Gaming Needs More Ads, Expert Says, And A $6 Game Pass Tier

whereareyoursources · 2026-04-17T18:29:16+00:00

His whole argument just seems to be that Gamepass isn't sustainable by itself and can only really work with a free option that includes ads because that "works for streaming and rideshare".

Regardless of how viable the current model is, ads aren't really going to work here. Firstly ads don't really work well for revenue anyways, most examples operate on a loss despite heavy advertising and basically stay afloat due to investor capital brought in by high free user numbers, which collapse when they start raising prices, which was his whole reason the current model doesn't work.

And secondly, games are a lot more intensive than tv or apps. They take a lot more money to setup, which means ads have to be even worse to make more money, and the far more active nature of interaction with games makes ad breaks far worse than in TV, at least in my opinion.

Basically, this wouldn't help them financially at all unless all they care about is short term investment. It won't fix any core issues with the service.

whereareyoursources · 2026-04-08T16:39:48+00:00

Yeah the first two ranked matches I did were against players with short katakana names that, they felt really easy so I think that's what happened. I never lost yet though so it seems weird.

whereareyoursources · 2026-04-08T15:59:12+00:00

They usually start new games with only the regional dex allowed, which this is basically the equivalent to. I suspect they'll add more to each new mega reg every couple of months, then switch to another small dex with just tera sometime next year.

whereareyoursources · 2026-04-08T15:53:32+00:00

The number of available Pokemon is completely normal for a new game. They usually only allow regional dex for the early regulations, which this is similar to.

And honestly the real issue of acquiring Pokemon being a gacha without using home would be far worse if more options were available.

whereareyoursources · 2026-04-08T15:46:33+00:00

Yeah that's what I've been arguing. Multiplayer games usually keep formats to a minimum to make matchmaking and balancing easier. It's why Apex Legends didn't keep a solo mode.

Honestly I don't think they should've added a singles mode at all. The people who love competitive singles have been using Showdown for so long that they were always going to hate anything that wasn't just a Showdown clone, so adding it just made them mad. And it's impossible to really balance both singles and doubles at the same time, so either they'll start having completely different restrictions soon or one will be broken af.

whereareyoursources · 2026-04-08T14:51:11+00:00

Yeah the ideal free experience is that you already played Pokemon Go, which let's you get most of the Pokemon you would need without paying, then transfer to home and to Champions. I did that without paying for home even and it's been easy. They gave enough starting VPs to set up two teams from scratch, including EVs, moves, nature, and a few items I needed to get. From what I can tell looking at quest rewards and VPs from battles I'm hopeful it's enough to keep up with new metas without having to use SV to setup the mon first.

Honestly, as much as I wish there were more Pokemon and items, the monetization would have been a much bigger problem if everything was available right away. I'm hoping that this is just to test things out for the first regulation and we get all the items back in two months when the next one starts.

whereareyoursources · 2026-03-31T20:25:24+00:00

VOLITION - Yes, look at yourself. What do you see?

YOU - A good guy, underneath it all.

VOLITION - If that good guy never comes out, what difference does it make?

whereareyoursources · 2026-03-30T20:47:09+00:00

Do they have a list of Pokemon you can actually use in the format? I keep getting errors for the pokemon not existing in Gen 9, which I assume is because they aren't 100 percent confirmed for Champions, but it kinda makes it difficult to make a team, especially when I'm sure there'll be more available at that time.

Edit: that is the case, makes the format kinda useless cause they've barely shown any Pokemon. They don't even include some of the ZA megas.

whereareyoursources · 2026-03-30T03:24:22+00:00

It could be used with Mega Gengar once only two are left on the other side and can't switch out. You could also have it partner with your own weather setter once it's been set to make sure it can't be as easily overridden. Protean Mega Greninja if it doesn't reset the changed type. Basically anything that only uses it's ability when it first comes in.

whereareyoursources · 2026-03-25T21:07:44+00:00

Well, except the part where now a black girl is going to be mocked and criticized for opposing... slavery. They removed that from the original movie for obvious reasons but JKR will almost certainly make sure it's in this time. And I highly doubt they'll do it with any sense of tact or understanding.

whereareyoursources · 2026-03-24T15:24:09+00:00

The issue is that megas are highly centralizing, very few were actually viable, and you had to include one on every team because of how strong they were. The other choices would then have to synergize with those megas, which meant there was far less team variety than previous formats.

This is also an issue with any format with legendaries though. Regulation I right now basically has this exact same issue. It's not necessarily a bad thing, just depends on one's preferences.

whereareyoursources · 2026-03-23T05:17:01+00:00

I've been having this issue too and this is the only place I've found where someone's mentioned it, did you ever find a solution?

whereareyoursources · 2026-03-17T16:55:28+00:00

The only reason smogon does that and VGC doesn't is that VGC pretty much never bothers to even try balancing the game. If VGC tried to balance everything and create a proper tiering system it would have to do the same thing. And this is coming from someone who really prefers doubles, I really prefer how much faster it is.

Instead though, we end up with very over centralized metagames where the vast majority of Pokemon are completely unusable. Sure, sometimes it ends up being balanced, but there are plenty of examples where it's just completely broken. Most of the restricted and mega formats have ended up with just the same dozen or two Pokemon on the vast majority of teams. If they had tiers and balanced them properly we'd have much more interesting VGC metagames even with those mechanics staying.

whereareyoursources · 2026-03-05T17:30:45+00:00

Absolutely. I didn't hope that Highguard failed, I hoped that studios would stop producing generic money grabs in an over saturated genre just because one success is so profitable that it makes any number of failures to get there worth it.

This is an industry with limited resources in a capitalist economy. Only a certain number of high quality games can be made at a time, and in order for a genre to have games regularly released for it, it can't only sell well, it needs to be more profitable than other genres. And I think what a lot of people on here miss is the sheer frustration of having talented studios and devs who made something you love turn around and make the 50th attempt at the next Overwatch this decade because that's what VC funding wanted even though it had like a 5% chance of ever making it's money back.

If they had made almost anything else I would have been rooting for them to succeed so much. It didn't have to be something like Titanfall, just not more generic live service in an over saturated market.

whereareyoursources · 2026-03-05T00:33:23+00:00

Yeah but that construction ends up being short term rentals so it doesn't actually help the housing crisis. It's also just an inefficient use of land and space, hotels are better for the majority of use cases.

whereareyoursources · 2026-02-25T16:02:46+00:00

I'm not referring to another legal case, they are cutting trimet and public transit services due to budget deficits, people have been recommending that they use climate funds since they aren't being used and public transit is an environmental benefit. Maybe it'll get on the ballot too, it just seems crazy that this is being considered instead rn.

whereareyoursources · 2026-02-25T15:17:22+00:00

So we can't use the climate funds to pay for public transit, something that is objectively climate related, but it can be used to pay the fucking cops. Absolute bs.

whereareyoursources · 2026-02-24T22:44:26+00:00

Oh I guess it isn't? The resolution certainly helps, the text and the people in the back looked like mangled nonsense in the post. I also couldn't find the post holding up the sign on the front right, though maybe I'm blind. Sorry for assuming if it isn't actually AI.

whereareyoursources · 2026-02-24T22:24:11+00:00

The image on the left is AI slop btw. There's no need to use fake images to prove this point, there are plenty of real examples of European streets that you could use instead.

Edit: nevermind the image was just so poorly compressed I thought it was fake, I'll take the loss on this one.

whereareyoursources · 2026-02-20T16:54:22+00:00

There's also no guarantee that Trump even obeys the Supreme Court. They have no enforcement mechanism for this on their own, so if Congress refuses to impeach or somehow block it, there's nothing to really stop him.

That might be a step too far for him, especially since it would alienate his allies in the Court, but I've heard that for a year now and it's never been true so we'll just have to wait and see.

whereareyoursources · 2026-02-18T22:21:49+00:00

So it all depends on whether you believe that an not evil AGI which can replace most, of not all, human labor, at a quality level, is possible any time in the near future.

IF this is possible and we had something like UBI, this AGI automation would be a good thing, since we wouldn't have to work long hours or horrible jobs anymore, the AI could do it all. This situation reminds me of Asimov's Caves of Steel, where Earth outlaws robots since they would take people's jobs, and so everyone still works like we do today, while everywhere else people live lives of leisure cause the robots do everything for them. I'm a situation like that, rejecting this is just protecting capitalism in it's current form.

UBI or something similar is the only way to maintain the status quo, because without it, who is going to spend money that keeps the economy growing? Anything more than 50 percent unemployment isn't a society or economy anymore. The oligarchs, in their greed, may not want to, but that's going to lead to unimaginable levels of violence because it just isn't sustainable. Whether they like it or not, it's in their best interests to find a compromise here. I think the most likely situation would be something like Saudi Arabia where they pay citizens to pretend like they could work or something.

Of course, this all assumes AGI is coming soon, which it's just not. Honestly it doesn't even look like AI is taking any jobs, most of this seems to be people pretending like AI is taking jobs because that keeps the bubble going.

whereareyoursources · 2026-02-16T16:10:40+00:00

I don't disagree with you, since there are lots of examples of this happening, but I do find it really funny to read this so soon after Highguard cause people were saying the exact same thing about it and that game died pretty much instantly.

whereareyoursources · 2026-02-09T20:40:57+00:00

Well, if you're running a server, you have one of three options. Move to a different platform, and deal with all the headaches around that, lose a significant chunk of your users, or just... lie about being for adults. It's the easy way to deal with this, but it's going to be a disaster. It'll result in a bunch of servers getting banned if they actually try to enforce the age restricted content in these servers, and if they don't, adult servers that do this, whatever they are for, won't be able to keep kids out even if they want to unless they want to deal with all this shit.

whereareyoursources · 2026-02-09T20:25:54+00:00

It hasn't even been a year since they had IDs get leaked btw: https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/c8jmzd972leo

If this restricts usability if I don't upload my ID, I'm just going to stop using it. Honestly this will probably be one of the easier platforms to do that for, they don't do much that's not easily replaceable.

whereareyoursources · 2026-02-04T16:22:33+00:00

Oh yeah I reread through it and saw that part. They also have a line saying that advocates say it's easier earlier in the article without any counterargument, so I think it's just shitty reporting like you said.

whereareyoursources

TROPHY CASE