The Cseekly Recap #21 - EA's shenanigans, Ubisoft fixing what can't be fixed, CDPR keeps the hope - video Dailymotion

JustCsomm

Hello there. Welcome to The Cseekly Recap. I’m your host, Csomm and this is a recap of selected news I have covered this week that I find to be interesting.  #thecseeklyrecap #gamingnews #opinion #discussion   Like, share, subscribe and all that good stuff!  Timestamps: 00:00 Intro 00:26 EA is being scummy again 05:19 Ubisoft living in delulu land 10:28 CDPR hopes to win people back 16:55 Outro   Sources:  Article 1: https://www.eurogamer.net/ea-advertising-ads-in-game-content-integrations Article 2: https://www.gamesradar.com/games/assassin-s-creed/ubisoft-admits-assassins-creed-shadows-story-didnt-land-as-we-hoped-so-its-final-update-is-trying-to-fix-it/ Article 3: https://www.ign.com/articles/cd-projekt-red-co-ceo-hopes-witcher-4-wins-back-players-after-heartbreaking-cyberpunk-2077-launch  For more content check me out at https://www.youtube.com/@realcsomm

Transcript

00:00Hey hey hey, it's time for another edition of the Cheekly Recap.

00:03I'm your host Chum, and this is a selection of news I have covered this week.

00:08The footage behind is from the game Star Wars Knights of the Old Republic.

00:12Let's get started with the first news of the week, and it's all about EA.

00:16I'm not playing games from EA to begin with, but I didn't really anticipate my interest to play one

00:22would be this low, particularly after reading this article. Because EA launches new advertising

00:28platform, enabling brands to quote, integrate directly into gameplay. And let me tell you,

00:35I don't buy EA's framing that this is primarily about enhancing the player's experience.

00:40This announcement reads to me like a company trying to unlock a new revenue stream from an

00:46audience that's already paying for games, battle passes, cosmetic items, and god knows what else.

00:51Because let's be real, just name me one thing where the user experience is better,

00:56because they are advertising you stuff. The key thing that stands out is that EA isn't just

01:03talking about realistic stadium advertising. I mean, that's an easy sell. Real sports have ads

01:09everywhere, so digital billboards in Madden or EA sports aren't controversial on their own.

01:16What's more telling is the emphasis on several things like advanced targeting, proprietary ad servers,

01:22campaign optimizations, audience measurement, brand engagement metrics, and personalized rewards.

01:29And to be honest, that's advertising industry language, not game design language.

01:34Look, from my perspective as a player, the concern is very simple. When a company starts measuring ad

01:40impressions inside a game, your incentives change. The goal is no longer just making the game fun,

01:47it's making sure you as a player spend enough time looking at branded content for advertisers to see

01:52value. So yeah, like I said before, thank fuck I'm not playing EA games, but for those sad thoughts that

01:59are still playing it, it's not looking really good. Also, the timing matters as well, because gaming is

02:05already heavily monetized. If EA were introducing this into, let's say, free-to-play titles, there'd be a

02:12stronger argument that ads help subsidize costs. But the thing is, many EA games are premium products

02:19that you buy at full price every year. And that's why many people see this as double dipping. And this

02:26is basically how it works. You buy the game, then you buy microtransactions, then you buy season passes,

02:32and then you watch ads anyway. And I'm supposed to buy the game and enjoy the experience and not buy

02:38more of the shit so I can play the game. I don't know about you guys, but when I see

02:43it from this

02:44particular viewpoint, which by the way is the most normal viewpoint ever, this looks disgusting. Also,

02:52this is a very slippery slope, because others are going to see what EA is doing, and then they are

02:58going

02:59to do the same shit. Today, for example, is going to be brand and stadium boards. Tomorrow, it's sponsored

03:05objectives, exclusive rewards tiered to brands, limited time promotions designed around advertisers,

03:11or UI elements that conveniently happen to be engagement opportunities. And to be honest,

03:17it's our fault, because the gaming industry has a long history of testing our tolerance.

03:22Features are introduced in their least offensive form, and if we, the players, accept them,

03:28companies gradually push further. I mean, throughout the years of me playing the games,

03:33I have witnessed this many times, and if I'm being honest, the situation is getting worse and worse.

03:39And I know what you might say, not every integration is bad. For example, a Red Bull banner in a

03:46football

03:46stadium is realistic, and perhaps a fictional sports broadcast sponsored by a real company can fit

03:53naturally. But when I read this announcement, I see far more discussion about what advertisers gain

03:59than what we, the players, gain. Newsflash guys, we don't gain anything. It's as simple as that.

04:05And pretty much that's why my initial reaction is simply discussed. EA says these ads will respect

04:11the player experience. Really? That's what you're calling it? Player's experience? So the real test

04:17isn't what the press release says. I don't really care. It's whether you, the player, can go through a

04:22match, a menu, or a progression system six months from now without feeling like you're participating

04:29in an advertising campaign. And ultimately, if you cannot, then this isn't about immersion.

04:34It's about finding new ways to monetize attention. So best thing that you can do is just stay away

04:40from EA games. It's very simple. Don't buy their shitty product, don't finance these stupid ideas,

04:45and maybe if you start voting with your wallet, these ridiculous things are just going to go away.

04:52Because the only thing that sustains this shit is money. And if you cut off the source,

04:56what the hell can they do? Absolutely fucking nothing. But ultimately, I'm not surprised they're

05:01doing this because gamers are gullible as fuck. And to be honest, if I was EA, I would just squeeze

05:07every buck from you as much as I can. And I'm not ashamed to admit that.

05:12The next topic is all about Ubisoft. Ah, Ubisoft. I can never get bored with this company. Because

05:20apparently Ubisoft admits Assassin's Creed's Shadow story didn't land as they hoped. So its final update

05:27is trying to fix it. Apparently, some story elements didn't resonate with the community. So they're using

05:35that feedback to kind of fix it. I don't even know where to begin with this particular news. But I

05:41should say, you know, kinda, kinda sneakily, maybe because the story actually sucks ass. Maybe because

05:48you have a black man in feudal Japan doing god knows all kinds of stupid shit. And then you're like,

05:55you know, it kinda didn't resonate with the community. If you didn't know that this isn't

06:00going to resonate with the community from the get go, there is something horribly wrong with you guys.

06:05And it shows. If you check their stock price, they're basically in the shit. But let's not be

06:11that negative, okay? At least they are admitting that parts of the story didn't resonate. And it's

06:17better than pretending everything was perfect. But then again, if you wrap shit in crap paper,

06:23it's still going to be shit. And it's still going to sting to high heavens. Perhaps next time they'll be

06:29smart and make a Japanese game about a Japanese samurai. Instead of doing whatever the fuck they

06:35thought is going to be a good idea. But you know what's funny? Whenever I hear developers describing

06:41a post-launch update as the quote, real ending, everyone should have their alarm bells go off.

06:48And it's actually rather simple. You paid for the full game. And if a significant portion of the

06:54audience felt the ending or whatever in the game wasn't satisfying, adding two more hours later

07:00doesn't necessarily solve the underlying issue. It just creates the impression that the launch version

07:06was incomplete. And a good ending isn't just a final mission. It's the payoff of everything that

07:11came before it. And it can go both ways. I mean, just remember Mass Effect 3 and that ending.

07:16I always tell to my friends that you should play that game up until 15 minutes before the game actually

07:23ends and you're good to go. But if you push those 15 minutes further,

07:27you're not going to have a very good time. Let me tell you that. Also, if Ubisoft thinks that fixing

07:33this story is going to make the game better, newsflash guys, it doesn't work like that.

07:39Assassin's Creed Shadows has numerous problems, from story lacking urgency and open world bloat. And then

07:46we have identity crisis between stealth and action because Naoe is built around stealth while Yasuke is

07:53built around combat. And you don't want to play a Yasuke bulldozer because you never played any

08:00Assassin's Creed game like a bulldozer. Then, of course, you had weak antagonist development. And

08:06obviously, the modern day storyline still remains underwhelming. It's safe to say they still haven't

08:12recovered from offing Desmond Miles. And that's actually the sad part because if you knew Desmond Miles is

08:18not going to be a thing anymore and you didn't have any contingency to kind of push the story in

08:24different direction, one must wonder how dumb you are because leaving the story as is or muddling

08:30through doesn't make any sense whatsoever as far as I'm concerned. Oddly enough, when it comes to

08:36Shadows, the problem with it isn't the story or graphics or combat or protagonists or whatever.

08:42The problem is that it's not bold enough. You finally have one of the most requested settings

08:49in franchise history coming to life. Yet much of the game still follows the familiar Assassin's

08:54Creed open world formula. Instead of feeling like a complete reinvention, it often feels like an

09:01iteration. I sincerely thought they're going to take the experiences from Valhalla, which was again

09:06bloated as fuck, make it a bit more compressed, and then sprinkle it with proper story and obviously

09:13proper protagonists and main characters. But instead we got Valhalla bloat, shitty main characters,

09:21dubious combat, and a story that's just fucking big meh. And since they are confirming now that it

09:29didn't land properly, you could even say the story was shit. Because why would you fix something that was

09:36okay initially? It makes no sense. If you're fixing it, it means it's bad. What they should have done

09:41with this particular game is just forget it exists. Don't talk about it. Acknowledge that you fucked up

09:48and move onward. Because again, like I said before, nothing will fix this no matter what you do.

09:55Take this experience as a learning lesson, a very painful learning lesson, and move onward.

10:03Make something more exciting. Make something that actually has common sense in it. Instead,

10:09whatever the fuck that was, what you did with Assassin's Creed Shadows. And who knows, maybe,

10:14maybe next time, stuff will land a bit better. But unless Ubisoft is hell-bent to push their

10:20bullshit forward, well, you know, it is what it is. There's nothing we can do about it.

10:24And the final news of this recap is all about CDPR. CDPR's co-CEO hopes Witcher 4 wins back players

10:32after heartbreaking Cyberpunk 2077 launch. I actually remember when I first played Cyberpunk 2077,

10:39or rather when I finished it. And even though I didn't have lots of bugs like other people had,

10:45there was this omnipresent feeling that the game was underbaked. A lot. And that being said,

10:52I think Nowakowski is being more realistic than a lot of executives tend to be. They could have said

10:57something like, we've fixed Cyberpunk 2077, players love it now, redemption complete. Which,

11:04from a certain point of view, you could say that's true, especially when Phantom Liberty was released.

11:10However, instead, he acknowledges something many fans still feel. Trust, once broken,

11:16doesn't automatically come back. And if you guys remember, the game was so buggy it was removed

11:21from PlayStation Store. They offered refunds and CDPR went from being one of the most beloved studios in

11:28gaming to a cautionary tale almost overnight. I mean, I was the one who pre-ordered Cyberpunk 2077,

11:36which is something I rarely do. And when I saw what happened with the game, it kind of made me

11:42rethink my future actions in a sense that should I pre-order Witcher 4 or Cyberpunk 2 when it finally

11:50gets announced, which means you will have the opportunity to pre-order the damn thing. And

11:56basically, even though the game is genuinely very good today, the pre-order element is something that

12:03many people will question first and then maybe buy on day one. But some people won't even buy on day

12:11one. And that's not irrational. Because once you break trust, it really is earned really slowly.

12:19Also, one thing about Phantom Liberty. That expansion showed CDPR could still deliver the kind of quality

12:25storytelling, world building and RPG design we expect from them. And if you play the game,

12:31they weren't just fixing mistakes. They were actually proving they could still make great games.

12:36And to be honest, they don't really need to prove that. We already know what they're capable of.

12:41But the problem here is delivering something that's properly planned and consistent and not

12:48having a situation where you definitely see that certain systems weren't developed till the end.

12:54Now, however, The Witcher 4 isn't going to be just another sequel. For many people,

12:59it will probably answer one question, which is, did CDPR learn from Cyberpunk's launch?

13:05But here lies the problem. Not only Witcher 4 needs to be revolutionary, at least some people think

13:11like that, but it needs to launch polished. If The Witcher 4 launches in excellent technical

13:17condition across all platforms, that's probably worth more to CDPR than any marketing campaign they could

13:24run. Basically, you just need to play the game, see that everything works, see that all the systems

13:30are properly fleshed out, and you basically won. However, if it launches broken again, the damage

13:36would be far worse than Cyberpunk, because people would view it as a proof that nothing was learned.

13:40And to be honest, I don't think that we are going to see this, especially because they said they're not

13:46going to make the same mistake, which was basically launching the game on the all-gen consoles. I think

13:53that was a big issue, if not the biggest issue of them all. And when I was talking about that

13:58it needs

13:58to be revolutionary, if you take Witcher 3, for example, as a starting point, a benchmark for Witcher 4,

14:06there are a lot of things that need to be addressed. Some of them I talked about in my video,

14:11titled things that I would like to see in The Witcher 4. I mean, I adore Witcher 3, I played

14:17it

14:1710 times already, but I can still acknowledge there were issues that really didn't resonate

14:22well when you look at the game as a single package. Also, when you look at the interview,

14:28the most encouraging part of it wasn't the redemption talk. It was the part where Nowakowski

14:33said they don't want to become a studio releasing a major game every year. The industry is full of

14:39examples where aggressive release schedules hurt quality. And I think everyone knows which studio

14:45is doing that. Ubisoft. Because if you're trying to become an annual content machine,

14:51that would be a mistake. And a colossal one, to be honest with you. Things need to bake,

14:58things need to sort of mature, you need to see the proper feedback, what people are telling you,

15:04and that two, maybe three year break between the releases is actually what you need. Otherwise,

15:09you are just trapped in your own echo chamber thinking that everything that you do is going

15:15to be amazing. I mean, sure, you're going to have couple of these lucky releases where everything is

15:20kind of going to feel amazing. But ultimately, complacency is always going to hit you no matter what,

15:27if you are not looking at a big picture. If I'm being honest, my concern isn't The Witcher 4 itself.

15:34It's that CDPR now has The Witcher 4, Cyberpunk 2, Witcher Remake, and other Witcher projects

15:41reportedly in development. The studio is much larger than it was during The Witcher 3 era,

15:46but managing multiple massive RPG projects simultaneously is going to be difficult. For example,

15:52scope creep, communication issues, and maybe deadline pressure could exactly be the problems that

15:58might mess up with their projects, which basically contributed to Cyberpunk's troubled launch.

16:05Overall, however, I think Nowakowski's comments are a good sign because they show humility rather than

16:10victory lap PR. CDPR has largely redeemed Cyberpunk 2077 as a game, and whether they're fully redeemed

16:18themselves as a company depends on what happens when The Witcher 4 launches. You know, people don't

16:24really care about redemption arcs. They care about the next release. And if The Witcher 4 ships polished

16:30and lives up to expectations, a lot of people will consider the lesson learned. And if it doesn't,

16:36the Cyberpunk launch will become the defining story of CDPR rather than a temporary setback. And as far

16:42as I'm concerned, I wish CDPR the very best, because I see the potential they have. It would be such

16:49a

16:49shame that something bad happens with The Witcher 4, and I definitely hope everything is going to be

16:55okay. And that's basically it when it comes to the news that I covered this week. Thanks very much for

17:00watching, and as always, I encourage you to leave comments. I read all of them and I'm very happy to

17:04interact there with you guys. And if you enjoyed this content, consider liking it and subscribing for

17:09more discussions like this. And that's it from me, until the next one.

The Cseekly Recap #21 - EA's shenanigans, Ubisoft fixing what can't be fixed, CDPR keeps the hope

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