a bold claim, with ramifications

This is a vibe I've always felt since 2018-ish (vtubing shattering a lot of stigmas about PC gaming) but seeing someone who lives in Japan say "yeah furniture stores have a PC gamer aisle now" really sends it home.

Part of why I can't relate is definitely because I got very good at masking my interests when I was younger lol.

The idea of being perceived IRL as a videogame enthusiast makes me break out in hives. Always has.

Calling it trauma feels overly dramatic, but my parents definitely instilled it in me.

I think it's a good thing that the freaks who make MTLs of game's in Japanese, and folks who spew story beats they got via osmosis from a Japanese speedrun stream, both are getting shut out. It's better for the overall health of the community in the longrun.

But have you considered that the median Trails player needs their treats, or will be forced to think about literally anything else for any length of time.

A completely unacceptable outcome.

FF11 too. That game is just a ghost in any context outside of itself. Even by adjusted "It's an MMO so it doesn't count" metrics, nobody acknowledges it even happened.

People need to begrudgingly admit that 14 exists, even if it's just to be loud about how little they think it matters.

Too many people really can't fathom how little Valve needs to care about the sales performance of anything. Money is no longer their purpose.

If you ever try to use sales metrics to ascribe purpose or success to anything they've done after like 2010, then you're fundamentally Not Getting It.

Dude's pretty quiet about it all things considered and the company will always publicly deny it, but he's been a hater forever.

www.gamesradar.com/games/gabe-n...

www.pcgamer.com/gabe-newell-...

Basically I think the primary metric for success whenever Valve releases a new hardware thing is whether or not the Valve Thing prevents Microsoft, specifically Windows, from gaining market share in the sector it's related to.

A 10+ years later we're seeing that eternal grudge pay off. SteamOS/Proton is generally excellent, Microsoft has no foothold in gaming storefronts or VR, and minimal success in handhelds. Now we're seeing them attempt to cut Microsoft's legs off in the small form factor dedicated gaming PC space.

Gabe hated Windows 8 so much that he pivoted the direction of the entire company forever in order to manifest a future reality where he could erode Microsoft's monopoly on PC gaming and prevent them from getting a foothold in any future PC-based gaming form factors.