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thedivinefish · 1 year ago

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TGIWednesday: They're just lemons!

TGIWednesday News

Seems some of my, dare I say material/sermons/life lessons, stories come from the grocery store and the LA Fitness center/gym and the other day was no exception. I needed lemons for iced tea that I make every day! In the produce section of our grocery store were 3 choices, a bag of regular lemons, organic ones (smaller bag of course) and 5 in a bag from New Zealand (Lord in heaven only knows what that cost to ship to the USA) not a single lemon, bag or tag was marked with a price. I took all 3 to two chatting managers standing about 25 feet away. It’s not our department they told me. I was like ok, we’ll it’s your store so could you help me so I can buy your products? They both gave me a blank stare and reluctantly used their little bar code units on each item and mumbled the price of each one. I turned around and walked back to where the lemon journey game began and all things being equal I got the organic ones. Just as I was ready to leave the manager of the whole store gave me a smiling hello as he sees me every day and I said, “None of your lemons are marked with prices, so you may want to address that one.” He would he assured me. What’s the moral of the story. Persist until you succeed. Try and try again. Keep going until you get the information you need, the money or even the right lemons. Never ever give up and make a little daily progress. As a result of doing that, I see your life getting better better best! RIP Jimmy Buffett ...singer-songwriter, poet, author, husband, father, grandfather, showman, mogul, billionaire Happy Birthday to all those with birthdays in September!

**ON DECK** Look for our latest MONEY audio MP3 to drop this month right around the first day of Fall. We're calling it “High Cotton” and it has over 80 clearings and a run time of 21 minutes. These clearings will support you in collapsing negative, stuck energy and uses the latest word tracks given to me by Spirit to help you rewire your mind to higher abundance frequencies that will allow your intuition to bring in more prosperous opportunities and options. We’ll even have the theme of this month’s Zoom event around High Cotton and improving your abundance for a magical Fall and a better holiday season! So stay tuned!

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~ I WILL PERSIST UNTIL I SUCCEED ~ I believe, think, know and feel that if I will just release my past, stay fully present in the moment and lean into the future everything will improve. I am ready, willing and able to persist until I succeed, turn noes into yeses and stay in a place of undeterred determination, I will reach my goals. I know, when, where, how and why to remember that life is not checkers but more like chess and I will make steady, calculated and timely moves until I succeed. I am asking in all languages and throughout all timelines and so it is. Know that if you’ll make a little daily progress that the rest of your life will be the best of your life!

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Fish Food

The Daily Bread To Feed The Fish

Hello Jimmy … I really enjoyed my appointment with you on Aug 25th. I’ve been interested in your work for several years , while enjoying the MP3’s that I purchased. That day ,I had lost power due to a storm here in Michigan, and was so glad I had enough battery power for our call. Your kind and gentle approach helped me relax, and has made a profound change in my life. I feel more confident and at ease. Totally worth it and so beneficial. I hope you and your family did ok during this latest hurricane. My brother in law in Sarasota got through it without losing power. I would hope that you did as well. The storm surge is always so scary for the coast line communities. I definitely joined in for prayers to lessen the storm. I’ll look forward to hearing your marvelous voice and pure energy again soon. All my best, Roger

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The Daily Bread To Feed The Fish

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SEPTEMBER 6TH "Today I will have the spirit of my favorite animal. I will keep open to infinite possibility to a great victory, abundance and favor that will unfold today in every aspect of my life. Here and now I will remember that my future is greater than my past and the rest of my life will improve."

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Below is list of over 35 titles in the MyBeliefWorks Clearings audio series, monthly Zoom clearing call replays and Guided Energy Processess. Find a topic that addresses your issue(s), click on the link to read more. We had a lot of help downloading & channeling these over the years & they keep getting better and we are ALWAYS working on the next one. Don’t forget… you can share these with your immediate friends and family.

Freedom from Abuse Overcoming Addiction Receiving Abundance Body Scan: Head to Toe Healing Bountiful Harvest Igniting Creative Spark Discovering Your Destiny Daily GPS Reset Releasing Dark Energies/Fears Crossroads -Decision Making Diet & Exercise Support Education & Learning Support Empowering the Empath Enthusiasm for Life Financial Windfall Gold Coin: Money in All Forms Healing Family Relationships Healing Body Disorders Joy of Money

IRS Stress & Taxes Relieving Holiday Stress Increasing Intuition Easing IRS Stress & Taxes Lucky 777 Finding Love & Romance Mental Stress Positive Money Mindset Moving Forward from Past Chronic Pain Relief Pet Healing Support Improving Sales & Success Improving Sex Improving Sleep Pro$perity Unlocked Traveling with Ease Treasure Chest Work & Career Success Weight Loss Support Restoring Youth & Vitality

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divinefishingtips · 1 year ago

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TGIWednesday: They're just lemons!

TGIWednesday News

TGIWednesday Video Download

FREE Live Appearances

Your Divine Uniqueness With host Moncef Akfir TAKING LIVE CALLERS **NEW DATE** THURSDAY SEPTEMBER 7TH 2:00PM Eastern Time Register below to access the call in details. FREE TO REGISTER HERE

Watch and listen to hundreds of Radio Show replays for FREE here in the archives from the Jimmy Mack Healing Radio show.

https://thejimmymackhealingshow.com/

Fish Food

The Daily Bread To Feed The Fish

Fish Food

The Daily Bread To Feed The Fish

Tell the Fish - 365 Daily Inspirations and Affirmations - by Jimmy Mack Own this e-book so that you can read inspiration every day!

Receive 24/7 Prayers from Jimmy

*Upon sending an email request after your purchase, you can receive a one-time sample/example of the software analysis. Most clients have had amazing results and outcomes!

You can add yourself and those living in your immediate household and yes you can include pets! Merely include everyone’s names and Jimmy will add them to his daily prayers.

You can run this monthly and stop at any time after the 30 days is up, you will have the opportunity to renew and update your list each month but are under no obligation. I believe you will experience magical transformations and make progress every day! SUBSCRIPTION AUTO-RENEWAL ($95/mo - save $5) Purchase a recurring subscription Update your prayers monthly. You can cancel or pause anytime.

Use PayPal for subscription Click here Use Stripe for subscription Click here. Could you use a private session? Are you feeling extra-crispy? If so, you can now Book Appointments... View Availability First, Then Pay 15 mins | 30 mins | 60 mins

30-Days of Prayer - $99

**Can't See The Full Email? Click Here to View Online**

?Visit our ?NEW O?nline ?TRAININ?G? CENTER

Visit now, Click Here!

The Fish Market

Buy Gift Certificates here

THZ Quantum Frequency Wand "Future medicine will be the medicine of frequencies." - Albert Einstein USE CODE: TSG10 (10% off) >> Best price, SHOP HERE

**We are NOT involved in the sales or shipping process of the 3rd party items, please contact them directly.

TGIFunny

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365dailyaffirmations · 1 year ago

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TGIWednesday: They're just lemons!

TGIWednesday News

TGIWednesday Video Download

FREE Live Appearances

Your Divine Uniqueness With host Moncef Akfir TAKING LIVE CALLERS **NEW DATE** THURSDAY SEPTEMBER 7TH 2:00PM Eastern Time Register below to access the call in details. FREE TO REGISTER HERE

Watch and listen to hundreds of Radio Show replays for FREE here in the archives from the Jimmy Mack Healing Radio show.

https://thejimmymackhealingshow.com/

Fish Food

The Daily Bread To Feed The Fish

Fish Food

The Daily Bread To Feed The Fish

Tell the Fish - 365 Daily Inspirations and Affirmations - by Jimmy Mack Own this e-book so that you can read inspiration every day!

Receive 24/7 Prayers from Jimmy

*Upon sending an email request after your purchase, you can receive a one-time sample/example of the software analysis. Most clients have had amazing results and outcomes!

You can add yourself and those living in your immediate household and yes you can include pets! Merely include everyone’s names and Jimmy will add them to his daily prayers.

You can run this monthly and stop at any time after the 30 days is up, you will have the opportunity to renew and update your list each month but are under no obligation. I believe you will experience magical transformations and make progress every day! SUBSCRIPTION AUTO-RENEWAL ($95/mo - save $5) Purchase a recurring subscription Update your prayers monthly. You can cancel or pause anytime.

30-Days of Prayer - $99

**Can't See The Full Email? Click Here to View Online**

?Visit our ?NEW O?nline ?TRAININ?G? CENTER

Visit now, Click Here!

The Fish Market

Buy Gift Certificates here

THZ Quantum Frequency Wand "Future medicine will be the medicine of frequencies." - Albert Einstein USE CODE: TSG10 (10% off) >> Best price, SHOP HERE

**We are NOT involved in the sales or shipping process of the 3rd party items, please contact them directly.

TGIFunny

Forward

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trai-all · 2 years ago

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Hard agree. I was somewhere between level 1701-1800 before I stopped playing in December 2021, came back for a couple of Archive events at some point, and then returned this October for one week of Junkenstein. I’ve been playing Overwatch since 2016. I bought one skin with cash (charity skin) and unlocked the rest just by earning levels, getting arcade wins, and getting endorsement boxes. I had about 75-80% of the cosmetics unlocked.

Since returning to try OW2… I’ve gotten to level 57 and am back up to level 5 endorsement. I’ve completed all the Junkenstein challenge modes, I alreadyhad the Endless and other Junk rewards for standard Junk (normal, hard, expert, and legendary).

I only got through to Expert on Bride of Junkenstein mode, couldn’t seem to get though legendary with randoms (though I did find a few people who knew what to do, it was hard to finagle them all together in one week).

I’ve unlocked nothing free and new that I was interested in with the exception of one gun charm. Everything else that was free was something I already had. I spent all but 30 coins buying skins back in December. I now have 80 or 90 coins. The cheapest thing I saw in the shop that I liked and wasn’t something I had cost 1000. That would take me around 20 weeks to get.

Now that Junkenstein is gone, I won’t be playing OW2 until another event comes out. 50-60 coins gives me absolutely no incentive to log in when I have other games to play that offer new experiences.

Also, the wait times aren’t good even as support when it means that the game often starts one team with missing player (usually support). In one week, I must have had 10 quick play games start that way.

Blizzard/Activision needs to get their act together and offer up PVE or bring back loot boxes (which literally earned them a billion dollars in ingame purchases in Overwatch) rather than being money grubbing. As someone who has spent hundreds of hours building cosplay, and has shelves full of OW Funko Pops, the new reward system sucks.

It is not going to keep people playing like “9 arcade wins=3 boxes” + gold cards for things like healing + player votes + endorsement boxes + loot boxes for levels + boxes giving coins for duplicates to be spent on thing you didn’t luck into opening.

Between the loss of all that AND the majority of experience though challenges being won only through eliminations AND the lack of peels with only one tank in the game, Blizzard is going to have a HUGE problem retaining players, especially support.

Funnily, I thought the big disappointment was going to be a lack of PVE at launch.

Seriously, my kid took one look at it and said “that would be like you paying me less than $1 per week for allowance, I wouldn’t be able to buy anything” (we give him $10 and, in return, he helps clean dishes). CheapAFBlizz.

(My disappointment is immeasurable, and my day is ruined)

So I downloaded Overwatch2 to see what’s new and what’s not and… welp

Keep reading

#overwatch2 #long rant #a burning pile of a shitshow #literally half a dollar for a week of my time #fuck off blizzard #blizzard activision

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butwhatifidothis · 3 years ago

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I did it! Finally fucking did it! I 100% the support log for 3H….Holy shit, that took longer than I was expecting, lol.

(Long rant, so heads up.)

I came in thinking “Oh they finally time-locked the supports, so I don’t have to have the damn cursor mocking me every time I open the menu like in Awakening and Fates, hurr hurr”. No no no no no. At least for Awakening and Fates, it was on my dumb ass for pressing the S-support and saving when I knew I shouldn’t. First off, if they wanted us to regain supports for Byleth in NG+, why the heck are supports for characters like Edelgard, Rhea, Dorothea and Lindhart locked? I don’t mean time-locked like the post-TS supports in a regular playthrough, I mean deadass “you can’t buy this, period” locked. “Oh it’s because you haven’t advanced that far in the story yet”. I can buy post-TS supports for the other characters, what makes El and Rhea exceptions?! The only thing that would be lost is that I don’t have to replay their entire route to get their S-support twice. It’s not like there’s enough differences between Bylad and Bylass to warrant the supports being locked, none of the characters specify a specific gender in their dialogue, and as far as different models go, changing models during a cutscene is coded into the game, so that should be no issue.

After going through the monastery option enough times, the hubworld is in this weird limbo state where it feels like it was made specifically for Byleth’s benefit (faculty training, recruiting party members, etc,) but the rest of the party seems to benefit from it instead (Instructions, Motivation points, etc). The Explore vs Battle options just don’t mix well, which feels like poor design choice. You can focus on auxiliary battles to raise your party’s level, but at the cost of potentially missing out on more party members. You can instead focus on the monastery to recruit party members, but at the cost of Byleth falling behind due to splitting activity points between recruiting and faculty training, and being in the monastery means less time grinding for levels. This isn’t as much of a problem in NG+, but if a game needs NG+ to lessen a design problem, then that’s more of a sign to me that the idea itself needed more ironing out.

As far as using the monastery to raise support points goes, the hubworld definitely needs a revamp. The only (good) options available are Meal Time and Choir Practice, with the latter being limited to once per week and the former making me think that the monastery must eat their own weapons to survive due to how fucking scarce food ingredients are. Getting meat and fish isn’t too big of an issue so long as you have enough money, but produce might as well be an urban legend. There were too many times where I had 60+ fish/meat, but produce was at fucking 1. I get that they wanted to be “realistic” in having seeds grow once per week, but if it’s at the cost of a gameplay element being nigh unplayable, then some more thought needs to be put into it. Sothis is a goddess of life and time, maybe her powers allow Byleth to make plants grow faster. Just something to make this section actually playable.

The final thing I wanted to talk about when it comes to the monastery is that, for some baffling reason, it is entirely possible to lock yourself out of key events like S-supports or being able to choose CF, simply by skipping to the end of the month. I’m not sure why this is a thing. It’s not like the game was designed with speedruns in mind (I mean, it is possible to beat a route in an hour, but fuck me if I ever succeeded in that), and nothing happens like a prompt popping up that you have to explore the monastery during that month or even limiting your options to just Explore (which the game has done before). This is especially weird for the quest in getting Jeralt’s ring (how to access S-supports), since Byleth is supposed to be sad in this month, so not being able to do seminars or Byleth being undeployable during auxiliary battles would make sense.

The option to choose CF is even worse though, because at least for Jeralt’s ring it’s a Red Quest that doesn’t allow you to finish exploring unless you complete it. For Edelgard, however? A dime-a-dozen quest prompt you can entirely look over and skip. No prompt by the game, no indication to talk to Edelgard, nothing. FFS, Rhea’s tea time quest was given more thought. At least her quest marker is a unique color.

(End of rant…sort of)

…So anyways, that was my experience with the game, lmao. Now you or someone else may be thinking, “nonnie, if you had this many problems completing the game, why did you bother?”, and the answer to that good question is…I’m not completely sure, lol. I know there’s more than one reason why, so bear with me here. I know part of it is due to sunk-cost fallacy (“I’m already this far into the game, I might as well fully complete it”), but I think a bigger reason is because I knew ahead of time that the routes were so similar to each other that there was little point in having a route split to begin with (except for CF, but who gives a fuck about that?). Despite all of my bitching, I do really like 3H even if I admit that it’s my least favorite FE game that I’ve played so far. I guess a part of me just wanted to like the game more despite my issues with it.

Now that I think about it, maybe the main reason was for fear of future mainline games. People are fear to like whatever part of a game that they wish, but I do think that 3H introduced some fundamental storytelling flaws that I’d rather not see repeated in the future, with me focusing on 3 in particular: 1) The Monastery, 2) Route Splits and 3) Byleth.

Aside from what I already talked about in regards to the monastery, if we are going to get another hubworld in the new FE title, have it to where it doesn’t conflict with how the rest of the story is presented. Is it better to simply tell us that the Western Church is xenophobic in an easily skippable side quest early on, or is it better to show us? Enemy Western Church NPCs going after foreign party members like Dedue or Petra more aggressively and calling them “animals” or the like, the map having Duscari NPCs locking themselves indoors for fear that the Western Church will persecute them, things of that nature. Is it better to tell us that there has been civil unrest in the Empire and the citizens revolting against Edelgard, or is it better to show us? Enemy Adrestian Civilian NPCs, assassins specifically going after Edelgard in a map, maybe one where a large farmland has been stripped bare. Things like that.

I’d rather do away with the Persona-calendar/Monastery hubworld, but if they are here to stay then they need enough content in it to keep the player engaged for 20-odd chapters, because there isn’t enough content in Garreg Mach to even hold up 12 chapters. Speaking of more content, if there’s going to be another route split in the next title, then there needs to be enough differences in the routes that actually warrants having a route split. Fates already did this well in having the route split be early in the game, along with the plot and story maps of each route being different, you could even skip to the route split moment on subsequent playthroughs, so 3H’s approach in having to play the same 12 chapters 3-4 times just felt like a massive downgrade. Playing multiple routes should feel rewarding rather than tedious, is what I’m trying to say.

Finally, and most importantly, I know that no one at IS is reading this but on the off chance that someone is - please, for the love of God, do not make another blank-slate/self insert main character like Byleth. Or at the very least, don’t have them be the focal point of the story, it’s a big reason why AM just works better than the other routes. For a game like FE, “self-insert” and “protagonist” goes as well as oil and water. Now, out of those three flaws listed, the Byleth one is what I’m hard set on. The monastery and route split flaws, my opinion might be flexible within reason, but the Byleth one…not so much, lol. If we really do get another self-insert doll for a main character, that alone is going to make the next game a hard sell for me, because seeing all the praise Byleth got (and has been getting) makes me fear that IS is going to take the wrong lesson from this and think they don’t have to put effort in making their protagonist anything resembling an actual person and their audience will still lap it up. It would be one thing if I just hated the character, but I don’t. I’m disappointed, which is even worse.

…With that said, it’s still better than whatever the heck Cap’n’Crunch is doing. Okay, rant over. For real this time.

—

I agree with a lot said here! But I do have a few disagreements, though they’re mostly my opinion than anything else lol

And this first one is probably like, extremely unpopular given how much shit I’ve seen flung at this aspect of 3H, but like… I actually really like the Monastery? Like yes, absolutely, it should have done more to not shelter the player from how bad the war is and it should change more with the world instead of being in this mostly limbo state where apparently seasons don’t real. I definitely also have those complaints, but to me, the Monastery was fine for the most part. A lot of the issues you brought up, like supports and Faculty Training and supplies for eating, weren’t a problem for me almost at all. My only real gripe is with how hard it is for Byleth to get training in Flying, Mounted and especially Heavy Armor without NG+ unlocking weapons ranks, since they don’t have access to Weekly Chores. I do believe I still managed to recruit everyone while only unlocking C in Faith on my Maddening playthrough of GD, but it certainly wasn’t easy. But I feel a lot of the problem people have with it are on subsequent playthroughs where they’re trying to do things like 100% any aspect of 3H, which yeah is gonna exacerbate the issues tenfold. Cuz like, while those three weapons ranks I mentioned are hard for Byleth to raise, on Normal mode you have unlimited auxiliary battles to help with all the other ones.

Like, I wanted to get Claude’s Dex to the max amount right? Just cuz I felt like it. And in doing that I found out just how tedious it is to get levels once a unit gets to a certain point, just cuz while Normal Mode gives you the Retreat option that lets you keep exp so you can drop a unit down on a yellow spot and get a decent boost in exp… you can do that like, twice or thrice on a story chapter. Once if it’s auxiliary (and not the freebie one). And that’s if you even have internet. And using the greenhouse to get Ailiell Pomegranates was a pain because they weren’t really guaranteed even if I used nothing but the right seed - doing that is more consistent, but not always, and I usually only got one anyway. It was annoying! But I was also doing a specific thing that’s gonna heighten the flaws in the system that I never would have noticed - didn’t even notice - unless I did that. The flaws are still there, don’t get me wrong! The Monastery definitely still needs improvement, battles still need to be a little more streamlined for future playthrough, but the flaws can seem a bit bigger than they are once you do certain things outside of a casual playthrough, know what I mean?

But, for example, when replaying 3H on hard mode and looking to recruit everyone after my no recruitment run, I didn’t come across any dilemma over “recruitment or Byleth being good, pick one.” That was the run my Byleth was usable, in fact - my first blind run that was no recruitment (save for Shamir) had my Byleth be pretty much completely useless while literally everyone else was fine. Also never came across problems with supplies for cooking (or at least not any big enough to comment on). So like, while these (and the above stuff) can certainly be problems for players trying to do everything everything in 3H, at least from my experience I just haven’t come across them. The monastery itself definitely needed a better story implementation, but yeah. I could’ve just been lucky tho lmao

I don’t mind how they implemented trying to get on CF at all tho lol. If you’ve been playing the game like it suggests you do - supporting characters and exploring the monastery there’s no reason for players to have missed getting on CF. If players wanted to ignore one of the biggest aspects of the game I don’t really feel that bad for them when they miss out on very achievable things. Plus, CF’s requirements are nothing in terms of FE’s madness when it comes to getting on a route. It may be more specific than any other route, but like I said, playing the game as the game tells you to would naturally land you in it (the only thing that might be a bit unfair is that I think if you talk with Edelgard at all that month you have to decide right then and there, and then the whole month is lost. Kinda ass).

Binding Blade, for example, requires you to do specific things that few first time players would think to do in multiple, random chapters in order for you to get the best ending. With absolutely no warning as to when these chapters happen and what to do in them. And some of these requirements are not fun lmao, I’d prefer how they did it with CF than with how they’ve handled ~secret~ stuff before personally

Pretty much agree with everything else though! While 3H is actually one of my more favored games in the series, I’ll be the first to admit that its storytelling is in dire need of improvement. Having the story and lore of the game just be spat out in lore dumps and this or that NPC just isn’t that good. Or if they are going to do that, at the very least give some visuals to go along with it! Imagine how much impactful Rhea’s story would have been if it was in a visual format, like CGs and/or a cutscene. It still would be an info dump, but at least we can see for ourselves how horrific the Red Canyon was for her! And I do not want another avatar in whatever next mainline game we get, personality or not. We’ve evolved past the need for self-inserts that all the characters Just Like lmao

But thanks for sharing your thoughts!! And sorry that it took so long for me to get to answering ;w;

#submission #anon #exqueuese me princess #but hey I found the og submission at least!! for some reason it got thrown in like the middle of my drafts?? weird lmao #but yeah overall I do think 3H could've done with some refinement for later more intensive playthroughs #and on the other hand I get why they didn't immediately think of them if that makes sense #also lol yeah the base game is infinitely more fun that whatever Cap'n'n doin' lmao

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nickcifonie · 3 years ago

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In 2021, Anyone Can Make $ Playing Video Games!

I grew up playing games like Risk, Monopoly, a little Chess... and still remember buying my first computer somewhere around 1986 solely to play a computer game on. It was an Apple IIc, and that first game was some type of Pirate Adventure. I wish I remembered the name. It wasn’t all that good, but still, I was hooked!

Since that first adventure, I’ve spent thousands of hours as well as dollars playing just about every type of digital game that has followed! PC games, Atari, Wii, mobile games... you name it, I play it! I’d always generalize the cost (to myself at least) thinking “some guys play golf 3 days a week at $100 a round... I play computer games”.

That’s my story, and I’m sticking to it! However, the story has changed...

“Pay to Play” has become “Play to Earn”!

If you would be to search terms like “crypto games”, “blockchain games”, “make money playing video games”, and others, you’d find some really incredible statements. Today, quotes like the ones below are becoming more and more common!

“I made $400 last week playing a computer game” “I just sold my RPG character for $200 profit”

“I was offered $1k for a skin for my laser rifle of doom” (I made up the “laser rifle of doom” part)

“I bred my pet thingamajig yesterday and sold the baby!” (it’s digital, for those of you wincing)

In 2021, thanks to the blockchain, there’s a growing community of gamers who are making real dollars daily, mining, fighting, shooting, jumping... all while playing the same type of mobile and PC games that you had to PAY to play just a short while ago...

...but let’s start at the beginning.

You paid $172,000 for a what!?

Yes... all the way back in 2018 a CryptoKitty named “Dragon” was sold for an incredible $172,000. (300 ETH) Don’t be too surprised, it’s justified! It’s an adorable digital image, or “NFT” of a cat, after all.

It’s a lot of money, but for NFTs and blockchain gaming, flipping a Kitty today may as well be considered the stone ages. It’s still a record, but while you can still get started collecting these digital felines for as low as a couple of dollars, big-dollar trades still happen daily.

On the flip side of mortgaging your home to buy a digital picture of a CryptoKitty, Bored Ape, or CryptoPunk, you may feel better if you begin your adventure into making crypto (it’s real money, dear!) by playing a video game where you can “make money” instead of spending it.

I’m not saying owning a CryptoKitty or any of a plethora of “Avatar NFTs” we see popping up on various exchanges isn’t one way to do it... I’m saying to me at least, as a life-long gamer I’d much prefer playing a mobile, console, or PC game to collecting pictures in a digital wallet.

So what the heck is an NFT?

I could go into a long explanation... but since this article is about gaming and not cryptocurrency, I’ll tell you an NFT is a “non-fungible token”, and leave you google it if you really want to dig in deep. I do want to share more, so I’ll ‘splain it as simple as I can for you Lucy!

A CryptoKitty, as stated above, is a type of image called an NFT. (the collection is called “CryptoKitties) It’s a digital picture of a cartoon cat. There are thousands of different ones that have different shapes, colors, expressions and traits. (kind of like a real cat, but eats less)

The difference, is only one of each design is actually a legitimate “CryptoKitty”. (or a legitimate whatever type of image it happens to be) To be clearer... each NFT is a “one of a kind”, so if you’re thinking “but can’t I just make a copy?”, nope you can’t.

I mean... you “can” make a copy of it if you really dig the design and want it on your desktop, but it would only be a copy of that particular NFT, not the real McCoy! Ok... so what makes one real, and the rest fakes? The blockchain.

Now, I’m going to be true to my word and keep my promise of not making this an article about crypto or the blockchain, so just know this: the difference between an image that is an actual NFT, and a copy of one, is there is an underlying digital code that designates the real thing.

So real in fact, that artists are creating or importing their paintings and creations to the web as NFTs, numbering them as they would a lithograph, and selling their entire collections. So if you are an art fan, check with your favorite creators... you may be surprised to find all of their “works of art” on an online marketplace!

NFTs are viewed on certain marketplace websites and digital wallets where the copies cannot be displayed, so that is how we know one is real, and the others are not! Having said that, sure, there’s more to it, but just know that there’s a 100% secure way of knowing an image is a real NFT.

In addition, there can be more than one NFT with the same identical image. However, each has a unique underlying code, so even if they look exactly the same, they are not! Look at it like the playing cards or comic books of old... there may be 1,000 created (or “minted” as it’s called in NFT land) but they will each be numbered 1 to 1,000.

And guess which is more valuable.....? I knew you’d get it!

And these NFT’s make money how?

You’re getting warmer! There are a lot of different types of games coming out these days where you can make money playing. There are RPG’s, MOBA’s, Shooters, games in first person and in third, dungeon crawls... you name it!

If you’re thinking “how did I not know this!”, I was the same until recently! I have been gaming almost daily since I stepped into Ultima Online back in 1997, and I can’t even begin to tally how many hours and/or dollars I’ve invested into gaming.

Now, our hobby pays!

After 30-something years, my wife still thinks I’m bonkers... but I got a totally different look from her a few days ago when I told her I sold my game character for well over $200. Legit. I sold two more yesterday, and another this afternoon.

Some of these only cost me $10 or $15, some much more. Some are free. I sold another NFT character last week for $1,950, and it was sold on the game’s website, not on the black market.

So not only can an NFT be a picture of an Ape, Vegetable, Duck, or Stripper on a pole (we’ll leave it at that) but it can be a character in a game, a weapon, a mount, armor, or more.

One game is giving away free pet turtles with each character. For the uneducated on “pets” in computer games, it’s not the kind you keep in a bowl in your bedroom. It’s a companion that fights with you in an online game and may shoot fire from its eyes, heal you, or similar.

Soon after being handed out for free, they’re now selling for around $60 each.

So an NFT can be an image, a video, music, a meme... or even a shirt or shoes! But we’ll leave the NFT clothing explanation to another article. ;)

Remember that rare skin you paid out the nose for a year ago in Apex? Or the L33T character you built up in Fortnite or Warcraft? If you’re no longer playing that game, it’s money under the bridge. And you don’t own the bridge!

In this new breed of blockchain games, you could have LEGALLY sold that character, skin, weapon, land, house, mount, or whatever it was when you tired of the game. For a profit. Maybe for a LARGE profit.

Yes, in the past we were able to find ways to get around the system and dump our pixels from time to time. We’d sell the account on the black market, or cut a deal with someone like a drug dealer on a Chicago Street corner. Then we’d over who went first...

“You give me the account and weapon first!” “No you give me the money first”. Sometimes the deals even went through. Others well... let’s just say half of the parties walked away happy.

I made good money when after 4 years of daily playing I sold my Ultima Online account for somewhere around $2,000, but I needed to find a trustworthy “go-between” to broker the deal. Even then, I was sweating it!

With today’s crypto games, not only do the games provide the platform to buy, sell, or trade your character and items, but it’s encouraged, and done with good old U.S dollars! I’ve made $ playing 4 or 5 different games already this week, as well as flipping (buying low and selling higher) NFT characters!

How else can I make money playing games?

The way you earn varies from game to game, but each week seems to reveal another new strategy, platform, or idea. Many are new strategies, and while some have “triple A” 3D animation and graphics, others are simpler and use basic one-dimensional graphics for the gameplay.

Some of these games are actually tied to a token on the blockchain. The game developer creates their own token, not too unlike Bitcoin or Ethereum, and it can be bought or sold on the open market as well as used in the game as currency.

Could you imagine if back in League of Legends, Guild Wars or Final Fantasy, when you were ready to move to a new game, you could sell or easily convert your gold to cash? Some of today’s blockchain games encourage it!

Not only can you now buy and sell characters and weapons, the gold in the game can be traded, bought, sold, or saved like real currency, stocks, crypto, or collectables. Never have I been as excited about PC and mobile gaming as I am today!

As an example, I am doing some work for a new game that will launch soon called Pepper Attack. Pepper Attack has its own token or coin... called MYTE. It can be used in the game as currency, but also be traded like Bitcoin. A lot of today’s blockchain games offer this same benefit.

Hi ho, hi ho, it’s off to mine I go!

Just by owning an NFT from the game, you can login on a daily basis and click “mine” earning real-value tokens passively. Your Pepper goes to work like one of the 7 Dwarves mining MYTE, and later on you can convert it to other tokens or cold, hard cash.

There's more to do in this particular game as well. Like any good RPG or MMORPG, each pepper has a unique combination or skills like attack, defense, evade, hit points, and more. As an example of the possibilities, if you have a high attack score, other characters will be able to pay you in MYTE to “train” them, raising their score as well.

In addition, these NFTs have unique physical traits, some are common and some are very rare. This game in particular have toons that look more like anime-ish elves with weapons and a stem... I have to admit the artwork is really spicey! (see what I did there?) Other games are of course totally different.

Some people will simply collect these NFTs/characters as an investment, like playing cards or comics. Others will use them in the game, and still others will do both. Either way, they can be held, or sold for a profit!

Unlike the games of the past, when you’re ready to move on you don’t walk away and lose all the $ you have spent for characters, skins, weapons, potions, and other items. When you’re done, you’ll be able to sell your character and items... possibly for a profit... maybe a lot of profit... and move on.

These are not your father’s computer games!

As we move ahead in the genre, we are seeing AAA studios coming out with big-dollar productions, like Blankos, Mist, Illuvium, Ember Sword and others. Some of these games actually let you buy the land you build on!

Did you have your own house in Ultima Online, Star Wars Galaxies, or Archeage? What if you could have used It as a shop and been paid in dollars for your wares, rented it to another player, or sold it for cold hard cash at a huge profit down the road?

In many of today’s games, not only is it common, but extremely hard to come by, and quite expensive. Not only are people paying thousands of dollars for a plot in some of the games that have land, but they’re paying it many months before the game is even released.

They do it, because in many cases they know that they can easily 2X, 10X, or even 50X their investment a short piece down the road. Seriously? Seriously... and the early bird catches the worm!

Other games with lesser budgets are more graphic-based, but have super earnings potential as well, and are just as fun to play. These include Splinterlands, (a card game like Magic!) Crypto Blades, Axie Infinity and more.

Regardless of if the new blockchain game of your choice is a RPG, MOBA, a card game or racing game... the fact that you can put some coin into your pocket playing adds a whole new element. It’s heckafun making money playing a game!

The early nerd catches the worm!

In many cases, if you can catch a game before it releases, the land, characters, weapons, and other items... in most cases all NFTs... can be grabbed at a tiny fraction of the future value.

Of course, always check out the game details and team first, and be confident it’s a good place to put your money. Not all games are made the same.

If you’re lucky enough to find out about and partake in an early sale, for example, like grabbing a character NFT or two in “Pepper Attack” before the late September launch date, you may be in for a real treat!

There are plenty of new titles coming down the pipe that look to be fun, have great communities, and offer earning opportunities. A web search will find services and websites that will keep you on your toes and alert you of upcoming blockchain game releases, marketplace opening, and more.

As we look forward, the future of gaming on the blockchain is really, really exciting! Not only are the games getting better and more fun, but they’re getting better at making the economics work more smoothly as well.

The games are not without challenges, as they need to be made to sustain themselves economically over the long haul. In addition, they need to have higher levels of security (thanks blockchain!) and of course, work without becoming “pay to win”. Thankfully, the new breed of developers have risen to the challenge!

The next time you look for a new game to add to your phone or desktop, or just want a change of pace, look to a game that pays to play! Your wallet might thank you.

Another perk, is your husband or wife will appreciate it as well! Instead of hearing “are you going to play that stupid game all night again?”, you may start to hear things like “I’ll put the kids to bed tonight sweetheart, so you can get online and play”.

One can only hope...

Author - Nick Cifonie

Nick is a lifelong gamer, who cut his teeth at the local Chicago arcade playing Tetris as a teen. Better known as Znick or Deacon Z, Nick became a Game Master in Ultima Online in 1997, ran a large multi-game guild for 15 years, and now spends his time in the “play to earn” arena. Professionally, Nick is a writer and 4-decade marketer working with the Pepper Attack team, as well as others. Nick is also a Catholic Deacon.

#nftart #nft marketplace #nftdrop #nftgallery #nftnews #nftcrypto #cryptoart #nftcommunity #nftartist #crypto #blockchain #nonfungibletokens #nft games #nft

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deadgrantaires · 1 year ago

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soooo as i worked up my courage to make a million calls this morning i also got the crushing news that my gov insurance has been ~*canceled*~ and as im trying to cope with that it goes hand in hand with now trying to rate my 20+ medications against each other and decide which ones im going to try stopping altogether bc i literally cannot afford to take them all, especially when my daily inhaler that i need to live/w0rk at all has no generic option and will ALWAYS cost me like $60/month. I have a month left to see doctors before i shut myself in and just live with all my problems forever bc all my problems need testing and all the testign costs hundreds of dollars, of which i do not have in spare cash with my measly p4ych3ck after yknow. rent and utilities and food. so thats out of the question. it also means if/when i get hospitalized again for getting ANY sickness i cannot afford the bill and will just be completely screwed. which is only BETTER because ofc nobody is taking covid seriously anymore despite still being in the middle of an unimporving pandemic. but no eveyrones ability to go to the grocery store without wearing a mask IS more important than my life, who am i kidding

but anyways im just. completley fucked and i guess its good i was always kinda prepared to be completely fucked and its really just a waiting game to see how much all my meds are gonna cost me and budgeting from there. but may have to say farewell to the dreams of seeing a therapist again since idk if i can afford it as a monthly/weekly expense with everything else. added to the fact that i have to keep switching therapists bc they "feel they arent helping me as much as they should" like yeah absolutley bud, the stress and frustration and panic of having to spend my obsolete energy shopping around for another therapist who takes my insurance and isnt meshing at all with me is surely BETTER than u spending the time to try and understand how to help me, as is literally. your job. so i think ill just give up on that!

like as if it wasnt bad enough that im jsut Not Eating half the time anyway bc i dont have any time or energy or will to make myself food. the ammount of times ive just gone to bed without eating bc i looked in the fridge 20 times and eveyrthing i thought about made me feel sick or exhausted me so i said fuck it and went to bed hungry. so like at this point saving money by not going to therapy would at least MAYBE give me wiggle room to buy more food i can actually eat. not that i can. leave the house at all any more since im so burnt out that even thinking about leaving the house on the weekend to get groceries literally saps away my strength all week trying to work up to it. and i STILL cant go out on the weekend. so i literally. dont know howim supposed to survive this other than just. see how it plays out and hope for the best or like. that i kill myself good enough that i just die and dont end up in the hospital with bills about it 🙄

#suicide m ///////#disordered eating m //////

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awhilesince · 4 years ago

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Monday, 13 September 1824

7 50/60

1 35/60

Breakfast at 9 – Mrs Mackenzie came and sat with me 1/2 hour she is in doubt whether to stay here or not seemed to ask my advice and be inclined to stay if her father is pretty well I would not speak decidedly but was evidently in favour of her staying she has had much unhappiness married against her choice from convenience a man thirty years older than herself who made her unhappy tho she always tried to do her duty her daughter cleverer than she is and rather the upper hand it seems Mrs Mackenzies being so communicative struck me – Mrs Mackenzie gave me a ticket given to her by Mr Brande that will always admit me to the Jardin des Plantes – Miss Mackenzie, too, came in and sat with me a few minutes –

on this account, it was 12 before I had read over my 3 letters finished last night, and had no time to make any extract from them – they must be in the general post office Rue Jean Jacques Rousseau before 2, or could not be taken in today, and then there being no English post tomorrow, must have waited till Wednesday my letter to my aunt (begun on Wednesday, 3 pages, the ends, and under the turn-down) giving an account of my journey, my being very comfortable here, of Madame de B–‘s (Boyve’s) being handsome – of our sitting in the Tuileries gardens, and of the Champs Elysées, and of the fête at St. Germain gave an account of the shawls worn and their prices – excerpt this –

My letter to M– (Mariana) on the same subjects only giving a more regular account, rather journalwise, and adding short answers to M–‘s (Mariana’s) last letter – Merely said on the subject of Mrs Henry Stephen B–‘s (Belcombe’s) management of the going-to-York business, I did not understand it, but she and Steph had my best wishes – Entreated M– (Mariana) not to pother herself about Petergate money matters – Mrs B– (Belcombe) knew what she was, and would take care of the girls – I did not think Dr. B–‘s (Belcombe’s) practice could now be sold for much – he was not likely to be well enough to introduce anyone – but Steph’s name and kinship would serve him – affectionate to π (Mariana) kind about Miss Pattison but much more the former to Miss Maclean very much so to her tho anybody might see it perhaps she herself may muse over a line or two in the first page – Told both my aunt and M– (Mariana) and Miss Maclean of my having Madame Galvani, that she alone was worth coming to Paris for; and all my time – would be taken up in endeavoring to gain the French language –

my letter to Miss Maclean begun at Shibden Wednesday 18 August, resumed and finished yesterday – foolscap sheet 3 pages, long ends, and under the turn-down – very small and short – Treated of my journey being comfortable here, the Tuileries Champs Elysées fête of St. Germain etc etc very briefly – all the rest bavardage amical –

went out at 12 1/4 (took Cordingley with me) direct to the general post-office in the rue Jean Jacques Rousseau – put in my letter to my aunt (Shibden) 22 sols. and to ‘Mrs Lawton Lawton hall etc 22 sols. and to ‘Miss Maclean of Coll Tobermory North Britain (Ecosse)’ 28 sols because letters here are paid for according to their weight, and I had sealed this letter and wafered the 2 others – wafers always used here because lighter than sealing wax, and for the same reason the French choose thin writing paper – saw the man who took my letters, and those of the crowd standing round the wire grating of his bureau, weigh each letter in a pair of scales hanging close to him –

from the Post Office walked thro’ the halle au bles, and the church of St. Eustache for Cordingley to see them – then along the rue de Grenelle direct thro’ the palais of the Louvre to the Pont des Arts – crossed the Pont neuf, and returned over the Pont royal thro’ the Tuileries gardens and got home at 2 –

the porter gave me a letter charged only 5 sols (brought by some private conveyance –sent thro’ our ambassador) from Miss Maclean (Tobermory) – Oh! that I had had it before I went out –

on coming upstairs to Mrs Mackenzie to ask what they were going to do, found them going to the Louvre to try to see the exhibition there of the new (modern) pictures – done by living and I believe all French artists; for the King’s death was hourly expected, and all public places would be closed for 6 weeks – his majesty had taken leave of his family, and received extreme unction – the garde du corps to be changed – Monsieur the next King will go to St. Cloud, and there will be no fête there – what a stupid place, says everyone with one accord, will Paris be! Away we went to the Louvre – shut already, sans aucune exception, till further orders – Sauntered in the Tuileries gardens –

Got back at 4 – read my letter from Miss Maclean – very kind and affectionate – I know not any of her letters that has given me more pleasure – perhaps the receiving it here, might add to my delight – I shall keep and read it by way of stimulus for see the end of the crossing Breadalbane thought me ‘almost quite handsome at Esholt’ and Miss Maclean evidently likes and admires me visited by an old admirer ‘you once said you thought I would have been happier in the married state no no you are mistaken unless with a mind and he art like your own the married state would have been misery to me far happier as I am ‘ – see the bottom of page one – and the last end for the following after desiring continuation of the extracts from my journal ‘you know not how I was tormented at home about you Miss Bs (Belcombe’s) manner of speaking half did this she only poor soul jested but very little difference of manner in you would have made me dislike you at that time I believe it was mostly occasioned by a little tincture of jealousy at home’..... thought I to myself this lets me into much the Belcombes are no advantage to me I now really dislike Anne not tho on her own hearts account for she is good but for the disagreeableness of her manners I would not for worlds be thought a friend of her poor soul she too was jealous I guess the style in which she would mention me – Breadalbane by thinking me almost handsome at Esholt has perhaps got over her prejudices and and I may conciliate her perhaps entirely with a little care – she must have some idea of Miss Macls (Maclean’s) partiality for on the arrival of my letter she threw it into the room with ‘there be happy’ see the first page at the bottom of the second is the more than permission to write Sibbella Mrs Grieves would have been most happy to see me –

Miss Maclean inclosed me a letter from her niece Miss Hobart – I should fancy her a nice good hearted fashionable girl the superior cleverness I have somehow expected would not strike one from her letter she is in first rate nobility society evidently – I am to burn the letter at the end of the envelope is the following ‘I certainly do spend a good deal on dress but if I had all to buy I think I could manage very well surely a single woman can live very comfortably on nine hundred a year which I under stand I have at my disposal uncle Sullivan told me before I went to Paris as worth eighteen thousand pounds and rather more’ –

At the 4th page of Miss Hobart’s letter (dated ‘13th’ August)

‘Now as to your dear picture, your friend whose name I forgot is perfectly welcome to it now, I will with pleasure lend it for a short time, but you may tell her she is much more welcome now than at the horrible time you mention, for if I survive you, I shall not then spare it.’ –

Reading and musing over my letter till near 5, then came the Irish girl and another young person from Madame Romatier to try on my new gown – not only my stays, but my petticoats ill made (true enough) – French stays would cost 30 francs and upwards – such calico as my petticoats are made of, so strong and good, not to be got in Paris – the best I could get would be thinner and finer 5 francs an aune an aune wide tho’ this of mine was 1/3 in England this and 1/2 wide – it would take 3 or 4 aunes for a petticoat; and the making (at Madame R–‘s (Romatier’s)) would be 5 francs –

Dinner at 6 – A Mr Moore who would speak nothing but desperately bad French all the while made his debut at table – to stay for how long, I know not – does not dance now in England – does not like the present style of dancing in England except at Almacks – rather a would-be-prig – nothing great, methinks, ab origine and at home – Madame de B– (Boyve) would teach me Ecarté, and after a game or 2, set me down to play with Mr Moore (not for money) and I played with him (the better of the 2 I think) for surely about an hour –

In the evening had Monsieur Bellevue; a Swiss count, a handsome young man; Monsieur Denappe, and Monsieur St. Auban – after playing at finding out words and talking to 1 or other (have not sat next Madame de B– (Boyve) these 3 or 4 nights)

came up to bed (leaving the party) at 11 35/60 making memoranda of my accounts – read and mused over Miss Maclean’s letter – all much kept me up so late – Very fine day – the sun out – very warm – Fahrenheit 69° at 12 3/4 – [E two dots O two dots, marking discharge from venereal complaint] –

reference number: SH:7/ML/E/8/0042, SH:7/ML/E/8/0043

#annelistercodebreaker #annelister #missmaclean #misshobart #mariana #augustseptember1824

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theurbansquared · 3 years ago

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Guide To Avoiding A Loser Brokerage

by James Hill | theurbansquared

Brokers can be bastards and some even get better at it while other brokers are legitimate life-changing business Sherpas

A broker is supposed to guide you through a career in real estate much like a coach or pimp - offering protection and how to understand a complicated system better and direct it to revenue without getting your neck broke while playing the game. I created and ran the most well-reviewed, largest full-service brokerage in the fastest-growing city in America. This gave me access to nearly ever broker and their broker's pay structure and innovations. I also got the agent's version of my same broker buddies brokerages when they eventually joined my brokerage; hovering anywhere from 20–60 agents. Trending insider chatter has blame going to real estate brokers of decades past (and current) and how they’ve managed their agents - - letting unsupervised agents with no experience run wild on the streets practicing on the public wearing out Realtor love and making a need for all the Mountain Dew-made Zillow-y options that currently exist.

Brokers are out of touch more than ever with today’s current media load, having to understand and use social media platforms for their advertising (since the private Town & Country affair that real estate once was is forever over and the landscape is a bit more like a half Juggalo, half programmer flea market).

Let’s dive into some situations and tenets that most agents don’t consider when choosing a brokerage.

Sales Volume

This is a bit of negotiating psychology and due diligence. Simply ask how much sales they (the brokerage) did last year and how much they’re currently at. If they don’t know these numbers they’re goons. If they don’t give it, you guessed it - they’re hiding something; their lack of revenue. I’ve hired and fired hundreds of agents and in interviews so few ask this question but it’s one of the most important questions you can ask as an agent and you need the information. An agent that doesn’t ask this has already given a tell that they’re not a top producer since they’re not interested in the production capacity of the team they may join. No bueno. Creep the brokerage as well obvi -- reviews, FB & IG engagement and current running ads, and make sure the company Christmas Party isn’t catered by Chic-fil-a at a Burnet Road dive bar.

Office

40% of your learning and 350% of your work will be done at the office. Those numbers will make sense 90% of the time after a few years in real estate. The rest should be on the streets - your car, properties, driving 75 mph talking and sending out docs, gorging on breath mints. Office, home, tiny homes, motorhomes have all blended into one larger conversation where work/live ethos are all in re-definition.

But, when you do need a more savvy moment in any market when people talk about borrowing or selling something that’s over $100K they don’t want to hear some bullshit too loud pedantic conversation seated right next to them at Starbucks or the local kooky coffee shop. In real estate Murphy’s Law is always in effect. The super important listing sign off that has to go well and they want to hear you pitch again before deciding? There will be someone (at this super ‘caj’ coffee house meeting) there projectile vomiting, or throwing cats, or something else tiresome or bad that takes more calls.

Speech and body language are massive parts of sales so when the entire set is thrown because a barista is running through a whole Sublime album. You want the most inviting cool office you can ever pull off at any given moment in real estate . Was that ever a question? There's a balance -- you can't afford that year one or three, but it’s called real estate for a reason. Sexy, exciting buildings is what the brochure said when I joined. Also, it’s about style not size.

If you haven’t lost business to coffee house back pressure you really haven’t failed at agency properly.

Social IQ

Social reach is the only conversation now. Many brokerages won’t make it as the lead generating aspects of the industry aren't powered by a private MLS anyone and the publicly-hated ‘Realtor’ designation have both brokers and agents guessing about tomorrow. Calendars, best practices and free shitty tips & templates are the du jour of the day for anyone trying to get an agent's eyes. You can Google and get all the ‘basic’ social media dance steps, but with everyone at the same happy hunting spot, you’re being covered up, which leaves all your new artistic efforts fruitless and also squandering winning time.

Traffic, leads and engagement are all separate areas that have to be fulfilled properly and even this is in flux with historic corporations and current start ups all on the same advertising playing field. Social reach and engagement is about going to the consumer direct and becoming their friend with soft bribes -- free food, gifts, prizes (trips, events tickets) or industry work tools. The great news is, real estate has always been mostly consumer direct - start up a convoy at the grocery store (bar, church, meetup) and you’re in the car that weekend looking for houses with a new client. While you, your brokerage and the world are figuring out their exact social media mix, you need to make sure a brokerage isn’t lost on social media since many won’t be able to stay in business in the next few short years. Your brokerage needs to have a plan and and at best some presence on social media. Plus, they should be running low-cost performative marketing ad campaigns to get a feel for what and if set user groups are responding to ads. Anyone can post on IG but people engage on IG when they become inspired. A brokerage should have some sort of inspiration and relationship tied in with the local allure of their city -- or heading that direction.

Mentoring

Much like a neurotic buyer chasing an interest rate for their home mortgage (and then never buying a house) agents too focused on commission may miss the essential career need for mentoring -- for their clients and career. I had a 5 deal minimum for my new agents before they were ever unsupervised and received more commission. I've had new agents with celeb clients in hand and celeb agents with no clients in hand. No one wants to do business with someone with absolutely has no, experience but they do it because they like you as a friend or fam. Your mentor is the person riding shotgun with you at the beginning of your career. On many levels you want to be this person since they embody the position and role. You're literally and figuratively are borrowing experience from them and they deserve to be paid for it. You always have to strengthen your brand outside of your brokerage but if you don’t have any experience your brand doesn’t have ‘strength’ you simply have a logo and a drag & drop website where you're possibly talking about yourself and love of unicorns or football shit but the big boat deals you dream about in bed aren’t gotten this way. Remember, no unicorn could ever throw a football good without a lot of practice and a good mentor.

Support

Support in a brokerage is really communication and solutions for small problems, and systems for managing bigger ones with people. Most of the annoying things in real estate happen outside of the deal - contracts, calls, emails, docs, signatures, more docs. You typically want a super admin, broker, or agent manager that you can call and they pick up the phone. It’s pretty simple. With a mentor, admin, or broker you’re going to have a n 8:30 PM question or deal that’s going down. You’ll need printer help. Real estate always happens now (this was one of the main mantras in my office). Printing, prequal, weekend support and constant post dinner shenanigans.

Training

Meet Frank Miller, David Mamet, the Sex Pistols, Tony Robbins, Wayne Dyer, Hendrix, Tom Hopkins, The World’s Greatest Detective and Conan The Barbarian. We had a lot of different inspirations for the style and ethos of our urban brokerage. The World’s Greatest Detective is Batman. It was a moniker that became popular in the seventies. We used this example about how important due diligence and proper Fact Finding techniques are for serving and closing deals for clients. (It’s almost essential to be inquisitive in real estate esp about property/development to have success). Training is largely your sales meeting(s). Although I don’t come from a car background I’ve mentored many car guys transferring to real estate (they typically are out of the industry within 2 years and are there only for boom markets). Car guys have meetings every morning 6 days a week and they’re not at 9 or 10 am. They’re already working.

free module: The Burger King Phenomena: Why Agents Do Less Working For Themselves Than If They Were Working At Burger King

Many brokerages have no training/meeting schedule (monthly doesn’t count -- that’s a meet and greet company pump and catch up meeting). If a brokerage doesn’t have training on a schedule then there is no training. You’ll possibly be thrown a 3-ring binder, or given some PDF’s, or links to old bizarre training videos or a soup sandwich of all three and sometimes even a bill for the training. An agent’s training/meetings and their attendance to them are the difference between an agent making it or not when you’re 24 months or less in the role as an agent especially in the fast turbulent waters of the current 2021 market where brokerage and agent purpose and pay are under attack. From my experience, new agents that hide die.

Media

Having a background as a creative director I’m aware with great detail of agency and brokerage media needs, the cost and time they extract, and the corresponding revenue they’re projected to bring back. Brokerages are looking for their purpose now as simply having a brokerage doesn’t bring in leads like it used to. This is fitting, since the digital dumbass brokers that that didn’t understand the importance of ‘the web’ rickshawed our MLS data and sold the agent/broker centric real estate system for their benefit while current agents are left with an empty greasy enough to-go box to curl up with. Brokerages were never media houses or ad agencies but now that consumer level graphic programs and website builders are ubiquitous and any agent after being licensed for 10 days can drag & drop a website up in 4 hours and make it look like a brokerage that’s been around for years. I know I’m going wide on the subject here but stay with me because this is the crux of where the industry and consumer are renegotiating roles.

A brokerage’s value proposition has changed drastically with the telecommute revolution that was only sped and strengthened by Covid. Also, generational knowledge base gaps in technology are more apparent than ever with technology as younger agents can often be more media savvy than their broker. The market is flooded with self appointed companies or gurus that are taking on the role of the classic ad agency (Mad Men) or media production house. Also beware of real estate coaches with little or no real estate experience offering to guide you in social media. Okay media can’t be used in apex situations (such as the luxury listings you’re after) and doesn’t draw apex listings. Beware of tapioca room temperature tips and general lists from companies that can appear informative but are really boilerplate low grade data to get your attention to ultimately upsell you on a paid service.

As an agent or a brokerage, consumer level graphic and website building programs can be a death ticket to your business as your competitors have the same tools and are cranking out the same type of style of messaging you are now. Now agents, principals, admins and in art class creating flyers. This has been done since the nineties as the valleys of dead agent careers is full of 2-day Microsoft Word (or any of their shitty office offerings) seshes to produce nasty flyers and presentations. These programs are fun and making bad flyers absolutely work related - the kind of work you don’t want’ related to your business because it’s adult crayon coloring. Activity does not equal production. Staying busy doing the wrong things doesn’t make money in real estate. Rather than spending agent winning time staying in the wrong lanes for way too long, get with a team or brokerage that are providing the most exceptional visual media you can find in your market. It used to be cool 2 years ago, now it’s the only thing that matters. Visual content.

free module: Better Agent Media, Less Agent Money (media tips and hacks).

Access

This is access to your broker. Brokers with families are typically less available. Your best bet as an agent is looking for a grinder broker who sleeps on the couch at their office. This person doesn’t have kids to build into so they’ll build into your career and you’ll get the most out of these brokers. Beware of cheesedick, apathetic, rich boy, bored brokers not around and more concerned with projects like a shitty vanity wine brand that their wife’s forced them to launch since she’s not living her best life anymore as an agent.

Style

What kind of style is your brokerage? Is there an opportunity to bring more style sophistication to the market -- standout in a smaller market? Or, are you in an ultra stylish market currently and butt hurt because you already have a little story about how you’re going to keep it real and be a Dockers wearing slob for eternity? The thing about style in agency is you always need to look like you can list a million dollar house. Oh, is it really that simple? Yes it is. You complicated it. Clients always care about their housing a little bit more than they care about your real estate career. They don’t have time to figure out why you’re wearing shoe styles from 7 years ago. Don’t make it hard for people to do business with you. If you’re ugly, even better. It can be a massive advantage. Everyone on the planet loves when someone who doesn’t fall into our general current ‘attractive’ spectrum doesn’t give af, looks great and puts themselves together in a stylish way that the viewer can understand (can I get away with Teen Wolf?). A great side benefit from this step in the right direction is it’s a great way to make someone who is conventionally attractive insecure.

You want to be in the same style as the people in your area but the secret is you need to lead that style pack if you can -- you always lead and dress apex. Years ago this was anecdotal but after over 100K hours in real estate a good suite (tailored) saved my ass and literally got me business. I listed the largest house in east Austin because of a suit (and got a front page story on the newspaper real estate section for free because the owner saw me walking into the next door neighbor’s house).

Offices, dress, logo, email signature are all elements of you and your brokerage’s style. Style in and of itself isn’t enough to be a top producer in real estate. I’ve had stylish and even celebrity agents that didn't do zilch, but style often is a fingerprint to something more.

Picking the right elements for your agent style is an art because you have to offer something from yourself that’s unique enough as well as something familiar (a bridge to your uniqueness). I have a background as a musician and also as a merchant sailor. Fortunately those are easy convo starters. You could be a philatelist and have some challenges, but regardless it absolutely will take a year or three to develop your own angle and style towards the market as you learn it and the agent role more.

Things that look attractive and familiar puts client’s psychologies at ease. So, if skinny jeans are in you better get in them (that’s like five years old now). You’re on stage. You don’t wear what the worker people behind the camera wear. If you want to wear boring shit get on the other side of the camera. If you want less leads saddle up to a forgettable brokerage. People have hard days. They want you to put an effort into your real estate agency role. Currently it’s a fried role so you’re dealing with that too. People love to be smiled at and sold and especially from someone who smells good. It doesn't ever get old. Don’t make them beg for your charm. Be a nice charming person with a shirt that fits good, it’s a powerful combo.

Get My Damn Paper

If you’ve never seen a werewolf in daylight mess with an agent’s commission after the deal’s done and funded. Admin? Who is the damn person who does the admin? (accounts payable is the icey pro word if you like). That person that you contact to get your commission check cut? If that person is a weirdo, or there’s an unfriendly or sketchy quality to the office or admin staff, do not go forward (don’t confuse this with new people or industry jitters). Grab some free coffee, leave the smarm and jet to the next brokerage blind date.

Software

CRM is an annoying conversation. Here’s the things with CRM’s - for all the work CRMs curtail, because of their complexity and existence and the work(time) they take to interact with you need to consider how much work you’re putting into operating the CRM software verses how much time it’s saving. Many times brokerages have expensive yearly subscriptions with per agent fees for their CRM which can make the brokerage have a zealot meth thing for the ‘team’ software and promise you can’t have a career without taking a bump too. To understand CRM better before it was a name, Client Relationship Management is what analog Proximity became. Let me explain - being close to people in Church, bar, school, same building -- all give proximity. This becomes familiarity, then ease, then trust. People do business with people they trust & like. Once people disconnected physically and started using other means more contact attempts have to be made to work for or ‘prove’ worth.

Follow Up is a large component of most CRM’s and there are gobs of money for agents who follow up meticulously. Simply ask the broker what CRM they use and research it. Something to remember - unless you’re extremely busy with your career you don’t need a CRM. You can manage & database your clients & leads ‘by hand’ and strap it to the cloud with G-Suite/Google Sheets.

Brokerage Name

A small but important aside, if a brokerage have named themselves after a precious metal or a gem, or if it says elite in the name then it’s not elite. If it has the words prestige or worldwide or international it may not be any of those either. I know a handful of exceptions to this rule but this is a great dirty primer to use when choosing a brokerage that’s going to propel your career and have shrimp options at the Christmas Party.

#agent #realtor #realestateagent #broker #brokerage #newhomebuyer #coach #businesscoach #entrepreneurs #new agent #zillow

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heartofarcanum · 4 years ago

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Is VIP Choices Worth the Money?

I think I said I was going to do this after a month, but my time management is awful, so I’m doing it now. This post will be completely spoiler free for all books, VIP and otherwise. This is simply about the technicalities of Choices VIP.

Here’s my take:

General Overview: VIP offers you unlimited keys and 10 daily diamonds, as well as a plethora of VIP exclusive books.

The Negatives:

This is a very clever (and slightly manipulative) business model because all these exclusive books mean that VIP consumers are spending (at best) twice the diamonds of free-to-play players, because they’re playing twice the books. That means we run out of diamonds fast - and could potentially be convinced to buy more diamonds on top of the subscription fee.

Since you can replay books endlessly with the infinite keys, you waste a TON of diamonds right off the bat. I personally made this mistake early on by playing several older books I had yet to play (Perfect Match 1&2 and Endless Summer 1&2), while also playing the recurring books (Queen B, My Two First Loves, The Nanny Affair, The Unexpected Heiress, and Open Heart). I wasted all the diamonds I got for signing on as a VIP member very quickly, and had to stop playing Endless Summer book 2 and The Unexpected Heiress (a VIP book), as well as not actually start any of the other VIP books, because I didn’t have the diamonds to keep reading them.

The only solution to this problem is minding your diamond amounts and replaying completed books often for diamond mining. This is a problem with free-to-play Choices as well, so basically - even though it’s advertised specifically as being a solution to the diamond problem - VIP doesn’t actually solve the diamonds issue.

The Positives:

All that being said, I do have a nice steady flow of diamonds and am definitely paying less for this game than I have in the past. I was one of those people who bought diamonds if there was a book I particularly liked. Now that I’m getting 11 a day (10 from VIP, 1 from the daily check in), I always have hundreds of diamonds.

I spend them on books, but I make them back very fast. I had 60 diamonds three days ago and now I have 120, just from daily check-ins, book replays, and the weekly release rewards. So yes, it is a good system if you were paying for diamonds already, and play this game often. If you really like to replay books, I would probably recommend VIP because you will make a TON of diamonds.

The VIP exclusive books are pretty great. They have all the same problems as regular choices books (limited LIs - most are 1-2 LI books, needless diamond choices, expensive outfits with crappy free options, and choices that don’t seem to mean much), but the stories are good and the characters are interesting.

The weight of your choices with the VIP books ranges. They can have more weight and a more serious impact on the story than those in free books, but typically the weighty choices cost diamonds. Think of that what you will.

So far I’ve played The Unexpected Heiress, A Very Scandalous Proposal, With Every Heartbeat, and Hot Couture. I’ve had to be strategic with my diamonds, and haven’t gotten very far on any of these books except The Unexpected Heiress because, frankly, the free to play books were more interesting to me and I was spending the diamonds on them. However, now that I’m playing through these VIP books they are good and fun. It’s personal preference, and personally I don’t know if I actually prefer any of them to the free-to-play books except maybe The Unexpected Heiress.

PB has composed new music for these books and made some new really beautiful art too, so that’s a big plus. The music for Unexpected Heiress is very 1920s and it’s a lot of fun.

Conclusion: Is this all worth the money? Ultimately, it’s up to you, and what you think your Choices experience is worth.

To me $15 a month is frankly a little ridiculous. It’s more than Netflix. I understand that Netflix has a much larger audience, but still. I most likely will stop VIP after I finish The Unexpected Heiress, because honestly that’s most of the reason I got it in the first place.

That being said, currently we’re at sort of a lull for good books and I think if you were ever going to try Choices VIP now is absolutely the time to. Without regular weekly books to spend diamonds on, you can play all the VIP books and all the old books you’ve been meaning to get to.

#vip #NO SPOILERS #Spoiler free #playchoices #choices

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unpopularly-opinionated · 4 years ago

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Destiny Ramble Pls Ignore :)

Thank fuck sunsetting has been sunset. It’s definitely the right call to make and not one I genuinely expected them to make. They made it clear their goal was still to shift the sandbox meta to new content every season, but doing so by disincentivizing players from using the weapons they want to use is not the way to go about it.

Personally, I think a better approach would be to incentivize using the new weapons. Bungie only adds like 2-3 new guns per season anyways, so why not incentivize their use by giving us like a +5% drop rate when using those guns or something akin to that? If that’s too unbalanced, then maybe kills with the seasonal weapons have a chance to drop legendary shards, prisms, or even ascendant shards. Who knows. But something like that is what I think will be a better approach to shifting the meta to new content.

The delay for Witch Queen is disappointed but expected. However, I am incredibly reluctant to buy it still. Bungie announced recently that they’re working on a huge expansion to their offices and teams, which is 110% what is needed and what I’ve been asking for for a while now, but with more team members needs to come more work, honestly. More content. More loot. More Destiny. I know they said there won’t ever be another Forsaken-sized expansion for Destiny, but they also said sunsetting was the new reality and they’ve since changed their tune on that after listening to the community.

Destiny desperately needs Forsaken-sized expansions. I don’t care how they go about making them, but they need to make them. If that means an extra delay to the Spring, I’d be willing to accept that. Whatever it takes to get things done right. Beyond Light was a bit of a letdown to be perfectly honest, and while I wasn’t there for the release of Shadowkeep, from what I’ve heard that too was a bit of a letdown. This means they’ve had two whammies since Forsaken, and how could they not? They’ve literally told us the best they would offer has come and gone, so every future expansion will feel small and unworthwhile in comparison. It sucks.

And I know how it sounds, demanding more content. It sounds petulant, and entitled, but when you charge $40-60 per expansion, I kinda expect $40-60 worth of content.

This also sort of goes along with the next change their making about only increasing the power level cap by 10 per season instead of the usual 50. On the one hand, I think this is a good idea because it does remove that incessant grind and feeling of being reset every single season. But on the other hand, you can grind 5-6 pinnacles a week, meaning you’ll be at this new seasonal cap in about 2 weeks into the season...then what do you do? They’re going to need to significantly beef up the seasonal content if that’s the case, otherwise you’re going to have large swathes of players popping in twice a season to grind out their pinnacles and then drop the game until the next season. Removing the grind is a double-edged sword that I’m not sure is going to swing in their favor.

They’re also introducing transmog finally which is great. I can’t wait to wear my Abhorrent Imperative armour forever now. My only hope which I’m assuming will not be met (which is fine I guess) is that they find a way to make it semi-permanent, in that I don’t have to continuously transmog every single time I get a piece of better gear. That would be frustrating, especially since I’m assuming transmog is going to cost some kind of currency, probably something stupid too like prisms (god forbid if it costs ascendant shards, that’d be the troll of the century).

To end on a high note though, THEY’RE BRINGING BACK ADA, BAY-BEE! WOO WOO!!!

#random rant #random #personal #destiny 2 #pls ignore #bungie #this is all over the place #also more negative than I intended #sunsetting sunsetting is a great change #delaying WQ is a great idea #nerfing stasis is a great idea #excited for transmog #can't wait to wear my favourite armour all the time now

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mellicose · 5 years ago

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Doctor ... WTF?

An impassioned rant about the steady decline of Doctor Who, the trajectory of the Thirteenth Doctor, and the righteous indignation after The Timeless Children, not only as a Whovian, but as a woman-

I love how certain people are spinning The Timeless Children as being good, yet the BBC has released (2)TWO statements basically telling fans the following:

“Doctor Who is a beloved long-running series and we understand that some people will feel attached to a particular idea they have of the Doctor, or that they enjoy certain aspects of the programme more than others. Opinions are strong and this is indicative of the imaginative hold that Doctor Who has – that so many people engage with it on so many different levels.

We wholeheartedly support the creative freedom of the writers and we feel that creating an origin story is a staple of science fiction writing. What was written does not alter the flow of stories from William Hartnell’s brilliant Doctor onwards – it just adds new layers and possibilities to this ongoing saga.”

Creative freedom, huh? Ask Joe Hill about it. Or Gaiman. The writers, including Chibnall, are only free to do what the Beeb and the other show investors tell them.

They go on:

“We have also received many positive reactions to the episode’s cliff-hanger. There are still a lot of questions to be answered, and we hope that you will come back to join us and see what happens, but we appreciate that it’s impossible to please all of our viewers all of the time and your feedback has been raised with the programme’s Executive Producer."

Uglylaughing.gif

There is a huge, monumental difference between 'not being able to please everyone all at the same time' and basically making a whole fandom, New and Classic, young and old, come together with the same level of disgust and disappointment.

I also find the people arguing "Canon? What canon?" about the Doctor now being the Lord and Savior of the Shining World of the Seven Systems to be foolish at best, and disingenuous at worst.

No canon?? So what have I been steeping myself in for years - a vague approximation of a tale? Please. Of course, writers have embellished and alluded, but tampering with the unspoken but well-known 'no touch' rule about the Doctor's origin is ... well, it's canon, in and of itself...

...which Chibnall completely wrecked, and I can't imagine why. Hubris? By all accounts, he was a fan. I thought Moffat was a dick for bringing back Gallifrey, but now, to me, my disappointment then vs now is like comparing a fart to a shitstorm.

Please excuse the scatological references, but I'm using it deliberately. It is a swirling turd, which I and many others wish we could flush down and forget forever.

In another RadioTimes article - which basically is the BBC - amongst the usual apologetics, Huw Fullerton drops this little gem:

“The glory days of David Tennant et al were in a different TV landscape, and if the Tenth Doctor touched down now it seems unlikely he’d command anything close to the ratings he did over a decade ago.”

Yeah, you can all take a break to have a hearty laugh. Or throw up. Whichever. Did they just hint that, basically, the incarnation of the Doctor who continues to get as much love (if not more) than Four, who still consistently gets thousands of butts in seats in conventions worldwide, and has made the BBC hundreds of thousands of pounds sterling in merchandising “wouldn’t command the ratings he did in 2008?”

As Gary Buechler of Nerdrotic said in his response to this article: “Actually, if David Tennant had been given as many chances as Jodie Whittaker, it would’ve had Game of Thrones-level ratings.”

And I agree. Not because I’m a Tenth Doctor stan, but because it’s just ... categorically true. His seasons consistently got average rating of 7.5 to 8 million viewers - and this in a time before BBCiPlayer, so 7-day catch up ratings meant nothing. It was butts on sofas then, which, to me, speaks of a massive, sustained interest.

But Huw goes on to say that such things mean nothing. And that the huge, telling sink in both overnight and 7-day ratings between the 11th and 12th seasons, and the dismal 4.69m 7 day ratings for The Timeless Children - the lowest for a NewWho finale since its reboot - shouldn’t be taken as a loss of interest from the fandom.

Then, pray tell goodman, what does it mean? Does it mean that fans are following the Thirteenth Doctor’s adventures in spirit? Ratings are tanking. Outside of the precious few who blindly tweet and write articles about the show solely based on its now female protagonist, people are notoriously furious, especially after the execrable season finale.

Yet BBC’s Piers Wenger, who once produced the show, says “I don’t think it’s been in better health, editorially. I think it’s fantastic and I think that, the production values obviously have never been better.”

Right. Okay. So, putting Tom Ford makeup on a pig makes it haute couture, huh? The writing is appalling, and after two excruciatingly painful to watch seasons, the Doctor has failed to appear - all I’ve seen is borderline sociopathic navel gazing from an ‘alien’ wearing a pastel duster.

How dare you besmirch the unfailingly cool reputation of the long coat, Chibnall? Jodie? How??

I will not let someone piss on my head and call it rain ... ‘because it’s a woman.’ Assuming I’ll accept it just adds insult to injury. Who do they think we are, as female fans? I will not cosign garbage to further an agenda that is ultimately damaging one of my favorite things ever, Doctor Who. I agree that politics, and a positive moral, have always been a part of DW, but at it’s best the writing was so good that it only added to the entertainment. Now, the BBC is feeding us all the bitter pill, without the kindness to hide it in a piece of tasty cheese. It gives the impression that they believe we are already so indoctrinated that we no longer need artifice!

Well, not only am I not indoctrinated, but I refuse to ingest.

I refuse to allow people to silence me because the Doctor is now a woman, and so am I. That, I shouldn’t say anything, or complain, because it’s an act of rebellion on womankind, not only in entertainment, but in general. Well, to that I say ... er ... I disavow.

Disavow. Disavow.

And this from a woman who once criticized Peter Davison for saying that casting a woman was “a vital loss of a role model for boys,” taking it as a sexist comment when in truth, it was just a relevant narrative concern about gender-swapping the traditionally male-presenting Time Lord. Just changing a character from male to female doesn’t do anything but demonstrate a tone-deafness about the emotional and physical differences between men and women, which exist whether we want to address them or not. This is why genderswap reboots are terrible. They are trying to further the feminist agenda, while surreptitiously painting traditional, every day femininity as weakness, and something to be avoided at all costs. I reject the modern Hollywood representation of what a ‘strong woman’ is meant to be. I can be clever, yet sensitive enough to comfort a friend when they confide their fears about a cancer relapse. I can be funny, and not at the expense of the man in the room. I can be brave, but not at the expense of my friends. The mind boggles as to why they thought their current tack with the Doctor was going to be any good. The Doctor is a woman, but more importantly, she’s a Timelord. Where are they? Is the alien that we’ve known and loved for the last 60 years truly gone away, and Thirteen is from a whole different timeline? If so, I don’t want to know her.

And it breaks my heart.

Why continue to support a corporation who thinks of me, the fan, as no more than a heartless, thoughtless consumer? A drone? A sheep who has no conscious idea of what I like or need?

I’m done. It’s been two seasons of absolute dreck, with absolutely no sign of a course-correction due to the overwhelmingly negative response. I may be many things, but I’m no masochist - even in the name of love. And Chibnall, knowing that many fans would go back to the classic stories to cleanse ourselves, went back to the beginning and took a giant shit there too.

Oh, the cleverness! the absolute schadenfreude of not only tampering, but rewriting the Doctor’s origins! I suppose that tells me he truly was once a fan. But no longer. Even if it turns out that the Master is as full of crap as Chibnall and it’s all an orchestrated lie, I don’t care anymore. Every inexplicable, terrible thing that happened before has already exhausted my patience with the narrative.

As veteral DW writer and script editor Terrance Dicks said:

If you’re concentrating on putting forth a political message, rather than on doing a really good show, I think there is a danger, maybe, you can do both but it would be hellish difficult, and I think that there’s maybe a danger that the show wouldn’t as be as good as it could or should be, because you’re not looking at the right aims.”

It seems like all that has been lost in time. Big corporations are buying up beloved science fiction properties, and systematically destroying them by trying to mix their politics into the mythos. [see ‘the fandom menace’]

I say, don’t support things that make you unhappy, in the name of nostalgia. That’s how they continue to upset us, while lining their pockets with our hard earned money. Complaining amongst ourselves, writing emails, or making angry Youtube videos no longer works anyway. Now is the time to just ... let it go. No more special edition DVDs, novelizations, or pretty action figures. Hit them in the pocketbook. We will still have fond memories of better times. I will not let them hijack, retcon, and retool them too.

There is a telling paragraph hidden in the depths of the article, which makes my DW fangirl sink:

It’s not as simple as “the ratings are down so Doctor Who will be cancelled,” as for the publicly-funded BBC there’s an interesting question about exactly what ratings are for beyond bragging rights. Obviously they need to make TV that people want to watch – but which people?

Not us, Huw. That’s who.

#dw #doctor who #doctor who season 12 #doctor who season finale #tenth doctor #dw negativity #the timeless children #or as I call it:#the timeless sham #issa no from me dawg #that little comment about dt really made me snort #i really hope he heard about it and had a long knee-slapping laugh #oh dear #the bbc really are deluded #they are truly drinking a koolaid whose potency boggles the mind #like can they see how off the mark they are?#do they have friends?

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0poole · 5 years ago

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Some thoughts on Temtem

Because as far as I’m concerned Pokemon games are some of my all-time favorites (as a group, since they’re basically all the same) so naturally there’s a lot to say about Temtem. Considering this is the first standalone Pokemon-alike that got serious attention, especially after the Sword and Shield riots making Pokemon fans just want something else, it’s basically the game that’ll let different developers make their own Pokemon-alikes.

And yes, I am going to call them all Pokemon-alikes because let’s be real that’s the role they’re trying to fill.

But actually, for once, there’s a few major things that I really dislike about the game. Like, seriously dislike. Considering we’re coming from the stuff people always disliked about Pokemon, I feel like it’s easier to be critical about this stuff. Might as well start with them so I can end on a higher note:

Conversations with random tamers. Literally like 95% of all tamer battles start with some sort of conversation with them, all of which require you to press some random response to either skip the dialogue or go through a completely pointless series of dialogue. There’s absolutely 0 chance I’m interested in what these random people have to say, because I know that no matter what, it’s going to end in a fight. Maybe if they made it so you can actually convince some tamers not to battle you, then it might be a fun mechanic (although I still wouldn’t bother, it would just have a purpose). But, no. All it does is make me want to spam click through everything and start the battle as soon as possible. It’s legitimately annoying. When it comes to more important tamers, it makes sense, just because that’s a convention of RPGs and junk. It still feels pointless, but at least it’s the norm.

The evolution system. Unlike Pokemon, where you evolve once your Pokemon reaches a specific level/etc determined by the Pokemon’s species, Temtem instead evolve a certain amount of levels after you catch them. Sounds pretty alright, until you realize that a lot of these level requirements are way too high. Most evolve after like 20 levels, and your starter evolves after 30. This might not be a total issue if the story is much longer than it seems, and the final battles are around lvl 60+, but even then it really makes you want to ditch the unevolved Temtem you caught a while back for its evolved form once you encounter it. Like, you can find Bunbun and Mudrid in the exact same area, so there’s absolutely no point to catching a Bunbun. If they evolved at a set level, you could just catch one, level it up once or twice, and it’ll evolve anyway, since there being others of its evolved form close by usually means it’ll evolve around that level. Instead, if you do that, you’ll have to wait a seriously long time. I’m currently going through this issue with my Mushi. This is even worse for the second reason:

Eternal double battles. For strategic purposes, it’s obviously a major plus. But, even though the difficulty is definitely higher than Pokemon, the battles are still pretty easy, so as long as you switch into the right types you won’t have any issue. That’s not the problem. The problem is that it makes leveling up feel so much slower. Since the EXP from a battle is always split between at least 2 Tems, it’s harder to train up just one of them. It’s worsened because all battles are set battles (where you can’t instantly switch Tems out once the opponent is about to send out another Tem) so that basically means it’ll be split between around 3 Tems each battle, since you’ll be accounting for a new type on the field.

The human names. They’re too out there to be at all memorable. Apart from Max, obviously, I can’t even remember any names because when I first see them I’m just like “I don’t even know what that word is so I’m just not going to bother.” I’m guessing this makes translating names easier, since no name has any obvious tie to some language/region, but it’s still annoying. Mainly because a lot of quests are like “Talk to [character name]” or “Find [character name]” so if you don’t remember the names it makes questing harder to follow. The names of the Tems are kind of in the same boat, but it feels more warranted because they’re weird monsters and not people. Most of them are a pretty normal Pokemon level of naming (Barnshe, Toxolotyl), some even less interesting (Crystle, Mushi).

The roadblocks aren’t any better than Pokemon. It’s still just “You can’t get past here until you get this item.” It’s like the tiniest step above Pokemon, where they just have some dude at an entrance who says “You can’t get past here because [reason],” but effectively it’s exactly the same. It’s even weirder with the Crystal Skates, because they don’t do any sort of slippery puzzle with the Crystal path before you get them, but later you lose the skates and THEN they put in the slippery puzzles in. They really should have just not given you the skates yet and made any reachable secrets a part of a puzzle instead.

The start of the game needs more variety/balance. Ganki is actually OP, and was my hard carry. But, there are so many Wind and Water types early on it gets kind of boring quick. It’s worse, because Wind resists Wind, meaning you’re constantly dealing with Tems that resist your type. But, sure, I guess the variety isn’t the problem and one of the most prominent types resisting itself is. Ganki does need a decent check though, since Crystal types don’t exactly come around until later.

The clothes are WAY too expensive. I’m the character customizer type. I want to buy out all the shops and make myself look snazzy. I can do that while a fucking early-game bikini costs 9000 Tembucks or whatever they’re called.

Then, here are some stuff I’m kinda neutral/iffy on:

The type chart feeling a little arbitrary. Obviously this one isn’t actually a problem, since they probably just did that to make sure Pokemon had even less of a reason to sue, but like I mentioned before, why does Wind resist Wind? When I imagine two gusts colliding, it turns into a giant tornado that destroys everything. That, or they just flow around each other. Considering it slows down the early game, I really wish it wasn’t that way. Another questionable one is that Wind is strong against Toxic. Maybe it’s just because we use vents to clear out toxic air? Considering most Toxic attacks involve liquid that doesn’t help much. It probably wouldn’t be an issue to someone who hasn’t completely and totally remembered the Pokemon type chart, though.

The “representation.” Yes, they tried, and that’s a step in the right direction, but like... it’s really not quite there yet. Like, in the character creation screen, as we’ve all heard from the #gamerrage you get to choose your pronouns. Sure, good. Then they give you the option of the girl body or the boy body, and the girl voice and the boy voice. Really? Still no ambiguously chubby option? Slightly more rounded faces aren’t enough people. Also, I still actually don’t get why they (as well as other game developers) don’t just put in a bald option. Did they just not model the scalp or something? It’s obvious they did because there was a bald option in the beta/alpha, and they just... removed it? Why? It’s not even a matter of reason, It was already there. But yeah, back to the gender representation bit, fused a bit with the conversations, there’s one specific bit of dialogue that really confused me. When big event happens and one girl tells you to go searching for her wife, sure they’re lesbians whatever, but then it pops up with the dialogue options of “Sure, I’ll go looking for him/her/them” but like, as 3 different choices. What’s the point of that? She literally said it was her “wife,” so I just picked “her,” but what’s the point of having the other options? If the first girl’s response is just like “’Him/Them?’ I did tell you she was my ‘wife,’ right?” It’ll boggle my mind even more. Anyways...

The Temtem designs. It’s more like two extremes balanced out to become neutral. I seriously love some of the designs, and I seriously hate others. From what I’ve seen so far, my favorites are Oree, Platimous, Capyre, Valash, Barnshe, Gyalis, Myx, Mushi, Valiar, Noxolotyl, and Kalabyss. My team at the end of the current story consisted of Mushi and Banapi, who I were still training, Gyalis, Mudrid, Kalabyss, and Gazuma, so I only slightly compromised for the sake of my interests. I actually seriously love Valash, but I already had 2 Crystals on my team, and being Neutral wouldn’t be much of a help. My least favorites, though, are Tateru, Taifu, Houchic, Tental, Babawa, Saku, Magmis, Ukama, and Vulcrane. So many Tems have the classic Pokemon issue of “just getting bigger” as the evolve, and a lot of them evolve for the worse, like Vulcrane and Saku especially. Vulcrane, Houchic, Tental, and Zenoreth (who I still sort of like for its colors) look uncomfortably humanoid, where they have almost too much muscle detail on their arms and legs. Pocus is a better example of a humanoid design, because its legs are much more nubby and arms less detailed. Plus, the former Tems’ designs aren’t quite exaggerated enough proportion wise, making them just feel kinda weird I guess. I don’t really know how to explain that yet. Some other designs I think are good, despite me not being into them as much, are Skail, Saipat, Sparzy, Cerneaf, Volarend, Shuine, Adoroboros, Tuwai, Kinu, Pigepic, and Anahir. Overall, Temtem have some good designs, with a few stinkers strewn about.

The evil team/rival. The evil team, as far as I cared to know, are just evil because they’re evil. They’re not crazy, but they’re fine. I definitely think the term “clan” can only be used in an evil context nowadays, so I guess that’s a good thing. Max is just whatever. I’m extremely tired of the stupid rhetoric Pokemon fans keep throwing around, suggesting the only good rival’s an asshole rival. It’s obviously just not true, and Crema’s obviously just catering to that idea with Max. They really just seem like an asshole for asshole’s sake, so that’s boring. The rival’s level of asshole-ness is completely independent of their quality. Honestly I’m like 2% of the way into wanting to make my own Pokemon region so I’ll be able to test my mettle there once it comes around.

The MMO-ness of the stuff feels really minimal, and sometimes I found it hard to find the NPC I was supposed to be looking for because they were in a crowd of random people. I’m pretty sure more MMO-esque stuff will come later, but now you basically just see other people walking around. I obviously didn’t use the co-op function either, but the fact that it exists is good. I guess a good thing to implement later would be an offline mode, so you can choose not to have all those strangers running around if you so choose.

Then, here are the things I really like:

The breeding system. It’s really just simpler, and that’s a good thing. It was kind of annoying to figure out which Pokemon have the same egg group (before I just used a Ditto, at least), but now it’s just based on type. Plus, you can just buy the right items to get the right stats. I do hope they lower the prices though.

FreeTem. It makes actual sense that the people who didn’t want Temtem to fight didn’t go full-on Plasma and become terrorists for their cause. Plus, you get money for cheating their obviously cheatable system. It’s a win-win!

The graphics. This is just one of those cases where people who don’t like it say it’s “bad,” even though they’re objectively wrong. The only “badness” about the graphics are the human faces. Everything else actually looks really nice and polished, especially the animations. I actually died when I saw my Mushi scurry behind me. It’s too cute. Too bad Mushook is losing its luster... But, anyway, it is one of those things that’s just a preference. There’s nothing wrong with the quality. In terms of human designs at least, I was going to say that they look to similar, but for the most part the only characters that looked too similar were the random nobody NPCs, and even then they put together the already existing character customization options in pretty decent enough ways. Some tamers even being not at all subtle references to other things was kinda cute too, although it’s not something I at all care for. That just seems like it’s asking to be reposted every other week on the subreddit...

The music kinda grew on me. The generic themes (wild battle/tamer battle) will never not get old, but the specific themes actually are pretty good. I especially like the theme of the Xolot Resevoir, since it kind of gave me Field of Hopes and Dreams/Scarlet Forest vibes. That might be my favorite kind of video game area song, to be honest. It’s the perfect blend of relaxing, mystical, and trance-y.

The gyms. No one, no matter how good you are, can actually get up to that high of a standing just by using one single type. The fact that Tem Dojos are all based on 2 types is great, especially in how their puzzles/appearance are styled. Obviously the slippery puzzle of the Crystal/Toxic dojo kinda took me aback as mentioned, but alone I liked it. The one problem was that 2 of them were with the exact same types, which kinda sucked, since it also used the same kind of puzzle. That’s the thing about good designs, though; you don’t mind as much if they’re re-used.

The CRYSTAL type. Oh my god, I love it so much. I tried to mask it a bit when talking about the Tems because it’s seriously my favorite thing about the game. It’s the perfect replacement for the Rock type, and it makes any Crystal Tem look so damn cool! The only one I don’t like as much, as mentioned, is Zenoreth/Azuroc, but that’s not at all the fault of their Crystal parts. I seriously wanted to create a whole team of Crystal Tems just because of how universally cool they all were. Gyalis and Valash are easily two of my favorite Tems. I also love how they managed to give the type two signature colors at once, with the bright red and seafoam green. Most other types really only use one or many colors for their part of the Tem’s design, but it seems so solidly both a red type and a green type, even if the icon is red. Since I play Pokemon/these types of games for the cool monster designs, having a whole section of the monsters be this cool is a major upside for me. I love it.

I kinda-sorta tried to arrange this list from worst to best, although really most stuff in between is sort of a crap shoot anyway.

Honestly, I don’t feel like a good source for a “should I buy this game?” kind of review, especially since the game basically just came out of Beta. If you’re into what they’re putting down, you might as well get it now. If you’re not sure, there’s no harm in waiting. The game is clearly making enough money to stay afloat, and since they’ve been at it for so long, there’s really no reason for them to stop now. I remember hearing about this game eons ago... Crazy to think I actually played it.

Now the next wave is Kindred Fates. That’s the next logical step in the genre. I hope this decade is the age of Pokemon-alikes, like how the past few years was riddled with BRs. Every game better have a monster collecting portion to it or else. I want to train my guns in CoD.

#temtem #opinions #rant #rambling #tem #crema #poole #etc #pokemon #thoughts

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