Max Dood Blames TRUMP for Sony's Disc Disaster?... Plus Top 10 Woke Game Red Flags

Sony just confirmed physical PlayStation disc production ends in January 2028 — and Maximilian Dood's take on WHY it's happening has the internet completely divided. We break down his comments, the actual reasons behind Sony's decision, and why this is landing right after the GTA 6 disc-less edition backlash.

Then we shift gears for our Top 10 Signs Your Video Game Went Woke — the tropes, changes, and patterns fans keep calling out across the industry.

Let us know in the comments — do you think Max has a point, or is this getting blamed on the wrong thing?

👊 Subscribe for weekly gaming news, hot takes, and debates.

#PlayStation #MaximilianDood #Sony #GTA6 #Gaming

Transcript

SPEAKER_03 0:48

What's going on, everybody? It's your boy Grant Ron here with the DMG Gaming Podcast. As always, I am joined by the biggest buddy dude this top of the Nope.

SPEAKER_05 1:03

End the podcast. Scratch it. End it. It's over. End the podcast. Damn.

SPEAKER_04 1:14

What were you thinking? I have no idea.

SPEAKER_05 1:17

What were you thinking? Oh my gosh. Do I do it again? Do it again. Don't do it again, please. You might ruin it again. All right. Fucking itch. All right. All right. Welcome, everybody. Uh real quick.

SPEAKER_03 1:31

Real quick. Because I mean, eventually people are going to see the video of this or eclips.

SPEAKER_05 1:35

Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 1:35

Why you wear the same shirt as me?

SPEAKER_05 1:38

I don't know. Why are you wearing the same shirt as me?

SPEAKER_03 1:42

It's funny. Like we literally aren't wearing like the same.

SPEAKER_05 1:49

Alright, everybody. Please, if you can, like, subscribe, go Google us DMG Gaming Podcasts, and like the video.

SPEAKER_03 2:00

And go to Timu and buy that shirt it is wearing.

SPEAKER_05 2:04

It's a silk dog. It's a silk. I'm gonna get mine from Target, like yours.

SPEAKER_03 2:11

Target.

SPEAKER_05 2:14

Alright. Big episode today. And we got three main subjects. First, we're gonna talk about Sony and them ending physical disc cells by 2008. Excuse me, 2028, January. And then we got a little beef again. Uh oh. What's beef, Ed? Some animosity. Some anima. Yeah. Uh I didn't want to cover this because I thought it was over and done with with him saying dumb stuff. Um, and it being who it is, but Maximilian Dude stated something earlier about uh a few days ago uh about why Sony is going to physical this cells, which we'll get into later. And then we're gonna have a top ten to end a show.

SPEAKER_03 3:04

Okay. I like it.

SPEAKER_05 3:06

You like it?

SPEAKER_03 3:07

Hey, before we get started, real quick. Yeah, how was your 4th of July?

SPEAKER_05 3:13

It was good. We went to old Plant City. What? What? Plant City? You ain't never been to Plant City in Florida?

SPEAKER_03 3:20

Like, is it a place of plants?

SPEAKER_05 3:22

Like, is it it's just a city called Plant City. Oh, okay.

SPEAKER_03 3:26

Okay.

unknown 3:27

Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 3:27

Well, just so everybody knows, just so Tampa grant. Just so everybody knows, 250 years ago, Ed, we kicked that ass.

SPEAKER_05 3:36

We whooped that ass.

SPEAKER_03 3:37

We whooped that ass.

SPEAKER_05 3:38

And then whooped that British ass.

SPEAKER_03 3:41

Then several several hundred years later, and two days later, the greatest thing ever happened.

SPEAKER_05 3:48

The shittiest fattest thing ever born.

SPEAKER_03 3:53

Fast forward to 1984, Ed, on July 6th. Two days later, I may add, the greatest thing has happened, right? Your boy was born.

SPEAKER_05 4:07

I don't know about the greatest.

SPEAKER_03 4:09

So it the so it goes in, this is the order that it goes in. Me being born 1776. That's the order of great things. And great things.

SPEAKER_05 4:22

Nobody cares about your birthday.

SPEAKER_03 4:24

Great things of America.

SPEAKER_05 4:25

Nobody but your mom, Beverly, cares about your birthday.

SPEAKER_03 4:29

Hey, you lead my mom, you leave Bev out of this.

SPEAKER_05 4:31

Hey. How's your how is your mom, by the way?

SPEAKER_03 4:35

She's good, man. Everything's good.

SPEAKER_05 4:37

Oh, a lot of stuff happened in family, man.

SPEAKER_03 4:39

Oh no, man. That's life. That's part of getting old.

SPEAKER_05 4:42

Yeah. Damn, we are getting old.

SPEAKER_03 4:45

I know. And just we are getting old, and some of us look older than others.

SPEAKER_05 4:51

Yep. What? Because I have so great. Because I got that man beard going on, bud.

SPEAKER_03 5:01

You got that damn before.

SPEAKER_05 5:04

That's a big beard.

SPEAKER_03 5:05

Right. Well, what's funny is your beards look like that since you're like 30.

SPEAKER_05 5:13

I could have grown a beard when I was in high school.

SPEAKER_03 5:15

You almost did.

SPEAKER_05 5:17

Yeah. Alright. What game are you playing right now?

SPEAKER_03 5:20

I'm playing Path of Exile 2 ahead.

SPEAKER_05 5:22

Path of Exile 2. You level 2.

SPEAKER_03 5:24

I just started. Like I literally just started an hour ago.

SPEAKER_05 5:26

We know we could play together.

SPEAKER_03 5:28

That's it. Good. Get my level and build.

SPEAKER_05 5:31

Play a video game together finally.

SPEAKER_03 5:35

I don't want to have to destroy you in front of everybody.

SPEAKER_05 5:37

Well, I mean, first off, my character's like level 96.

SPEAKER_03 5:40

Oh.

SPEAKER_05 5:42

Yeah. That's what I thought. I could hook you up with some uniques too, dog.

SPEAKER_03 5:46

Well, and then let's get on there and hook me up.

SPEAKER_05 5:49

I could hook you up with a bunch of good stuff.

SPEAKER_03 5:51

Give me some, like, let me just power level. Like, go ahead and give me some like low-level stuff.

SPEAKER_05 5:54

I want to give you some uniques that will make you power level.

SPEAKER_03 5:57

Okay.

SPEAKER_05 5:58

That's what we're gonna do. You pretty much can just slaughter everything.

SPEAKER_03 6:02

Okay. I like that.

SPEAKER_05 6:03

Alright. Okay, so let me pull this up real quick. Let me share my screen so we can get into this. There we go. Oh god. Alright. So Grant.

SPEAKER_03 6:24

Yes.

SPEAKER_05 6:25

A few days ago. Well, I'd say about July 1st, I think they announced. A few days. Yeah. What?

SPEAKER_04 6:33

It's a few days. Yeah, it's a day.

SPEAKER_05 6:36

Uh Sony announced a physical disc production ending in January of 2028 for new games releasing on PlayStation consoles.

SPEAKER_03 6:51

Well, we all knew this day was coming. Because we are moving in, we're moving into a digital era. I mean, you know, the thing about it is, man, these things aren't gonna last forever. Physical media is dying day after day. I mean, when's the last time you seen a DVD, Ed? Or a Blu-ray? I mean, I mean, I think they still make Blu-rays, don't they? I think. I don't know. I don't know.

SPEAKER_05 7:17

I mean, I I remember just I say a few years ago, it was really 15 years ago.

SPEAKER_04 7:23

Yeah.

SPEAKER_05 7:24

Going to the local base exchange and buying DVDs, movies, and games and everything. Nothing was really downloaded.

SPEAKER_03 7:34

No, and so I mean, hell, even the even gaming magazines and stuff are online now. Like all digital physical media is dying. And I believe that by 2030 it'll be completely gone.

SPEAKER_05 7:48

The question is, do you own it? I think that's what the everyone is concerned about when it comes to digital. Do you truly own it? Because if you think about like Xbox when they had uh oh whatever's what what whatever that video service was before they went with like their Xbox video stuff, um anything you bought on that service they had prior is no longer you don't have it anymore.

SPEAKER_08 8:11

Yeah.

SPEAKER_05 8:12

You know what I mean? I'm not saying Sony will ever shut down or you know, get rid of that. I doubt they ever will, because it'll be a huge uprising over it. But you know, what if they lose rights to something? I'm not saying they will. Because, you know, companies want to get their game sold. But there's always the possibility of something happening, of them not being able to sell the game or have the ownership rights to sell it, and then the people that bought the game through Sony on the PlayStation 5 or PlayStation Network or whatever, uh no longer get their own the game.

SPEAKER_03 8:53

Yeah, I think that's gonna be a problem. I mean, they gotta have they have to have some checks and balances with that.

SPEAKER_05 8:58

Like if I pay this is like something far-fetched, I'm saying here.

SPEAKER_03 9:01

Yeah, yeah, yeah. But I'm just saying, like, I feel like if I'm paying $70 for a game, because I mean you can go one or two ways. I feel like if I'm paying $75 for a game or whatever, the game seems like every year they keep going up. So let's say they're 70 now. Um, I want to own the game and I want to be able to always keep the game no matter what happens to the game. Now, if this is a thing that where you quote unquote you don't keep the game and you're kind of just like purchasing the playing rights for it, then the games don't need to be $70.

SPEAKER_04 9:31

Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 9:31

You get what I mean? Like they need to switch to membership or they need to switch to um, you know, where you just have the whole library or whatever, you just pay like $50 a month, you know, and you can play all the games that come out, especially if you're not you're not gonna get to keep them. You know what I mean? Um they gotta do something, but yeah, they gotta do something because that's that's the thing, is is you can't keep charging $70, $80 for games and then pull the rug out from under people.

SPEAKER_05 9:59

So we're gonna get into I don't want to get into the stuff now because I want to kind of go into that with Maximil and Dude and our second subject. But my thing is, you know, when it comes to like single player games, right? Wouldn't it be well see that's the problem though? Like if we go back to just how thing everything is, like the market, like the market I would say want for physical game media is really low. I get the I I listen, I get the uproar over it, all right? With the 10-15% that wants physical games, that you know, purchase physical games of you know, gamers, but the the demand is not there. And as a I don't want to be a corporate shield here, but as a business or looking at through the lens of Sony, like it's a obvious call on their side for money. Why? Because they have such a low demand for the physical games already. And this wasn't just a build-up, I mean it was a buildup to it, but it wasn't just like it came out of blue, it was just gradual, every year it just kept getting lower and lower and to eventually where it's just going to be lower, way lower, like five percent, like a year or two from now.

SPEAKER_03 11:33

Well, also, also you have to think we've also had retail isn't there anymore, you know what I mean? No, I think the people who are clamoring for physical media are the collectors. That's cool, you know what I mean. Um, I feel like I feel like this though. I feel like they need to keep the physical media around if they make like a special collector's edition. You get what I'm saying? Yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_05 11:53

Like I think they should keep it around for single-player games that have no live service.

SPEAKER_03 11:58

Uh yeah, yeah, that's true too. But I feel like what they should start doing, if there's going to be like a collector's edition, then they need to like cap the number. You know what I mean? We're only making you know 20,000 of these, you know what I mean? Physical. I mean, you could download the game, but I mean, if you want the physical copy, 20,000 of them, that's it. We're doing it. Because you have to think, though, man. Like you said, you're not being a corporate shield and you're thinking as a business. Yeah. I mean, also, a lot what a lot of people are not thinking about is shit. Last last year, we had like an ungodly run of like terrible games. You know what I mean? Like, and you have to think that Sony's forking out physical media money for these terrible games.

SPEAKER_05 12:39

I mean, they already lost a hundred hundreds of million dollars. Yeah, I'm saying, like, so uh whatever that game was. What was it? What was it called?

SPEAKER_03 12:48

Assassin's Creed?

SPEAKER_05 12:49

No, not even that. Um, the one that was a big failure. They're gonna be.

SPEAKER_03 12:53

Oh, Duskborn.

SPEAKER_05 12:54

Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 12:55

So I mean, yeah, think of let's use a perfect example. Perfect example.

SPEAKER_05 12:59

No, no, no, no, no. The the hero shooter.

unknown 13:03

Oh.

SPEAKER_05 13:04

The fuck was it called? What was it called?

SPEAKER_03 13:08

I don't know. Oh, oh, um what was it called, dude?

SPEAKER_05 13:14

It failed. Like they we were making fun of the like. Yeah, I know. I don't know.

SPEAKER_03 13:18

It's been so shitty, I forgot the name of it.

SPEAKER_05 13:20

I gotta look it up.

SPEAKER_03 13:22

But also, what'll just use let's just use Dustborne as the perfect example, though. Right? So here's a game that you had to make millions of Concorde, yes.

SPEAKER_01 13:31

Duh.

SPEAKER_03 13:31

Concorde. Um, so we'll use both of those games as perfect examples. Here you had two games that failed immensely, right? And you still had to make millions of copies of this game. Like you had to physically make millions of copies of this game. Now, most people were like, well, it doesn't cost that much because it's all you know, okay. But it still costs, you have to, you have to you have to decay. Let's just say um it costs seven dollars to make the game. You know what I mean? Well, think about that. Um the game sold poorly, um, you couldn't even give this game away. So they were wasting seven million dollars, let's just say um they made a million copies. So they lost seven million dollars on that game, and even more on Concord.

SPEAKER_05 14:24

Yeah. So let's read this.

SPEAKER_03 14:27

But I'm gonna say, well, my point, my point is this is not the 90s where they had like banger after banger after banger. You get what I'm saying? Like, don't get me wrong. I'm not saying it was a complete fail. Like, we had great games, but we had more, like this last year, we had a lot more shitty games than we had great games.

SPEAKER_05 14:43

I mean, at the end of the day, it still doesn't, I mean, it just doesn't matter. The demand is just it continues to decline every year.

SPEAKER_03 14:49

For every Claire Obscure, we had 17 Concords. That's what I'm saying.

SPEAKER_05 14:53

Like, do I want physical game meters staying around? Hell yeah, I do. Yeah, but I am also uh realistic, it's going to eventually dissipate.

SPEAKER_03 15:02

Yeah, I mean, it's just because we're just moving away from this.

SPEAKER_05 15:04

Like 2028 is actually good, and that's actually pretty. I mean, that's when it's gonna drop like below 5%, even if they said they want to stick around.

SPEAKER_03 15:13

Also, I think it's just people are not willing to accept change. I mean, look at the mall, for example. The mall is dying because of Amazon. Exactly. You know what I mean? Like everything comes to your door. I mean, I'm not I'm not a I'm not like a door dash person, you know what I mean? Because I don't feel like paying $15 to go get it. But if I'm hungry and I have no time, it's very convenient and it's replacing a lot of things. You see what I'm saying? Like, like things are replacing things, always. Faster things are replacing things, all right always.

SPEAKER_05 15:47

All right, let's read this. All right, this is from the senior director at Sony Interactive, uh, Sid Schumann. He him? Hey Grant. Is it's a he him? Did I need to know that? Is a he him, Sid Schumann. I just I mean, what is that? Sid Hum Schumann him human? Is he uh did his pronoun his Sid S. Human. Why did I need to know that?

SPEAKER_03 16:15

Like, what was the important?

SPEAKER_05 16:17

I don't know. All right, anyway, so he this is what his statement is. As consumer preferences and broader entertainment industry continue to shift away from physical disc to digital, physical game disc production for all new games releasing on PlayStation consoles will be discontinued starting January 2028. Following this date, new games will be available on PlayStation Store and at retailers in digital formats only. This transition has no impact on games that already released or will be releasing prior to 2028 in this format. This is a natural direction for Sony to adapt to consumer trends as a general preference for digital media significantly outpaces physical disc. This transition will enable us to align more closely with how most of our community prefers to access and play games today. We'll continue to prioritize prioritize our resources to drive innovation and how players can access games and provide choices as to where players prefer to purchase new games, whether that's set in retailers or PlayStation Store. We remain committed to delivering a world-class gaming experience to our fans, and we thank you for your continued support, Sid Schumann, he him.

SPEAKER_03 17:23

Okay, two things. One, I hate when people use pronouns like this. You know what I mean? Okay, let's just let me just if if you're uh if you're a trans, whatever, you know, and you want to be consult called, I'm past all that now. Like if you want to be called something, that's fine. But if you're obviously a guy and you just want to be a part of the you want to be a part of the group, then it says that's my statement. That's what I'm saying. It's like it's a statement, great. But what I'm saying is, like, you're you're obviously a guy, you want to be called a guy. Like, what's the fucking point? You know what I mean? Like, okay, if you're a girl and you want to be called a guy, okay, whatever. Like I said, I'm past all that.

SPEAKER_05 17:56

True, true inclusivity would be him just to leave it out.

SPEAKER_03 18:00

Let me guess. But my but my point is this like if you're a guy, it'd be like if you're like, hey, I'm Edward Phillips.

SPEAKER_08 18:06

He him.

SPEAKER_03 18:07

Like, okay, you know what I'm saying? Like, they just want to be involved in this thing, and I hate it. It's like just your pronouns, obvious fat. It's like yours, always hungry. Anyway, listen, listen. Um, um, so so let me ask you a question. So, physical media, I mean, uh the download. So, for example, GameStop, who thrives, who lick like their whole store is physical media, right? Um, are you gonna be able to like buy download codes from GameStop? It's like, are we moving to that?

SPEAKER_05 18:41

Like, you can still go to GameStop, you can still have to make the picture of the game and then you pick it and it's a digital copy.

SPEAKER_03 18:48

You put that there. So that's that's what I'm saying. So, but let me ask you a question. That takes is that going to that's gonna take away from the that's gonna take away the monopoly of the place, quote unquote, the PlayStation store, the Xbox store, or whatever store. So, I mean, is that what they're moving to? Like, if I want to go to Walmart and I find a game, I'm buying the digital copy only, like they're gonna give me a code. What happens if I get out in the parking lot, somebody robs me and takes me takes my code?

SPEAKER_05 19:10

I mean, that's the thing though. Like, it people aren't just not going to go there to buy a game. They're just why would you go to buy a digital code at a store? That's what I'm saying. So, like, how are they gonna sit on your ass at home and just go to their online thing and do correct? Yeah, they're not doing that, they're not gonna do that.

SPEAKER_03 19:31

That's what I'm saying. Like, like, so the only way this is gonna work is if somehow GameStop has to give a a discount for their digital download. Like, I mean, I don't I don't understand, like I don't know. Like, I feel like this is gonna be the end of of GameStop, honestly.

SPEAKER_05 19:46

Well, I mean, if they're doing this, then all right, then games should be going down in price, though. They're not doing the physical, they're not spending money to you know manufacture the physical copy of it. So shouldn't games go down a little bit? Yeah, I'm talking about like five dollars off the top head.

SPEAKER_03 20:02

Yeah, for real. Yeah, you're right. But like, so like so what is so like what is this like? So let's just say I do go to games something that I do buy the digital copy, they're gonna like download the code to like a like a like a like a wallet, like fucking crypto. Like, what are we doing here? That's what I'm saying. Like, how is this gonna work? Because the only thing this does is it makes sure that PlayStation Store, Xbox Store, Nintendo store gets 100% of the sales. That's what I'm saying. Like, then they're gonna complain about a monopoly. We already know how this is gonna go. Because anytime that one somebody does something good or whatever, sometimes innovative, and they control the market, oh, there's a monopoly. So GameStop will complain about that because it'll kill their business model.

SPEAKER_05 20:46

That's correct. All right, I want to share this clip.

SPEAKER_03 20:49

Okay, all right.

SPEAKER_05 20:50

So let's uh share this real quick. This from Asmogold's uh YouTube.

SPEAKER_03 20:56

I feel like as soon as people mention Asmogold, like all the blue hairs immediately get mad. They get mad before he even says anything.

SPEAKER_05 21:03

All right, so let's listen to this real quick. It's not it's real quick.

SPEAKER_06 21:05

All right, it's crazy that they actually understand this. Like, I I didn't even know they were involved in this at all. But yeah, okay. He actually is explaining it very well. Chat.

SPEAKER_07 21:18

Niggas be spamming that X button, bro. Damn. Yeah, niggas be spamming that X button, bro. But it's also like if you don't agree to it, you just can't play the game. So, like, what do you do? Uh-huh. You don't play the game. You stand up and you don't play the game. Chat, I think what people need to do for the next, like, whatever they push, whatever they push for the next big game that is gonna be solely digital in 2028, no one buys it. GK6. That's not gonna be that's not gonna be like the first big like because it it really starts in like 2028.

SPEAKER_03 21:54

Yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_07 21:55

I'm just saying it's already hedging.

SPEAKER_06 21:57

GT6 is having no discs, so why don't we all this boy? GTA 6 to send a message.

SPEAKER_03 22:01

Because nobody's gonna boycott it.

SPEAKER_06 22:04

No one wants to do that, right? Y'all can do that. Oh, you got big right there, huh? Whoever his friend is is the most bass motherfucker I've ever heard. Oh my god. Totally succinctly and perfectly explain the stop killing games thing. On top of that, immediately calls him out on this virtue signaling, creates a situation that's fucking perfect. I love it.

SPEAKER_05 22:36

But I mean, that's I mean, the guy got caught out right on the spot.

SPEAKER_03 22:41

No, because nobody's gonna boycott GTA 6.

SPEAKER_05 22:43

No one wants to boycott GTA 6, especially all these other streamers, man. Nobody's going to. This is going to be their like gold mine, right? They're not giving that up.

SPEAKER_03 22:54

The average person. Here's the thing is the average person doesn't give a fuck. Honestly. Let's just be honest. Nobody. You ever, Ed, do you remember when everything, like all the you remember 2020 when all this stuff was going on, and people were like, boycott this and boycott that? Nobody ever boycotted anything. Yeah. Like they're like, stop going to Walmart, dude. Walmart's packed to the fuck every single time you go there. Like, nobody's gonna boycott. So if everybody's like, oh, boycott games and whatever. Look, you're not people need to understand that when it comes to moving forward in technology and in life and things like that, you either adapt or you don't fucking play the game. I mean, here's the thing is for example, Ed, if they look at you and say, Ed, you don't own the game if you download it. You don't own the game, but you can play the game. You don't own the game. Nobody owns the game, but you can download whatever you want to. You're still gonna fucking buy the game and play the game. You don't give a shit if you own it or not anymore. But you want to play the game. You're gonna play the game. Just like every every person out there is gonna play the game. So here's the thing is oh, let's just say this. We'll just use this guy's example. Let's say GTA 6, Ed. Let's just say GTA 6, and they say, like, you know what? You could you could play $99 for this and you don't own it. Everybody's still gonna download the fucking game, Ed, and play it, and they don't care because they want to play the game so bad. When it comes to games that people want to play, that goes for every game: Madden, NCAA, uh 2K, all these games. They don't care. So you're not gonna boycott anything.

SPEAKER_05 24:33

I get it. But what you're saying here is you don't own the game, but you have to pay $100 to play the game, right?

SPEAKER_03 24:41

Yeah.

SPEAKER_05 24:42

Okay. See, that's the I gotta push back like hard on that. You know why? Because this is a perfect example. Like, let's say this is this is some Chinese communist party shit. Let me show you why. Because if you don't own if you're buying something and you don't own it, and let's say you're streaming and you get you say something politically incorrect, and that company that you bought the game from, even though you don't own it, says, oops, you don't we're you're not allowed to play it anymore. We don't care if you bought it. We're we're taken away from you because of what you said was politically incorrect. Well, you don't agree with your statement. So now you cannot play the game anymore. Damn.

SPEAKER_03 25:26

Yeah, no, that's crazy. But what my my point is, and I'm not saying that it's right. My point is the average American doesn't give a shit. That's what I'm saying. It's kind of like this, Ed.

SPEAKER_05 25:35

I I think something like that though, people would beat the drums. Like, because that that's crazy.

SPEAKER_03 25:40

You would have to, you would have to have, you would have to have how many gamers do you think there are? How many gamers do you think they are?

SPEAKER_05 25:46

This is where I'm going at. Like, when it comes to big prominent streamers that let's say this event does happen, someone gets their game taken away from because they said something politically incorrect. Dude, these streamers on YouTube they get millions and millions of views like Hasmangold, Tectone, all right. Correct, I agree.

SPEAKER_03 26:02

Yeah, I agree.

SPEAKER_05 26:04

And guess what would happen to that company, dog? Governments would start getting involved because it'd be becoming such a big deal. And then, not only that, now you're affecting their cells. I think their voices are big enough to actually affect their cells.

SPEAKER_03 26:19

It's gonna take, but here's the thing is it's gonna take a big streamer, like a big, like a like a Kai Sonai. Or somebody like somebody like that. Yeah, Aiden Ross. It's gonna take somebody like that, it's not gonna take fucking Jimmy John up the fucking road. Um that's what I'm saying. No, come on, guys, let's not play the game. No, because at the end of the day, it's kind of like this, Ed. I mean, people are addicted to gaming, especially more now than ever. Like it's been like an addiction. You know what I mean? It's not like an addiction. I mean, when you have an addiction, uh you don't really care about the terms, you just want the drug, Ed. It's like crack cocaine. If they looked at you and said, look, you're you can rent the crack rock, you're still gonna smoke it even though you don't own it. You get what I'm saying? That's what I'm saying.

SPEAKER_05 27:01

Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 27:03

The average person doesn't give a shit.

SPEAKER_05 27:05

I get agreed. All right, I'm about to show you something else. All right, so we talked about the physical disc cells with Sony. Okay, we got that out of the way. All right. Now we'll go into our next subject. It involves a certain person named Maximilian Dude.

SPEAKER_03 27:18

Oh, God, this guy.

SPEAKER_05 27:19

We talked about him on our last podcast. Let me tell you something. I used to like Maximilian Dude when it came to watching his videos and his excited reactions to like all types of stuff. All right. I thought it was fun to watch because I would get the same excitement when certain games come out. Um example, Final Fantasy VII Remake, right? Yeah. Oh yeah. Uh when they first announced it. Big excitement. Yeah. I like watching people's reactions to the announcement and the trailers. I think it's really fun. And he was one of them. Yeah. All right. He said something based off these, you know, Sony going to physical. Now, I don't want anyone to get on their, you know, skirting a bunch and stuff like that. I don't want you to get all hippity hoppity on us in our comments. And I know you will. You will.

SPEAKER_03 28:10

I want you to.

SPEAKER_05 28:11

We're shown a clip from Maximilian Dude. Okay. And we're going to respond to it now. Is it the entire segment of his talk, entire, I would say, discussion on this? No. Oh, God, you know what's going to happen. Ed, you didn't you didn't get to the 18th minute part. It is his words. Yeah. Okay. And we're going to react to it.

SPEAKER_03 28:31

You didn't get all the way to the end, Ed, where he cleared it all up at the very last sentence.

SPEAKER_05 28:35

But anyway, so let's get to the clip. All right. This is his statement on why Sony is going this route on physical, on uh, I guess you can say getting rid of physical discs by 2028.

SPEAKER_03 28:47

All right, I can't wait to hear this.

SPEAKER_05 28:48

Nice. So let me share our screen real quick and blow this up.

SPEAKER_00 28:55

Games will be released on PlayStation Store and at retailers and digital formats only. I have choice things to say of how we got here, but I'm gonna save it. Us being in this precarious position didn't just happen because things happen. This happened because people voted for very specific people. As consumer preference games will be released on PlayStation. Dude looks like fucking Professor Snape.

SPEAKER_03 29:17

I'm sorry. Like I can't I look at him and he looks like he looks like Snape head. Looks just like him.

SPEAKER_05 29:26

Let me take out my Zen for this.

SPEAKER_03 29:28

This is like fucking Professor Snape. He does.

SPEAKER_05 29:32

Alright, so his statement. Now, did he go on and talk about other reasons? I'm sure he has other reasons, but this is a very, very non-existent factor. Okay? Because now we're gonna break it down. Now, what can we, I would say we're not gonna I'm not gonna put this in his mouth because he didn't say it, right? But he said voting for certain people, right? We got we got to this point. So I'm gonna go in and assume this is not what he said, but I'm going to assume it's Trump. We're gonna read between the lines.

SPEAKER_03 30:13

It's not Marco Rubio, Ed.

SPEAKER_05 30:15

Trump grant. It's all Trump's fault. Okay.

SPEAKER_03 30:19

It's not Cindy Hyde Smith, Ed. It's Trump's fault.

SPEAKER_05 30:23

All right, he didn't say that, but he wanted to I think he said. He won't. That's who I think he is referring to. And I think that's a fair, that is a fair assessment in today's political crime climate and who the current president is. Yeah. Alright. But Grant, so I'm gonna show you, I'm gonna go over a few things, okay, on why that is not the case. Okay. You y'all can disagree, agree. We'll make a clip of this video and you guys can go at it on the comments, okay? And we'll post it. And everyone can say what they think, if they agree or disagree with Maximil and dude, or if uh they agree with what we said, okay? All right, so first off, let's talk about Sony when it comes to their actual sales grant, okay? So this year alone, well, I would say the last several fiscal years, 85% of their game software and I would say purchases were digital. Yes. All right, 85%. And I'm just gonna use fiscal year 2025 as an example. Okay. God knows what it is for fiscal year 2026. I guarantee you is probably more when it comes to digital purchase. Okay. So this then this didn't happen overnight. Okay. It didn't happen the last uh two to three years of the Trump presidency or even before his presidency. This shift started a long time ago. And so why is it that we always mention Trump, but we never mention other political figures, Grant?

SPEAKER_03 32:04

Because they have to have somebody to blame, and he's the he's always the always the king. He's always the one that blamed. Because I remember Ed, I remember strictly downloading the game during the Biden administration. And I never once thought about oh, it's damn this, damn this Joe Biden for making me by making this easy for me to download this game.

SPEAKER_05 32:21

I'm not even blaming Biden because again, it's not their fault either.

SPEAKER_03 32:25

If you want to blame anybody, if you want to here's the thing is if you want to blame somebody, blame fucking father tyne for moving this forward.

unknown 32:32

Like for real.

SPEAKER_05 32:33

You know what I mean? So Sony, that's Sony sales, okay? But X Xbox dude is further along than them when it comes to that, dude. Their digital media sales were 90% FY25. 90% digital sales.

SPEAKER_03 32:52

And I remember getting so mad at Bill Clinton when they stopped making fucking VHS. My God, it was his fucking fault.

SPEAKER_05 32:59

All right, so Sony and Xbox have been going this this is the route they were going. Okay. Just a steadily incline, I would say, yeah, incline of digital media purchases compared to the physical copies. It's going to happen. All right. Do I personally not like it? I don't like it. I like physical copies again. Yeah, it's cool. I do. But I'm also, again, a realist. Okay. It's going to happen. And no amount of uh we us complaining about is going to shift a major company's business strategy on it. Okay.

SPEAKER_03 33:35

You know what's weird? You know what's one thing that I that I've never seen people complain about? Well, I mean, I've seen them complain about it there, but not like they never complain about movies coming to streaming like fast. You remember, remember when a, for example, you remember when a movie would come out, Ed?

SPEAKER_05 33:53

Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 33:53

And it would be like in theaters for like four months, and then it would come to VHS?

SPEAKER_05 33:57

Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 33:58

Dude, all movies now are like there for like a month, and then they're on streaming a video. You know why people aren't complaining about it? Because it costs 90 goddamn dollars to take your family to the movie now.

SPEAKER_05 34:10

Especially mine.

SPEAKER_03 34:12

Yes, that's what I'm saying. Like, but nobody can people nobody complains when it's on the good end, like, oh we'll just wait for Super Mario uh. Yeah, exactly. And then the food. So they're not complaining about that. You know what I mean? They're not complaining about that. And they're actually happy when it comes to uh the digital download and stuff like that. They'll they'll rent it for $4 or whatever. That's I mean, don't get me wrong. You know why, you know why that's a good idea to rent it for $4? Because it fucking makes good financial sense, Ed. Yeah, you could pop popcorn and fucking grill hot dogs and shit on your at your house for a third of the price. Yep.

SPEAKER_05 34:49

All right, so let's get into the third point of this. This retail collapse predates all this, okay? Retail is collapsing to digital media, to you know, Amazon, all that stuff. Retail has collapsed. GameStop. So check this out. The last two fiscal years, GameStop has closed 1,300 stores. Yeah. Okay. So that didn't happen because of political figures. Yeah. That happened because it's a natural progress of time and technology. Yeah. All right. You cannot put the amount of money that companies save by going digital or you know, owning their own logistics, all the stuff that Amazon is doing, whatever. You can't stop it. It's technology and it's moving faster and faster, okay? You're not going to do anything about it. You can we can complain about it, like we do a lot. Yeah. I mean, I don't like it, but guess what? Can't stop it. Sorry. It's gone. Now, GameStop, being that being said, uh, they still got stores around. You know, they're still there, but it's gonna be harder and harder for them to uh unless they completely change something or you know create a different type of business model and go into something else that you can only get at a GameStop, you have to bring customers in. Yeah. If we're going down this digital game cell, you're not bring customers in because they're just gonna just click, click, click. Oh, I got the game downloaded. Well, time to play. They're not going to travel.

SPEAKER_03 36:30

People are lazy, people are lazy as fuck now.

SPEAKER_05 36:33

Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 36:34

Like I saw, I saw, I've seen people spend again. We'll go back to the DoorDash thing. I've seen people spend $15 to get it delivered to them, and it's like right up the road. Like literally, they could drive two miles and save $15, but they don't want to do that. It's the convenience ed. Pay for convenience.

SPEAKER_05 36:53

The last thing, Grant. Maximilian, dude. Political figures. Oh, guess who you you voted for somebody. You voted for somebody, it happened. Oh, it's Trump's fault. I know he didn't say it, but this is what everyone when they someone listens to a video, dude. Yeah. No, dude, that's funny. Because you know, he's the last thing's dude. You know what I mean? Anyway, that was funny. No, it's not funny, but go ahead. Anyway, so someone watches this, of course, they're gonna think Trump. Even though he didn't say it. Oh, but you don't think Trump.

SPEAKER_03 37:28

Everybody's coming up, you're like, he could have been talking about Biden.

SPEAKER_05 37:31

He didn't say Trump talking about a representative or Florida. We could have been talking about our senator. He could have been talking about your governor, Ed. Yeah. So the last point corporate decisions, Grant, take years to plan. Of course. They take years, not weeks, not a few days.

SPEAKER_03 37:52

All right. Unless you fuck up severely, then it could take it, then it could take immediately action.

SPEAKER_05 38:00

This was in the process for years. And they were moving to this eventually. This was not, oh, we woke up one day, oh, hey, we need to stop physical media sales a couple days ago.

SPEAKER_03 38:12

Well, people don't understand. People this is what people don't understand. These guys, GameStop, Sony, all these people were talking about 2026 and fucking 2019, Ed.

SPEAKER_08 38:23

Yep.

SPEAKER_03 38:23

Because they have charts, they have trajectory. And this is the stupidest thing. I have this is the dumbest thing to ever say that you blame a president because, oh, the physical media. But you know what? You know what? I don't ever hear nobody. Ed, I'm gonna name you three stores. We're having a Radio Shack. Why did Radio Shack close down, Ed? Amazon. Right?

SPEAKER_04 38:52

Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 38:53

Why did fucking all uh Amber Crombie and Fitch, why did the malls shut down, Ed?

SPEAKER_05 38:59

Because I'm not gonna I'm not going to a store.

SPEAKER_03 39:03

Exactly. If I don't have to shut it online. If I don't fucking money, exactly.

SPEAKER_05 39:06

If I can get it for around the same price I could get it at a, I don't know, one of those like, you know, what do they call them? Warehouse sales or whatever the hell they do at some of these shopping districts. If I can get it still cheaper online, then I'm not going anywhere. Yeah. Buy it online.

SPEAKER_03 39:24

Exactly. Also, retail changes year to year, and it keeps progressively getting easier and easier. If you ever want to blame, um, this is how you know when you can this is you have all right to blame a political figure uh if Walmart shuts down, a big conglomerate like that.

SPEAKER_05 39:41

Like if we just get zoomed back in.

SPEAKER_03 39:44

Like if Walmart shuts down, Costco, Ed. If all the Costco's close because of the the the economy. Okay, I get it.

SPEAKER_05 39:51

Maximum dude, for the second podcast episode in a row, you're on our podcast, and you are wrong yet again. I'm sorry. You're wrong. All right, and you're wrong to just vote to turn this this political message.

SPEAKER_03 40:09

But Ed, you didn't get to the end. He said Condoleezza Rice at the end, Ed.

SPEAKER_05 40:13

Alright, so to close it off, Sony themselves stated this. They stated it was not due to tariffs and stuff like that. They just released the message and why they're doing it. Because the sales are going from the consumer, the consumer are going after digital on a vast majority. Of course. And it is a business decision. So that's it. But it's Trump's fault, Ed. Yeah. All right, Grant. Last subject, buddy. We got a top 10 list today. All right. The top ten signs, your game is woke. Oh, is going to be woke.

SPEAKER_03 41:04

Alright, so I'm gonna let you lead it off this time, and then I'm gonna follow your lead. Okay.

SPEAKER_05 41:11

So Grant, my number 10.

SPEAKER_03 41:14

Okay.

SPEAKER_05 41:16

My number 10. As soon as you hear, Grant, about the consultants, the DEI teams, the ESG influence, quote unquote. The two games come to mind. Dragon Age the Velgarde, of course. Concorde, of course. They had DEI initiatives, heavily DEI initiatives. Yeah. And uh they prioritize messaging over gameplay polish and you know, contributing to uh the their their woes and why their games didn't sell too. Commercial struggle. I love this. I do this. Commercial struggle screen. All right. But this is expanding this these DI teams. You know, once you hear about Sweet Baby Incorporated or somebody, right? Oh, you already know your game's about to be woke. Yeah, and now this is spreading a course. Well, it's been an Ubisoft for a while, you know, um, and Bioware, which is Dragon Age Velgar. All right, that's my number 10.

SPEAKER_03 42:20

And my number 10 would be square jawled females. Now, don't get on. I'm not gonna say now, do I like sexy females in my game? Yes. Do I think that all females in video games need to have huge tits and a fat ass? No. But do I all want do I want my females looking like you, Ed? I do not.

SPEAKER_05 42:47

I got a square jaw and look at it.

SPEAKER_03 42:49

Actually, I don't want nobody looking like you. But anyway.

SPEAKER_05 42:51

You cut someone with that thing right there. Cut it. Cut. Cut.

SPEAKER_03 42:59

Need to cut them calories.

SPEAKER_05 43:05

Alright, so do you have anything else to expand on this or are you good?

SPEAKER_03 43:09

No, I'm good.

SPEAKER_05 43:11

Alright. My number nine, Grant. Censorship. You know, the remake censorship. Yeah. They change something right. Or the modern audiences. Yes. Oh god. The modern, the modern audiences changes to a game. I'll give you a good one, Grant. Obvious one. Mortal Kombat 1. Oh, yes. They dude. Like they butchered all the female characters in Mortal Kombat 1. They changed them all. Like the female at outfits, the sexualization. Hey, I get it. Okay, whatever, but he make them attractive. That's how why these characters got popular, dude.

SPEAKER_03 43:55

What do you think? Katana, Katana used to it was hot, and now Katana is terrible.

SPEAKER_05 44:00

And Spider-Man 2. Insomniac. The company Insomniac.

SPEAKER_03 44:07

Yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_05 44:08

Game Company. The changes to Mary Jane's appearance and other adjustments. They just they just can't help themselves, dude. Dude, you oh man. Before we continue, I wish I got this dang clip. I wish I had it. Remember the God of War?

unknown 44:26

Yes.

SPEAKER_05 44:27

Did you watch that video? Yes. You know what I'm talking about?

SPEAKER_03 44:30

Yeah.

SPEAKER_05 44:31

With the the the two people sitting down, they're like God of War programmers or developers, right?

SPEAKER_08 44:36

Yeah.

SPEAKER_05 44:37

And they sit there and the interviewer asks them a question Hey, what got you into God of War? And those dudes said like the most 2018 one.

SPEAKER_03 44:50

Yeah.

SPEAKER_05 44:51

Dude. Yeah. And this is how we get it. This is what we get. We get these visitors, these colonizers to our video game IPs, Grant.

SPEAKER_03 45:00

They do no research.

SPEAKER_05 45:02

Yeah. 2018 is what got you in the God of War. We're talking about some masterpiece of some games you're missing there. You're talking about some storyline. You're talking about like Kratos at his rawest.

SPEAKER_03 45:16

Yeah.

SPEAKER_05 45:17

Anyway, go ahead, Grant. You're number nine.

SPEAKER_03 45:20

Number nine, Ed. Body type one, body type two.

SPEAKER_05 45:28

Oh, dude, they did that's everywhere now. Yeah. That's in your new Square Enix games.

SPEAKER_03 45:32

Do you remember when I called you the remasters? Do you remember when I called you? I literally called you and I said, Ed, because you downloaded uh Dragon Quest III as well.

SPEAKER_05 45:43

Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 45:43

You haven't played it yet. I played it first and I was like, Ed, what are you talking about? No, you did. I'm saying, like, I was actually like, you weren't home yet. Like you downloaded it, but you weren't home yet. Yeah. I said, when you get home, I said, help me figure out which one is the male and which one is the female. Because one said it's a body, it's a type A, type B, and you couldn't really fucking tell at all.

SPEAKER_05 46:08

Well, see, I go a different route. You can obviously tell one's a male and one's a female. Now they adjusted the outfit a little bit, right? You remember the famous barbarian girl bikini. Yeah, that's what I'm saying. It wasn't like that in this one. But you can still, I'm still like, why wouldn't you say male-female? I mean, you still tell long hair, short hair, yeah. One was out obviously has breast, one doesn't, male-female.

SPEAKER_03 46:37

Now, luckily, the game wasn't woke, so luckily, yeah.

SPEAKER_05 46:44

Yeah, I mean, they didn't change.

SPEAKER_03 46:45

I feel like what they did there, somebody put they had to put their little touch on it, had to put their little hand on it. And then you know what I mean.

SPEAKER_05 46:51

Yeah. All right, Grant, my number eight. Climate, anti-capitalist, oh yeah, or progressive messaging, the messaging grant, and inside the games, even if games they remake, they change the messaging, or with the new games, they just add they add their worldview. Yeah, add the worldview on stuff, grant. Yeah. So far Far Cry series is a big perfect per I'd say perfect one. Because games like uh uh Horizon also, like Zero Dawn with the eco-terrorist, the eco-terrorist corporate villain tropes, grant the corporate villains, you know, even though most of these corporations give a lot of people jobs, but they're villains, Grant. Yeah, they're villains. Now, I'm not pro-corporate, like especially when companies like treat their employees wrong or stuff like that. I'm not that, but I'm also definitely not anti-corporate due to the fact they give us people jobs, all right? Yeah, but they have this in games, grant, and Dragon Aids of Elgard seems like they had explicit social commentary, like misgendering apologies, grant, and you had to do push push-ups to do when you said someone when you didn't have a chance to get someone. Barbs. Yeah, barbs. Anyway, that's my number eight.

SPEAKER_03 48:11

Number eight, Ed. No, yeah, number eight. Fat superheroes that aren't. And I'm not talking about superheroes that are I'm not talking about villains or superheroes that are already fat like the blob. I'm not talking about that.

SPEAKER_08 48:32

Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 48:32

I'm talking about when you create somebody who's supposed to be he's supposed to be a realistic uh defender of the realm, defender of Earth Ed, and he's 300 pounds and he looks like he should be in the gym instead of fighting saving the galaxy.

SPEAKER_08 48:47

Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 48:49

Fat superheroes. Uh basically Concord. Yeah. Like you mean to tell me that I had how many people were on there? Like eight.

SPEAKER_05 48:58

Oh god, I don't know. Eight horrible looking characters.

SPEAKER_03 49:02

Let me just start by this. Okay. Whenever you played a if you played a new game, right? If you ever played a new game, especially back in the 90s, whatever you didn't really know who was going to be in the game. Okay. Like Mortal Kombat, for example. Most people pick Luke Kang because uh martial arts, or people pick Kung Lao because he had the cool hat, or whatever. Jax because he was jacked or whatever, like that. Yeah. You know what I mean? Um, and Concord, you had to pick fat obese woman because she fucking because I don't know why.

SPEAKER_05 49:33

Yeah. Man, the game was racist too. But people don't realize. Like all saying bolsters that defended that game, the game was racist as hell. How they uh depicted uh black women. Yes, and they don't realize it. They defend that game when it was racist as hell. All right, anyway, so my number seven grant virtual signaling in games and marketing. I'm not about in the game, I'm talking about in the marketing for the game and the uh dev statements. We get a lot of those, right? Those dev statements, those community managers. Oh, yeah. Grant. So Concorde, oh God, here we go again. Concorde heavy emphasis on diverse hero designs and inclusivity. They made sure they announced that uh ahead of time, even now, all the game cons and stuff like that. Inclusivity grant. And uh then it just had a rapid failure immediately after that. Bowers marketing for Kurt Dragon Age, the Velgarde. No, highlighted representation grant. They highlighted it as that's why the game's good. Representation. No, a gamer looks at a game. Is a game has good gameplay and a good story? That's it. Is the game fun? Is the story good without adding all the bullshit that ruins the story? Dragon Age Rail Guard. That's what they care about. They don't care about inclusivity. No game, no gamer sits here. Man, I hope this game has inclusive inclusivity grant. I hope it does. If it doesn't, I'm not gonna play it.

SPEAKER_03 51:02

No. That's my number seven. Number seven, Ed, pronouns. Pronoun. Especially at the beginning. What game was it? What game was it that you streamed and you they had the breast scars and all that shit where you like removed the tits and then what that is? Yeah, the character creator.

SPEAKER_05 51:24

Okay. You could have the uh implants removed or the you know the augmentation, the breast augmentation. Yeah, that was part of it. That was you had the scars and everything.

SPEAKER_03 51:32

But also, you had they actually had you had to um they had to make a patch to re remove the pronouns because it was such a bad thing. Like people didn't want it that much. Remember that?

SPEAKER_05 51:45

Oh, they kept it, dude. The pronouns in there, yeah.

SPEAKER_03 51:50

Yeah, they're in there. I thought there was like you they get you can like hide it or something like that. They meant where you can like hide it.

SPEAKER_05 51:56

Yeah, or something. You know what I mean? Yeah, you could do that. All right, that's your number, what, seven? Seven, yeah. All right, six, Grant. Diversity quotas over historical accuracy. And guess who I'm talking about, Grant? Uh-oh. Assassin's Creed Shadows. Yeah, Grant, they had to have a diverse cast in Sengoku era Japan. Sengoku era Japan, diverse cast. Couldn't help themselves. And then for spoken, Square Enix. It was criticized for his limited white character in this world. Oh, but that's racist. What are you talking about? Oh, you don't have enough white people in it? Oh, you're a racist. Okay, well, everyone says when there's not enough black representation or Indian representation in the game, they get all upset. So, guess what? Another race called white people can also get upset, right? Is that how we play the game? No, I don't care. Like, I really just don't care. As long as the game is good and the story is great without adding all the bullshit. Guess what? Force Bulken felled at that, Dragon Age of Belgar felled at that, and Assassin Creed Shadows felled at that.

SPEAKER_03 53:12

All right. Yep. Number six. Ed, you're gonna love this one. Number six, Ed. The developers spend more time bitching on Twitter than they do promoting their game. Oh my god.

SPEAKER_05 53:27

The community managers.

SPEAKER_03 53:29

How many how many times have we seen as soon as a game comes out, they're on the forefront saying bigots and racist and this and that, and they're oh man.

SPEAKER_05 53:46

Yeah, that's a bad one, dude. Like, all you have to do is promote your game and shut the fuck up.

SPEAKER_03 53:52

Exactly. You come out there trying to defend anything that people are saying, I know your game's about to be woke and trash.

SPEAKER_05 54:00

And you know it's about to be bad.

SPEAKER_03 54:01

Yeah.

SPEAKER_05 54:02

Because if they gotta come out and defend it like that, they know it's bad. They know it. All right. Grant, my number five anti-male or toxic masculinity themes in video games. Well, as soon as you hear about that, the anti-mill. It's toxic masculinity, Grant. As soon as you hear that, like here's a perfect example The Last of Us Part 2.

SPEAKER_03 54:25

Yeah.

SPEAKER_05 54:26

It portrayed male characters, and I would say it had themes around toxic masculinity. It definitely had that, but it had strong criticism, bashing it, and everything like that. And then you had like other ones like Dragon Aids of Elgard, same thing. So you have something like that in your game, or you're promoting it, or whatever, that messaging is gonna be trash. And you can say what you want about Last of Us Part 2. They butchered the story, man. And people will defend it to their grave, but I'm sorry. The story is what basically pushed me away from it. And yes, I did play it. Go ahead. Number five.

SPEAKER_03 55:14

Messaging over marketing.

SPEAKER_05 55:17

Yeah, that's one I had.

SPEAKER_03 55:20

That's it.

SPEAKER_05 55:22

All right, number four. Heavy focus on LGBTQ plus AI QB. Blah, blah, blah, blah. Blah blah blah blah. Representation of romance. Heavy focus on. Like majority of the game is just that. Everyone's gay. That's it. That's the game. Everyone's gay. Yep. Can't do it. Can't can't change the story. Can't make decisions. You're gay. Well, this one didn't do it 100%, but man, was it closed? Uh Dragon Aids of Velgarde. Again, I know it's a main topic here, but it is. It had very prominent non-bibinary companions and dialogue focus on identity. And like everyone could be queered. You could, but you couldn't do like a straight relationship with some characters. They locked that out. It was just stupid. Okay. If you're going to make choices, then choices need to be full circle. Full circle. Alright. Don't pick and choose. Have it choices for everything. Alright, Grant. Number four.

SPEAKER_03 56:26

And this would be considered um probably more for remakes and remasters. Existing characters receive major personality changes and backstra backstory changes. Yeah, that's one of mine. Yeah. How many times have we seen that?

SPEAKER_05 56:45

Oh, all the time. It happens all the time. And it's very pr prominent in um your remakes of these games, of these IPs, or you know, the sequel or whatever, the new game of the IP, where they add all this stuff. They add stuff that wasn't prevalent in the last games, you know what I mean? And that kind of goes into um my number three, which is race gender swaps of established characters.

SPEAKER_03 57:16

Correct.

SPEAKER_05 57:17

Okay. Example, Assassin's Creed Shadows. Alright. This isn't a race swap, but you had Yasuke, a black samurai.

SPEAKER_04 57:29

Yeah, we get his a historical figure. He's a legendary black samurai.

SPEAKER_05 57:36

As the protagonist in feudal Japan. And we can get into all the history changes Ubisoft did, the walk the lockout of the Wikipedia page, and then them going to these radical communist historians. I we I don't want to go down that road because we have a cover in another podcast, but it happened. And then like Marvel superhero games. I'm not talking about Marvel Rivals, but a lot of other ones. Adapted, swapping like classic character designs or demographics. They do it, man.

SPEAKER_04 58:09

They do it a lot.

SPEAKER_05 58:11

Alright, go ahead.

SPEAKER_03 58:16

What number are we on? Three. Come on, come on, snap. Number three, eh. Dialogue frequently references contemporary social issues.

SPEAKER_05 58:29

Yeah. Yep. That's it. That's uh that kind of covers a lot, though.

SPEAKER_03 58:36

I'm just waiting for one of these games to talk about and they're going to change this.

SPEAKER_05 58:41

Progressive messaging.

SPEAKER_03 58:42

Well, that's going to be like president. That's not going to be President Trump. He'll be like, it would be like another bad guy, but it'll be like President Blond hair. Yeah, it'll look just like him, but it'll be like President Strump or some stupid shit.

SPEAKER_05 58:53

Yeah, that's tired. That's a tired trope. It's really tired. Like even if they did Biden or someone that's funny, that falls asleep all the time, that's like mentally incapable, I would be like, it's tired. I get it. And I get what y'all doing. Alright, number two, Grant. You already talked about this, but pronouns and character creation or dialogue, dog. Like just stop. It's stupid. No one wants them. Nobody wants pronouns. End the story. Dragon Aids of Elgar with Tosh. Alright. That was just that was so cringe. And uh get on Xbox. Four's a Horizon 5. Guess what? Pronouns pronouns. Like, no one cares anymore. Like, we're done with pronouns. No one cares except the people trying to virtual signal from the dev teams and everything like that. That's the only people that care. Gamers do not care. Vast majority. Like 99%. Statement, yes, that is a fact. No one cares about pronouns.

SPEAKER_03 1:00:08

Alright, head number two. Legacy characters are sidelined to spotlight new ones.

SPEAKER_05 1:00:17

Yeah. Guess what?

SPEAKER_03 1:00:19

And what I mean by new ones, I don't mean like specific, for example, and they and they almost and they did this in Final Fantasy.

SPEAKER_05 1:00:27

They're about to do it very recent.

SPEAKER_03 1:00:29

Yeah. So you remember, like, first of all, in Final Fantasy VII, the original, the OG, nobody gave 45 fucks about Yuffie. Like, I hate Yuffy, and I never got her on my team. Ever. Ever.

SPEAKER_05 1:00:44

Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 1:00:44

But they tried to make her a main character in this game. Like they wanted you so bad.

SPEAKER_05 1:00:52

Integrade, that special download, that's DLC or whatever it was for Final Fantasy Remake. Yeah. They went into her story, and I was just like. Exactly.

SPEAKER_03 1:01:03

Um, because they made the butt, you know, like so in the OG, she was a brat. You know what I mean? Like, she was just like, but in this one, she's like, you know, like I'm I'm like like uh supergirl or whatever, like a you know what I mean? Like yeah.

SPEAKER_05 1:01:18

Yeah. Alright, Grant. My number one, you already talked about it, dude. This is this is what grinds my gears. It grinds my gears, Grant.

SPEAKER_03 1:01:28

All right.

SPEAKER_05 1:01:29

My number one is ugly or realistic. When I say realistic, you know what I mean? Female characters. Just ugly.

SPEAKER_03 1:01:40

Yeah.

SPEAKER_05 1:01:40

The jawlines, alloy, like her facial hair, stocky build, you know, her, you know, the features that make her very manly, or you know, oh, is it it's very gray? Don't know if she's a man. She's obviously a woman, especially from the first one, you know what I mean? But they just keep making her like very butch. I don't like that. But they do this with a lot of characters, they make the little jawline, yeah, cut, like masculine jawline stuff. It's it's it's it's it's gets it's gets really ridiculous. And it's way over people are tired of it. Listen, gamers, majority gamers, which are again, I'm gonna go ahead and tell you when it comes to real gamers. Yes, I'm sorry, women, but when it comes to not talking about Candy Crush, you know, doing those little surveys that say, oh, it's close to 50% of gamers are female. I'm not talking about that. I'm talking about real gamers. It is a very masculine slash, I would say, male-led industry. It is. All right. Sorry to say, but it is. This is not sexist, it's just the fact, it is the basic fact, and that's what it is. All right. So if you have that, why are you marketing to something that is your not your top like priority, which is your customers?

SPEAKER_03 1:02:57

No, all right. Now, when I get it, I get it when people say like, oh, well, there's like, for example, like if you're in like an apocalypse if you're game and you're an apocalypse zombie, like I don't expect your woman to have makeup on and have you know a low-cut shirt.

SPEAKER_05 1:03:12

But like a normal-looking women, but not when you take an obviously main character or girl that used to be attractive, aka Laura Croft, in your new Netflix series anime. You're making her masculine.

SPEAKER_04 1:03:25

Yeah.

SPEAKER_05 1:03:25

Okay. When you do that, you you lose me. Now, another last example is a fable reboot, and they had to boy, they had to cover this up. Well, not even cover it up, play, throw like other things out there to get people off this subject because this is you making an obvious, straight up, trash garbage face of a character. Okay, no one liked that. No one wants that. Not even the women want that. No, nobody besides the fat overweight piece of shit that you have on your game dev team that has a woke personality wants that.

SPEAKER_03 1:04:01

Yeah. Ed, you're gonna like my number one. My number one, Ed, high IGN score. Ed. Do you remember what Concord got?

SPEAKER_05 1:04:21

Oh, it got like an eight or a seven. Got one of those to tell you right now. I think it was.

SPEAKER_03 1:04:26

Do you remember what Dustborne got?

SPEAKER_05 1:04:28

Oh, Dustborne got like a seven, two.

SPEAKER_03 1:04:32

Me and you a long time ago looked up what they's born. Do you remember what go back and I want you to look? So what did uh what did uh the other one get? Concorde seven out of ten. Okay.

SPEAKER_05 1:04:48

The gray seven, the yeah, the mysterious seven IG and seven.

SPEAKER_03 1:04:53

So we also looked up scores from remember when we're doing the the old games and we're looking at the scores and stuff like that.

SPEAKER_08 1:05:00

Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 1:05:00

Remember they gave Final Fantasy 7, like an eight or something like that, or something like that? So that means it's only one point higher than Dustborne.

SPEAKER_05 1:05:10

Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 1:05:11

One point higher than Concorde.

SPEAKER_05 1:05:13

Yep.

SPEAKER_03 1:05:14

So anytime that IGN gives it a high score, it's gonna be a garbage game. Yeah, they'll give now now they're gonna be like, oh that's not true.

SPEAKER_05 1:05:25

When it comes to these certain games, you know what I mean? They're they're doing the messaging or the yeah, they're on that fence, you know. They'll they'll they'll put that seven.

SPEAKER_03 1:05:33

Like they gave like what they they gave uh Assassin's Creed, what a nine?

SPEAKER_05 1:05:38

Yeah, something like that. Let's see. Assassin's Creed Shadows, IGN score, blah, blah, blah, blah. We gave it an eight.

SPEAKER_03 1:05:47

Eight, okay.

SPEAKER_05 1:05:48

The game, the same game you played last time.

SPEAKER_03 1:05:51

Do you remember what game was it that we saw? And I can't remember what game it was, but it was a game, it was oh, I know it was. It was um Claire Obscure. It was Clarobscure. And some guy gave it a four because it didn't have enough representation.

SPEAKER_05 1:06:06

Oh, yeah, that was another remember.

SPEAKER_03 1:06:08

Do you remember that?

SPEAKER_05 1:06:09

Yeah, that was a trash company. Trash game magazine. I forget what it was. It wasn't PC Gamer, it was something very similar to it, though.

SPEAKER_03 1:06:18

They gave it a four, Ed, because it didn't have enough representation.

SPEAKER_04 1:06:24

Alright.

SPEAKER_05 1:06:26

Grant, that was our top 10. Signs your game is going to be woke.

SPEAKER_03 1:06:31

Also, I love the graphic.

SPEAKER_05 1:06:34

It's great. Yeah. Great graphic. Alright, before you close us, guys, if you like the video, again, like and subscribe. Go Google us DMG Gaming Podcasts. We're everywhere. Audio form on Apple, whatever podcast and platform you want, we're on YouTube and X.

SPEAKER_03 1:06:55

And Ed, you'll be getting on Path of Exile to give me all the good gear.

SPEAKER_05 1:06:59

In a little bit after I take my daughter to go eat some crab.

SPEAKER_03 1:07:04

Man, you better tell her to wait on that crab while you gave me the gear.

SPEAKER_05 1:07:08

I understand.

SPEAKER_03 1:07:09

That's cool.

SPEAKER_05 1:07:10

Um you about to get on right now?

SPEAKER_03 1:07:12

I'm gonna get on right now.

SPEAKER_05 1:07:13

Like as soon as we end this.

SPEAKER_03 1:07:14

Like let's already load it up, buddy. It's already booted up.

SPEAKER_05 1:07:19

Alright. Give me about an hour.

SPEAKER_03 1:07:22

Okay. I'll keep leveling up until then.

SPEAKER_05 1:07:26

Alright.

SPEAKER_03 1:07:27

I almost got killed by the first boss, by the way. You got killed by him before, though. I D, because I forgot how he moved. Um, so alright, guys, that's the podcast. We appreciate y'all tuning in. Um, you got anything you need to say? You got any shout-outs?

SPEAKER_05 1:07:43

Happy birthday tomorrow, Grant.

SPEAKER_03 1:07:45

Ah, that's right. That's right. Grant's birthday. America's birthday.

SPEAKER_05 1:07:54

America's birthday yesterday.

SPEAKER_03 1:07:56

I know. I'm assigned. No, I'm going in order of greatness. I'm going I'm going in order of greatness.

SPEAKER_05 1:08:00

Tomorrow is just another Monday.

SPEAKER_03 1:08:02

I'm going in order of greatness. See, yesterday they're actually shooting fireworks in honor of me.

SPEAKER_05 1:08:06

No, they it was the 4th of July. America's birthday.

SPEAKER_03 1:08:10

See, like when Trump and them had the UFC thing and the crowd went crazy, it's because they showed me on the Titan trying.

SPEAKER_05 1:08:15

No. America's birthday. No one cares about tomorrow.

SPEAKER_03 1:08:19

It's actually on your calendar. No, it says Boxing Day. It says Boxing Day on some of them, and then it says Rent's birthday.

SPEAKER_05 1:08:27

If you didn't text me earlier, I would have forgotten. Oh nice notification, buddy. No, go ahead.

SPEAKER_03 1:08:36

That's all right that's I always forget yours until I see it on Facebook. Oh man. That's all right. Alright, dude. So anyway, go like and subscribe, everything. Go uh to our website. Fuck. It's like it's like that long ass. Just Google it. All right. It's there. Pod pages. DMG gaming podcast. Fuck.

SPEAKER_05 1:09:04

You said you're going to change it.

SPEAKER_03 1:09:06

I know. I need to go change that back. All right, come on. Alright, guys. We will see y'all next week. Y'all have a good one. Peace.

SPEAKER_05 1:09:13

Peace.

SPEAKER_02 1:09:15

Yo. Yo. Yo. Eddie.

unknown 1:09:21

Yup.

SPEAKER_02 1:09:22

Yup. Yep. Yo.