#Ea is evil

[vavuska]

We all know that EA's new The Sims 4 EP called “Lovestruck” is just like…. A teen rated ripoff of “Wicked Whims” by TURBODRIVER and the rest is like… Stuff from “The Sims: Hot Date” days of yore ported into TS4.

But it's important to notice that ALREADY EXIST a teen rated version of “Wicked Whims” called “Wonderful Whims”, which includes the turn on/off system. There is also already a dating app mod called “SimDa” Dating App by @littlemssam . So this is stuff that has already been done for a looong time.

Here I explain EA legal conditions related to mod and cc

Update - 21 July 2024: here some cc and mods that does exactly what this EP does!

HOW TO EFFECTIVELY BOYCOTT EA: [X]

[trutown-the-bard]

EA KILLS AGAIN.

[madame-helen]

They are the true evil within 💀

[miyku]

[phantomsies]

my last time speaking on this bc I’m back to my smut and stupid shit afterwards (cause yk this is my safe space 🤪😜🫶🏾👍🏾) , but I’m genuinely scared, not just for this presidency but my local leadership too. Hence why I always make such an emphasis on it. I live in a small town and it’s very much class/racially divided. The sheriff (a white woman btw but a woman nonetheless) has been actively trying to harass and run everyone from my side of town. She pretty much wrote off this area as a bunch of drug addicts and says ‘she hopes we all just kill each other’. (My family has never done, sold or even been around drugs and yet her dumbass cops are convinced bc we’re black with nice vehicles, that we must sell). She’s also pushing for the gentrification of our area so all of her rich cohorts can come and tear down our houses and build a suburbia. Just the other day, a cop made me move my vehicle from in front of a store I park at all the time bc im disabled and even the closest parking spot is far on this leg and he did it just to be an asshole. I can’t even cry abt this presidency yet bc I’m now worried that my local leaders are going to make our lives hell. Not to mention, they voted no on abortions and gender affirming care as well. I hate it here so fucking bad.

[alisadraws]

I'm going to start unfollowing artist who have latched to datv romances, sorry but I'm tired of seeing blocked tags in my timeline. I'll be back when you start doing other art, maybe.

[variouspolltournaments]

Propaganda

Catherine Foundling: No Propaganda Submitted

Setsuna Higashi: Grew up under a highly controlling ruler, and encountering the world of the Precure challenged everything she believed in. Nearly sacrifices herself for the villains in desperation before she accepts that it doesn’t need to be that way, and becomes a precure in the process. Takes a while to accept that her friends trust that she isn’t a villain anymore as well

[lazari-returns]

For Lazari

How… intresting it appears I have found a world without my influence… well I might as well introduce my self too you… I am tesl a an entity similar to your father… yet the complete opposite to be honest.

- @red-documents-redo

He mis pronounced it on purpose.

Much like almost every other Lazari reboot, she still has no idea who her father is.

[labotor11]

Remora d'Amaronis ✦ Satyr ✦ Charlatan ✦ Great Old One Warlock (Beholder Patron)

A fluffy-eared woman who revels in theatrics, Remora left her former life and responsibilities behind upon encountering her enigmatic patron – a whimsically cheerful Beholder with an insatiable appetite for magical relics. Her days are spent assuming the role of a scholarly wizard, worming herself into unsuspecting adventuring parties in pursuit of her patron's coveted treasures. It's only after the group achieves its quest that she drops her facade, gleefully skipping away with their hard-earned spoils.

don't mind me just showing off ;_; somehow the pink eldritch blast took the longest to figure out

[lucy-the-demon]

When other Sims esc life simulators come out and the Sims franchise dies and the community fades onto obscurity

The only thing I'm gonna miss is pasnerv..

[timothylawrence]

love to see people who very obviously havent spoken to wyll nor done any of his quests hate on him. like wdym he "gets what he deserves for getting in a relationship with mizora for more power". please finish act 2 and then start shit talking him at least.

[vavuska]

Seems that EA is now allegedly accused of a mayor privacy violation, having used tracking tools on The Sims FreePlay app to secretly gather and transmit players’ personal information to Facebook for advertising purposes. This data potentially includes unique Facebook IDs, which can be used to match players’ in-game activities to their individual Facebook profiles. Attorneys suspect that these potential data-sharing practices may violate a federal privacy law and are now gathering players to take action.

So, there are at least two class action against EA, because it seems to collect data from players using the Meta Pixel software to harness data from players and sell it to the Meta company, who owns Instagram, Facebook and other social networks.

It would be interesting to learn if this allegations are true and how this would be seen in the eyes of GDPR, European Regulation 679/2016, which allows the processing of personal data only with consent given by the data subjects and also in the context of (online) games.

Consent in the context of the GDPR must be understood as an unambiguous indication of an informed and freely given choice by the data subject, relating to specific processing activities. The burden of proof that these criteria are fulfilled falls upon the controller (i.e., the game developer).

Google Play list the privacy condition of EA for its games, including The Sims Freeplay. Basically EA claims to use players data only to give them "better game experience", which seems vague but not less legit. The only less transparent thing I noticed is that the instructions to opt out of targeted marketing of in-game ads are in English and not in Italian: downloading the game, players allows EA to share their account information with third-party partners to customize advertising experience, which is basically all app developers do, but it's weird that the instruction to opt out doesn't have been translated at all!

This is not the first time EA is accused of, well, unethical commercial practice, since EA has been sentenced to pay fines by Austrian (2023) and Belgian (2018) civil court, because their FIFA loot boxes violated local gambling laws.

Moreover, it's important to notice that in January 2023, the European Parliament adopted a report calling for harmonized EU rules to achieve better player protection in the online video game sector.

The Parliament called for greater transparency from developers about in-game purchases: player should be aware of the type of content before starting to play and during the game. Also, players should be informed on the probabilities in loot box mechanisms, including information in plain language about what algorithms are devised to achieve.

The Parliament further stressed that the proposed legislation should assess whether an obligation to disable in-game payments and loot boxes mechanisms by default or a ban on paid loot boxes should be proposed to protect minors, avoid the fragmentation of the single market and ensure that consumers benefit from the same level of protection, no matter of their place of residence.

The Parliament highlighted problematic practices, including exploiting cognitive biases and vulnerabilities of consumers through deceptive design and marketing, using layers of virtual currencies to mask/distort real-world monetary costs, and targeting loot boxes and manipulative practices towards minors.

[boss-poss]

My take on the whole HD2 psn account scandal is that it sucks and it should have been expected but I really want to highlight just how far under the bus sony is throwing the devs with this:

-Announcement came out yesterday, meaning that the brunt of the (assuredly) expected blowback occurs over a weekend when most of the players don't have anything better to do and the news has reached most of them. Arrowhead takes the heat and eventually anger simmers down when monday rolls around and people get back to work and such. No skin off sony's back.

-Arrowhead community managers are already known to be blunt and dismissive compared to other games making them, and arrowhead by extension, seem the easy target as they deal with complaints. AH says they're already chasing sony about related issues but the chance of the big S giving anything more than an empty promise (if even that) is remote.

-HD2 has a large community, and as with any game playerbase, it's filled with reactionary idiots and trolls. The principle of the thing (giving sony your leash), not to mention the hassle or regional issues that could come with creating a psn account, is enough to whip people into a frenzy. There was no way this was expected to go over well.

-The requirement for a psn account was always noted but was waived for a couple of months, more than enough time for people to get invested and buy premium currency, not to mention the game becoming a landmark title among a sea of trash. That's more than enough time to forget a stipulation like that. Can't have people refunding to show their displeasure!

-A warbond was announced right before the psn mandate so whether that was to try and cushion the blow or just unfortunate timing or a mandate from higher up it makes AH look like they prioritize selling you stuff over player enjoyment, adding fuel to the fire.

-A lack of polish in certain areas of the game and rampant balance issues that cause players and the devs to butt heads have been ongoing issues since launch. Clearly, AH is having a time keeping their vision and player enjoyment balanced which has already created a fairly deep divide. The psn requirement is pretty much taking a hammer to a widening crack and will (whether intentionally or not) bring more heat towards the developers.

-PSN is famously bad at security and ultimately pointless off of their consoles, with numerous huge data breaches and accounts offering little more to players than a way for you to give your information so sony can sell it. That seems to me to be the main motive here, alongside cementing the notion of HD2 as a playstation exclusive (sorry xbox players but I don't think you'll be getting this game anytime soon). A live service game that isn't squeezing every last penny out of its players at every opportunity is ultimately financially inefficient and I'm sure some sony people are kept up at night by that fact.

-The biggest fuck you I've seen though is that the game is sold on steam in countries sony doesn't support, meaning that you could have bought and played the game already and then now be barred from playing it a few months later (can't have those pesky, preemptive refunds). Also, VPNs are against sony terms of service, so yeah... any burner accounts could get you banned and be a huge hassle.

I can't conclusively say that sony set up arrowhead as the patsy while they try to collect all that sweet, succulent, valuable, personal data but I don't believe this was an accident either. Corporations are far from stupid and fortunately for them and unfortunately for consumers, a significant portion of us are pretty easy to lead by the nose to certain conclusions. They know this and many facets of business work along those lines. Outrage is profitable and brings attention, if you're not the one in the direct line of fire.

I feel bad for the devs and I doubt much will come of this besides a temporary drop in players and maybe some sort of optional linking concession if things get dire enough, but I doubt the game will fail. Arrowhead aren't the devil but they did sign on his dotted line and sometimes the cost of success is getting told you'll bending over and taking it for someone else. Seems to be the case here to me at least.

[pk-sideblog]

Also, before someone decides to argue, I am a NaruSaku and SasuLee shipper. I literally think Sasuke is queer, but that doesn't erase that some of y'all just hate women. Because there is sincerely nothing Sakura Haruno has done that she A) Hasn't shown growth and moved away from behavior wise B) That isn't nearly as close to the same level of bad that Sasuke, Itachi, Neji, Gaara, Obito, or even Naruto "Probably would have been the coolest guy" Uzumaki have done. But, people rush to defend them but cannot extend the same grace to Sakura who was just an annoying teen girl?

You don't have to like her, but some of y'all need to really reflect and realize your dislike of her is rooted in some base of misogyny and because a femme presenting woman dared to be close to your favorites; or for some that a not femme enough presenting woman dared to not kiss your power fantasy's feet. Ultimately, sexism is a disease and it's disturbing the hold it still has on the Naruto fandom.

[choccy-zefirka]

I gotta admit, I have always been curious about Minthara, and if Larian does implement the Minthara vs Halsin ultimatum, I might actually choose her to see what she's all about (provided that I am not planning on romancing Halsin during that run). I am just anxious that, because of some of Halsin's unexpectedly cruel comments about Minthara, myself and fellow Halsin might start getting hate. :') Dragon Age has taught me some harsh lessons

[pentacass]

why sol laughs when she's in pain: she trained herself to laugh to make her matron mother's frequent whippings (barely) more tolerable while aggravating her mother even further

why ves laughs when she's in pain: unhinged clown