment entirely to his humanity. We must look at the evidence and admit that sometimes the Forbidden G Word (i.e., government) works and is heavy-handed, with top-down regulation and oversight needed to guarantee society avoids the worst abuses at work. If you want more CEOs to take pay cuts instead of laying off workers, there needs to be a system that forces them to do that. Otherwise, surprise, the land of Mario regresses to the mean.

Even If Your CEO Is Taking A Pay Cut And You Can't be Fired Easily, You Still Don't Want To Be A Japanese Salaryman

So, with strong labor laws in place, life as a Japanese salaryman must be naturally superior to that of an office worker in the United States or Europe. Right? I'm being facetious, but the reality is incredibly murky. Sure, workers have the right to unionize, AND layoffs are more challenging to pull off than in the United States, but that doesn't necessarily mean life is great in a Japanese cubicle. The hours expected of a worker are insane, and the overall compensation for labor is paltry compared to other "developed" nations. Most metrics put the average Japanese worker as working more than the average American worker, and overtime often goes uncompensated, with many salarymen laboring until 6 PM at least twice weekly. While reforms are improving things, and Nintendo even offered its employees a 10% raise last year, in the world of consumer technology and entertainment, the expectation for many continues to be working thirteen hours a day, six days a week, for three straight months. This matter isn't new news and, since the 1980s, has been a known quantity. And to Nintendo's defense, they are neither the only pillar of the entertainment industry working employees to the bone nor the worst offender. A new survey came out from starting employees in the domestic Japanese animation industry, and the results from it are DIRE! A high percentage of female employees cited at least one example of workplace sexual harassment, and across the board, most stated they were expected to work eight hours a day. Furthermore, Japan has a forest and a bridge notoriously known as places where burnt-out business people wander into to kill themselves; I don't think that's a stunning indicator of Japanese corporate culture, even if one CEO tried to save face over ten years ago.

And it's not as if Nintendo's worldwide track record is pristine. While Nintendo's home base is held in high regard, Nintendo of America is a bit of a different issue, with multiple reports about it being a toxic workplace cropping up throughout the last decade. These reports stem from female contractors struggling to advance in the company and had recurring run-ins with full-time employees who harassed them, and sometimes sexually. This situation includes, in one instance, a full-time employee sending a text message referencing the sexually explicit Vaporeon meme to a female staffer who later indicated in another text to the same female employee that it was okay to be sexually attracted to Paimon, a minor, in Genshin Impact. That came from a report by Kotaku in August of 2022, which was the second article of theirs that year that alleged sexual harassment by full-time Nintendo of America staff on its temporary and independent contractors. Likewise, Japan's #MeToo Movement has been one of the most underreported, at least outside of Japan, extensions of the movement, and that's incredibly unfortunate. Spearheaded by actor Shiori Ito, the movement has made some gains in terms of legislation and workplace oversight and protections. Still, many industries, like technology and filmmaking, continue to resist necessary reform efforts.

Likewise, have you ever noticed how mum Nintendo has sometimes been about crunch? Well, that's because some of its most highly regarded figureheads were subject to it. While not 100% supporters of the practice, they cite it as a vital part of the learning curve to being in the video game industry. Take Sakurai as an example. He could/should be an advocate for abolishing crunch, considering his health has at times greatly suffered as a result of it, but he isn't. Instead, you should not take him seriously regarding his public advice about personal work ethic and should ignore his tips about work/life balance. The guy who has had multiple health issues because of overworking and passed out at a gym from dehydration seemingly thinks you should always take your work home and never stop thinking about self-improvement. He is as connected to game development as the company accountant, and seemingly doesn't see the contradiction in what he's experienced to what he's advising. However, there's a more significant core problem with Sakurai's ideas about work-life balance, which Nintendo willingly presents to the world as an extension of its own, that he constantly lays out in his video blogs that Nintendo is always happy to promote. Unlike what Sakurai might suggest, though, this is a message almost every Japanese corporate monolith wants you to believe: your life is not entirely defined by what you do for work. Likewise, don't take your work home, especially if it is your first significant idea or project. Most people's first passion project is a hot mess. These creative endeavors often try to do too much in one game and require a filter. Telling people never to let go and hone their craft even outside the confines of the workplace is terrible advice. Go home—freaking breath. Live your life for as many hours as possible, disconnected from games, and with the people you love and the social security networks you know will support you.

Now, some credit has to be given to Nintendo for addressing some of these new and recurring issues. Nintendo of America opened an investigation into its workplace following Kotaku's reports, and forced out the accused employee of the worst offenses in that report. Fundamentally, Nintendo compensates full-time staff well above the averages of the gaming industry. The average full-time employee at Nintendo stays with the company for about fourteen years before leaving for new opportunities or retiring. That is unheard of in the video game industry and suggests that its corporate system and meritocracy work for a significant portion of its staff. Just look at their leadership and notice the continuity! The most notable thing you can say about Nintendo is that no one has ever left since you or I first grew up in the gaming hobby. Unlike the rest of the Japanese gaming industry, which has hemorrhaged talent and names over the years, Nintendo has something special that keeps its biggest names there until the very end. The last time we can say someone left the company with bad blood was Shouzou Kaga and before him, Gunpei Yokoi. However, take their impressive retention numbers and average salary with a massive grain of salt. None of those self-reported numbers include the MASSIVE bevy of temporary contractors that Nintendo cannot live without.

Lionizing Iwata Allows Brutal Tech And General Workplace Conditions In Japan And Nintendo Of America To Dodge Scrutiny

Let's quickly return to the NLRB lawsuit that Nintendo settled through its contracting agency. That lawsuit revealed a whopper of a detail about its treatment of its temporary workers. On average, the complainant made $16 per hour and established that that rate was the norm with Nintendo's contractors. I speak for everyone when I say that that number is low. Nintendo of America is in Redmond, Washington, and the state minimum wage was $14.49 when the complaint was filed. Nevertheless, that means Nintendo of America's average third-party contract was well below Washington's annual salary for 2022, which was $84,167.00, with $0 worth of benefits. Well, maybe that was the industry standard. Well, not so fast because Activision-Blizzard was around the same time, in light of a unionization push at Raven Software, transitioning all of its testers into full-time staff with starting wages of $20 per hour PLUS benefits, which set a precedent in the industry. Also important to note is that Washington is one of the most expensive states in the United States to live in and consistently ranks in the lowest echelons regarding housing affordability and cost of living. So, for decades, the supposedly "pro-worker" Nintendo benefited from thousands of hours of labor that were compensated WELL BELOW a livable wage.

While Microsoft, Sony, EA, and Embracer have all faced rightful public scrutiny because their layoffs have been swift and public, Nintendo appears to be blameless in the public's mind regarding employee cuts. That's thanks to its unique Japanese respect for labor unions and its corporate culture centered around a growth mindset and self-reflection, right? Well, again, no. Nintendo has been cleaning house; it has gotten away with it by making temporary contractors redundant or not renewing their contracts, which often do not register as formal layoffs. Frequently, it has moved many of those third-party jobs into a smaller collection of internal ones, which Nintendo frustratingly highlights as evidence that they are one of the lone companies hiring instead of cutting staff. Hundreds of third-party testers and Q&A workers have been left in the lurch about work because Nintendo is transitioning to new hardware. Still, more importantly, it's turning hundreds of third-party jobs into a select few first-party ones. That might not register as the more extensive layoffs plaguing the industry. Still, to those affected, many of whom at no point had employee-provided benefits and healthcare, it stings no differently in one of the most expensive states in the United States of America. Nintendo's treatment of their years of service remains as disrespectful and insulting as those far more public layoffs authored by its competitors.

Finally, the fact remains that the current head of Nintendo of America, Doug Bowser, is likely a union buster and certainly has approval from his higher-ups to maintain that agenda for as long as possible. To this day, Bowser repeats the same lines and defenses we have seen countless times whenever a workplace even tangentially entertains the prospect of unionizing. He points to Nintendo's high employee retention numbers, the impressive average career length, and comparatively high compensation packages as proof that employees are happy and don't require unions. Again, those numbers are not entirely reflective of Nintendo's workforce, at least not reflective of the warm bodies that go into every game they put out, especially the critical darlings. So, when he says, "Our focus has always been on creating a culture that's inclusive, has a work-life balance, and is focused on our singular mission of bringing smiles to faces," that sounds great on paper. Still, it only extends to the tip of his company's iceberg.

People who lose their jobs in the video game industry don't need or benefit from you or me citing a white knight from over ten years ago as a source of hope. They need you to stand by them. They need you to scrounge contacts if you have them to help them through a difficult time. They need your support when they try to bargain collectively or attempt to gain recognition for their labor. They need you to shut up about the one or two good apples you can remember and recognize there's no good way to rationalize what's presently happening in this industry. Iwata was a great game designer who was honest about his love for the games he touched and worked on. However, Iwata is, at best, an aberration and, at worst, nothing more than a sleight-of-hand act for a monolith that has continually gotten away with some egregious workplace practices. Lament the loss of generations of talent in the video game industry this year without falling prey to over-simplistic soundbites or memes. You at least owe those impacted by corporate greed that much.

Well, here's the second part of my two-part retrospective looking at the jobs from Final Fantasy III and their indelible legacy on the games that have come out that bear the "Final Fantasy" moniker after that. If you missed the previous episode, you should click the link below. In general, this blog mini-series looks at every job in Final Fantasy III and assesses the core mechanics and possible pitfalls for these jobs across the three major releases of Final Fantasy III. Those are the Famicom, DS/3D remake, and Pixel Remaster releases. Sometimes, jobs are unique across all versions, whereas others stay relatively the same. Finally, to better communicate how these jobs have persisted beyond their appearance in Final Fantasy III, I will connect each to an icon or character in a subsequent Final Fantasy title, with spin-offs being fair game.

Before we jump into the jobs you unlock at the Water Crystal, I'd like to make a slight plea. This episode was an absolute pain in the ass to research. Starting with the Water Crystal, we begin to experience a LOT, and I do mean that, of jobs that have morphed and changed massively across the decades. Communicating those changes took a lot of work. Please let me know if you enjoyed even a small portion of this mental exercise. As with the previous episode, if you have suggestions about modern character connections I missed, consider dropping a comment, and I may include your input with credit.

Water Crystal Classes

Geomancer - [Rating: C]

The Geomancer is tricky to assess in Final Fantasy III. There's a part in the game where things are cake if you take advantage of it, but that's one fleeting moment. The Terrain command can dole out massive damage and is a viable alternative to Black Magic when struggling with crowds of trash mobs in dungeons during the mid-game. Unfortunately, Bells are a crappy weapon type, and the Geomancer's spells are completely at the whim of chance, with you entirely unable to select the spells you want. They also change depending on your characters' presently occupied terrain. That last point could be more apparent while you play the game, but it isn't. Generally, I wouldn't say I like jobs that rely on chance or roulette reels, and that's a big problem here, with more than one job from the Water Crystal having the same issue. Nonetheless, casting what are ostensibly spells without worrying about spell slots is handy, and the fact the Geomancer is immune to Silence is also a plus.

Changes for the 3D remake - Little was done to make the Geomancer better in the 3D version of Final Fantasy III. In the 3D remake, the Geomancer unlocks at the Fire Crystal instead of the Water Crystal, which is one of the odder job relocation decisions in the 3D remake. Beyond that, the job seemingly is more random in the 3D remake, as the damage of the Geomancer's spells when using the Terrain command depends on your character's job level. Having an additional metric to get even the slightest bit of positive damage to a job that is STILL A ROULETTE REEL is a complete bummer, but it isn't the worst job in the 3D remake.

Franchise Comparison - It's Mog from Final Fantasy VI. The Geomancers in the Tactics franchise stand as the best "pure" representations of the job and its gameplay potential, and BOY ARE GEOMANCERS BUSTED when you know how to use them! The Tactics Geomancer is glorious, especially when you make Ramza one and equip him with an Ageis Shield! Nonetheless, Mog from Final Fantasy VI is a named character, and they do a far better job of making you work for your combat-positive gains while limiting you from smoking everything that stands before you with little effort. The Geomancer doesn't force you to track down spells or dances like Mog does in Final Fantasy VI, but like Mog, the Geomancer is a free spirit that feels ancillary to more substantive combat options. Both are "fun" and add variety to a relatively straightforward affair, but you would be crazy to opt for them long-term.

Dragoon - [Rating: A]

If a Final Fantasy game forces you to use a job, that job should at least slap, and the Dragoon in Final Fantasy III does indeed slap! Spears are an INCREDIBLE weapon, and the Dragoon has a robust assortment of heavy armor, only occasionally beaten out by the Black Knight and Viking, and is not replaced until you unlock the Ninja. The Water Crystal is STACKED with martial classes that hit hard. While the Dragoon isn't the hardest of these hitters, it is the most versatile, with the ability to dual-wield lances. This weapon type covers a variety of elemental and mechanical niches. For example, when you pair the Blood Lance with a duplicate or a higher damage-dealing variant, you have a self-sustaining character that rarely needs healing as long as you aren't fighting undead enemies. The Jump command has some immediate uses beyond always killing flying enemy types in one hit. With the Jump command, your Dragoon leaps into the air, and while they are removed from the battlefield for a turn, they will strike in the next turn and deal massive damage. It's important to note that while the Final Fantasy Dragoon starts at Final Fantasy II, Final Fantasy III codifies its underlying math and utility. Using the Jump command guarantees you never experience a Game Over as you face a possible party-wiping boss attack. Having a Dragoon is like buying insurance against the game's more brutal bosses. Its damage output could be better, but it does so much more than dealing damage that you can happily ignore that fact.

Changes for the 3D remake - The 3D remake leaves Final Fantasy III's Dragoon relatively untouched. The only notable change, like other jobs, is that the Dragoon's damage output is dependent on a formula rather than the original's die roll, which means the 3D remake emphasizes one's job proficiency level. The result is that there's a slower burn on the Dragoon. Nonetheless, the 3D remake knows to keep the Dragoon intact during the sequences where it is a necessity. Your attack advantage multiplier is massive whenever you use Jump on an enemy weak to Wind. Ultimately, it is still a handy job that only takes a slight step backward compared to other job changes in the 3D remake.

Franchise Comparison - How could it NOT be Kain Highwind from Final Fantasy IV? Square Enix still trots him as the mascot for the Dragoon, and to this day, when you pull up any of the Final Fantasy reference books when you turn to look at the "Dragoon" section, you always see Kain right there with his massive lance. Cecil might be the protagonist, but Kain may have him beat in terms of which Final Fantasy IV character has been used outside of the context of Final Fantasy IV in supporting media. Also, huge props to him for being the character that crystalizes the Dragoon armor, though he is not the first character to wear or use it. Estinien Wyrmblood from Final Fantasy XIV is an excellent modern pick. They seem married to the limited weapon and armor set of the Dragoon and love doing flippy shit when attacking. They have story arcs that have story arcs and seemingly have schemes layered upon schemes like a literal David Xanatos. Nonetheless, Freya from Final Fantasy IX is the correct "alternate" pick because, much like Final Fantasy III's Dragoon, you only ever want Freya jumping. Even if it is not her best option, you still opt for her to jump because it allows you to dodge dangerous turns during a troublesome encounter.

Viking - [Rating: D+]

The Viking is one of the oddest failures in Final Fantasy III. Having a character with a massive pool of HP and can tank sounds like a good idea. The issue is that the original Viking couldn't provoke or draw aggro from enemies. It wasn't until the 3D remake that Square gave it a command or ability that made it capable of doing what it was meant to do. In the Famicom version, you can have a Viking add gobs of HP to your characters, but any attacks it pulls from enemies are incidental and not by design. Likewise, while it has AMAZING stat growth, especially in growing a character's HP, they are physically weak on the offensive end. Properly equipped Black Belts, Dark Knights, Dragoons, and Knights can out-damage Vikings even if Vikings can use hammers and axes. Plus, with its stat growth being so one-note, it's hard to justify using it when every other martial class at the Water Crystal is more well-rounded.

The Pixel Remaster has the courtesy of pulling a note from what it did with its Scholar in trying to strike a middle ground between the Famicom version and the 3D remake. It gives the Viking a unique ability called "Draw Attacks," which can only mean that the Viking is finally good, right? Well, here's the issue. While you can draw attacks from regular enemies, the "Draw Attack" ability isn't as helpful as you'd think. Critically, the boss attacks you are usually concerned about are AOE spells or maneuvers. The Viking doesn't do anything to prevent those from afflicting all of your party members from taking that damage. Take, for example, the Cloud of Darkness, whose only routine is to spam the same "Screw You" laser beam ad infinitum. Vikings don't redirect that beam of energy onto themselves because it cannot change the basic routines behind bosses and their most potent abilities. So, long story short, Vikings still suck!

Changes for the 3D remake - So, this point is a weird one. The 3D remake gives its Viking the "Provoke" ability, but there's a fairly decent chance the move doesn't work, and when that happens, you essentially are left with a character with a wasted turn. From levels one through twenty, the 3D remake Viking only has a "Provoke" success rate of 60%, which only improves by 10 percent every TWENTY LEVELS! That's right, your tank only has a 100% chance of doing what you want it to do, starting at level 99! On the flip side, using Provoke in the 3D remake lowers the defense of its target when it hits. The 3D remake also gives Vikings more attack power but at the cost of dropping its agility almost to zero. So, hopefully, you have a character that has no issues with taking damage if you become committed to using this job. Also, in this version of the game, all hammers inflict lightning damage. That is a double-edged sword, as there are bosses with magical resistances that can make these weapons entirely useless.

Franchise Comparison - I will have to cheat a bit with this one. Discounting characters that visually pay homage to Norse and Viking warriors, which would have opened things up to dozens of Final Fantasy XI and XIV characters, I'm going to fudge things and use characters that would be more considered Berserkers as that job has essentially become the franchise evolution of Final Fantasy III's Viking. Umaro in Final Fantasy VI is a mindless yeti, but they have a massive pool of HP for enemies to pick away at, reminiscent of the Viking. A better fit would be the later versions of Ash in Stranger of Paradise. With their mix of high HP and damage mitigation, when they unlock the Liberator tech tree, they feel like a Viking warrior about to set a village into flames. That's doubly the case when you have at least some of their Berserker tech tree unlocked.

Black Belt - [Rating: A+]

HERE WE GO! After giving the vanilla Monk in Final Fantasy III some shit, we finally have a punching-based class that deserves to be in your rotation! Beyond the Black Belt job being a heavy damage dealer, having a character that doesn't require a lot of financial investment, as it is better without armor or weapons, allows you to spend your resources elsewhere (i.e., Knights, Dragoons, and Black Knights). Likewise, around this point in the game, its biggest shortcoming (i.e., not having armor) becomes less of an issue, as your White Mage should be able to pop off the Protect spell without being too concerned about spell slots. The Black Belt's unique skills are a bit more mixed. The Boost Command, which raises your base attack power for your next attack, has its uses during boss encounters, but for the most part, you'll avoid it because you're better off attacking as is and not losing a turn. The Kick command is your AOE option in the Pixel Remaster version, and it is almost entirely useless because it does low damage to all of the enemies on your screen and does not scale at all. Black Magic is THE GO-TO for crowd control before you reach the Water Crystal, and that does not change after the Water Crystal. Did I also mention that the Black Belt's stats, outside of the magic-focused ones, are downright absurd in the Famicom and Pixel Remaster versions?

Changes For the 3D remake - Here's another job where the 3D remake commits almost no changes to a job other than to place it at a different crystal. In the 3D remake, the Black Belt unlocks at the Earth Crystal, whereas it unlocks at the Water Crystal everywhere else. Also, the 3D remake makes the Black Belt a more well-rounded character class with a more even stat growth that is not as titled towards Strength as in the original game. Oddly enough, the Black Belt is one of the few times when a Final Fantasy III job's unique ability becomes more transparent in the 3D remake, as the game more actively warns you not to use Boost a third time. So, props for that one!

Franchise Comparison - The most straightforward comparison is the right one. The Black Belt in Final Fantasy III influenced the gameplay design of Yang in Final Fantasy IV to such a degree that it feels apt to mention him here. The AOE Kick command in the Pixel Remaster version of Final Fantasy III is the same one Yang has in IV, and it even has the same gameplay flaw that I can only imagine is a copy-paste job more than anything else. Snow from Final Fantasy XIII and Amarant Coral from Final Fantasy IX are respectable mentions, and both are Monk-hybrids with kung fu-like moves. In all cases, you have martial artists with straightforward playstyles with a few complications to make things interesting when you get tired of doing the same two or three combos or moves.

Dark Knight - [Rating: B]

We have another job that is somewhat different across all versions of Final Fantasy III, including the Pixel Remaster version. The Famicom version of the Dark Knight is a Knight-Paladin hybrid as it would automatically deal with enemies that divide and multiply via its weapons. It could also use White Magic and even up to level three spells at that. Starting with the 3D remake, the Dark Knight gained a unique ability to handle enemy types that divide. Still, across all versions, Dark Knights that equip Katanas can deal additional damage to these enemies. The Pixel Remaster version of the Dark Knight provides you with the "Bladeblitz" ability, an AOE physical attack with some advantages against respawning enemies. Unlike the Dark Knight's unique ability in the 3D remake, there's no HP penalty in using this command, so when in environments like the Cave of Shadows where every enemy will divide or spawn, it's likely the only thing you want your Dark Knight to do.

The Final Fantasy III Dark Knight has multiple levels where using one is all but a necessity. In any environment with enemies that divide, not having even one Dark Knight makes that entire dungeon a laborious journey unless you run away from every random encounter, which is a viable strategy. The issue with the Dark Knight is that it is a glass cannon with armor made of paper. Worse, everything that makes them worth keeping around after the Cave of Shadows costs triple that of the standard array of equipment other jobs have in the game. In the Pixel Remaster, and this issue also applies to its equivalent in the 3D remake, using Bladeblitz anywhere outside of the Cave of Shadows feels like a wasted turn because it doesn't do a ton of damage. As a result, the Dark Knight feels like a gimmick job and an incredibly expensive one. Knights, Dragoons, and Black Belts all feel more valuable immediately and for less.

Changes for the 3D remake - Here's another odd example of the 3D remake being more straightforward than Final Fantasy III's Famicom and Pixel Remaster versions. How does the 3D remake Dark Knight deal with enemies that divide? Katanas do double damage against them, and one Dark Knight wielding a katana disables all enemies' ability to divide right from the get-go. It is actually EASIER to beat the Cave of Shadows in the 3D remake! In fact, the final boss at the Cave of Shadows, Hecatoncheir, does less damage in the 3D remake. The first downside to the 3D remake version of the Dark Knight is that its AOE physical attack, Souleater, comes at the cost of 20% of its caster's HP. On the flip side, it does a decent amount of damage on all the enemies on the screen, with a handy buff against enemies that can divide. The nice thing about this attack in the 3D remake is that it is one of the rare abilities that does complete damage even if you place your character in the back row, which you likely want to do with your Dark Knights. Unfortunately, as with any AOE attack in the 3D remake, it scales poorly on bosses and uses a formula that values your job proficiency.

Franchise Comparison - Mentioning or picking Cecil from Final Fantasy IV has to be considered cheating. At this point, everyone who cares about Final Fantasy IV knows that his status as a Dark Knight is temporary, even though the Paladin version of Cecil is rarely seen outside of Final Fantasy IV. Fray Myste might be the most "interesting" Final Fantasy Dark Knight character from a narrative standpoint. Not only do they embody the Dark Knight archetype by being a person with a past that you have to whittle away at to uncover the truth, but they also have all of the expected moves and attacks of the job. But, if I am going to mention a Final Fantasy XIV Dark Knight character, it would behoove me to name-drop Emet-Selch. I have to be honest; I am not as enthused by him as most, but there's no denying that they chew through the scenery in every set piece they occupy. HOWEVER, if you indulge me in a guilty pleasure, I need to mention the Dark Knight from Final Fantasy X-2. Getting the Dark Knight dressphere is a complete annoyance, but once you get it, there's no need to use or try out any other non-White Mage job ever again. Its self-damaging Darkness spell is busted, and as long as you have at least one White Mage, the HP penalty for using it is irrelevant. When you encounter any enemy not immune to the Death status, it also helps to evaporate any form of difficulty in the game.

Evoker/Conjurer - [Rating: F-]

This class sucks. With the Evoker, you can review a list of Final Fantasy III's early summons. Each has a "White" and "Black" variant of what that summons can do. The White effect has a 100% success rate of afflicting enemies with a negative status effect, and the Black effect involves casting an elementally aligned spell that ignores the Magic Defense stat of any possible enemies on the screen. The Summons you can use at this point suck shit; worse, the Evoker cannot directly pick which abilities their summons use. No matter what, there's a fifty-fifty shot the summon in question will either do damage OR do something that involves a status effect. Even when you level up your Evoker and gain better summons, you are still at the whims of Lady Luck, which, in my case, means seeing the same Chocobo kick move more than a dozen times.

Changes For the 3D remake - EVERYTHING IS STILL THE SAME, SO THE JOB STILL SUCKS! As in the original, you have no direct control over what your summons do. As a result, this job feels oddly useless, which relegates these awesome-looking summons to the periphery until you get the Summoner. I should provide some context as to the thought process on why the Evoker is such a headache. Final Fantasy III was a game that pushed the Famicom/NES to its technological limits. Including flashy monster animations was essentially a strut that the designers wanted you to work your butt off to see because they busted their asses to include them in the game.

Franchise Comparison - When I think about underpowered playable Final Fantasy characters that rely on luck to a frustrating degree, two names immediately come to mind. First, you have Cait Sith, whose slot-reliant combat system ensures they are never a character you can rely on to help you in a sticky situation, much like Final Fantasy III's Evoker. Also similar to the Evoker, he joins your party alongside some bruisers, but at least the Evoker doesn't have a non-zero chance of wiping out your party when you least expect it. The second name that comes to mind is Selphie from Final Fantasy VIII. Sure, the Junction System in Final Fantasy VIII means you can make anyone capable of leveling Mt. Everest. Still, when it comes to Limit Breaks, Selphie is someone whose Luck-base swings can drive you crazy. Much like Cait Sith, she also has a smidge of a chance of prematurely ending your game.

Bard - [Rating: Famicom Version: D+; 3D Remake: C-; Pixel Remaster: F]

I KNOW! I said I wouldn't give different grades for the same job across multiple versions, but the Bard is such a fringe case that I had to do it! The Final Fantasy team of this era had a thing about Bards having terrible stats, hence Edward in Final Fantasy IV, but things are way worse in Final Fantasy III. On top of that, Final Fantasy III's Bard feels like a halfway complete job as its harps do shit damage, and in the Famicom version, there are no added effects to any of your attacks. The Bard is basically a shitty DPS class. Some harps have a chance of inflicting a status effect, but there are no party-wide buffs or healing spells when you sing in the Famicom version of Final Fantasy III. Fun fact: the last two harps in the Famicom version are bugged, with the Lamia Harp not functioning as intended and the Dream Harp glitching out of the world and being impossible to acquire! Instead of bestowing effects through harps, the Famicom version of the Bard had two additional commands: Cheer and Scare. Cheer increases the strength and speed stat for everyone in your party and can be done more than once, while Scare lowers the level of all enemies by a single point. Cheer is a fine, if mediocre buff, and Scare can cause entire swarms of enemies to flee from combat. The issue with both is that there are better ways to skin a cat than to use either of these abilities. In the case of Scare, if you would rather not deal with the enemies on the screen, why not just run away?

Oh, but you're playing the Pixel Remaster version of the game, right? Well, the Bard IS EVEN WORSE in that version! In the Pixel Remaster, the Sing command has four unique spells, each tied to your job level for each character. At level one, the sing command only has Paeon, a light party-wide version of cure. At level ten, you unlock Minuet, which raises your party's attack and intellect stats; level twenty provides Elegy, which lowers the total damage your party takes and is not limited to whether the damage is magical or physical; the final sing ability is Requiem and unlocks at level thirty and attempts to inflict a randomly selected status effect on every enemy on the screen. Scare and Cheer are gone, and unlike the 3D remake version, there's no offensive spell that does damage. Can you see the problem? By getting rid of the skills from the Famicom version and tying the job's abilities to a character's job level, it sucks shit for hours upon end, and even when you get everything, some of the abilities rely on luck! The Bard here still gets a standard Attack option as compensation, but HOT DAMN, is it a total waste of time!

Changes For the 3D remake - Did I mention that the Bard is an entirely different beast with every version of Final Fantasy III? In the 3D remake, selecting the Sing command causes the Bard to perform a move contingent on their equipped harp. The game has five harps, meaning there are five spells to mull over. While their damage output is still relatively paltry in the grand scheme of things, the 3D remake mercifully has the damage of attacks attached to your Bard's Intelligence stat rather than their Strength stat. The available songs either increase your party's defense, increase your party's physical attack power, damage all opponents, heal the party with an AOE variant of Cura, or decrease all incoming damage for an attack. The 3D remake's Bard is better, thanks to having an offensive attack option, but only having one spell instead of a pull-down menu is a disappointment.

Franchise Comparison - I'm going with Hurdy The Moogle from Final Fantasy Tactics A2 and Songstress Yuna from Final Fantasy X-2! What, you were expecting me to pick Edward from Final Fantasy IV? But Songstress Yuna is the best narrative and mechanical execution of the Bard in the franchise! The concert scene in X-2 still stands as one of the most underrated moments in the series, and the Songstress dessphere can keep you and your parties going for a good chunk of the game. Hurdy embodies the cheer ability from the original Famicom version of Final Fantasy III, and his anti-undead skills prove to be clutch during an exceptionally long part of the game. BUT FINE! Let's talk about Edward, a soulless shit piece that leaves your party just as he starts to get good at doing what you want him to do! Final Fantasy IV defenders always point out that after level 70, he becomes the best character in the game, but who has time for that? Admittedly, the fact that he requires that level and length of commitment to get anything respectable out of him on the battlefield makes him a perfect analog of the original Bard job from Final Fantasy III.

Earth Crystal

Magus - [Rating: A-]

With the Magus, you finally have a class that can use all the high-tier Black Magic spells! Some of these spells can rip through the mid and late-game bosses in record time, and others are incredibly situational. Compared to the Black Mages that come before it, the Magus sacrifices a significant number of level one through three spell slots to open things up to higher-leveled ones. Nonetheless, this shortcoming matters less as you progress the game as the enemies begin to scale and render those lower spells virtually useless. The other problem with the Magus is that it does not have a ton of spell slots at the start; therefore, much like the Black Mage, you often elect to have them sit in the back row shooting arrows to preserve their most potent abilities until you absolutely need them. Luckily, the growth rate for those slots is absurd, and the massive pool of slots far exceeds that of the Black Mage and Sage, even at moderate levels. If it were not for the fact that it was replaced by the Sage and a bit too situational at its start, I would have given it my highest marks.

Changes for the 3D remake—The Magus is identical in execution, but its growth rate in the 3D remake more closely follows an exponential growth graph. Like most of the Magic-focused jobs in Final Fantasy III, the Magus starts with fewer spell slots at the start in the 3D remake, but unlike the other magic-oriented jobs, that never changes. It's not until Level 50 that the 3D remake version of the Magus stops having half as many usable spells as its Famicom and Pixel Remaster counterparts, but the deficit remains. Admittedly, the Famicom version of the job has too many slots, and the Pixel Remaster strikes the best middle ground. Nevertheless, it is still another uncomfortable example of the 3D remake of Final Fantasy III being unnecessarily challenging because so many boss encounters rely on your ability to use Black Magic.

Franchise Comparison - After giving Final Fantasy XIV characters the "honorable mention" distinction for this entire feature, it is time to connect a job to one of them. A mage with an endless list of options that causes them to feel widely powerful and out of the league of the rest of the field despite looking unassuming? Yeah, that sounds like Y'shtola. The game even presents her as a queen among mages, which is what the Magus is unless you go out of your way to acquire the Sage in the Eureka cave. And I echo my point about the Magus being unassuming in its garb and presentation. It is a Final Fantasy tradition for your best magic casters not to look the part, and only on a few occasions has the franchise afforded its best mages high fantasy-like trinkets or vestiges. If I hadn't tapped Vivi and Aerith for different jobs, I could have heard claims that they deserve to be grouped here.

Devout - [Rating: A+]

The Devout is the White Magic version of the Magus. Devouts can use all White Magic spells and have a spell slot growth to support them in casting healing spells however you see fit in the Famicom and Pixel Master versions. However, as the grade here suggests, the Devout is a few steps above its Black Magic counterpart. The reasons for this are immediately evident. While having AOE Black Magic is "nice," having AOE healing spells is a thousand times more valuable and critical to your ability to progress through the game. Getting Curaga and Revive is vastly more important than getting Flare or Meteor, and it's not even a contest. The minute you get Curaga, the need to worry about stocking up on potions and Phoenix Downs before every dungeon drops dramatically. Likewise, Devouts get some reasonably attractive offensive tools. Keeping with tradition in Final Fantasy, Wind Magic is a White Magic spell school that includes Tornado and many helpful buff and debuff spells. Haste, Protect, and Esuna can be critical tools during some late-game bosses, but the cherry on top must be Holy, which causes almost every Undead enemy to melt away in a single move.

There's another feather in the Devout's cap that the Magus doesn't have. Even after you unlock the Sage, there are times when you rightfully might not swap your Devout out, though the same does not apply to your Maguses or Summoners. Sticking with the Devout provides peace of mind because the Sage has far fewer spell slots than any prior Magic-based jobs. Especially during the game's final dungeon and boss gauntlet, you don't want to be stingy about your ability to cast Curaga or Arise. Budgeting your Summons or Black Magic spells is easier because you know only to use them when in a bind or during a boss battle. However, who's to say you don't get unlucky with a random encounter and take more damage to a single character than expected? If you opt for nothing but Sages, that can be a problem, but that can be avoided with one character sticking around as a Devout.

Changes For the 3D remake - The 3D remake repeats everything it did with the Magus with its version of the Devout. Its spell slot growth rate is slower, and its stats are also curved. No matter, the Devout is as critical in the 3D remake as it is in any version of Final Fantasy III. Because bosses are bound to hit you harder in this version of the game, and twice at that, you will need healing. As a result, my word of caution about not immediately swapping all of your magic casters to Sage applies even more. For most that reach Final Fantasy III's final moments, continuing to use the Devout provides insurance as you know you have healing spells you can use liberally.

Franchise Comparison - I want to put Rosa from Final Fantasy IV here. I know some people would group her in the "White Mage" category, but she has more meat on her bones long-term beyond healing, though that is the lion's share of what she adds to the party. The big difference between a standard White Mage-like and a Devout-like is whether or not they can cast Holy, the series' ultimate White Magic spell. Rosa gets that, and when she does, along with all of her positive buff spells, she contributes much more to your party dynamics than simply reviving people when they die. It pains me to say anything positive about Final Fantasy XIII, but you can also lop Hope into here. While he's incredibly underpowered for much of the game, when you specialize him down his Medic tech tree, he unlocks Holy, which does ungodly gobs of damage to even magic-resistant bosses. If you want an out-of-pocket pick, I'd like to interest you in Minwu in Final Fantasy II. Though he is only in your party for a short amount, he's so immediately above the abilities of your party members that they feel like they are in a class of their own, which is what the Devout feels like.

Summoner - [Rating: B]

I want to give this class a higher score, but I cannot. The Summons struggle to tread water over your white and black magic spells unless you complete the optional dungeons that unlock the best summons. Even then, your spell slot's slow growth with the Summoner seriously limits how often you can use the best summons in a battle. Sure, Bahamut might be able to inflict more damage in a single turn than most of your high-tier black magic spells, but you most likely can only cast them once or twice per battle, whereas you have dozens of casts of Flare, Meteor, and Quake. Even then, the Summons cannot compare to some of your best martial class options. An adequately leveled Black Belt will probably do more for less than your average mid-level Summoner. Nonetheless, having a Summoner in your rotation isn't a terrible idea, as they don't need to worry about spell slots, and they have some decent options that can take the burden off your other Magic casters. And there's no denying that the pixel work for these Summons is incredible and absolute eye candy in the Pixel Remaster.

Unfortunately, the Summoner has a weird downside that never made sense to me. With the Evoker, each Summon inflicts damage or provides a handy buff or healing spell. When you use the Summoner, the Summons only do damage. Admittedly, their damage throughput is miles better than that of the Evoker job's Summons, but losing those non-damage options for every summon is baffling. Maybe I may want Carbuncle to cast Reflect or the Chocobo to heal my party. Who's to say? These Summons suddenly being unable to do that is downright strange and removes class utility for no apparent reason.

Changes for the 3D remake—Are you ready for me to say it for a third time? The 3D remake has the Summoner start and end with more spell slots than in the Famicom and Pixel Remaster versions. Wait, what?! Yup, you're reading that right! Of the dozens of magic classes in the game, the Summoner is one of the rare examples where the 3D remake almost immediately unlocks your abilities and options. Now, the 3D remake does make the bizarre decision to have the level one Summoner only start with one cast of a level one Summon. However, the 3D remake version of the job unlocks the level five Summons ten levels earlier and gives you the most casts of every summon across every version of Final Fantasy III. This growth rate is what the Summoner SHOULD BE! If I put in the work to get all of the most extraordinary things for a job, and doing that involves completing a batch of new dungeons, I should be able to see that shit at least more than once every blue moon.

Franchise Comparison - It's Yuna. Terra is in second place, and Rydia deserves to be in this conversation, but come on now, this goes to Yuna. I know Final Fantasy IX fans will be on my throat about not mentioning Garnet or Eiko. Garnet would have been an honorable mention if it had not been for that two-hour crease when she is completely useless. Still, seriously, Yuna is the current gold standard on making a summoner both a narrative and thematic touchstone for the Final Fantasy game they inhabit. Terra loses points because she is in a game wherein everyone can utilize summons, though she is the first character you see in Final Fantasy VI to use spells. Rydia's status as a Summoner is equally poignant at times in Final Fantasy IV when the plot kicks up the wet works regarding her father, but Yuna is special. No game takes the idea of the Summoner being its own job and runs with it as a distinct identity and skill set only a few can use, quite like Final Fantasy X. And GODDAMN, if Final Fantasy X doesn't make you work like Final Fantasy III does to unlock some of Yuna's best assets. Each of her Summons covers a different need, with only the last few completely replacing earlier options. Play Final Fantasy X; it's a good game.

Eureka Classes

Yes, these classes are "optional," but I would be a fool if I did not discuss them in some capacity.

Sage - [Rating: A]

Giving the Sage a lower score than the Devout might seem like a spicy take, but hear me out. Yes, you have Black, White, and Summoning Magic available in a single job. With Summoning Magic on tap, you finally have a magic-based job that is only partially caught with its pants down when you run out of spell slots. Nonetheless, the limited number of spell slots is a huge letdown. When you get the Ninja, the need for any other damage-dealing martial class plummets. There's no need to consider alternate martial classes, nor do you need to think about Black Magic as an alternative to your weapon-dealing damage output. Thus, if you are popping off spells, it is overwhelmingly going to be White Magic, and there are times when you might still use the Devout over the Sage because it has more spell slots to burn. You could do what I did during the trek through the World of Darkness and have one Devout and one Sage alongside two Ninjas if you're growing slightly concerned about your White Magic spell slots running low. Nonetheless, when you reach some of the most demanding bosses in the game, your Sage should be going HAM by casting every tool in its toolbox, and as long as they are at a decent level, you should be perfectly content.

Changes for the 3D remake—The 3D remake nerfs the Sage and Ninja in a few crucial regards, and its reasoning is immediately apparent. The 3D remake wants you to complete a new optional questline to unlock its Onion Knight job, which is its best job. As a result, it has the Sage and Ninja unlock with the Earth Crystal. The core concept of the Sage as being able to cast level one through eight White, Black, and Summoning Magic spells still stands, but with one massive caveat. That caveat pertains to how it uses Summons as it uses them using the Evoker's ruleset instead of the Summoner's. Likewise, the 3D remake drops the Sage's number of spell slots to a quarter of what the Sage gets in the Famicom and Pixel Remasters. While I don't love this change, there's something to this nerf that I do respect. In practice, the Sage becomes the natural evolution of the Red Mage and serves a similar role in that it helps you keep all options on the table when entering unclear combat situations. Objectively, in a world where we care about sound and fair game design and not breaking shit, this is how things should be. That said, Final Fantasy III doesn't play fair, and not being able to break it via a direct route sucks shit.

Franchise Comparison - In theory, this is where I would mention Fusoya from Final Fantasy IV. Fusoya can use White and Black Magic, but what limits them is a limited pool of MP, which you can only circumnavigate starting at level seventy. Fusoya also represents the Sage job in that he has an obvious downside; the problem is that his downside is way too much at the point where you get him. Fusoya is definitively the worst playable character in Final Fantasy IV, and on top of that, he's a temporary character. So, it guts me to mention this pile of dogshit, but we need to turn our attention to Final Fantasy IV: The After Years for a clearcut example of a Sage in the main series. In that game, you have Leonora. Yes, you need to go out of your way to complete a series of quests that open up her ability to use Black Magic, but once you do, her only downside is that she has a paltry amount of HP. Her MP is decent and only a few steps below the other magic casters you get in The After Years. Now, if you will excuse me, I have to vomit into a toilet because I feel nauseous saying anything remotely kind about The After Years.

Ninja—[Rating: S+]

The OG Final Fantasy III Ninja is utterly busted, and in the Pixel Remaster, the Throw command, if you know how to exploit it, is one of the easiest ways to destroy everything the game has left up its sleeve. If you complete Eureka, there's no reason to use any damage-dealing martial class other than the Ninja. Period. The reason for this is clear. Ninja stars, or shurikens, do more damage than virtually everything else in the game, and only Ninjas can use them. In the original Famicom release, the Ninja had no special abilities but could equip almost every non-exotic weapon class, which included throwing weapons. However, lacking the Throw command, shurikens, and all throwable weapons for that matter, were equipped into your weapon slot, and each time you used them, you would expend them until your ammunition was exhausted. If you ran out of ammo during a battle, your Ninja would be stuck fighting with only their bare hands, which was an inconvenience, to say the least.

As in previous job types, the Pixel Remaster takes a few notes from the 3D remake but, unlike the latter, preserves the Ninja's broken status as a venerable world destroyer. Shurikens can now be accessed using the Throw command, which pulls up a menu of throwable weapons, and you can equip standard weapons for your Ninjas as they still have a standard attack. If anything, this is one of the rare examples of the Pixel Remaster version of the job being the strongest one because the Ninja can utilize its most potent resource (i.e., throwing stars) without stripping away your ability to do above-average damage with a weapon not tied to an ammo count. Also, the formula for the Throw command is BUSTED! To be exact, it is:

Throw Damage = (Weapon Attack x 2.5 + 100) x Power x 10 / 99 x Bonus

Bonus = (Random # between 1.0 and 1.8)

Can you see the problem? Shurikens have a Weapon Attack score of 200, and no modifiers are tied to your job proficiency, meaning your base damage is mainly free from your character's levels. In my case, I beat the Cloud of Darkness in less than ten minutes because I had two Ninjas endlessly spamming ninja stars until their ammo was spent.

Changes For the 3D remake - Similar to the Sage, with the 3D remake having its sights set on the Onion Knight being its most OP job class, the Ninja has taken a few notable steps back. First, instead of being able to use almost every weapon type, they are limited to Swords, Daggers, Katanas, and throwing weapons. That's not a huge blow, considering those are the ones you only care about, and with the inclusion of the Throw command, you have the same upsides I mentioned with the Pixel Remaster. Shurikens are less potent in the 3D remake but still pack a wallop. The weird thing about the 3D remake's version of the Ninja is that while it is notably weaker, it is a more well-rounded job. The Ninja can attack from the back row, and if equipped a certain way, they can attack from there without any combat penalties. You can also equip them with weapons that absorb HP, like Blood Swords or an Orichalcon knife, and if you dual-wield these together, you create a walking murder machine that cannot die outside of a scant few boss battles. The Ninja is still a highly recommended class; it just isn't a job you can prescribe to automatically win the game, like in the Famicom or Pixel Remaster versions of Final Fantasy III.

Franchise Comparison - Who are the most powerful characters in the Final Fantasy franchise, discounting villains or cosmic figures? Mind you, these need to be characters that take center stage, and you never shirk away from them when you gain access to them. I can think of only two characters. The first is Noctis from Final Fantasy XV. Is Noctis an anime shit boy? Sure. Does Noctis also have a ring that can delete you from existence should you get on his wrong side? YUP! That poor Adamantoise never knew what hit it. The other example that comes to mind is Jack Garland from Stranger of Paradise Final Fantasy Origin. I know. The memes with Jack are hilarious, but hear me out. Do you ever want to be playing as any character besides Jack in any video game ever made? He can become anything you want, and when you know how to build him correctly, he punches everything in the face until they are dead. That's metal. With the release of the post-launch DLC, Jack has gotten even more busted, especially with the job that can shoot things from a distance. Finally, much like the Ninja in the Famicom or Pixel Remaster releases of Final Fantasy III, once you find a busted strategy for Jack, there's little reason for you to abandon it, which is both a strength and weakness of Stranger of Paradise's core design.

Preamble

Last month, I wrapped up my retrospective on Final Fantasy III, and while it is not a game I would ever recommend to a layperson, it is a game I deeply respect. Despite its MANY, and I do mean MANY, problems and shortcomings, playing the game provided me with a better understanding of how the original Final Fantasy team ended up reaching the narrative highs of Final Fantasy IV and VI and the in-depth mechanical trappings of Final Fantasy V. Final Fantasy III is vital to the evolution of the series in several ways and the most prominent example stems from its job system which codified many of the character jobs and character types the series remains married to even to this day. Even with the release of Final Fantasy VII Rebirth, recurring series conventions still borrow from the tome of knowledge that Final Fantasy III instituted, which is a sign that there's some form of vestigial DNA from Final Fantasy III still informing the development of games in the series.

Whenever I cover a Final Fantasy game emphasizing jobs or character-specific tech trees, I usually relay my rankings on what jobs and characters made my experience more manageable. I did not do that with my Final Fantasy III retrospective because I wrote enough about each of Final Fantasy III's jobs and how they can be seen in subsequent Final Fantasy games to warrant it being a separate feature on the site. I wrote so much about these jobs and their connective tissue with future Squaresoft and Square Enix titles that I even needed to break this deep dive into two parts. Furthermore, I pushed myself with this mini-series in that I made contemporary or modern comparisons for each of Final Fantasy III's jobs in subsequent Final Fantasy titles. I might have a brain illness.

Nonetheless, here are the ground rules for this mini-series. First, I assure you that I played every job in Final Fantasy III at least once. That doesn't mean I used every job as exhaustively as possible, but I did give each job at least thirty minutes of my time. As you can deduce from my retrospective, I developed job preferences, especially at the end of the game. In general, I used well-known heavy hitters for as long as possible, and for the jobs that had apparent shortcomings and issues, I ditched them after realizing it would be a complete chore to make them hold their weight in combat. Second, and as if it weren't already clear, my experience with Final Fantasy III is mostly clouded by the Pixel Remaster version of the game. I did play the 3D remake, but that game is challenging, and after getting my ass kicked one too many times, I gave up. I know many lower-ranked classes I will harp about are better in the 3D remake. As such, I will make special notes about how jobs have changed over time.

Finally, I mixed things up as much as possible for my modern comparisons. Sometimes, I looked at a job type and thought of other representations of that job in subsequent Final Fantasy games. However, there were times when the core conceit of one of Final Fantasy III's jobs reminded me of someone or something from far left field. I'll include more digestible examples for every job, but there are some deep cuts that, at least in my mind, communicate how profound Final Fantasy III's influence is on the series. Also, my comparisons will be limited to Final Fantasy games from Final Fantasy IV forward. Saying the Warrior in Final Fantasy III is similar to the Warrior in Final Fantasy I is a no-brainer. I will also allow for spin-off games because there are a handful of examples I cannot ignore that feel entirely apt. Likewise, if you can think of a comparison I missed, feel free to share it in the comments, and I might even edit this post to include your suggestion with credit. So, without further ado, let's jump into it!

Default Class

Onion Knight - [Rating: D+]

The Onion Knight is OG Final Fantasy III's starting job, and it has neutral to bad starting stats and is greatly limited in its usable equipment. It is a job you should throw into the trash the minute you encounter the Wind Crystal. Yes, I am aware that when your characters reach level 90, it becomes a beast, but who in their right mind has the time or patience to do that outside of people who have to see everything in the games they play? The rule here is that once a character reaches level 90, the Onion Knight adds points to a character's core stats upon each subsequent level up while using the job. Furthermore, the "Onion" equipment is the best weapon and armor set in the game. I have never seen this exponential growth in action, as I value my time. With so many other job options at your disposal that are immediately good, it's hard to justify using the Onion Knight more than the brief moments when it is required. Nonetheless, there is a light at the end of this class's tunnel, hence the plus at the end of the grade.

Changes for the 3D remake - This is a weird one. The 3D remake changed its starting class to that of the "Freelancer," which starts with the ability to use all non-specialized weapon types (i.e., they can't use Bells or Harps). The 3D remake also allows its starting class to use level one White and Black magic. The 3D remake does indeed have an "Onion Knight" job. Still, you only unlock this job if you complete the Mognet sidequest, which, if you are using the DS version, is now impossible to complete because it requires the DS wireless service that got shut down a while ago. It's still doable in the PC release, but the Onion Knight is essentially a secret job that is even more powerful than the Ninja. It can use every weapon outside the job-specific ultimate armaments and every Black and White magic spell. Unfortunately, the Mognet questline involves you tackling a bunch of late-game optional dungeons that are not a ton of fun. The best way to view the Onion Knight in the 3D remake is the same way you likely view the bonus jobs and dungeons in the GBA version of Final Fantasy V. If you want to make Final Fantasy III an even more harrowing experience, than it already is, feel free to have a stab at the optional content in the 3D remake. However, it is to be avoided at all costs for the rest of us.

Alternate Franchise Examples - Out of principle, I will disqualify the Onion Knight from the 3D remake when drawing comparisons. What we are trying to think about here are examples of characters that start underpowered and, over time, become the best at what they do. There are plenty of examples of the Onion Knight's stat growth throughout the series, as it has become a slight series hallmark and Easter Egg for diligent players. However, if you ask me, the best example of what represents the heart of the Onion Knight is found in Final Fantasy X. I know people HATE Bliztball, considering the game forces you into a match against an elite team with a group of bums as your teammates. However, Final Fantasy X's Onion Knight is staring right at you during this required match. That Onion Knight is none other than Keepa. Though it is a chore, once you get Keepa's levels high enough, his stat growth makes him the best Blitzball player in the entire game, and it's not even a contest. However, as with the Onion Knight in Final Fantasy III, you must be an absolute MANIAC to see this stat growth happen in-game.

Wind Crystal Classes

Warrior - [Rating: B]

Until it gets replaced with the DPS options unlocked in the following two crystals, the Warrior is your martial class workhorse. It is straightforward and has a robust assortment of no-nonsense weapons and equipment to utilize whenever you visit a new town or city. When you enter a weapon or armor merchant, you know exactly what to get your Warrior, and how to make them stronger. The only thing holding it back is a problem that plagues many of the early jobs in Final Fantasy III. When you start unlocking further classes, the Warrior falls to the wayside, and there's little reason for you to return to it. It has decent stat growth, but subsequent jobs dwarf it mightily later in the game. Nonetheless, you'll likely have at least one in your party for a while and won't be complaining when you see it dole out damage at a steady rate.

Changes for the 3D remake - The 3D remake keeps things simple with its version of the Warrior. It allows it to use axes on top of its previous assortment of equipment and provides it with a new "Advance" ability. This maneuver allows the Warrior to deal an attack that does more significant damage at the cost of its defense stat being reduced for a whole turn. If that sounds familiar, you probably are thinking of a particular Final Fantasy character with this exact ability. Otherwise, the Warrior's stat growth is more balanced, though still skewed towards martial class categories, but still a step or two behind the DPS jobs unlocked in the following two crystals.

Alternate Franchise Examples - I was split on this one. I wanted to give the nod to Ramza from Tactics, but their Mettle commands provide way more non-DPS utility for me to brandish them as a classic Warrior. To me, a Warrior gets the job done through purely grognard ways and remains in your rotation because you know what they bring to the table. A far better fit would be Steiner from Final Fantasy IX. Steiner hits HARD and gets almost all of his defense from wearing heavy armor when everyone else around him is well below that, and he gains new swords and weapons that dole out massive damage. He's a straight arrow in a game with many odd hybrid-like characters, and there's something deeply nostalgic about using him because you don't have to think too long when mulling over his battle menu. HOWEVER, Steiner is a knight with splashes of Samurai in his DNA, which leads us to a weird truth about the Warrior class in the Final Fantasy series. While considered one of the "classic" jobs of the series, the Warrior job is always a stepping stone to bigger and better things and there are not a ton of examples of "true" Warriors that stay in that lane from start to finish. The closest you can get to that is Paine in Final Fantasy X-2 who starts as a Warrior and her ultimate transformation is aligned towards dishing out hard-hitting attacks with very little strategizing required from the player.

Monk - [Rating: C+]

Final Fantasy III's Monk is a disappointment compared to Final Fantasy I's. III's Monk still does a decent amount of damage, and I'd advise you to have one in your party because it saves money and allows for the Warrior in your party to be decked out in better equipment, thanks to a lack of competition. Nonetheless, the power curve with this class is gradual, and by the time you see the fruits of your labor, you're likely nearing the point when you want to ditch it in favor of better alternatives. It does not help that the Black Belt is a better version of the Monk by every possible metric. "It's fine" best describes how I feel about Final Fantasy III's Monk. At the very least, seeing the Monk use nunchakus is fun.

Changes for the 3D remake - The Monk is another job that receives minor changes in the 3D remake. That means they are even less likely to be in your party rotation as they cannot keep up with the classes that have been significantly buffed. First, the best non-fist weapons are brass knuckles instead of nunchakus, which is a significant cosmetic downgrade if you ask me. However, they gain a new "Retaliate" passive ability wherein they counter-attack upon taking damage from any enemy. This ability can be helpful, but with the Monk likely only using its fists, it is up in the air if any of the damage it does during counter-attacks even matters or is noticeable, especially when it comes to gimmick bosses. That said, your character's Attack stat goes up by two points every time you level them up as a Monk, making it a worthy addition for even a brief period.

Alternate Franchise Examples - Obviously, it is between Tifa and Sabin. The two represent the most iconic fist-based damage-dealing attackers the franchise has ever seen, with Zell Dincht from Final Fantasy VIII as a close third. That said, I enjoy seeing dolphins bursting in the background whenever my character performs a limit break, so bonus points for that. Sabin might get the nod, considering he's more of a monk in the purest sense. I like to think the elemental damage some of his Blitzes do is incidental to the physical toll they take on their victims. Tifa and Zell, through their respective game's magic systems, can utilize Black and White Magic relatively quickly. If you want a character who fights barehanded in combat, consider Prishe in Final Fantasy XI. She even has a bit of Diablo's Monk in her DNA, as she can cast healing spells while demolishing the things she punches.

White Mage - [Rating: A-]

With Final Fantasy III lacking the open-ended gameplay of Final Fantasy V, completing the game without using the White Mage is impossible. The good news is that, outside of the Mini-based dungeons, you don't feel like that impedes you all that much. Instead, the programming team decided to give this version of the White Mage some offensive spells like Aero and Aeroaga so they can contribute to damage dealing when you don't have any obvious healing targets. Using staves is another option if you want them to deal even more damage against bosses with elementally focused weaknesses, but at the end of the day, you need to heal, and this job gets that done. Like some other classes, it's held back because it has not one but TWO jobs that replace it from your rotation. However, it remains a fixture in your parties for hours upon end and rarely feels like a hindrance, and that's worth something.

Changes for the 3D remake - THEY MADE THE WHITE MAGE WORSE! I do not know why they did this, but the White and Black Mage gain fewer additional spell slots with every level up in the 3D remake for their first FORTY LEVELS compared to their Famicom/Pixel Remaster peers. For example, at level ten, the 3D White Mage has thirteen level one spells, two level two spells, and one level three spell. The number of level two and three spells you get is HALF the number the original version provides! Likewise, the higher-tier spells unlock later than in the Famicom version. For example, level five spells unlock at level twenty in the Famicom version, while they unlock at level thirty in the 3D remake! The good news is that the White Mage's spell slots experience a quadratic growth rate at higher levels in the 3D remake, while they have a linear one in the Famicom and Pixel Remaster versions. Nonetheless, getting to that point of growth is laborious and annoying.

Alternate Franchise Examples - I will go with Aerith and the Remake version of her at that. This next point will be slightly controversial, but Aerith is one of my least favorite characters in Remake and Rebirth, though I always feel like she needs to be in my party. Pulling off her combos and Limit Break is a genuine pain, as they require you to play around with buffs and debuffs or demand a lot more timing and careful planning than the other characters you can control. Having her deal even a fraction of damage on par with everyone else's primary attacks is also not worth the effort. And yet, you must acknowledge how much you need her because not having a designated healer is often wholly untenable. Sure, when things are going well, and everyone is at max health, you feel like she sits in the corner twiddling her thumbs. But when shit does tits up, she's there much like the Final Fantasy III White Mage to save your ass! At least you don't have to worry about her burning spell slots to get through Mini-based dungeons.

Black Mage - [Rating: B+]

There's an awkward period at the start of the game when the Black Mage will probably deal more damage than any other job assignment in your party. It is highly recommended that you have at least one in your party because so many of the dungeons and bosses are weak to at least one of the game's core elements. Even the Warrior takes some leveling and equipment gathering before it takes its role back as your best damage dealer. Still, the limiting spell slot situation, especially at the start, prevents you from relying on Final Fantasy III's Black Mage for too long. The result is that the Black Mage takes a backseat when you are slogging through dungeons unless you find yourself in a pinch and want bad stuff to go away quickly. Then, when you get to a boss, you burn everything they have at their disposal and watch these big epic battles melt away in seconds. Despite all of its limitations, it is still an asset. Curiously enough, the Black Mage can use bows, enabling it to do more physical damage than your White Mage while staying in the back row.

Changes for the 3D remake - Every criticism I made about the 3D remake's version of the White Mage also applies to the Black Mage. However, things are slightly worse with the Black Mage because at least your starting cure spell gets the job done, and you start with plenty of level-one spell slots. With the 3D remake's Black Mage being afflicted with the same problem of having fewer spell slots and having a slower spell slot growth rate for its first thirty levels than in the Famicom version, it feels utterly handicapped for at least two hours. Remember, because the 3D remake was designed for the Nintendo DS, it displays fewer enemies, and those enemies get more attacks and larger pools of HP and MP as compensation. So, having a Black Mage that does the same amount of damage but with fewer tools at the onset is an unreasonable burden, and getting this job to tread water is zero fun in the 3D remake. Nonetheless, you need a decently leveled Black Mage to surpass some more demanding bosses in the 3D remake. So, you usually have one in your party, even if they feel like a complete hindrance. Also, the Famicom version allows Black Mages to use Daggers, but the 3D version does not. I don't know why someone saw fit to do this in the 3D version, but it sucks not having a viable DPS weapon option for the Black Mage for no reason.

Alternate Franchise Examples - This category is not even a contest. It's Vivi. I want to throw a bone to all of you Final Fantasy XIV fans out there and give props to Lalai Lai. Lalai is a new gold standard for the Black Mage that has done a phenomenal job of communicating the job's conventions to a new generation. If I wanted to pick a character that exemplifies all of the negative trappings of the Black Mage job type, especially the problems I cited with balance in III's 3D remake, I would have gone with Palom in Final Fantasy IV as getting them to not die in two hits is a colossal feat. And what do you get in return when you stop that from happening? A sniveling brat that doesn't so much as give you a casual thanks for your hard work. Yet, Vivi perfectly embodies everything the Final Fantasy III team tries to accomplish with its Black Mage. Like III's Black Mage, Vivi starts as a liability and rises to respectability and confidence through hours of work and patience. Narrative-based character growth married with your in-game progression in a Final Fantasy game? HOLD THE PRESSES!

Red Mage - [Rating: D+]

What a bummer. It seems the Final Fantasy III team interpreted the adage "jack of all trades, master of none" literally. Lacking the upside the Red Mage has in Final Fantasy I and V, Final Fantasy III's version of the class has little reason to be in your rotation when the unadulterated versions of your starting jobs are downright better. Cool, it can use swords, armor, and magic, but your options are so limited you prefer sticking with anything else. For example, while it can use swords, it can only use the most basic versions of that weapon type, which often means it cannot take advantage of new equipment with fun or critical buffs that make upcoming dungeons easier. Worse, its spell slots are puny compared to every other magic-casting class. You can still do decent damage with a Red Mage, but there's no shaking away the feeling that the class feels like a trap. That's doubly the case when you consider the original Final Fantasy III Red Mage can only use up to level four spells.

Changes For the 3D remake - The 3D remake fixes almost all of the Famicom version's problems with the Red Mage. The first fix involves the 3D remake letting Red Mages use up to level five spells. It also adds more exotic weapons to the Red Mage's list of equipable items. They curiously don't have a unique ability like other jobs, but the Red Mage is a more balanced and versatile job overall. It's not exactly the sexiest update in the 3D remake, but quite possibly one of the most effective as the Red Mage goes from being one of the first jobs you discard to one that functions as a proverbial pinch hitter. Say you're tackling a boss and don't know if it will resist physical or magical damage. Having one of your characters be a Red Mage means you always have combat alternatives for the battle.

Alternate Franchise Examples - Alright, I have two picks. First, I can't help but think of Ritz from Final Fantasy Tactics Advance. Ritz is officially a Red Mage hybrid, but despite her official character art always depicting her holding a mage's staff, in-game she uses rapiers to deal decent, albeit comparatively weak, physical attacks. Her utility in Tactics Advance lies not in her ability to do anything exceptionally well but instead in her ability to bring almost everything to the table, so no stone is ever unturned when you find yourself in combat. She covers your bases, which is usually the biggest draw of the Red Mage in Final Fantasy games.

Similarly, you have Lightning in Final Fantasy XIII. She is the only character that starts as a Commando/Ravager/Medic, practically making her a Red Mage. She can build up the chain gauge to any enemies you encounter, deal massive damage to enemies that have filled their meter and are stunned, and heal your party members when they are in a bind. She, by herself, does everything you need in a battle to be successful. The game has her start with these three jobs because they often have her in parties that lack one of the game's core combat mechanics, especially during that awful slog where everyone is paired up into groups of two.

Fire Crystal Classes

Thief - [Rating: C-]

How much do you run away from combat in the JRPGs you play? Your answer to that question highly influences how you rank Final Fantasy III's Thief. The Thief feels like a mess outside of having better rolls on running away from trash mobs. I would swap to one when I encountered locked doors, which the Thief can handle without using Magic Keys, but those doors are rare on the game's main path. Even more peculiar, the Thief's best equipment does not start unlocking until the temple after you unlock it, which is A CHOICE! Nonetheless, this game a breeze when you can run away from shit. Having a Thief in the party ready to toss everyone out of combat when you have had your fill with dungeons is clutch. But outside of that, you're better off using any other job, excluding the Red Mage, at least at this point in the game.

Changes For the 3D remake - Here's another one of the weirder balance changes in the 3D remake. While the Thief unlocks at the Fire Crystal in the Famicom and Pixel Remaster versions, the 3D remake has them unlock at the Wind Crystal. Honestly, the 3D remake is on the right side of history. Being able to flee non-boss battles more readily is a handy tool, especially during the Mini dungeons, which already limit what you can do in battle. Steal is still a debatable ability as the enemies in the 3D remake, and all versions of the game for that matter, usually only provide basic store items, and your success rate when using the steal command is lower than it should be, regardless of your job proficiency or level. Besides the Thief getting a more balanced stat growth than they did in the original game, its unlock placement is the only significant change here.

Alternate Franchise Examples - Zidane, Yuffie, Locke, Balthier, and even Rikku are all examples of Final Fantasy thieves done right. Many of these characters have the Steal command and can fill your coffers with loot and essential usable items that may prove helpful. Locke gets points for having the ability to pick locks and open doors without using items. The thing is that all of these characters are too good to be placed next to the Final Fantasy III Thief. It does them a disservice. As a result, the comparison I will make is to quite possibly one of the weakest and worst versions of the Thief character type in the Final Fantasy series, as their stumbling points echo all of what you experience with the Thief job in Final Fantasy III. That comparison is none other than Tristam in Final Fantasy Mystic Quest. In Mystic Quest, Tristam is one of the game's guest characters and is, by a country mile, the one you tag along with for the shortest time. Due to how little he accompanies you, he has the most negligible stat growth in the entire game, and all of his mechanics seem relatively half-baked. In fact, because of his paltry stat growth, your main character will likely be better than him when you encounter him a second time. If it were not for Alus in Final Fantasy II, I would have felt inspired to call him the Prince of Cannock of the Final Fantasy series.

Knight - [Rating: A]

Final Fantasy III's Knight is an imperfect beast, but a beast nonetheless. I'm not the biggest fan of the Knight's unique abilities, which allow it to take damage intended for low-health allies, or its souped-up version of the Defend command, which results in your character only taking one damage if they use that command. Nonetheless, it hits like a truck, and the fact that it can dual-wield swords means it becomes one of your most reliable damage dealers for almost the entire game. Its armor options are incredible, in addition to the weapons it can use. The job's stat growth is also well-rounded, though it heavily skews towards the martial class stats. That consistency means that it only gets replaced once you unlock the Ninja class, as the Water Crystal martial classes have some quibbles or problems with equipment costs that prevent you from entirely replacing the Knight. Overall, it is a fantastic job.

Changes for the 3D remake - I have no idea why the 3D remake does this, but its version of the Knight can use level one White Magic, but only the three spells tied to that tier. Those spells are Cure, Poisona, and Sign (i.e., a spell that provides a copy of the world map). The 3D remake also makes the Knight's improved Defend command buff far less straightforward and significantly worse. Instead of it being a flat one damage whenever you use it, the 3D remake uses a formula that calculates your job level and deducts a percentage from incoming damage based on that formula. It's needlessly complicated, but the Cover support ability remains almost the same as in the original game. It is still an excellent job, as its core utility remains as crucial as ever, especially with harder-to-kill enemies populating every corner of the game. Nonetheless, it's one of the odd examples of a job from the Famicom version being debuffed in the 3D remake.

Alternate Franchise Examples - Let's go with Agrias from Final Fantasy Tactics and Cloud from Final Fantasy VII! Agrias hits hard with some of the best swords in the game, and her techniques allow her to attack enemies from afar. You benefit from using those abilities, but her main gimmick is that she packs a wallop when she lands an attack and sports armor that keeps her from taking too much abuse in return. She also does things to keep those around her safe. Cloud is a more orthodox pick. While Agrias has spells and techniques that draw her from her usual sword-and-board diet, even in Rebirth, you want Cloud swinging his giant Buster Sword, and if he isn't doing that, you're wasting your time. Sure, the Materia system allows anyone to shoot lightning from their eyes or ice shards from their nipples, but for all intents and purposes, Cloud is a Knight whose main draw is packing on armor and hitting things with his sword. When he isn't hitting things with his sword, he's helping you prevent his allies from falling in battle. His design's straightforwardness is part of why you don't mind him being a character you are permanently locked into using for most of the games he is in. He gets the job done and makes everyone around him better as a result.

Ranger - [Rating: C+]

The Ranger is another job that errs its way into the "It's fine!" category. The Ranger's big problem is its short shelf-life. For a brief moment, it has one of the few non-magic crowd control options in the form of its "Barrage" ability. However, even when you pick it up, your designated Black Mage is slowly but surely growing its spell slots, and there are better crowd-control options with the introduction of jobs locked behind the Water Crystal. Furthermore, the randomness of Barrage and its sometimes paltry damage output limits its usefulness as the game progresses. The good news is that the Ranger can use White Magic up to level three spells. Having a pocket Cura on hand is incredibly useful, and having a non-White Mage use Mini for entering and exiting Mini dungeons takes a load off your White Mages. Ultimately, it has a time and place, even if that time and place is the size of a pea.

Changes for the 3D remake - OH, IT'S SO MUCH WORSE! First, the 3D remake completely removes the Ranger's White Magic, plummeting its usefulness immensely. Likewise, the Barrage ability is now dependent on your character's job level with Ranger, but even at higher levels, it does less than average damage per hit. The Ranger's stat growth is even worse in the 3D remake, but that's most likely in reaction to the Ranger having an absurd stat growth in the Famicom version, and the Pixel Remaster strikes a nice balance between the two. In the end, the Ranger is far more skippable in the 3D remake than it is in any other version of Final Fantasy III. That's doubly so, considering that the Ranger's glasscanon sensibilities are even more brittle in the 3D remake.

Alternate Franchise Examples - My thought process here is to consider not just Rangers in the series but long-distance attackers who can't take a beating. For example, Barret is a tank that can take a beating on top of being a guy with a machine gun on his arm, so I'm not considering him here. As bizarre as this sounds, I will opt for Ace from Type-0 and Fran from Final Fantasy XII. Picking a Final Fantasy XII character is dicey as, if you get the appropriate licenses, you can have them do and use anything you wish. Nonetheless, all depictions of Fran show her using bows, and her starting stats in the original version of Final Fantasy XII were among the lowest of all your other party members. Many surmise this was a passive hint that she was a long-ranged fighter. Her stats are modified in the Zodiac Job System versions of Final Fantasy XII, but her overall HP is still below average. Ace from Type-0 might sound like a shitpost, but hear me out. He attacks using a deck of cards and tends to stay away from the middle of battles as he has incredibly low HP. He also has an insane evasion stat, and his ultimate ability allows him to teleport wherever you want, which mimics that of the Ranger in Final Fantasy III. However, just like the Ranger, when he does take a hit, you usually have to burn a turn healing to get him out of critical health. Wakka from Final Fantasy X would also be a candidate. Finally, let's not pretend that Edgar's Auto Crossbow isn't a copy-paste job of the Ranger's Barrage ability.

Scholar - [Rating: B-]

Of Final Fantasy III's "gimmick classes," the Scholar is the one that maintains its self-worth the longest. Having Scan on tap is helpful, and there are boss encounters where having a Scholar is incredibly important. What annoys me in the Famicom version is that checking for enemy weaknesses (i.e., Scan) is one ability, and checking the enemy's HP (i.e., Peep) is an entirely different one. The Pixel Remaster version mercifully merges both into a single "Study" command. And herein lies a MASSIVE PROBLEM for me and this feature. The Scholar remains, BY FAR, the Final Fantasy III job that has changed over time the most. The NES/Famicom version is primarily a DPS job that can scan enemies but mainly uses books to deal elementally themed damage. That's it.

The Pixel Remaster doesn't give you the Famicom version of the Scholar. Instead, it gives you a weird hybrid version that merges parts of the original with mechanics and ideas exclusive to the 3D remake. For example, the Scholar in the Pixel Remaster has the "Alchemy" command, a modified version of the 3D remake's "Item Lore" ability. Be warned, this version of "Alchemy" does NOT involve combining two items to make a more potent third one as you do with future versions of the Alchemy or Mix command. Instead, when using items during a battle, they are more effective. For example, a Scholar who uses a Hi-Potion will restore 1,000 HP instead of the usual 500 HP, which applies to offensive items as well. However, because the Pixel Remaster's Scholar has this new ability, it hits significantly less than the Famicom version. The Famicom Scholar's core Strength stat is almost always four to five points higher than its Pixel Remaster counterpart, and that's nothing to scoff at in practice. This situation is a weird one; there's no doubting that, but it gets even weirder because now we need to talk about the Scholar abilities only seen in the 3D remake!

Changes for the 3D remake - I spilled the beans, but the Scholar is an entirely different beast in the 3D remake. First, they can use Black and White Magic but only up to level three spells. Second, Scan and Peep are combined into a single "Study" command, but this ability also removes ANY AND ALL beneficial status effects on the enemies you use it on. You only have this in the 3D remake, but ultimately, it means the Study command also casts Dispel. Moreover, because this is a special ability, it does not spend MP or spell slots. That alone makes the Scholar one of the best jobs in the 3D remake. Finally, the 3D remake gives Scholars the "Item Lore" support ability, which, again, doubles the potency of healing and offensive items. The result of these changes is that the Scholar skyrockets from its mid-tier status in the Famicom version to a much higher-tier status in the 3D remake. Even if you don't care about knowing the overall HP of a boss, you can immediately get rid of any buffs they might be sporting in a single move. You can use this to your advantage, as some bosses are programmed to buff themselves as a move if they detect they don't have any at the start of their turn, which can cut the combat efficacy of bosses in half. And when you consider almost all bosses get an additional move in the 3D remake, that proves to be enough to turn the tide of battles.

Alternate Franchise Examples - Well, which version of the Scholar am I trying to compare to? Oddly enough, Atlus, not Square, has remained obsessed with JRPG parties having a designated researcher who relays enemy weaknesses and strengths on a handy information sheet. Nonetheless, you can tell how parts of the Scholar's design would go on to inform how Chemists work in the Tactics games. There's also that Tonberry Scholar in Final Fantasy XIV. Final Fantasy XI also has a pretty in-depth Scholar class that sported a fantastic quest with some fun pivots and worldbuilding. Nonetheless, Rikku comes to mind the most in terms of a Final Fantasy character that gains most of their combat usefulness through items. Yes, most of that stems from her utterly BUSTED Mix ability, which I have been on record saying is the only way I feel comfortable beating Yunalesca. Nonetheless, Rikku is a character that draws you to merchants in an effort to discover new recipes that may prove pivotal in battles, much like the 3D and Pixel Remaster versions of the Final Fantasy III Scholar.

When it comes to the original version of the Scholar, I don't know. The closest thing to the OG Scholar I can think of is the Scholar in Final Fantasy: The 4 Heroes of Light. They do extra physical damage when using books, much like how the job functions in the Famicom version of Final Fantasy III. Still, they are ultimately limited to that of an equipable crown. Making a character in Final Fantasy XII that uses Measures after assigning them the Machinist job has some Scholar vibes, but barely. The Scholar job has been a "work in progress" since its debut. I hate to end this episode on this note, but do you have any better comparisons? I'm at a loss for words here.

Let's Talk About Raising Money FOR KIDS!

Well, it is that time of the year again when I throw in my lot with the members of the Giant Bomb Community Endurance Run. Those who have been around this site for a while may recall the Giant Bomb Community Endurance Run being a community-led Spring charity drive. It is something that got started years ago when electricviking noticed that after the Persona 4 Endurance Run, users would not stop asking the staff to do another one. He challenged the community to do their own with games of their choosing while also raising money for charity! These days, the Giant Bomb Community Endurance has stuck around, but with streaming gimmicks and the site's most significant users sharing their respective knowledge of a cavalcade of big and small games. Some still make an effort to finish what they start, and others treat their streams to create user-created Quick Look homages or video essays. I will be bucking a trend this year and will NOT be streaming any JRPGs. Instead, I will use this edition of the Giant Bomb Community Endurance Run to revive one of my most neglected blogging features on the site, "The Quest For The Worst Adventure Game Puzzles!" So, for those asking me to return to my old tricks of complaining about pixel hunts in Myst clones or SCUMM-based or parser-based old-school design foibles, read on about what I will be doing from April 12th through the 14th!

This year, I'm fundraising for Feed the Children! Feed the Children is an OK-based US charity that provides food and nourishment to children in need worldwide. It operates in the United States, El Salvador, Guatemala, Honduras, Kenya, Malawi, Tanzania, Uganda, the Philippines, and numerous areas impacted by natural disasters or war. With Feed the Children, even a $1 donation provides $9 worth of food and living essentials. Giant Bomb has continued to transform and change since the last time we hosted one of these Spring charity drives. All I ask is that for any of you who have enjoyed my blogging or thread-creating efforts, the Community Spotlights that I write on the site, with the help of Marino, or the work I do on social media to try and bring some attention to the magnificent works you publish on this site; please consider donating what you can spare to my donation page linked below. Even a single dollar is a massive morale booster, and if that's too much to ask, don't worry. You can help by sending the link to my donation page to people you know who might be interested in donating or spreading the word further. This year has been challenging for many, and I welcome you to sit back and enjoy what I will be streaming for your entertainment.

Important Links:

• My Donation Page: https://tiltify.com/@chris-zp-f/chris
• Team Page: https://tiltify.com/+gbcerxiv/gbcerxiv
• My Twitch Account: https://www.twitch.tv/zombiepie

FMV Fridays!

Friday, April 12th ⋅ 4:30 – 10:30 pm (PDT)

Bargon Attack

To start things off, I'm finally taking the time to explore a game from Coktel Vision, a former French game developer known in the past for its classic adventure games and penchant for making questionable edutainment games in Europe based on the Asterix and Playtoons IPs. However, they are also best known for developing the Gobliiins MS-DOS games, and many of you are most familiar with them being the studio behind Inca (i.e., that Inca People CD-i game). It would behoove me also not to point out that they had a WEIRD STREAK in which they pulled a note from the Leisure Suit Lary series and made a string of softcore pornography point-and-click adventure games, but I'm not going to talk about those in any way shape or form now or likely ever. Nonetheless, outside of "peak" Cryo Interactive, there was a brief one to two-year window when they were the second biggest European adventure game studio, occassionally outperforming larger outfits like Psygnosis by sheer volume. At one point, they even convinced Sierra to be their exclusive North American publisher for games like The Prophecy and Lost in Time, the latter of which might be something I have to cover on the site as it is widely considered as one of the most challenging '90s era point-and-click adventure games ever made.

Coktel Vision was also wild about its writing and production values, and Bargon Attack is one of their middle-era works that best communicates that. The game mixes FMV cutscenes with the expected pixel-based SCUMM-engine-like gameplay of the era. Bargon Attack is also one of many games that show that Coktel had a passionate love for the first generation of the SCUMM engine and viewed later engine revisions by the late '90s as a betrayal of the genre. Bargon Attack looks and plays like Maniac Mansion, with a few unique quirks here and there, but it is a game that was released in 1992. That means it was pitted against Indiana Jones and the Fate of Atlantis and came out AFTER Monkey Island 2. It was also released the same year as Sierra's King's Quest VI: Heir Today. This game got BURIED by its competition, and that's a shame because it's a wild and wacky ride. It's an alien invasion point-and-click adventure that borrows several notes from Sierra's Manhunter series and even has some brutal player death scenarios to find. Still, it also has the jaunty humor of LucasArts' Zak McKracken and the Alien Mindbenders. This game has some out-of-place live-action FMV cutscenes at the start, which feature actors who are CLEARLY the designers having a fun time, with some of the worst costumes I have ever seen from a game of this type from this era.

Wrath of the Gods

Here's a game I cannot wait to show you all if you decide to tune in to my charity stream. Wrath of the Gods is a pure edutainment FMV adventure game with green-screened actors, usually various designers and their family members, pretending to be Greek gods and goddesses. The acting is terrible, making it one of the funniest games I have played this year. The game is the only title from developer Luminaria, which means it was likely a passion project of a close group of friends, which are always the best FMV games to play. Last year, I played Gothos, and that game is truly something special. The weirdest part about Wrath of the Gods is the fact that you can still legally play it as someone from Luminara continues to renew the license to the game's official website, which now lets you play the educational version FOR FREE! As someone who teaches history/social studies and has played this game at least once, I can authoritatively say that the "educational" merits of Wrath of the Gods are highly dubious. Sure, the game has an in-game encyclopedia. Still, it is buried deep in the game, and most of your experience will involve butting up against random NPCs and marveling at the over-delivery of their lines.

For the most part, Wrath of the Gods falls into the "pick-up and delivery" format that was incredibly common in FMV adventure games of this era. The trick is not in solving puzzles or complex brain-teasers but through your ability to parse backgrounds and foregrounds and click on objects that are the size of a handful of pixels and then apply these items to quest givers or pieces of furniture that are several screens removed from where you picked them up. The act of playing Wrath of the Gods could be better, but that's not why we are here. We are here for the bad acting AND the stop-motion animation for all of the Greek mythological monsters and creatures you encounter. While the overall product isn't great, I have to give Luminara props for leaning into their material and providing some INCREDIBLE Ray Harryhausen-inspired stop-motion monsters that filled my heart with glee when I first saw them. There's a fight with a Medusa and a Chimera; both look how you would want homages to Ray Harryhausen's work on Jason and the Argonauts to appear and animate. It's stunning and nostalgia-pleasing stuff.

Soldier Boyz

What would any FMV streaming special be without at least one rail shooter? Here's the kicker. Soldier Boyz features some incredibly poorly compressed cutscenes produced by a future award-winning director. The cutscenes in Soldier Boyz were directed by none other than Darren Aronofsky. The guy who directed critically acclaimed films like The Wrestler, Black Swan, and The Whale directed cutscenes for a terrible FMV rail shooter. This game was released less than one year after Aronofsky made Pi, but shortly before he released Requiem for a Dream. While between those two projects, he decided to try making cutscenes for an FMV rail shooter that was essentially a re-interpretation of the almost wholly forgotten HBO Home Video film starring Michael Dudikoff, Soldier Boyz. I get that people have to eat, but alongside finding Nick Offerman in MTV's Club Dead, seeing Aronofsky's name pop up during the game's credits was the most glorious FMV surprise of my lifetime. My jaw dropped, and I began punching the air; I won't lie. The idea of Aronofsky directing something with popcorn movie action sensibilities with shmaltzy, hyper-charged acting is alien to me.

Besides the novelty of playing a cheap check that a famed director made to feed their family, there are a lot of layers to Soldier Boyz's awfulness. The film and game feature a troop of committed delinquents who must perform a rescue mission in Vietnam to make their case that they deserve freedom. How both Soldier Boyz products go out of their way to make you believe you are watching teenaged criminals slowly embark on a combat-based character change, at times, reek of racially-coded tropes that would make Daryl F. Gates blush. There are two Latino/Latinx gangster characters, and you can feel their actors struggle as their directors continually ask them to play up their accents to a painful degree. The gameplay is no different from the 3DO version of Demolition Man, but with one massive caveat. Soldier Boyz was filmed without using a blue or green screen and instead was filmed on real exterior sets. This point of differentiation means the in-game video compression is atrocious, and every cutscene is overblown regarding the gamma and overall brightness. It is downright impossible to play. As a result, I will be playing the game with an invincibility cheat. Without this assist, there is no other way I can imagine beating the game.

Quest For The Worst Adventure Game Puzzle SPECIAL

Saturday, April 13th ⋅ 10:35 am – 10:35 pm (PDT)

Commander Blood

There may be a handful of you who may recall that in the early days of the Giant Bomb Community Endurance Run, I would pick a single game to stream and play for nearly 48 hours across the three-day event. Those days are beyond me as I have come to respect variety and pornography as the spices of life that keep me going. I offer considerable props to users like @dixavd, @mattyftm, or @marino, who might still remember me streaming Final Fantasy VII and getting lost trying to find Kalm. Nonetheless, as a funny compromise, I tend to pick a single moderate-length game for the main event of the Giant Bomb Community Endurance Run on the Saturday it takes place. On this day, I complete this selected game within ten to twelve hours. This year, I am playing the game I crowned during my 2023 GOTY awards, the "Best Use Of FMV," Commander Blood. On Friday, I plan to share some hilarious uses of FMV featuring less-than-professional actors doing their best, but have you ever heard of an FMV game using puppets on miniature sets? Let's talk about Commander Blood, one of the weirdest adventure games I have played short of Eastern Mind: The Lost Souls of Tong Nou.

I flippantly mentioned Cryo Interactive during my pitch for Bargon Attack. Still, it bears repeating that for the longest time, they were one of the biggest developers for the adventure game genre, especially when LucasArts shuttered their investments in non-Star Wars game titles in the early 2000s. It is hard to pinpoint titles of theirs that have stood the test of time, but there's no denying that they really went for it with almost everything they made. Their Atlantis series copied Myst's formula but beat Cyan at making fully 3D worlds by over a decade. At a time, they even released more game titles in Europe than their early French-developer rival, Ubisoft, and some of their works, like Versailles 1685, even outperformed Ubisoft's contemporary best hits by a not insignificant margin. With Commander Blood, they decided to have a go at making an FMV adventure game, but outside of a handful of CGI character designs, almost all of the characters in the game were created using live-action puppets in front of a chroma key screen. And before you make comparisons to Farscape, be aware that this game came out in 1994, meaning it predates Farscape by at least FIVE YEARS! Commander Blood and its weird use of puppets was a germ in someone's brain that grew and evolved independently of any influences outside of maybe Thunderbirds. And HOT DAMN, am I desperate to show you all the majesty of Commander Blood's ending cinematic! It's AMAZING!

Welcome To The Weird World of Faux-Edutainment!

Sunday, April 14th ⋅10:30 am – 4:30 pm (PDT)

The Pink Panther: Passport to Peril & The Pink Panther: Hokus Pokus Pink

Both of Wanderlust Interactive's Pink Panther edutainment games are aberrations in the pantheon of edutainment games. Both tackle some serious topics, like the Indian Caste System and the legacy of colonialism in Australia and don't sugarcoat the facts. On the other hand, the game presents these sometimes bitter realities in musical numbers that have one-sixteenth the budget of classic episodes of Schoolhouse Rock! All the while, you have the Pink Panther, who talks in both games, getting into wacky hijinx and engaging in crass bodily humor. Wanderlust Interactive's heart was in the right place with their Pink Panther games, which ended up representing Parthian Shots in terms of their abilities. They did nothing of note after Pink Panther Hocus Pocus Pink, but unfortunately, their works are undeniably messy. Let's just say that when the second one of these games attempts to broach the topic of Arab-Palestinian-Israeli relations, it reflects widely held, and not sufficiently debated, '90s geopolitical sensibilities. "It tries" is the most apt descriptor of Wanderlust's efforts to provide an educational effort with each of their Pink Panther titles.

But both games have incredibly adult moments wherein they subject you to body horror, especially in the second game, which comes out of nowhere. The second game starts with a child performing black magic and transforming one of his friends into an ogre. And then he fails to prevent an evil spirit from possessing them. The first game has a genuinely frightening juxtaposition in which you see the summer camp the Pink Panther is attempting to manage completely descend into chaos as robotic doppelgangers of camp attendees shatter into pieces and reveal their inner machinery. These are both anomalous games with some of the most insane tonal whiplashes I have ever seen in video game history. I will be playing both games back-to-back as they represent the surreptitious rise and fall of Wanderlust as a developer. I can only assume they paid a decent amount of money to get the Pink Panther IP and did it a good service compared to other less successful children's games. Nonetheless, there are times when they attempt at the creative audacity of Jim Henson by ratching up stakes or eliciting non-traditional emotional reactions in edutainment, and I don't hate it for trying because that's what makes both of these games more memorable experiences.

If I Can Reach $750 Before The End Of The GBCER, THERE WILL BE A BONUS GAME!

Leather Goddesses of Phobos 2: Gas Pump Girls Meet the Pulsating Inconvenience from Planet X!

As a token of appreciation for your support, I'm offering a special donation incentive if I manage to raise $750. Leather Goddesses of Phobos 2 is already a front-runner for the worst game I have played this year. With its Leisure Suit Larry-like sensibilities and its employment of the lion's share of the writing staff behind Infocom's Zork text adventure games, it is a video game oddity. At times, it errs every so closely to being a softcore pornography game, though it shies away from showing anything overtly explicit. It also features some "classic" humor writing from early PC game designer titan Steve Eric Meretzky. However, the end product is downright infuriating, and how you repeat your actions to complete the three different routes via its selectable player characters at the start of the game is downright criminal. I don't want to play Leather Goddesses of Phobos 2, but I will for the kids and in the name of charity. That is the cross I am willing to bear for the Giant Bomb Community Endurance Run this year. Stay tuned to find out more!

Let's Set The Scene

Around mid-March 2024, Bloomberg reported that Sony was "pausing" production of the PSVR2 due to unmoving inventory. As indicated in their report, Bloomberg showed that the PSVR2 has consistently declined in overall sales since its launch, despite other competitors (i.e., Meta) within the VR market seeing the opposite trend with their hardware. Likewise, Bloomberg and The Verge corroborated reports that Sony is still exploring making the PSVR2 usable on PCs, which would unlock it from being a console-exclusive device tied to the PS5. The potential of this PC-oriented pivot in turning the device's fortunes is why Sony is still in the VR hardware market. That's not entirely revelatory news, considering Sony announced PC compatibility with the PSVR2 in February 2024. Nonetheless, there are still grounds for skepticism and concern from early adopters, considering this news also coincides with Sony's decision to shutter London Studio, one of the few in-house studios Sony had dedicated to developing software and games for PSVR2.

2023 and 2024 were not kind to Sony's VR investments, but, as I hinted earlier, while they are not alone, the market for VR is growing, albeit in ways that do not benefit Sony's direction or approach to the technology. In Q4 2023, Meta shipped 1.3 million units, whereas Sony's PSVR2 only shipped ~325,200. Yes, that comes with the caveat of being "units shipped" instead of completed sales, but it shows what retailers are opting for and which software giants are starting to take the reigns of this likely niche market. Likewise, while Apple's Vision Pro is still pegged at the absurd price of $3,499, the International Data Group (i.e., IDC), a market analysis group specializing in technology, estimates "the VR market to grow on average 31.5% per year between 2023 and 2028." Now, there's a massive caveat to that statement: the IDC's estimate predicates almost all of VR's growth on enterprise market gains over consumer-based ones. While Apple's entry into the VR space is bound to net gains in the R&D side of things, which reviews of the Vision Pro seem to suggest, that does not change the fact that the entire world of VR and AR is undergoing a significant pivot to stave away the buyer's remorse some of these software and hardware companies are feeling after investing gobs of money in creating mixed-reality software and manufacturing divisions.

Sony's PSVR2 is not in a position to react to the seismic shifts in the VR market. It is a device with gaming in mind first and other entertainment applications and uses second. Nonetheless, they remain one of the most prominent figures in the realm of consumer VR, and let's not pretend their competitors don't have looming dragons to slay as well. While Apple's Vision Pro enamored critics and its most ardent supporters with great internals, including one of the best displays and a seamless video passthrough setup, it also launched without critical entertainment apps like Netflix and YouTube. Apps from owners that are drawing weary of toeing the line of Apple's closed ecosystem in light of Epic's lawsuit and are groaning at the prospect of making apps with consistent content updates to what many already know will be an infinitesimal userbase. And Meta's VR division is a money pit. Despite what Mark Zuckerberg and everyone else at Meta might say about their VR lab driving up record revenue, they also drew up record costs. There's no doubting if Zuckerberg weren't completely sold on VR being the future, Facebook/Meta would have pulled out of the market entirely.

Meta's Money Pit Is Slowly Becoming A Monopoly

But how bad is Meta's VR lab revenue situation? Every quarter, Meta/Facebook burns through billions of dollars to make progress in furthering its consumer and enterprise metaverse ambitions. Even after Meta called Q4 2024 a "banner year" for its VR division, which it calls Reality Labs, while it proudly advertised that it had generated $1 billion, it also was forced to admit its costs had ballooned to $5.72 billion, representing a total net loss of $4.56 billion in a single quarter. And what was its message to investors? Why it said bluntly in its earnings report, "We expect operating losses to increase meaningfully year-over-year due to our ongoing product development efforts in augmented reality/virtual reality and our investments to further scale our ecosystem." Since 2020, Reality Lab, formerly known as Oculus VR, has not once generated a quarterly loss of less than $1.5 billion. And yet, they indisputably have the world's most extensive user base of any given VR ecosystem. But there's a method to Meta's madness. While firm sales data are fuzzy in tech these days, especially when it comes to VR and AR, Meta's strategy of throwing money at its VR problem has netted them at the lowest estimates, 55% of the VR/AR market share, and on the higher estimates, 75%. If someone will make money in the mixed reality space, it will likely be Meta.

Say all you want about it being a fool's errand, but Zuckerberg and Meta have something almost everyone else in the VR industry lacks: they have an end goal in mind. Meta plans to keep the lights on, regardless of how much money it may cost, as part of a grand strategy to have an almost complete vice grip on the consumer VR market. And with some of its competitors ducking out, scaling things back, or entirely leaving consumer VR in favor of enterprise VR, Meta is slowly but surely developing monopolistic control over the market. It's a small, niche market but still utterly dominated by Meta. Likewise, as it turns to enterprise applications of its VR technology, it increasingly views the consumer side of things as a way to make people less apprehensive about seeing VR used in workplace and industrial settings. For example, if a doctor has some exposure to playing around with Beat Saber at a friend's house, they may be more open to using more advanced versions of the same technology in manipulating projections of human body parts at their hospital. And let's also not dance around the issue of Zuckerberg's metaverse dreams. The play there is relatively simple. Suppose this hardware can be used to host digital meetings and business reviews, with additional tools that allow bosses to assess the engagement and diligence of workers. In that case, they will see an opportunity to sell Meta devices to every corporate business worldwide. It's also a play to inject youth into its social media platforms (i.e., Facebook) as the users of its current platforms, outside of Instagram, are showing signs of getting older despite reasonably steady growth.

There are a few messages to pull from this information. The first is, if a company as "in it" as Meta is still struggling to draw a profit from an unsurprisingly small clientele, why would things be any better for smaller efforts, or in the case of Sony? Is the PSVR2's target audience a fraction of what Meta works with? Probably. The cost of entry for a PSVR2 isn't just the $549.99 price tag of the device; you also need a PS5. Having a VR-ready PC may come to more than the cost of a PS5. Nonetheless, let's not pretend as if one of these doesn't have a massively larger user base with more in-depth software and app support out of the box. Oh, and Meta's Quest 2 is consistently below the PSVR2's price tag across the board and sometimes erring below a $200 price tag. Meta's overall strategy on the consumer side of things is to corner the budget VR headset market, costs be damned, and never look back. No one else is willing to do that because everyone knows it doesn't generate enough revenue to offset expenses. And with the demise of London Studio, it's not as if Sony has an upcoming title to point at to get people excited about the future, which makes their supposed confidence that things will get better with PC compatibility all the odder. All of Meta's VR devices are compatible with Steam via Steam Link at no extra cost and have more extensive libraries immediately. Is Sony's new PC plan for PSVR2 going to open the floodgates to allow third-party marketplaces officially without the use of outside apps like Trinus? If they don't, they don't provide a great value proposition to VR consumers. The Unreal Marketplace even has an officially sanctioned Meta plugin to make its software and marketplace compatible with Meta VR devices. I'm unsure if Sony would EVER allow that to happen in an official capacity.

No, Seriously, Everyone In VR Is Realizing The Money Is In Enterprise

Let's return to that Bloomberg report, which stated that Sony had manufactured over 2 million PSVR2 headsets as of March 18, 2024. That number is well below the 5 million units sold Sony self-reported for the original PSVR in 2019, and AGAIN, with the PSVR2, we are working with the supposed number of units shipped versus units sold. This fact is undoubtedly a shocker, considering Sony was pretty immediate in championing PSVR2 at the onset when it sold 600,000 units in its first six weeks. It's not precisely BREAKING NEWS, but the landscape and appetite for VR have changed since Sony launched the original PSVR in 2016. And yet, Sony continues to have the same VR playbook or sales plan as it did in 2016: sell headsets to as many compatible console owners as possible. This next point is a fun mental exercise, and this only partially relates to Sony, but check out Steam's best-selling VR-only games list and look at how many titles are two years old or more. VR and AR may have had their "peak oil" moment four years ago, but no one talked about it despite all the signs and red flags. And yet, all of this aside, you might be surprised that Sony currently stands as Meta's most significant source of competition. Even if you want to argue that the prospective buyers for a $549.99/€599.99/£529.99 VR headset, alongside a $450 to $500 console, is small, it's still a more extensive workable clientele than what most non-Meta VR companies or subsidiaries are working with presently or in the past. Yet, even if we trust the highest estimates that state Sony has 25% to 30% of the VR market, the future of a VR device tethered to the ownership of a video game console is STILL incredibly bleak.

CNBC reported that in 2023, the overall sales of VR and AR headsets dropped by approximately 40%. When I said AR/VR had experienced its "peak oil moment," I wasn't joking. There may be untapped non-US, non-EU, and non-Japan markets to sell mixed reality headsets to, but the people who want one in the markets where these products have been introduced already have one, and those who don't aren't on the fence about the technology. VR remains relatively divisive and utterly bereft of consumer enthusiasm, as prices for the hardware are increasing, not decreasing. There's no "easy money" selling virtual reality anymore, and that's the main reason why the mixed reality industry is contracting and not expanding, even as profits seem to have risen year-to-date. The landscape of device providers and where they are now perfectly reflects that massive contraction. Valve updated its VR marketplace and OS in 2023, but they have been completely mum about any hardware sequels or revisions to their Steam Index headset despite registering plans for one back in 2019. Despite forging an alliance with Steam and initially making progress against Meta's dominance, HTC's Vive division announced they would mainly transition new devices from consumer VR in favor of enterprise and business endeavors. Despite reviving its XR division out of the ether in response to Apple, Samsung's Gear VR ended support in 2020, though Meta has courted many of these VR users with the Oculus Gear VR app. Finally, when was the last time we heard Nintendo offer any new variety packs or products with its Labo experiment?

And what about AR? The AR landscape has tumbled down a schism of two enterprise-focused paths. Either a) AR tech is being sold to creatives and professionals to assist in the practice of social interactions and applications that benefit from having holographic pictorial supports in activities that cannot be done in person, or b) AR tech is being sold to business owners and bosses that hope to reinvent workplace collaboration to gain more buy-in as return-to-work initiatives are met with pushback or resistance. Those wildly creative Hololense demos at E3 with a person manipulating tiles and blocks in Minecraft using their hands? None of that will ever come to the consumer gaming sphere. Everyone with even a centimeter of skin in the AR industry has given up on making the tech affordable to the layperson or feature-rich enough for AR glasses or lenses to make sense to everyday consumers. Google Glass certainly made a splash when it was first introduced. Still, Google discontinued the consumer division of Google Glass in 2015 in favor of the product becoming enterprise-only, and in March of 2023, Google even discontinued that. Hololens is in an even weirder position, given that Hololens 2 was released in 2019 and Microsoft's CEO, Satya Nadella, has continually affirmed that Microsoft, under his watch, will continue investing in metaverse application software. Still, late in 2023, Microsoft announced it would deprecate Windows Mixed Reality, the platform Windows 10 uses to work in AR settings. Furthermore, layoffs have gutted almost all of Microsoft's mixed reality and AR teams, including the military application division, which was presented as the most likely candidate to make money. This development says a lot about how ready AR is for the real world. So, Sony is basically all that remains if you are curious about jumping into VR or AR as a regular consumer and don't want to send money to Mark Zuckerberg.

So, What's Next? Nothing?

There's one unanswered question about the future of PSVR2 that I and anyone here cannot answer. When the original PSVR sold around five million units during its lifetime, did it make a profit? After factoring in manufacturing costs, R&D, and marketing, did Sony's most successful VR venture butt up against the same hazardous cost overruns others in the VR industry encountered? Regardless of the answer, when trying to discern why the first generation of PSVR worked and sold far better than its technologically improved successor, it's not exactly a secret. Sony's decision to make the PSVR2 have better fidelity, a higher resolution screen, and a better operating system inadvertently did them in as creating an improved VR headset is partly why the PSVR2 cost $100/€200/£150 more than the original PSVR. Likewise, 2016 was a very different market for a VR headset than where PSVR2 found itself in 2023. Is there an element of the first device being lightning in a bottle, something Sony should have known it could not replicate in the future? Sure, and there are hallmarks of the Xbox Kinect here, but at the end of the day, if the price of the PSVR2 was aligned more towards its predecessor, there's no doubt the adoption rate of curious PS5 owners would have been better than where it presently stands.

It's weird to say this point, but if Sony still wants to have skin in the mixed-reality game, they need to make a more affordable VR headset by creating a worse version of the current PSVR2. Hoping that things will improve after opening the PSVR2 to the PC market is a fool's errand unless Sony decides to make the device more open-source and officially allow for third-party apps and marketplaces like Steam and Epic. Otherwise, they're going to get annihilated by Meta. Why would I even consider a PSVR2 on PC to any of Meta's options unless I had enough innate hatred of Facebook and Mark Zuckerberg that I was willing to ignore a more feature-rich alternative, often $200 cheaper? Was making a console VR headset a lousy idea from the onset? Maybe, but gaming and entertainment remain the lion's share of what drives VR sales even as the industry shifts. And as sales slowly move away from the United States and Europe and more towards Japan, China, and Southeast Asia, there's still a possibility of making a pretty penny. But even in markets that might know and respect the Sony brand more than Meta's, can Sony continue to stand against Zuckerberg's willingness to burn money to smote his competition? Also, with it not being a secret that Sony isn't in the best shape, do they have a war chest that can compete against the billions of Instagram dollars Meta is using to further its metaverse?

Sony is also in a terrible position to adapt to the changing landscape in VR, and I refuse to believe that they don't know that. Meta and others embrace a more gradual version of the phone industry's hardware revision timelines wherein new tech is introduced once every two years, and that's something a console-only VR headset cannot embrace. The closure of London Studio is a definite blow to the future as well, but it is increasingly apps, and not standalone VR games, that drive interest and sales. Again, when Apple launched their Vision Pro headset, they were excoriated by many not for lacking exclusive VR video games but for not having Netflix and YouTube support at launch. Sony might be a software and multimedia conglomerate. Regardless, its VR device is positioned to stand on the laurels of its gaming titles, which will not move emergent VR consumers toward their device.

Nonetheless, if Sony decides to leave the consumer VR market entirely, there will be immediate and swift reverberations in the VR industry. Not only would it take yet another consumer VR product line off the shelves, which has been dwindling since the technology's peak during the pandemic, but it would also further Meta's almost monopolistic control on the industry. I don't know about you, but I wouldn't say I like Zuckerberg's ideas for the future of collaborative work through the metaverse. With the possible demise of consumer-grade VR drawing nigh, VR being a tool for corporate oppression and monitoring is likely here, and the reversal and end of this is incredibly murky. So, console-based VR is in its death throes. Microsoft's Holonens project has spurned non-enterprise consumers, and it has been years since Nintendo uttered the words "Labo." Sony's SIE representative was unwilling to put up a front while being interviewed by a mixed-reality enthusiast site and instead called VR "not a core proposition" and a "challenging category" for the company. To me, that means the end is nigh for console VR gaming.

Preamble

Well, this is certainly embarrassing. It's been almost a month since February's Next Fest event ended and I'm only now getting around to wrapping up my thoughts about the most prominent demos I played during the event. Since I published the first part to this series, some of the game's described in this post have released. Between getting a serious cold which has, as of the publishing of this blog, transitioned into a sinus infection, I haven't been in the best shape to be writing at my normal pace. Nonetheless, here's the second part to my series as well as a link to the first part if you missed it:

• A Review Of Demos From The February 2024 Steam Next Fest Event I Played [Part 1]: Yes, This Blog Talks About Balatro

Rotwood

What is it?

Rotwood is a 1 to 4 player roguelike dungeon crawler with hack n' slash gameplay. It comes from Klei Entertainment, best known for Oxygen Not Included, Mark of the Ninja, and Don't Starve. Rotwood continues many of the graphical hallmarks of Klei Entertainment's earlier works. It features a pseudo-2D structure with you controlling 2D character portraits that still need to move up and down environments as if they have Y-axis and Z-axis movement. Think Don't Starve, but now it's an action RPG that features many of the same people who worked on that and Mark of the Ninja. This game combines Klei Entertainment's work on Don't Starve and the expected dungeon-based roguelike gameplay hooks, but Rotwood allows you to play with up to three additional companions. I could not check out that part of the game when I played its demo during Next Fest, but it is an intriguing premise. In terms of saving when playing with friends, I suspect it will be the same as how the multiplayer worked for Don't Starve Together in that your saves are attached to a host. When this host invites previous party members back to continue play sessions after a break, you pick up where you left off.

What's in the demo?

The demo for Rotwood features what I predict is the game's first "dungeon." You have a route to a final boss with plenty of forks that lead to randomized merchant and side quest placements. There are more dungeons beyond the starting forest, as it only took me about an hour to get to that dungeon's boss, though I was not successful in beating them. I also don't want to oversell the procedurally generated nature of Rotwood; after attempting to beat the game's boss, the merchants' placements did not deviate that much. But what did impress me, even after dying once or twice, was the depth of some of the weapon combos and synergies. As you encounter new weapon types, whether an ax, bow, or sword, they all have unique combos to discover, wherein your passive abilities and the character's weapon proficiencies work together to fill the field with damage-dealing attacks or projectiles. For example, in my first playthrough, I opted for an axe and discovered a fantastic combo with a cannon alt, which was a unique pickup, and after pressing one light attack followed by two heavy attacks, the canon would lob a trio of mortars. In my second and most successful playthrough, I created a "keep-away" style character that relied on projectiles and would even spew additional projectiles after dodging three times in a row. Finding new efficacious combat options is the best part of Rotwood, but much like any roguelike, you can't be too married to any of your favored choices for too long as they could be gone in a heartbeat, and Rotwood can be fickle.

The premise of the game is simple enough. You control a furry or scaly avatar decked out with starting equipment that you decide on at the start of the game. After creating a character, you learn about a forest that contains many riches as well as combat challenges, and similar to the works of Supergiant Games (i.e., Hades and Bastion), the game's dungeon features non-boss levels that spawn a finite number of enemies that you must clear out before moving on to the next level. Occasionally, you will have more than one option as to where you will go, and this will determine which merchants or sub-bosses you encounter during your journey. The game's roguelike element stems from when you lose equipment. Everything you bought during your trip disappears if and when that happens, though there are no hard caps on the number of lives you have with your playthroughs. It's a kinder version of Rogue Legacy in that your character will retain cosmetic changes, and any merchants you unlock in the game's hub world will persist. Still, when you respawn in the dungeon, it returns you to the same 1-1 level if you fail to defeat the final boss in that environment. Nonetheless, there are "chapters" in the game wherein particular boss fights act as capstones before you transition to a new environment or climactic change in the story.

Will I buy the full game when it comes out?

Maybe. Though this game is more in Mento's wheelhouse, I'll consider it. I was never a fan of Don't Starve and am still not entirely sold on Rotwood's multiplayer element, which separates it from an incredibly crowded field of indie 2/2.5D roguelikes. It has a look, and I don't doubt that, but as is the case with many of Klei's recent works, I'm already concerned about balance. Yes, this was a demo and a work in progress. Nonetheless, I'm not alone in saying that entire weapon types and passive abilities are immediately BUSTED or completely inert. Part of that might be the nature of the beast, but the swings in Rotwood are WILD, and there's something about its bizarre difficulty spikes that got on my nerves. While attending the first boss, I picked up on some fun combos and laid waste to nearly everything during this trek. Then, there was a massive plant-like mini-boss almost entirely immune to the weapon I was sporting. I felt pantsed, and that just sucked. If you give me the option of relying on projectiles or axes and even have buffs and passive abilities to strengthen those options, designing encounters that essentially feel as if they are playing an Uno Reverse card downright knocks the wind out of my sails. I'm optimistic things might change, but Klei Entertainment has been a bit mum since debuting Rotwood's demo.

Serum

What is it?

Goodness, remember two Next Fests ago when almost every game demo being promoted was a survival crafting game in the mold of ARK: Survival Evolved? I sure do, and that's part of why I go out of my way to play at least one survival crafting game every Next Fest. After completely dominating the event for two years, the world is finally healing. Serum comes from first-time indie developer Game Island, whose expressed mission is to be a "Game Development Studio with a clear goal - creating the best possible survival games." Serum features an objective-based narrative-driven survival experience wherein your character requires a life-saving serum within a finite amount of time, or else they die. The game is a semi-open world but grounds your character and their ability to progress throughout it using a hub location in the form of a shack. In this derelict building, you can craft story-required items, raise plants, refine resources, and engage in all your usual survival crafting game staples.

What's in the demo?

The game starts with your character attempting to conduct an investigation who inadvertently finds themselves at the whims of an evil organization that has injected a virus into their body. This virus can only be staved off if you inject a serum into their veins every ten minutes, though that time increases as you upgrade the potion's potency via new crafting items. Of all things, and this is going to be a stretch, but this mechanic reminded me of Dead Rising 2, where you need to occasionally drop everything you were doing to remember to give your daughter some anti-zombie medicine, or else your game was effectively over. And that shit was annoying then, and it's STILL irritating as all HELL now! There was one time when I was looking over blueprints and thinking about crafting new items to better automate an aspect of my base. While scanning over my options and calculating the resources I would need to collect, I noticed the music was suddenly getting louder and more dramatic. Still, I thought it was a glitch because Serum already has some weird audio issues. Lo and behold, that's how the game warns you while you are in a menu or mid-action that your ass better be taking some serum or else you die! And guess what? I did not know that and died. It's a lesson I learned the hard way!

Beyond making a solid first impression with its lush forest and surprisingly multi-layered shack, most of your time involves scouring the surrounding environment for materials that net new serums and tools that allow you to unlock more areas. For example, you need to craft a blunt object to break crates and another to pry open gates, and having spare serums is necessary if you wish to make long treks. Likewise, while you can rely on the plants and objects surrounding your dwellings for the start of the game, you'll eventually exhaust these resources. You will ultimately need to grow plants using a hydroponics system and engage with the game's recycling/refining mechanic. It's nice that there's something built into this game to make sure you don't accidentally screw yourself over by expending natural resources down non-viable pathways. Only some things in this base are available in the demo, but there's enough to it, and its gimmicks give you a good sense of how its approach to crafting works. Finally, this is a survival game with a story, which I was not prepared for, given the genre generally doesn't care about storytelling. Serum does an admirable job directing you to new locations while an unseen omniscient voice speaks to you through a walkie-talkie. These new locations opt you into building specific items and unlocking further tools. They also reveal another layer of its mystery and build upon the game's theme of you being somewhere that is not what it seems.

Will I buy the full game when it comes out?

No. First, this problem may have improved, but Serum was one of the worst-performing demos I encountered throughout February's Next Fest. Serum chugged and repeated audio clips, my character clipped through objects and platforms, and worse, after completing a mission as instructed, the task would not tick off on my objective list. Again, it's a demo, and the developers of Serum are not precisely a large team, but I struggled to play the demo for more than thirty minutes due to many of these technical issues. Second, needing to worry about a timer while performing the usual survival crafting gameplay loops holds zero water with me. I get you eventually get improved versions of the magical death-avoiding elixir that almost render the time limit element of the game to an afterthought. Still, it's always there, and with inventory slot improvements locked behind typical incremental survival crafting build paths, needing to plan for serum-based wiggle room when making even the most basic environmental exploratory efforts is zero fun. Finally, the developer deserves some credit for trying its hand at grafting a story to a genre that typically doesn't care about that. Still, the voice acting in Serum completely ruins any of the intended effects of its more gripping moments. The line reading isn't just flat; it often elicits the opposite intended emotional reaction.

Kamaeru: A Frog Refuge

What is it?

Kamaeru Frog Refuge is a frog-raising simulation game with a cozy pace and hand-drawn aesthetic. Kamaeru features a female player character attempting to bond with a male compatriot trying to revive a derelict frog sanctuary. As you assist them, you try to clear out weeds and rocks to make way for a new landscape that will be more inviting to your soon-to-be amphibian friends. The most straightforward comparison to make is to Viva Pinata. Like Viva Pinata, Kamaeru relies on animals passively visiting your park or sanctuary through what you build and create instead of through actions directly done in the immediate or surrounding world. Every species of frog in Kamaeru will only appear in your garden if you plant specific shrubbery or landscape the area a certain way. Even then, the odds of these new species showing up are determined by percentages. Your actions take place in two distinct fields, one where you place objects and plants in a wildlife refuge and another where you collect and craft items to unlock new things to put in that refuge.

The demo allows you to interact with a handful of storyline missions before it caps what appears in your game. Through a tutorial, you understand how to attract new frogs to your pond and craft new items and furniture, leading to new amphibians. The game also sports a day-night cycle, with your character unable to perform specific actions at night. Like Viva Pinata, the game divides your actions into different screens, though Kamaeru only appears to have two areas you need to worry about. The first is the actual wildlife sanctuary, wherein your ability to clear it out and plant new flora or place new objects requires you to budget energy resources or action turns. The other screen is where most of your crafting and resource collection occurs. On this second screen, there's another pond where you can plant even more flora to unlock berries and bugs that allow you to level up your character and spawn new items or tools that make way for entirely new types of frogs. You can also craft sellable goods here so you can purchase new items. Still, within the first ten to twenty minutes, you discover around a half-dozen currency types in Kamaeru, each with a different pathway you need to interact with to get more of it.

There's also a breeding mechanic in Kamaeru, but I will caution that the demo limits what breeds will appear in your game so severely that the mechanic doesn't make the best first impression when you play the demo. To unlock new colors or patterns of frogs, you need to interact with a Punnett square and place previously unlocked frogs to unlock new recessive or dominant variants. This process is made incredibly more challenging as your ability to place things where you want to is limited thanks to the game having half of your possible turns taken by a computer meant to represent "natural selection," which almost always works against your favor in that it actively attempts to limit your ability to unlock new things. If you forgot this part of middle school biology class, this part of the game is incredibly frustrating, but that's not all! As you collect raw materials, which include berries and other plant-based resources, you can craft them into goods that are sellable in a local farmer's market. However, the amount you produce is determined by your ability to perform a minigame, though even if you fail at these minigames, you'll still net a nominal amount of goods to sell. These minigames are, bizarrely enough, displayed in a small window at the bottom of your screen, which makes it occasionally tricky to figure them out the first few times you play them.

Will I buy the full game when it comes out?

Probably not. Looks can be deceiving, and Kamaeru is a cozy-looking animal-rearing game that commits the same cardinal sin as Viva Pinata. Despite its presentation suggesting that it is a breezy experience with waves of new content that will unlock at an easy enough pace, it's shockingly stressful. Throughout the demo, I felt like I needed to think about how to budget my time and actions before the end of the day, and with so many different systems that opt you into other currencies or upgrades, remembering how to do that isn't as easy as you'd expect. For example, one of the unlockable frog sub-species requires that you have a specific plant that only unlocks after you have collected three flies. These flies will only spawn in the second pond and require you to clear out space to grow a specific plant you can only get after you have sold enough goods in the farmer's market. However, that means you need to grow berry bushes, which spawn berries that you need to click, one at a time, to nab and then refine into candies and jams via a minigame. With barely a quarter of the game's content unlocked after my hour playing it, I felt dizzy, considering how careful I had to be about what I was doing and which plants and items I needed to grow and place in finite spaces across two screens. I genuinely worry that this will get frustrating and overwhelming in record time with the full version of the game.

Tales of Kenzera: Zau

What is it?

Tales of Kenzera Zau is a game project led by actor Abubakar Salim, whom many of you might know as the voice behind Bayek in Assassin's Creed Origins and the father in the TV series Raised by Wolves. Salim set out to try to depict Bantu culture with Tales of Kenzera: Zau as well as convey his own experiences with death and grief following the passing of his father. Tales of Kenzera is a 2.5D Metroidvania wherein your character, Zau, is trying to kill three monsters as part of a ritual which will permit the god of death to bring back his father. Zau is gifted two masks, a Moon Mask and a Sun Mask. The Moon Mask will enable him to shoot projectiles and attack enemies from a distance, whereas the Sun Mask is a melee-focused brawler. Each of these masks can be upgraded, and you can switch between them without restrictions. While you help Zau navigate their surroundings in hopes of finding the three legendary monsters, you will need to shift platforms, dash into crevices, and wail away at enemies that populate the world. You know, your average Metroidvania stuff.

What's in the demo?

First, I must come clean and admit that I played Tales of Kenzera on a mouse and keyboard set-up, which the game advises you against. Also, while playing the game, I got a game-breaking glitch that ruined my playthrough and was only solvable if I started a new save from scratch. While trying to push a block so my character could navigate to a new platform, I caused the block to fly out of the screen and become unusable. Those two points aside, I still had a good time and have to join the rest of the gaming community in applauding the game's developers for lovingly depicting an under-represented culture and world experience. I LOVED how your character's relationship with the god of death was not an immediately negative one. Instead, Tales of Kenzera depicts a culture that views death as inevitable. Zau's struggles to come to terms with his father's passing are also incredibly relatable and wonderfully told. Obviously, the god of death has an agenda, but the life lessons and parables you experience are true highlights, and I did come away from the game wanting to see where this story goes.

Nonetheless, I wasn't super enthused by its core Metroivania mechanics and feel it wears thin even within the scope of its demo. The combos are relatively simple, and transforming between the two forms is much less dynamic than I thought it would be. The Moon Mask shoots projectiles, and the Sun Mask is melee-focused. While some areas and enemies encourage you to use one mask over the other, it's a basic rendition of the Ikaruga's dueling colors mechanics, with you almost always being able to skew towards whatever playstyle you prefer. Also, with each of these masks sporting its own upgrade paths, I hope and pray that the developers took the time to balance things because it would be shitty if you spent most of your time opting for one mask and the game punished you for that. I have my fingers crossed that there will not be a moment when the game starts kicking your ass because you have entered an area or found a boss that requires one over the other. Luckily, the upgrades are exciting and change how you approach combat and non-combat scenarios, adding an extra layer to the gameplay. Nonetheless, the 2.5D environments are pretty vanilla, and the puzzles, from what I played, are nothing to write home about.

Will I buy the full game when it comes out?

Maybe. Tales of Kenzera is a game I will withhold my judgment until it launches, and I can read some reviews on how it shaped up. The demo is fine from what I played, but it was sometimes rough around the edges and lacked some of the gameplay depth that makes Metroidvanias able to sustain your attention for hours upon end. I'm most concerned about how Tales of Kenzera's endgame will pan out. Even within the demo, the combat started to feel mindless, and what impeded by progress, more often than not, was the platforming, which I did not enjoy. Again, that might stem from how I played the game, which I am willing to accept, but there's a floatiness to Zau's jumps and dashes that felt wrong, especially in a Metroidvania. There's also a linearity to Tales of Kenzera, which I did not mind, but it does feel like the game railroads you along a critical path more so than most games of this type. Nonetheless, with the game's heart in the right place, and considering it is a first-time project for its creative lead, I'm still willing to maintain an open mind should the final product prove all of my concerns or complaints wrong. I cannot help but root for this game.

Ultros

What is it?

Ultros is a Metroidvania game on acid. It features psychedelic visuals while you explore an alien planet with wildlife that looks like nothing you've ever seen before. As you explore your surroundings, you discover your character gains new abilities and upgrades through eating plant life and defeating bosses. When combating enemies and bosses, the game provides bonuses to your kills should you use precision-based attacks or stealth maneuvers rather than if you defeat these enemies through direct combat. Power-ups and new abilities are also unlocked by planting seeds on the planet. As this is a Metroidvania, there's plenty of platforming to be done, and your expected dead-ends only unlock if you have a specific ability when butting up against that barrier. However, Ultros is a Metroidvania with a trick up its sleeve. Now, I will warn you that this "trick" is a bit of a spoiler, though the game lays this out to you before the end of its opening act. So, be warned if you decide to read any further. I can only discuss this game if I can go beyond saying that its graphics are evocative and stunning or that it has your typical Metroidvania ability collection systems.

What's in the demo?

Ultros's core Metroidvania trappings are solid, and your ability to draw levels from in-game actions is a refreshing change of pace. However, the big kicker with Ultros is that it is a game set in a time loop. This twist is only briefly touched upon in the demo, but when you "complete" the tasks and goals with any given day or setting, the game resets and thrusts you back to square one, with none of your previously unlocked abilities you just started to wrap your mind around available anymore. In the first playthrough, you get the double jump rather quickly, but that ability is ripped away from you after you complete the first chapter, and for the next one, collecting it is not as immediate as before. However, the environments and levels warp and wobble to match the subsequent placement of tools at your disposal while also making way for new ones. The time loop element is also where the plant seed mechanic comes into force in both a good and bad way. On the one hand, seeing your actions mean something significant as you progress through the story is incredible. On the other hand, those seed planting locations are rough. If you forget to do things at the earliest opportunity, you do a lot of backtracking to place a singular item in a faraway location. Ultros is a Metroidvania game that requires a lot of patience and won't be everyone's cup of tea as a result.

I'm on the fence about Ultros. You eventually get the ability to create platforms, which allows the game to throw the Metroidvania game design manual entirely out the window, and the times when Ultros deviates from your expectations are incredibly freeing and awe-inspiring. Nonetheless, many of its freeing moments stem from you breaking plants or picking up trinkets in one timeline and applying it to a part of the environment so a wall or impediment will disappear. What you need to use and where is not always clear, and the game devolves into trial and error more than I'd like. The game's fast travel system is even more groan-inducing because unlocking more than the few freebies it provides requires you to collect soil and apply it to areas with the space to make way for new plant life. But the game almost lost me when you needed to manipulate the plants as they grow. The clearest example comes when you enter the Greggamoja Refinery, where you have to use your character's spray ability to bend a plant's stems so it grows along with a stream of water. It's incredibly frustrating, but it does play into the game's overall environmental themes and the recurring storyline that your character needs to bring life back to a diseased planet.

Will I buy the full game when it comes out?

I have already purchased this game, but I want to share some caution with those interested in picking it up. This next point is a nitpick, but Ultros's sometimes monochromatic look was a problem for me. Especially in the starting forest and hub world, parsing out what objects and things are a part of the foreground and background was difficult. When the game transitions to its less bright environments, this problem completely dissipates. Still, sometimes, I lost track of gobs of meat or materials because they blended too closely with the surrounding environment. That aside, I loved this game. I enjoyed how the upgrades largely stem from your feats in combat rather than entirely being locked behind tracking down trinkets. The game has an incredible look, and the variety of locations and environments is stunning. There's something about the game that gives me Fantastic Planet vibes, with the aliens you encounter and their exotic culture and ways of life being a real trip. The time loop element also mixes up what would be a vanilla Metroidvania experience. The first time I lost my powers, I felt dispirited, but when I realized the game had plenty of new tricks and tools to try out with every reset, I started looking forward to the next time loop. As intended, finding out the latest "mechanic of the week" is the best part of Ultros. Now, if only some of those plant seed locations were not a complete pain in the ass.

Children of the Sun

What is it?

Children of the Sun is a third-person puzzle shooter from indie game developer René Rother, whose previous work includes being the lead 3D artist behind El Hijo: A Wild West Tale. Children of the Sun is an often abstract mix between the sniper-based puzzle boxes of Sniper Elite and the grindhouse sensibilities of Robert Rodriguez and Quentin Tarantino. With each level, you are presented with a half dozen or so targets spread across a field or building complex, and using your character's unique abilities, which grow over time, you must take each of the targets down with a single bullet. The targets are displayed as glowing outlines of bodies, similar to how bodies look in Superhot and will move as you aim and eventually curve and pivot your bullets. As if this paragraph were not already chock full of comparisons to other games, when you complete a level, you discover your performance and ability to explode objects in the environment and assassinate targets in quick succession doll out points, which are ranked across global and local leaderboards which gives Children of the Sun a Neon White element that drives you to replay levels.

What's in the demo?

The demo provides the prologue and a set of levels from what I assume is the game's first chapter, which serves as a tutorial of sorts. Things start simple enough: you need to shoot bullets from distant positions and hold your controller buttons or mouse clicks to cause the bullet to bob and weave around objects so it can strike every single target in a given level. As you play, you learn how to bank shots and do other flourishes, which quickly become necessities in not just wracking up more points but completing the levels in the first place. The use of global and local leaderboards is a nice touch. Like Neon White, your desire to push your score up just a few more points leads to organically testing new strategies and exploring alternate vantage points. There's also a story about your character wanting to enact vengeance on people who wronged her, but the demo only deals with vagaries between your puzzle combat arenas. The comic book cutscenes in the demo are there even if they don't accomplish anything beyond setting the tone.

What I am less enthused by are some of the unique abilities. Due to the game's minimalistic art style, the visual clues and prompts that guide your actions outside of the tutorial could be better. It's sometimes not immediately apparent when certain skill shots and abilities are tantamount to a successful assassination. After completing the demo's tutorial missions, I was occasionally lost in looking at the placements and movements of enemies on a field and brute-forcing what I needed to do or what was even on the table. Sure, that's part of the game's charm. Still, I wonder if things would be better if explosive objects were highlighted in one clear color and signs that communicate the need to curve or pivot bullets in another. Over time, you get more comfortable playing with the game's tools, but within the demo, I started to feel slightly overwhelmed by the speed at which the game introduces new things. The fact is the game doesn't stick with abilities long enough for you to build what I call proficiencies. Rather than juxtaposing one cool thing to another, the abilities should have several tailor-made set pieces that make players comfortable with the new rules they are butting up against.

Will I buy the full game when it comes out?

Maybe. This next point might sound a bit "mean," but this might be the most Devolver-ass video game of 2024. Between the game's minimalistic but evocative look, grindhouse-inspired cutscenes, and highly satisfying combat, it feels like something that bleeds Devolver's DNA. As suggested, I felt some frustration as I drew closer to the end of the demo, but not to the point where I wanted to dismiss the game outright. Likewise, with such an exciting world and premise, I hope there's more to the game's narrative underpinning than you being on a revenge tour to fight against the people who murdered someone close to your character. Beyond that, I genuinely wish Children of the Sun had remained committed to new mechanics and maneuvers for more than one level before transitioning to something new during its opening act. I still am not great at banking shots and struggle to tell apart explosive and assassination-ending objects. But that said, I'm not going to sit here and deny that I did not replay levels in hopes of jumping up one or two spots on the game's leaderboards, as was the case with Neon White.