Evan

Smash/Pokemon/D&D enjoyer. I like video games but I only play 3 of them. Cat-Haver, Uncle, and honorary Trumble. mitchbazooka on the other app

[Evan @MitchBazooka]

Even with Fury of Cerberus and a Neve's Emerald full armor build it still came down to a last hit scenario #WizardofLegend #Contingent99

[Josh @JoshAlexCairo]

@CorbyVo this one still kills me every time I see it

[Variety @Variety]

Mark Ruffalo is being defended by more than 170 Jewish entertainment figures in a new open letter rejecting Paramount's claim that Ruffalo fueled “antisemitic tropes”:

“The time is over for spurious charges of antisemitism to be trotted out, this time in the defense of war, oligarchy, and AI domination. That tired playbook has run its course. We stand proudly with Mark Ruffalo, and with all decent people who are bravely rising and speaking truth to power.”

Supporters include Hannah Einbinder, Joel Coen, Todd Haynes, Ilana Glazer, Tony Kushner, Emma Seligman, Jane Schoenbrun and Wallace Shawn.

The letter follows a heated week in which Ruffalo has been at the center of a growing confrontation over the Paramount-Warner Bros. merger. In a social media post on Aug. 21, the Marvel star attacked the deal over its potential consequences for Hollywood and accused the Ellison family of being complicit in the “genocide” against Palestinians, which he said “was built on an apartheid system of oppression powered by Oracle.” In the post, he highlighted Oracle’s ties to the Israeli military.

“Pointing out the crucial connections between what is happening in Gaza and what is happening in Hollywood is the exact opposite of antisemitism. It is, for us, the very essence of Jewish ethical duty," reads the open letter defending Ruffalo. "According to a recent Washington Post poll, 61% of American Jews now agree that Israel is committing war crimes in Gaza; and four in ten even agree that these crimes amount to genocide. Do those attacking Mark Ruffalo as an antisemite seriously believe that all these American Jews are antisemites too? Or that we don’t see the connection between, on the one hand, the criminal impunities that have led the US and Israel into unending disaster and, on the other, the oligarchic powerplays of the Musks, Ellisons, Thiels and others who are working to dismantle our democracy?”

https://t.co/Y1nciNx0T2

[All-bones Jones💀Skeleton Vtuber @AllbonesJones]

that is why i love this pokemon yellow tas, once it gets going it's just next-level fucking around

[ReCollect64 @DefaultDNB]

[Looking forward to see what happens with this games source code!]

SSB 100% Decompiled

Ready for a Recomp ~ Aug 25, 2026

https://t.co/4svEuZ2FFl

#N64 #ReCollect64

[Lewtwo @Lewchube]

Have felt this way for the last few years largely on the Western side (effortpost incoming) be it released works by TPCi (lack of guest artists, merch etc.) or the amalgamation of Pokémon into a brand first and foremost. Fans are often portrayed by TPCi in a weirdly homogenized way, which tends to execerbate this feeling. The "Hello Trainers!!" marketing gives me the ick because TPCi generally fails to recognize that a "Pokémon Fan" can mean one of many different things.

From the impression I get; Little Timmy going to Worlds on summer vacation; a Pokémon GO influencer in their late 30s; young adults that play the TCG; or even someone like me that really just loves the singleplayer JRPGs— are all put in the same bracket. This isn't me advocating that one group get special preferential treatment and it's awesome that everyone loves this series so much, but something about this engagement with the community feels fake and it sours me a lot on the official front. There's a massive difference in products like Legends ZA versus a TCG mat with FRLG Sugimori art pasted onto it, but (generally) it feels like TPCi believes those products should be engaged with on equal terms by a super broad demographic.

Compare this to the JP side. Things that appeal to an overtly massive young audience like PokeToon (we're talking very very young kids watching animations on YouTube) are directed/boarded by fucking industry legends like Shingo Yamashita, with an immense amount of care put into the craft of that product that your average sakugahead will appreciate. Conversely, you've got releases for more specific audiences like Project VOLTAGE, that use something for more adult fans as a springboard to create genuinely awesome stuff for all groups. We're three years in and people that don't really care for vocaloid are praising the accompanying audiovisual work to come out of that incentive, all in a language they don't even understand!

I get the impression that something like PokeMiku could not earnestly spawn from TPCi. Closest thing we have to a Western creative force is Niantic, where Pokémon GO has been ferociously (and deservedly) lambasted by its OWN fanbase for a decade. This isn't to say "Thing VS Thing: Japan" (because every series will inevitably have their tacky McDonalds collab wherever they are) but seeing the sheer force of artistry on display for things like TCG sleeves or deck boxes versus the west is ludicrous. The impact that non-Japanese fans have had on the series (think Carlos on ZA or Toby on SV) compared to TPCi's persistent influencer culture is staggering on its own. Even DeNA had guest artists from Western Pokémon Twitter to create artwork for Masters!

The term "unearnest" is again, probably the best way to describe this feeling, but I get the impression that being a "fan" of Pokémon to TPCi is merely equivalent to that of a consumer. I dont mean that in a cynical way, but largely that the barrier to entry for being a fan (previously: "fanatic") doesn't really start with those that have a sincere engagement with the series, and instead those that purchase products and/or engage with "fandom culture". Both sides struggle with tribalism in different ways— the JP front is borderline hyperconsumerist with modern Pokémon products almost as a lifestyle with very little criticism— but I feel that's somewhat understandable given the series is literally etched into the country's manhole covers— I totally buy that Japan loves Pokémon as a foundational cornerstone of modern culture. Meanwhile, the ENG fandom is practically all infighting or appeal to nostalgia, with any reverance for artistry or the production behind the series (GAME FREAK in general) treated with apathy at best and ire at worst.

As someone that has spent the last few years really trying to deepen the understanding of this series and vouch for basic conversation on topics like gamedev or design intent, it does feel like a lot of that effort gets walked back a combo of modern Western social media culture and a very smoothed-down brand. It's one thing to deal with the rise of "who gives a fuck" dunk culture from people with a tangential interest in the series, but it becomes worsened when TPCi see these subjects as not worth acknowledging or solely for selling nostalgia. That official statement about FRLG being the "definitive way to play Kanto" is eerily lock-step with the current crop of fans that generally believe games like Red and Green hold no value. Not to say people need to love them above FRLG (or like them at all) but every discussion I've had with JP fans (in disagreement) always ended in mutual understanding regardless.

Truthfully, I dunno how to "fix" this issue since it's so multi-faceted and partially relies on TPCi to start catching up to the JP branch. Even once-in-a-lifetime stuff like the DPMA Documentary release (that took up an entire month of my life!) felt marred by AI generated reconstructions and "leak culture" that destroyed the spread of valuable info. It wasn't a company sending a DMCA to suppress that info like you'd expect, (quite the opposite given some GAME FREAK staff I've chatted with since) but the warped will of fandom itself. Shit— for every new and cool thing released by a fan nowadays; we get a dozen leaks for Generation 23; TCG scalpers invading a Walmart; AI generated fangames with no respect for the original work; gimmick accounts that post the same thinly veiled, outdated microaggressions on *some* modern aspect of the seires; valueless recycled discourse on Palworld/whatever type Luxray "should" be; or people shadowboxing "genwunners" despite having never even played those games— all that set us all back by a wide margin. I think it honestly sucks to go in with genuine sincerity on the internet with regard to nerd* hobbies, it is genuinely inescapable and I really wish more people would push against it or create spaces for that discussion to begin with. Like I said, I've thought about this for years so I'm always down to DM if you're interested in talking about this more LMAO

[Dan Fornace @danfornace]

My heart goes out to the 2XKO team. It’s a big blow to the fighting game community and game development in general to have this project stop active development.

Our projects are pretty delicately linked as our team at Aether Studios set out to achieve a similar goal for the platform fighter genre as the 2XKO team was attempting for the traditional fighting game community.

Before our Kickstarter, we pitched to publishers and investors and we even had Project L listed as a north star of what we were looking to do.

Now that we’re both on the other side of releases, it’s easy to come up with a ton of little reasons that were “oh so obvious” as to why it’s been hard to attract and retain players.

But at the end of the day, the current landscape for multiplayer games is brutal. You either bottle lightning, go out of business immediately, or like our projects, struggle to release frequent updates that can steer your project toward financial sustainability.

And you can say, “Why even attempt a live service then? People liked boxed games.”

Most multiplayer games today are live services even if they didn’t intend it. They might have a less grueling release schedule, but every successful multiplayer game including fighting games are either still in active development or had a multi-year DLC schedule that has now concluded while we wait for the next game in the series.

By the end of Rivals 1 development, it felt like we were running a live service out of a game that was meant to take just a few months to create in Game Maker. We were constantly running into issues trying to expand that game, and there were many times we wanted to give up development during the 10 years of updates the first game received.

So we looked at a game like League of Legends and later 2XKO to help guide our development plans for Rivals 2. We designed updates in a way that would generate income every month while also having bigger content drops for the less committed players to return to.

And it worked! But at a much smaller scale than a AAA game would need or even where we hoped we might be. We’re still operating at around 10x the Rivals 1 numbers had before workshop launched.

But a 3D game is much more expensive to build and maintain. We’re still struggling to stay sustainable. If we had the same burn rate as the 2XKO team, we wouldn’t even be close. It’s a good thing we didn’t stretch ourselves to launch on console right away, because our engineering burn would not be possible to pay the team and update and bug fix the game on multiple platforms with the numbers we have now. We would have had to stop development by now.

One difference between the two projects now is that Riot Games as a company will still exist after 2XKO ceases active development.

Aether Studios does not have that same luxury. If Rivals 2 falls then so does Aether Studios and so does my livelihood.

We have no other option and we will keep working until the wheels fall off completely.

I know people on 2XKO team who are in a similar position to me. They were there to make a fighting game. So the end of this project is the end of a dream.

I hope they find something awesome to do next, and they are in a good spot personally. Because there were so many right decisions made on that project. But at the end of the day, you need to attract and retain players for the business to work. And that’s our job now when making a competitive multiplayer videogame.

[Kyle Gordon @kylegordon101]

My magnum opus

[enemycharlie @enemycharlie]

Contestants didn't know who we'd be debating until we showed up, so imagine everyone's shock when Tim Pool is the moderate 😭 This show was also pitched as 1 Moderate vs 20 Progressives and they changed it to 20 Liberals. Most of us were socialists lmao.

[pulse tx @Txqza]

this shot is transcending the game

[Marshy 🔜 Riptide @marshadowssb]

This is how Melee commentary sounds like to me

[Der Kernel @Der_Kernel_]

More Dagoth Updates

[Evan @MitchBazooka]

@pattsully @ConcernedApe Looks like it’s cheaper through kohls if anyone else is looking - https://t.co/3AUkKLuWQz

[UndreamedPanic @UndreamedPanic]

1 tomorrow...

[Aitch @rwing_aitch]

Announcing Preflight: Practice while queuing Ranked, Direct, Teams, etc.

Queue while practicing vs the MOST flexible practice cpu ever.

Need a falcon that spams nair and bair? Want a fox that only fullhop bairs on plats? You can set it up in Preflight.

https://t.co/SzjTfMeVAf

[Li'l Mitts @SSBM_LilMitts]

the classic, for my fans and fellow Randall lovers❤️

[Evan @MitchBazooka]

@UndreamedPanic I hope you know that the people who play this will really appreciate the polish you put into everything. Standards for fan games are high but this is going above and beyond to make the experience great on most platforms even though it’s reasonable to optimize for the biggest ones

[Ashton Herron @herron_ashton]

A new era of connectivity for Game Boy Hardware is here. And its just getting started!

Use original hardware to play Game Boy games online!

Join the Crowd Supply campaign for GB-Link USB V2
https://t.co/uQFmeCIciE

[aMSa 🎮 🇯🇵 @aMSaRedYoshi]

aMSaMonster

[La Vermu🍸🇪🇸 @Vermutin2]

Pasada total la del skater profesional olímpico y los fotógrafos 🔝🔝🔝

[Ben Naumann @InternetJumbo]

13th Century Live Streamers:

Solar Eclipse