Mom, I Can’t Pause #5: DREAD, Hacking Dread, and Far Cry 6 Dread(ful?)
I hope you enjoyed that title because I have to admit: that was a bit of a stretch. I’m a few days late. Allow me to explain why with the first topic:
METROID: DREAD Is Here!
If you’re an avid reader of this newsletter (and of course you are, right?), you may have noticed I put this up on a Monday instead of a Friday like I usually do. Well, I have a good reason for that:
A new Metroid game has dropped! The first new Metroid in 11 years! The first new 2D Metroid in about 20 years! I don’t understand how people are not excited about this. Even if Metroid isn’t your jam, which I totally get, a new game is kind of a big deal. A new mainline game in a beloved series should always be a big deal, no matter the publisher. While Metroid is a fan-favorite series, it hasn’t always been a hot selling IP. So, it has been encouraging to see Nintendo market the shit out of this game. A welcome surprise for sure.
So, I didn’t put this up on Friday because I wanted to get a few days with the game, just so I can form a basic opinion without burning myself out on it. As you know, I don’t get any of this shit for free, so I have to play it at the same time as everyone else. Don’t consider this a review, but in short: yes. Goddamn. YES. This is undoubtedly a new Metroid game in mechanics, but it’s got the old charm of Metroid that has been updated for modern times. This has to be attributed to MercuryStorm, the developers of the (then unexpected) remake of Metroid 2: Samus Returns. Once longtime Metroid producer Yoshio Sakamoto saw the work MercuryStorm did on Samus Returns, he knew he had the proper team in place to bring the long-gestating Metroid Dread to life.
While I keep playing and enjoying it, I have to outwardly hope that people actually buy this game. Surprisingly, no Metroid game has ever sold above 3 million copies for its lifetime. Hopefully, this go-around is bought by gamers far and wide, allowing us to have more 2D Metroid in the future. After all, it did inspire the “Metroidvania” genre we all love, and as long as one of those franchises is alive, the inspiration will spread farther and wider than it already has. Here’s to hoping that Castlevania actually returns sooner than later.
Also, as a brief aside: Metroid Prime 4 is probably going to be a banger of a release, too. But who knows when that will be ready? Let’s hope sooner than later, so we can keep this Metroid train rocking and rolling for the foreseeable future.
Holy Shit, Twitch Got Hacked
Twitch got hacked this week. Suffice to say, that’s a bit of a big deal.
This past Wednesday, Twitch admitted to being hacked via their Twitter account. Along with sensitive user data being compromised, the entire site’s source code was mined. Furthermore, creator payouts and various bits of projects in development internally at Twitch and Amazon were also included in the 125 GB leak. Crazily enough, this may not be the end of it, as the leak has been dubbed “part one.” That doesn’t surprise me, though; 125 GB seems like an insignificant amount of data leakage for a website as large as Twitch, creator payouts notwithstanding.
Look, I’m going to be extremely frank here: I am not a Twitch streamer. I would like to be, but every time I think about starting my channel up, I just can’t be bothered to do it. Still, I find the platform fascinating. Plus, I have a number of friends on the platform that I like to support (follow my friend Marxelle for instance, his channel is good stuff)! That said, I don’t really have a horse in this race for Twitch. Can’t help but find this hack to be utterly fascinating, though. I mean, did we all suspect that these creators were making so much money? We all knew they were making good money on Twitch, but that much? It’s legitimately fascinating to see that! It’s also good for creators of color, especially since a lot of creators feel that Twitch is not doing much for them. To see a list of high-earning creators have very few people of color is par for the course, yet frustrating nonetheless.
I think this story will have many more twists and turns in the future, but we’ll see just how deep this hack goes. Hopefully not too far, but I suspect it’ll be even worse than we expect.
Far Cry 6 Sure Did Release, Alright
Yup. That’s right. Far Cry 6 is out and seemingly is More Far Cry, as we all kind of expected.
Ubisoft tends to have a formulaic system in place for their franchises. Assassin’s Creed has one, as I’m sure you’re familiar with. Mainline Assassin’s Creed games have been the same, more or less, since the fourth iteration of the game. There may have been tweaks here or there, but they’re the same every time. Far Cry is the same way. Once Far Cry 3 hit the scene, it was over for the series. Every game since has been Far Cry 3 but in a different location, and this latest iteration seems like the same thing.
A charismatic yet chilling villain? Yup.
A player-character that has character, but is vague enough to be a blank slate? For sure.
A setting/plot that could be saying much more about the subject matter than face value? Oh, you bet your ass it has that.
Look, I won’t be playing this. I already wrote about my apprehension regarding Ubisoft games fairly recently, so I don’t wanna discuss Far Cry from that angle. However, I have to ask: isn’t this boring yet? Do you really find 5 games (including Primal) of the same shit with no real innovation between the sequels beyond better visuals still appealing? I don’t mean this to be some grand statement against Far Cry or Ubisoft, but damn man. The sameness of it all grows tiring after a while.
