I know this will sound petty but I hope Sony’s insistence that Nintendo not be included in their definition of the console market backfires. It was such an absurd argument to make on their part

Did Microsoft release an update over the last several months improving network download speeds for games? I haven’t been on my Xbox for a while because of a recent job change and move than I am now just settling into, but I am noticing for the first time since buying my Series X it is downloading games and updates close to the speed I actually pay for with my ISP. It is a huge improvement, seeing 750 Mbps download speeds while downloading Wo Long

Hoeg did not put a percentage on it be he said he still thinks the deal goes through with remedies.

Idas apparently said (though I cannot find it and I got tired of scrolling back through posts) before the recent EU news that he gave the deal a 25% chance of going through globally.

Most of the financial analysts still think it’s going to go through.

I am wondering what accounts for the wide variance of opinions here. A theory I saw on twitter that I think has merit is that because this deal is so large and “not normal”, an extra political dimension has been introduced that is throwing previous precedents out the window. The FTC and CMA in particular have political motivations to at least appear as though they are being tough on tech.

I remain optimistic this deal goes through, and if the CMA accepts behavioral remedies then I think it’s virtually certain the FTC will be brought back to the negotiating table. I think regardless we will have a clear understanding of if this deal will happen by the end of April

I'm beginning to understand why Soul Hackers 2 didn't score that well on Metacritic.
Dungeons are almost as poor as the ones in Persona 4. Story is way worse. All party members are introduced within the first three hours of the game.

Another thing that annoys me: Why is the auto text so poorly designed compared to the Persona series? Text scrolls way too slow and can't catch up to the voice overs. The result of that are unnecessary waiting times between the lines until the text has finally caught up. What's worse, even when the lines aren't voiced, auto text is still in effect. But since the text is scrolling so slow, I press the button to display the whole text box. However, the new text box will pop up only a second after pressing the button so if there are more than two sentences in one text box, I can't read them before the next text box pops up. Persona didn't have this problem. You really expect me to constantly switch between enabling and disabling auto text or wait for an eternity for the text to scroll through?

Meh.

I'd say that at the start of this, I think most antitrust specialists, lawyers or anyone with knowledge in this field would have been extremely confident in this deal going through because legally it should have been easy, there are no laws that this deals infringes upon, antitrust or otherwise and the market data is in Microsoft's favour.

However, a lot were likely caught off guard by the current political climate, even Microsoft were caught off guard and didn't expect this level of scrutiny, a lot thought that the FTC would pass it. So I think this is one of a few reasons why there are so many different opinions now, there is simply a lot of uncertainty which makes it harder to gauge now.

Most still seem to agree that the FTC will absolutely lose in court, they have zero legal standing for blocking the deal and courts will side with the actual law. The CMA has always been the final boss/wildcard in all of this. CMA being a complete wildcard makes judging it harder to do alongside the political climate.

If you think CMA will accept behavioural remedies then you should basically think this deal is a lock for approval but if you believe that CMA won't accept behavioural remedies then you're more likely to be extremely pessimistic on the deal passing, ultimately, nobody knows what the CMA will do but the PF seem to indicate behavioural will be hard to accept.

I also think that some (not Hoeg) don't realise how incredibly hard it is to overcome the CMA or how hard it is to make them accept behavioural remedies and a few don't seem to realise just how little oversight the CMA has. I've seen a few who aren't familiar with UK's CMA (because they specialise in American law).

It seems that among some financial fellas (like Patcher) there is a belief that if the CMA blocks the deal, Microsoft can just appeal it like they can in USA/EU and take CMA to court. I've seen a lot of "Wtf" and surprise at how the CMA operates during the course of this deal from American industry analysts. Fact is, if CMA blocks the deal then Microsoft is fucked, they have FAR more power and less oversight than FTC and even EC do.

If Microsoft appeals CMA's decision then it goes to CAT who almost always side with the CMA because they usually have to find that CMA has broken some sort of rules. When Meta appealed CMA's decision to CAT, they agreed with CMA on 5/6 counts but agreed with Meta on the last count relating to redactions for confidentiality but agreed with CMA on the block.

So CMA went back and fixed that aspect where they made a mistake and blocked it again, Lol.

It doesn't instil confidence when every time the CMA put out a statement it's either straight up wrong or just backwards indicating they have spent 12 months looking at the gaming market and competition but don't have a clue about it.

Compulsion Games

RECOGNIZED AS ONE OF MONTREAL'S TOP EMPLOYERS (2023):

Here are some of the reasons why Compulsion Games ULC was selected as one of Montreal's Top Employers (2023):

• Compulsion Games ULC helps employees access the care they need with unlimited coverage for psychotherapy (including coverage for their families) -- the company also maintains a subscription to the Headspace app, which provides resources on meditation, sleep wellness and physical activity
• Compulsion Games ULC honours long serving employees with paid sabbaticals at milestone years -- employees receive a month off after five years of service and three months off after ten years
• Compulsion Games ULC maintains progressive family-friendly benefits, offering maternity and parental leave top-up for new and adoptive parents (to 100 per cent of salary for up to 15 weeks) and unlimited paid personal days to help employees balance family commitments

Highlights

Top Employer: Compulsion Games ULC

For those wondering what is parental top up. In quebec canada every worker is allowed parental leave paid by the state up to 52 weeks for mother with 26 at 70% salary and 26 at 55% and 5 weeks for the father at 55%. The mother may transfert week to the father. The top up is a employer contribution that raise the state contribution to a certain % (100% in this case)

Me when DQ12 is PS exclusive 

I know US workers have it rough with paid vacation days but I expected Canada to be not just a little better but a whole lot better. Three weeks (I guess that translates to 15 working days if you're on a 5-day-week?) is still very low.