Very disappointed with Linus and his whole perspective in this situation. He has consistently chosen to prioritize the business, and specifically the need for high volumes of content, over everything else. Likely part of that is to cover the enormous expense of building out Labs, but what is the point of that investment if the company culture behind it does not actually care about quality testing standards?
Setting aside "trust me bro" and the data accuracy problems, everything about the Billet Labs story is bad for LTT and Linus specifically. His constant and sole focus on the relatively minor cost is obnoxious, but it also reveals what is really motivating his decisions. The only good things I can say about his leadership instincts are that he seems to defer (sometimes) to his wife's better judgement, and on a similar note has finally given over the CEO duties to an actual adult, but now I wonder if it's too late for any of that to matter.
I have unsubscribed and won't be watching any LMG videos until I hear things have improved, but even then I'm not sure I'll ever enjoy seeing Linus himself in a video again.
Like, is the Billet Labs issue supposed to be sabotage or something? He's shitting on it right from the beginning, uses the wrong card, installs it poorly, then refuses to retest because...it'll cost him...like...$500?
It's like if I was reviewing a screwdriver, decided to use nails because I couldn't find any screws, held the thing upside down, then bitched about how shitty it was. And when it's pointed out that my review isn't fair, refuse to retest because a box of screws is $8 at Home Depot and the screwdriver probably sucks anyway. And on top of that, just sell the screwdriver to someone else instead of giving it back.
Does LMG have investments in a competitor or something? It is so willfully irresponsible that I almost want to claim conspiracy because I can't believe that a company would make so many poor decisions by mistake. What is going on over there where a $500 reshoot that would ensure a fair and balanced review of the product is such an nonnegotiable prospect?
I don't think anyone intended to cause problems, but at some point enough incompetence that is allowed to continue becomes the same thing, at least in my book. Having a system where it's that easy to just lose some other company's property and then, even worse, allow a third party to take possession is absolutely an unacceptable level of mismanagement.
What is going on over there where a $500 reshoot that would ensure a fair and balanced review of the product is such an nonnegotiable prospect?
It's all about the money. LMG is prioritizing speed and quantity over quality or even just basic professionalism.
And it's prioritizing short-term views over long-term stability. Sure, rushing the review gets you views now, but if companies realize that you're not going to give their product a fair shake, they'll stop sending you products. Then to review things, you'll need to buy them yourself, further cutting into your profits. If Billet Labs ever makes another product, they're not going to send LTT a review sample because of this whole shitshow. Other startups are now going to be hesitant to send LTT review products because 1. They may not get a fair review, and 2. They may not get their review product back.
LTT has been an entertainment channel with a drop of info for a while now, their content is pretty much only suitable as background filler while eating food. Their thumbnails and titles are also unusable without extensions to decipher them (shoutout to DeArrow from Ajay Ramachandran). For the actual good tech info you to go Hardware Unboxed or the very creator of this video.
Watch the video and then decide if you are still excited about it. The one video when they announced the power supply test lab is one of the many ones called out for misinformation in this very video. With their standard of information being what is it, no data they provide should be used for any serious purchase decisions.
Can I get a TL;DR so I don’t have to watch a video when explaining this type of thing in words is much more helpful IMHO.
Edit - Also would help to have at least a mention of who created the video and their credentials to be the authority on what LTT is doing wrong. The current thumbnail reminds me of a tabloid and is a 0% click though chance.
I haven't enjoyed their main channel content for ever. Every once in a while if I'm interested in a product and have exhausted all other decently sized tech channels, I may watch their coverage but I've likely already made my mind up on the thing. I don't and wouldn't trust them for GPU, CPU or case reviews. I do generally like listening to the WAN Show, but Linus is sticking his foot in his mouth an awful lot these days. I like his vision for the lab, and I like what he ultimately wants to build with it, but I really worry they're going too fast and going to bake in a lot of problems that will haunt the platform for ever, assuming it even gets off the ground. I was already worried but this video made me even less optimistic. I only knew about some of these oversights, the extent is pretty startling.
Nobody really expects RPG's to be as big and deep as BG3, they just want a complete game that works without shitty microtransactions everywhere and always online for no reason. Plus, having interesting characters and storylines, quests that can be solved in more than one way, and gameplay that's actually formed by taking player feedback and listening to it is what people reacted well to, among other things. Baldur's Gate 3 doesn't even have Denuvo!
If there's one thing that I hope competitors learn from Larian and BG3, it's that respecting your players and giving them what they want leads to success. Similar to Elden Ring and from software, like that video mentioned. Now compare BG3 to Diablo 4 and Immortal, or the upcoming Starfield and you'll see why people love it. It's not about specs or scope, it's about designing a game to be actually FUN.
It's not about specs or scope, it's about designing a game to be actually FUN.
This is the key point that these publishers and studios are trying to avoid.
How much of most AAA budgets are spent on designing microtransaction psychologically manipulative money sinks (dark designs)?
How much of most AAA budgets are spent on creating addiction in the player-base so that they keep playing the game (and spending money)?
How much of most AAA budgets are spent on bullshit DLC (not actual new content)?
How much of most AAA budgets are spent on bullshit to satisfy shareholders?
How much of most AAA budgets are spent on shit the devs don't want, but executives do?
How much of most AAA budgets are spent on bullshit padding for marketing purposes?
How much of most AAA budgets are spent on bullshit DRM?
And keep in mind, by budgets here, I mean both the dollar amount AND time spent by devs that could be spent elsewhere (which is part of the dollar amount since salaries, but I wanted to make it clear that time spent is also important).
Some of the absolute best games in the industry have literally none of that, and people still want to play and buy them years after release because gasp they're actually fun, but these publishers and devs don't want to compare to those, because they WANT the industry to be a bunch of "GAAS" bullshit that's basically a vacuum pushed into people's wallets, cause hey, if it worked for Candy Crush....
The tl;dr (or tldw) is that it's generally close to the performance of a 6800 XT, but the 6800 XT often outperformed it. It's slightly better than the 4070 in many titles with no RT/DLSS. With RT, the 4070 pulls ahead slightly.
Honestly, I mostly don't agree with the term "Early Access", if you're charging money for it, it's released. If people are paying to play it and it's in an incomplete, buggy state, then they're not only beta testing and co-developing a title, they're PAYING to do so. They're paying to work, which is even worse than working for free.
I don't know many, if any games that are really worth doing this for (with exceptions like Larian Studios and Baldur's Gate 3 and the Divinity Original Sin series) because most games honestly shouldn't exist. There are way too many games and way too few people to play them. It's similar to Movies, TV, and Music. Most of the creative media out there should not exist and have no customer base or interest.
They're not made so people can enjoy them, they're made because of the creators' desire to make them. It leads to the atrocious workplace conditions and exploitative labor the entertainment industry at large has, and why it's so difficult to unionize or get fair wages, hours, or treatment. Even with the actually good games, there's way too many for people to actually finish in their lifetime. Now add the mediocre and bad games, and it's exponentially more impossible.
Jesus Christ. I don’t watch tech YouTube anymore, I just come back when I need to buy a pc part or something. Back when I did, Linus seemed like a guy with integrity, I guess I was wrong.
It first started with buying stock or w/e in that laptop company and stating that he personally won’t review their or anyone else’s laptops. But it didn’t matter, even back then. You and your wife are sole owners of media outlet that would review those laptops. You gotta pull out of that part or not invest.
And now all of the things Steve said. Cross brand promotions, not giving a fuck about their tests accuracy, constant errors.
But to me the most egregious thing is always Linus reaction. Condescending, hostile, with superiority starting with “uh, eh guuuuuuuyyyys, I can’t….” When he thinks of any arguments followed by doubling down either by “I’m experienced” or “it costs ME money to be accurate”. Like, bitch I don’t give a fuck, it’s your job to give accurate, trustworthy information. And Luke just sits there like a Linuses bitch he is.
And the waterblock cooler example is so infuriating. He tested a prototype, on a card that the makers said they don’t know if it would work, and shat on it. Would he use i don’t care know, cooler made for am4 board on intel whatever their socket name is? (One that doesn’t have adapters or something)
He either was always like that but didn’t have enough clout to act like it or money really changes a man. Guy is no longer the “buddy fellow tech nerd guy” he still would like ppl to see him as. But his fanboys won’t see the truth and it will always stay like this
To summarize the actual tweets/comments/etc that these videos (there are multiple) are panicking about.
Smaller studios aren't going to be able to replicate the scale and complexity of BG3. So people shouldn't be using BG3 as the bar to compare future titles/RPGs from other studios going forward. Larian is comparable in size (or even larger) to Bethesda when they released Skyrim, and no one has been able to compete directly with Skyrim either.
Not all games and RPGs need to be as complex and long as BG3. Expecting open-ended, 100 hour-long RPGs for every future game/RPG isn't realistic. Not all games require that scope, it's rare to get such a budget for this type of game, and even if you did, most companies won't be able to replicate the game in a meaningful way. Just like how companies other than Rockstar would struggle to replicate the scale of games like GTA and RDR.
There, I've summarized multiple 20 min videos. Just without all the hand-waving and drama.
Nice. I remember the insane graphics this game provided when I finally got my 3dfx Voodoo2 running properly back in 1998. Looking forward to a modern overhaul.
The Video Game History Foundation conducted a study that showed that 87% of video games are commercially unavailable and therefore in danger from a preservationist point of view. To summarize, they want allowances built into copyright law to provide the same level of preservation and accessibility that other media, like books and movies, enjoy. The Completionist recently did a video on it with members of the foundation that talk about it: www.youtube.com/watch?v=UyhsZE6QIJ4
Nerrel also has a good video that touches on how emulation is a gray area with court case rulings that contradict on another: youtu.be/yj9Gk84jRiE
Amazing news! I didn't even know about this lost Shantae game! I ve still got a NDS but i would prefer to have it on Steam, hoping for that PC release :P
Me neither, but thought it was a really cool idea to revive a canceled game. Especially since they're also releasing a physical cartridge for it as well!
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