GTAV could probably be optimized to run on Switch at 720p/30fps (since it ran decently on PS3), but it was considered a miracle that it ran as decently as it did on PS3 even with not really nailing the 30fps. Most likely it was just seen as too much work to put that same level of effort into the Switch for what would at best result only somewhere between the PS3 and PS4 versions, and at worse would be a choppy unoptimized mess (think GTA IV on PS3).

Right. Personally I don't really care much, voice acting seems like not exactly hard work. Obviously it's recognizable when there is BAD voice acting. Still, there is no obligation to pay any particular amount. Literally all she's entitled to is "minimum wage". The object for any dev should be to get quality work for the least amount of pay. If they want to hire some famous actor, that's different, but that is almost more like a marketing gimmick in the video game space ("hey guyz, look at this famous hollywood actor starring in our video game... it's got dat cinematic quality).

But if she feels she was lowballed relative to what people would normally expect, then sure, she can let people know. Probably doesn't change much in terms of people participating in a boycott, but it is a bit lame to not just bring back the same character and give her a small slice of the success of the game franchise. $4000 is obviously ridiculous in that light. If she was holding out for millions then she would be the ridiculous one. Hard to know without knowing if there was some middle ground on the table, or if they really did only offer $4000 as their "final offer".

Exactly.

Especially if a person is being charged with violent crime. Even if charges are pending and they aren't technically "convicted", seems reasonable to bar them from possessing firearms' while their case pertaining to violent crime is being adjudicated, that's if you let them out on bail at all. What are you going to do, send them home and let keep the tools try to kill the witnesses? It's insane.

I can see it being unnecessary to temporarily bar them from owning firearms if it's a "white collar" crime or non-violent offense.

Games library wise it isn't much better than Wii-U, when you consider like half the best Switch games were Wii-U remasters (or remasters from prior gen). Ok, not literally half, but you get my point. It's substantial.

That being said, for those who skipped the failed Wii-U I guess you can say it's still a necessary "console" because you get improved versions of most of the essential Wii-U games and the Switch exclusive part of the library is also probably trending towards being better than the Wii-U by the time it's all over. But it still really only boils down to maybe 15-20 exclusive games that must be played - with the 3rd party library being of little serious value to people that like to play on the couch.

I wouldn't exactly say CD is a "dead format" necessarily. Isn't it still the "defacto" format for physical releases, or has Vinyl officially taken back the mantle? Either way I don't think we can quite call it dead yet since there actually is a consistent release schedule of music (funnily enough I've noticed a few artists releasing things on cassette tape, but that seems more of a gimmick or for nostalgia... not the same as the CD releases).

Anyway, I mostly got rid of cassette and VHS. Those were just bad technology anyway. I still have most of my CD's (other than stuff I purged because the music no longer interested me). I was actually still listening to CD's in my car, until a couple years ago I traded in my car and found that new cars no longer come with CD players! Fortunately I had ripped most of my CD's to .FLAC and that's what I use now on a USB stick. Occasionally I'll even buy a new one (re-issues and super-deluxe editions with surround mixes and what not). DVD I mostly purged to upgrade to blu-ray. I still buy blu-rays and 4K so I consider that very much not dead yet.

I never had any UMD's (never had a PSP anyway) or laserdisc.

Doesn't this basically mean nobody wants it? I'm not sure "not supply constrained" is a good thing here. There have even been "deals" knocking $50 off the S.

I wouldn't say it has zero value, if someone just wants it as a second console or just a very cheap entry into "current gen" gaming it seems like a decent value - esp if you get a deal on it. But it's only "good" on the set of games that are actually well optimized for the S, and my guess is over the next few years that gap will widen or they will basically stop optimizing games for the S entirely (not sure if they would just flat out not support the S, but probably more and more shoddy ports that barely run compared to the X and PS5 version).

I'm still working through my PS4 backlog.

I thought about getting this just because of how dirt cheap (I've already seen some below MSRP deals) and readily available it is compared to the Series X or PS5. But the performance issues some games are having sort of turned me off and i figure might as well just wait for the more proper upgrade. Some games sound like they are well optimized for Series S, others not so much. Actually in that way it's almost like a step backwards into the PS3/XB360 era were there where so many high profile games with very suboptimal ports compared to the other, and it's all a bit hit or miss. This issue is bound to just keep getting worse too as more effort is made to optimize for PS5/Series X, it just becomes too tall a task to waste time getting the Series S version up to speed.

I guess for $299 it is what it is. It's a compromise. I'm sure it's solid so long as you stick to the well optimized games.

That was a very interesting generation of consoles. The Gamecube was probably the best designed and most efficient of the 3 overall, certainly more powerful than the PS2, but each console had it's quirks and trade-offs. The mini-DVD was an interesting compromise for the Gamecube that had its' own plusses (speed) and minuses (storage). Obviously the PS2 had substantially more "good" games and dominated the gen in total sales, but if you told me I could only have 1 of those consoles and 25 of it's best games, the Gamecube probably wins. It was also the last time Nintendo attempted to compete with the others in terms of having equal hardware. After that it was gimmicks and then abandonment of the space entirely (moving towards a tablet/mobile platform).

It was clearly better from a technical perspective than the 3DS. Not even close really, the OLED screen was a thing of beauty and made colors pop compared to the washed out colors on the 3DS that you'd constantly have to hold at the right angle for that 3D effect (sometimes I would just slide the 3D effect off because of the annoyance).

Sony gave up on it pretty damn fast, although I'm not sure if they committed to another wave of games would have made much difference to the position of the console. Investment and ROI terms, Sony probably made the correct call. I mean, people already weren't buying it even when Sony was still supporting it...

When you look back at it as a historical system, it would be nice to have had a few more "1st party" games (or something like an exclusive Castlevania or MGS or Grand Theft Auto) to highlight on it's top 20 games list. As it stands you might struggle to get a list of 20 great games on there without throwing in a few indie PC games and shovelware type JRPG that became the standard for the system. The 3DS probably wasn't as great as prior gens either in terms of volume of original classic games (lots of ports!), but it was still multiple times better than Vita because at least it had 1st party support pretty much all the way through.

I wouldn't say EV's are dumb, but a Plug-In Hybrid that could get 50 or 100 miles of electric only range would probably be more ideal for alot of people. The problem is to this point most of the plug-ins were only getting a sad 10 or 20 miles on EV only, so the EV only mode wasn't very useful. You get 50 miles of electric only driving before firing up the engine, then it's a bit more reasonable and useful to more people as a sort of pauper's EV.