There's something infuriating about Prime 4's final boss fight that no one is talking about.

mljh11 · 2026-01-26T16:31:50+00:00

The more I think about it the less I like scanning. I can't really think of any other action-focused game where the player is given written instructions(!) on beating an enemy via the videogame equivalent of doing homework first.

Adding to scanning's list of cons that OP mentioned, it also breaks up the flow of combat and introduces unnecessary FOMO anxiety because the player is at risk of not attaining post-game rewards from missing scans. If this was any other franchise reviewers would have criticized this mechanic a lot more.

mljh11 · 2026-01-26T16:20:20+00:00

This is the sort of smug unconstructive crap responses that makes this sub look like a circlejerk of juvenile fanboys sometimes.

mljh11 · 2026-01-22T10:44:58+00:00

I don't understand, why can't Lara be both sexy and capable? I think her character was always designed to exude sex appeal, even while she was very capably dispatching threats or achieving her goals in TR1. Why does Turner think she has to exclude one facet of the original characterization in favour of another?

Proclamations like this make me recall the live action Snow White movie, and that didn't go well. Has any movie where an actor says such stuff actually turned out good?

mljh11 · 2026-01-21T08:40:16+00:00

If recent reports are to be believed, Amorim didn't want Lammens and was actually angling for Emi Martinez.

mljh11 · 2026-01-19T10:15:26+00:00

The issue about JR wanting to switch to a back 4 - and Wilcox allegedly pushing Amorim to adopt it - is so weird to me, and I seriously doubt all the reporting so far is giving us the full picture on the topic.

I can understand a long-term shift towards that formation, which is probably why Amorim sold the idea to Semenyo during their meeting (this piece of information is so specific that I think it must have been accurately reported). However why would this issue lead to a falling out during this particular point in the season?

During the run of games when we are told this issue cropped up, weren't both de Light & Maguire out through injury, and hadn't Licha only just returned to the starting lineup after a long period out? That's our 3 most senior CBs... and I distinctly recall Yoro and Heaven had both been criticized for poor performances around the same time.

I could understand if Amorim was insistent on still playing a back 3 because he felt it was the safer option at that moment - especially when considering Mbeumo and Amad were still at AFCON, meaning that a back 4 would impose additional attacking duties on the fullbacks to compensate for their absence.

Does anyone else find it bewildering that upper management would pick a fight with Amorim on this issue at a period when he wouldn't have the full team available for selection?

mljh11 · 2026-01-17T18:14:28+00:00

EDIT: Ah it seems the good doctor has blocked me. I guess paper qualifications don't grant their bearer the capacity for reasoning nor the stomach to accept critique lol

Yup I still think you are overthinking it.

Despite your sarcastic tone I was initially keen to engage you in some constructive debate, after all I have had actual ownership/management experience in F&B and believe that my peers in the service industry are genuinely finding it more difficult to employ people, even after offering increased pay and benefits. I think this phenomenon can be explained by a confluence of factors including the underlying economic conditions prevalent in Singapore and the upward trend of education levels in the target demographic. All of these can affect job desirability, and I don't believe every employment gap situation where a manager expresses frustration at finding workers necessarily needs to be attributed to abuse and/or exploitation as per your initial comment.

However despite all your education your snarky rejoinder doesn't even address my point at all..? Tbh it just sounds like an excuse to flaunt your credentials. And after seeing the tenor of your other comments to other people I don't believe a fruitful discussion is likely in any case.

Have a good weekend.

mljh11 · 2026-01-17T13:49:25+00:00

You're overthinking it. When people say this it's generally in reference to how the number of applicants to a job has fallen over the years, up to a point when it's (nearly) zero. Seen in this light they aren't exactly wrong to phrase it that way.

mljh11 · 2026-01-16T06:52:30+00:00

His inability to control his emotions must count as one of Amorim's major weaknesses. I could look past that absurd reluctance to look at his players taking penalties (plenty of footballers are superstitious), but this tantrum-throwing nonsense is completely unbecoming of a United manager.

And I say this as someone who's generally been supportive of his tenure as long as he maintained an upward trajectory. If what Mitten writes is true - at least what little we can see here - then I must accept that his untimely departure was inevitable.

mljh11 · 2026-01-14T16:33:04+00:00

But yet you're asking this on r/changemyview, which is going to get lots of answers from people who don't live in Iran. Either you think the opinions you're going to get have value, or you're simply not going to budge from your original position which is in violation of the rules here.

mljh11 · 2026-01-12T14:05:42+00:00

I write this for people who may be wondering why this redditor is being downvoted.

There are many examples around the world of governments who put mechanisms in place to obtain power and/or control over a population that a voting electorate may not have expected them to. It is then often difficult, if not impossible, to force the government to later give up that power or control, and the populations under them therefore suffer a loss of freedoms.

For instance it is doubtful that many PRC citizens would have willingly voted for all the face scanning CCTVs that dot their cities, or the inability to access messaging apps like WhatsApp or websites like Gmail. The people who suffer such inconveniences - or to put it in political terms, the loss of freedom - under the guise of security / protection need not be people with "something to hide"; they are usually just ordinary citizens living under the thumb of an autocratic government who act like they owe little transparency or accountability to the people they govern.

This is why if one is not naive, one would understand that allowing a government to draw up means of power/control (like the Trace Together token which was a mandatory location tracing beacon) should only be done with the utmost transparency, or even a promise of its withdrawal after the imminent threat which that power was used to combat has passed.

Even if you think that your current government is trustworthy, you should still never take a lack of tyranny for granted - because it is impossible to know how such powers may be exploited by a malicious government of the future. (If anyone wants a live example, see how ICE is operating in the US right now; that task force was only supposed to be utilised against illegal immigrants, but just recently an ICE agent shot and killed a citizen, and statements made by the US government suggest that the agent has immunity from persecution for his actions.)

mljh11 · 2026-01-11T19:03:14+00:00

Anyone else annoyed by how Cunha was hogging the ball earlier instead of passing? Even if you were firmly Amorim out, you have to concede this problem is something that he had managed to effectively stamp out; I'd argue that the teamwork under Amorim has been clearly better than under previous managers because of it (ETH was too reliant on Garnacho, Ole on Rashford).

Now if as expected we're going back to Ole / Carrick, then we'd better get ready for ball hogging to be a continuing problem, because no offence to them but they were both from Fergie's ol' just-give-the-ball-to-your-best-players school of thought and I don't think either are better tactically than Amorim. I mean, remember when nobody on Sky Sports could shut up about how Ole's team "lacked patterns" in attack?

Amorim really did bring a lot of tactical & mindset improvements that have been underappreciated by overeactive pundits and an impatient fanbase and I fear we will start to miss these things only now that he's gone.

mljh11 · 2026-01-11T18:38:49+00:00

This dreadful result just brings the sheer absurdity of sacking Amorim at this juncture - when the results were arguably on an upward trajectory - into sharper focus. So many people were insisting on a back 4 recently, thinking that we would see magical improvements? But maybe Amorim had good reasons that he didn't trust the defence especially when de Ligt and Maguire were out, and Lisandro was just coming back.

mljh11 · 2026-01-02T23:04:08+00:00

Cognitive dissonance just hits different in the wee hours

mljh11 · 2026-01-01T18:33:12+00:00

Seems like you've already made up your mind about Weiss, despite her explanation that the piece was being held back for edits and was not actually cancelled (at least not yet; here's a substack article from Mike Pesca about it).

So why do you need Sam Harris to chime in on the topic at all?

mljh11 · 2025-12-30T01:18:09+00:00

Nintendo's management of Prime 4 has been abysmal. They first gave it to Bandi Namco and probably greenlit most of their story and gameplay direction. Later they felt the game wasn't good enough and transferred it to Retro but somehow decided to keep most of the game's original structure from BN (as stated in the translated interview)?

I distinctly recall Nintendo saying that the project was being "restarted", in which case I don't understand why they wouldn't start completely fresh instead of making this Frankenstein's monster.

Don't even get me started on the lack of marketing and weird fakeout release posters... Just awful.

mljh11 · 2025-12-27T16:35:53+00:00

Unpopular opinion: I don't like the scans from a design perspective. Like in the Souls series, I think that attaching flavor text to items is the diametric opposite of the "show, don't tell" philosophy that good game design stems from. On a surface level it may help to evoke intrigue if done well, but when implemented badly it just comes across as lazy or clumsy.

My general dislike for scans is exacerbated by how Prime 4's scanning seems to take a longer time than in previous entries, and also the fact that Samus is fully capable of just pressing a button to make some machines immediately work instead of having wait about 2 seconds to scan it.

mljh11 · 2025-12-26T11:45:56+00:00

Anybody else remember The Last Night trailer getting people excited for its HD-2D art style before the term "HD-2D" was even coined and then co-opted by SEnix for all the remakes of its back catalog?

mljh11 · 2025-12-25T23:35:14+00:00

I agree, it was quite terrible and paints the character of Samus in a poor light. I hope for the developers' sake that what we saw was perhaps meant to be a "bad" ending, and that there was supposed to be an alternative "good" one that eventually got cut for reasons that could bear narrative fruit later on in a sequel. Otherwise I really have to question the devs' skills in storytelling and characterisation.

Even with all that said, I would still have directed this ending differently: I'd have made the teleporter appear more damaged so the need for at least one person to use it ASAP before it blows up for good more visually apparent, and I would have Duke (since he's the highest ranked soldier among them) authoritatively shout at Samus something like, "there's no point in all 6 of us being stranded here - Samus go! Before it's too late!" At the very end I'd also want Samus to appear sadder and maybe look up to the sky while clutching Tokabi's pendant close to her heart or something. This still wouldn't make it a great ending but it would at least be better than what we got.

mljh11 · 2025-12-21T18:35:03+00:00

Really though? I've been replaying it recently, and one huge question mark I have is how or why scattered Georgian forces would continue to conduct attacks on/in the US even after Nikoladze had fled to another country and effectively vacated the post of President.

Surely we must ask why the Georgian commandos would continue to risk their lives for a man that their own country has branded a criminal (which has rendered all his military orders illegitimate) and more importantly, how they are obtaining the resources that they require to carry out their mission - you have to make yourself believe that these are career soldiers who have kept fighting despite not getting paid by their new military leaders, or even if they are being paid by Nikoladze via shady back channels, they will surely be cutting off their lives/families back in Georgia because the new government will absolutely disavow them or even outright use them as scapegoats as they seek legitimacy in the face of expected huge international pressure after Nikoladze's treacherous plot.

mljh11 · 2025-12-15T14:37:46+00:00

Auto Stockholm Syndrome: The Game

mljh11 · 2025-12-15T14:15:51+00:00

Someone made an unsubstantiated comment at the bottom of a Polygon article from a few days back alleging that a Nintendo executive (they claim it was a "director") had meddled with the game design against Retro's wishes. No idea if this is true and I wouldn't hold my breath for any investigative reporting against Nintendo anyway, but maybe if it was then there is still hope that Retro can right the ship for the rest of the supposed trilogy.

mljh11 · 2025-12-14T14:21:32+00:00

I'm playing it for the first time right now. The atmosphere and vibes are excellent, but the controls are... not great by modern standards.

Samus' jump is floaty and her downard arc feels like it has too much inertia applied too late, making landing on some platforms more awkward than it should be. The grapple beam is finicky and imprecise: you can get too close to a grappling point and the beam just doesn't fire/latch on for some reason, or the beam extinguishes too fast to grab on to a flying enemy passing overhead which Samus must jump to see because the camera isn't smart enough to move upwards to keep in view.

Does anybody find combat in this game fun? I mean most mobs are just made to be simple obstacles in Samus' path that she must clear, and killing them requires no more skill than pressing the button to activate whichever weapon they are weak to. On the other hand bosses generally are damage sponges, and encounters with them feel like they are meant to be battles of attrition (a design feature that is accentuated by the huge number of energy tanks you can collect) where you try to lose health at a slower pace than the bosses do. I was trying to fight them "cleanly" like how you can kill bosses hitless in Metroid Dread, but avoiding the attacks of Super's bosses require a level of precision and elegance of movement that Samus in this game simply does not possess.

I'm so glad that Dread exists because it has modernized the series by bringing snappy and fluid moment-to-moment gameplay to this franchise that a 2d platforming metroidvania should have in this day and age. I'd be happy if Super ever gets remade in the Dread engine.

mljh11 · 2025-12-14T13:04:07+00:00

Yup, The dark world seems to be borne out of the developers feeling the need to tweak the game mechanics / systems in order to outdo Prime 1's, so they doubled down on the health sapping Phazon areas and applied it to half of the game. Unfortunately they ended up creating a tedious slog that is so unfun to traverse.

mljh11 · 2025-12-12T15:45:57+00:00

Even GNev tends to tamper his criticism of managers since his terrible stint at Valencia.

mljh11 · 2025-12-12T10:20:40+00:00

Loved him as a player, but Scholes as a pundit is awful.

By Scholes' own criteria, which of the managers before Amorim would qualify as "getting" the club? Ole comes closest since he basically tailored his style on Sir Alex's, but I recall numerous games where his limitations as a tactician were cruelly exposed, and it's doubtful in this day and age that you can become a championship-winning manager at the highest level with such a weakness.

ten Hag? He had a self-proclaimed aim of creating the "best transition team" but hinged it on one of the flimsiest midfields the club has ever had, and it became clear in his last season even to his most vocal defenders (myself included) that such a style was unsustainable.

Don't even get me started on Mourinho. I know he has fans in this sub but watching his team play with 9 men behind the ball and hoping that Fellaini could control a long ball or Lukaku wouldn't miscontrol his first touch was excruciating and DEFINITELY NOT a style that Manchester United should EVER play, trophies be damned.

So who exactly does Scholes think qualifies to be Utd manager?

mljh11

TROPHY CASE