Month: September 2025

I don’t know that I would call it a complaint, but saying we have too many video games sure seems like a good problem to have – for the player.

But having too much of anything is almost certainly going to, at least, end up being bad.

I don’t know when we might see the negatives for this and maybe we already are – I keep, as best I can, a running total of job losses in video games alone for the year. Now some of those come from mergers and buyouts but a lot just come from studios who release a game and then don’t make that money back so they have to cut staff and sometimes just close up shop altogether.

I’m not sure releasing fewer games would help the situation but it sure would give me more time to buy what I want and play it while waiting for the next thing (that’s a really funny joke if you know my buying/playing habits, but we’re talking in a general sense here). I know it would give more games more time to soak. Time to own the shelf space or the mind space of the players.

Breathing room. Not only for the game but the consumer as well.

I don’t know the result of this or when/if we ever see one. I worry that with all the games releasing and a fair chunk of them being very good titles, they’ll miss the boat. Studios releasing in an uncrowded space could make their money back but not currently it seems. And more failures to reach money goals means more layoffs and closures means less games.

Maybe there’s an ebb and flow to that. Maybe we’ve done this before and I just wasn’t paying attention. Maybe this is blown out of proportion. I just know you don’t hear us talking about playing the latest titles almost ever in the sense that we’ve played them. But, man, that’s a lot of job losses for the year so far.

Ubisoft, it has been 4,423 days since a new Splinter Cell game (non-animated series or guest spot in another game franchise, remake, BBC radio drama, or VR exclusive) was released.

Also, there’s been 4,400 job losses in the gaming industry since January 1, 2025.

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Surprise! Tariffs make things more expensive. I actually didn’t have to finish writing that. The whole smart document thing saw “tariffs make things…” and it completed the rest of it.

So yeah, now we’ve got the second price hike in 6 months for Microsoft consoles. We’re at a point where if you bought a Series X back in 2020 when they launched, you could sell it now five years later for a profit. And that’s even if you’ve used it for that long as well. Also amazingly, you could trade that in at a game store and now get FAR more for it than you would have 6 months ago.

It’s ridiculous. It’s also ridiculous with how much a console is going to cost. PS5’s were already up there and now the Xbox family is kinda surpassing it – in price mind you. Also, let me go back and point out that we’re nearing 6 years of these consoles being around. You look at ANY other time previous and tell me when you’ve seen the consoles GO UP in price where it isn’t a collectible but still on the shelves. Sure, they’ve released upgraded versions of these things with the Pro models and what not, but it’s never been like this before that I can remember.

And I won’t even bother to think what will happen when these companies start showing off their next generation of hardware. It feels like that is something on the horizon but I’m honestly hoping it is way down the line when we’re past this whole tariff thing and things have settled a bit. If it doesn’t, we’re probably looking at 800-1000 dollar consoles.

I don’t know if that’s the “sky is falling” mentality, but we’re already in the 650-750 range with what’s out there now and going beyond that with better hardware and stuff, the price will be significantly higher. If you want to get in now, you should. Do it before the price hike takes effect on October 3rd.

I saw another trailer for the Splinter Cell animated series for Netflix and I’m very excited for it. It won’t fill that void of having a new game in the series but it’s something to remind people it exists and hopefully resurges Ubisoft to get on the ball with whatever they’re working on. Ubisoft, it has been 4,416 days since a new Splinter Cell game (non-animated series or guest spot in another game franchise, remake, BBC radio drama, or VR exclusive) was released.

Also, there’s been 4,400 job losses in the gaming industry since January 1, 2025.

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We’d planned to bring you one of our first interviews in I don’t know how many years but some technical issues have pushed that through to next week.

We’ll be talking with Aaron Gwynaire about his new game NEYYAH.

As for today’s show, it’s a lot about Nintendo. Both with their Nintendo Direct held on Friday and a little something about their IP protection. We focus more on the direct, however.

I’m glad to see them supporting Mario for the 40th anniversary, although a massively overpriced port of two games wasn’t on my bingo card – however, given their recent releases of Switch 1 ports to Switch 2 with upgrades and making them SEVENTY DOLLARS, I shouldn’t be surprised.

Come to think of it, watching that direct and seeing some first party releases like Yoshi, Metroid, and others, I’m only now realizing that those will also come with a price tag of seventy or higher. And Nintendo doesn’t do discounts. Not anymore. What little they do is barely anything worth waiting for. And it’s likely I’ll move to buying their titles used much further down the road.

Not that it matters. My backlog is full of great things to play and as each week passes my PC gaming wish list keeps dropping in price with sale after sale. I’ll be fine for gaming. Just not…Nintendo gaming – though I have a full backlog there as well.

What I don’t have is Splinter Cell. Ubisoft, it has been 4,409 days since a new Splinter Cell game (non-animated series or guest spot in another game franchise, remake, BBC radio drama, or VR exclusive) was released.

Also, there’s been 4,400 job losses in the gaming industry since January 1, 2025.

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It’s been a few weeks and in that time I seemed to have found some games to actually put some time into. Nothing new, of course, but given I haven’t played them yet, they’re new to me.

Recently I finished Astro’s Playroom. This was a pack-in title with the PS5. A console purchased in November of 2020. And it’s so very weird to go back and finish something that you hadn’t touched since January of 2021. There’s a few trophies from the game that scatter from November of 2020 to January 2021 and then a MASS of them all within the most recent weeks. And that’s the weird part. If it wasn’t pulling me in then, why now?

I don’t know. It’s over with and was a fun little title and pretty cool to get as a free download – we don’t really get a lot of those anymore with our console purchases – or at least we didn’t back then. We still don’t but the Switch 2 did have the option of getting it with Mario Kart World. And if you buy an Xbox I think it comes with a month free of Gamepass which is a massive library to pick from, so I guess it isn’t all bad there.

It was fun to find games again to play, and continue to play – not just a few moments of gaming and then be done with it. I’m hoping the streak will continue because I’ve got a lot more to look into or just to continue to play. With some new stuff on the horizon as well. Oh! Hey! The two Horizon games I haven’t played either.

Still no Splinter Cell game to play, yet. But next month we get an animated series. Sorry, Ubisoft, fine print says that doesn’t count. We want a brand new entry into the series. And it has been 4,402 days since a new Splinter Cell game (non-animated series or guest spot in another game franchise, remake, BBC radio drama, or VR exclusive) was released.

Also, there’s been 4,400 job losses in the gaming industry since January 1, 2025.

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