- they/them
The FullMutant Chao • Artist/Animator • Enby/Pan • Autistic
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So uh... i know from my last journal i've been too harsh on Sandfall Interactive with AI placeholder pandered in Clair Obscur: Expedition 33, but there's good news, there's good news!
There's a brand new Q&A from a lesser youtube influencer about E33, and there's a timestamp at 11:44 and they asked if there's genAI in the game, and i know a lot of people on social media attacking Sandfall for crossing the line using AI assets from UE store and calling out on them for harming the environment, hypocritical articles, disrespecting their concept artists, and booting them out on an Indie Game Awards after pointing out the placeholder at launch of the game before quietly patching out thinking that it's just another slop of a game. But..... the more i look at Sandfall's (especially Guillaume Broche) answer, the more i dug deep, i realized... oh my god... Larian and Bethesda wished they were Anti-AI when Sandfall came to their senses and clarify everything from start to finish they're legitimately anti-ai and realized we got the info wrong n' this was left in by accident and they knew how distatsteful AI was for them to just rush out and they took the time to fix it was was left behind.
Well, it's close enough and quite understandable for them to come out.
Also i will say this if they're truly Anti-AI, possibly we should've been too harsh on them too much, but still, they should've came out sooner til' this was spred before causing them to get disqualified at IGA and it doesn't cut it since the placeholder was genAI found from UE store (or somewhere, i dunno.), but at least they got the concept artist to do the job for them and at least they came to clarify how they hated using AI during development, so i'll let this one slide for now, AS LONG they won't use it again in the future titles and speaking of which...
Come to think of this, they're not doubling down on genAI (as i said before) and people at Sandfall are truly passionate devs who care about their game. So.. they're not Larian or Bethesda, so... they are really good people who want to escape from a hellish AAA empire and make their own projects and show them how it's done and it worked, so they're really are independent (if counting hundreds of people who worked on E33). So after all this minor misinformation and fallout, i can see why this was a mistake and we've overreacted a bit and we see they're not bad people and they're ain't technically hypocritical (if the articles are confusing to believe), so i can believe them and i may owe them an apology since they're Anti-AI for now and i think i may get my hands on E33 sometime in the future, don't expect much, lol.
And while there's still no official statement yet, but i guess this Q&A will do if not better, but if the final piece should've stayed at launch, we wouldn't be dealing with this fiasco since using genAI asset was a bad taste for them. Still sucks they got disqualified at IGA for this, whoops. :v
If anything like if this is gonna change your mind then... yeah, you can play Expedition 33 since there's no genAI assets anywhere after patch so... that was a relief at first, and if you're still burnt from all the drama from Sandfall and all the chaos mentioned before this was spred, then you don't have to play it, there are plenty of JRPGs that will excite you like Xenoblade Chronicles, Final Fantasy VI/VII, Chrono Trigger, Tales of Symphonia, Persona 4/5, The Last Story or NieR:Automata™, even indies like Sea of Stars, Ikenfell, Deltarune, In Stars and Time, and especially the upcoming Threads of Time, these games are worth playing too made by creative/passionate game devs who love working on their game. Despite everything we kinda had it rough and we're still reeling from it.
So, Sandfall, you've may have gotten a rough time, but i respect you, just keep doing creative works without using genAI in future titles, gonna keep my eyes on you from here on out.
Okay, i'm done talking about E33 for now, i'm tired. XD
I'm off the hook for now, take care, support human artists and Merry Christmas!
Hope 2026 won't be shittier than 2020 n' 2025.
So uh..... i thought about writing this before The Game Awards but i'm kinda late for the party and this isn't a review on Clair Obscur: Expedition 33, i never played it but i'm just gonna spill out something that's been brought up before the patch kicked in just quickly at launch, and... look, i don't think E33 is bad, don't get me wrong! I think it's a beautiful masterpiece with all it's passion put in to it with colorful characters, great worldbuilding, evolved gameplay and the story is pretty wholesome n' heartwrenching to see. And above all JRPGs... this is a step-forward from any JRPGs and it was made for only $10M in a low budget as Godzilla Minus One and it even won Game of the Year and this is evidence that a video game doesn't need that high of a budget to make a best experience as the marketing make ya think and i hope more studios n' indies will take notes from this to improve their game even more!
But aside from all the greatness n' hype about Expedition 33, i uh... i kinda hesitated to play it because there's some hiccups pointed out that there was an AI placeholder asset pandered in either during development or at launch and... yeah... this is problematic that they crossed the line with this one out and this is also a bigger punch one of us couldn't forget, i mean... the screenshot doesn't lie. but all of that was patched out with real drawn newspapers, that a relief fix but still... there's a line, there isn't an official statement, no frequent answers, nothing, they just stayed silent after the patch and this is gonna bring up bigger questions than ever and not only that this is some kind of disrespect to any artists who worked on this. OH. Speaking of which... The concept art was found around ArtStation already exist and they think it's difficult to draw newspapers, then hire an artist who did the reference/concept so it would be no problem (they also use placeholders they find from other sources without ai via shapes, bitmaps, etc.) or especially use a different engine like Godot which it's free so there isn't any ai asset pack leftover in stores in unreal/epic, but damn... they just fumbled the ball this deep and this is much harder to forget.
Look... Sandfall team, i know you guys took development on this game since 2019, i get that you're new and escaped from Ubisoft to make your own passonate project based on France with a concept n' prototype and building up a team of people who cares and protect a big project you made in a cave (I'm referencing Iron Man, lol.) and i like how it turned out, but still, ya gotta keep using your human creativity on video games and pay the artist to get it done with their own reference or other sources rather than using or placing ai assets from unreal stores (i just don't get why people still use UE), also don't just quietly patch it and say nothing about it if people points out on it and move on without a guilt, ya gotta come out on this situation otherwise they'll push you harder cuz we have questions about it, i'm sorry but this doesn't work that way since one of you kinda done harm the environment and a lack of respect to a concept artist.
OH and there's also an article after a week ago stating that Sandfall is Anti-AI and will never use any AI junk in future titles, this made me chuckle because this doesn't bring the fact they've been caught using it themselves while working on this game. And then there was another article back in summer that they used some bits of AI. Hypocritical much...? I mean, pick one, are these guys Anti-AI or not...? If they used AI for other visuals across some places in the game and not just placeholders, are you guys trying to keep damaging the environment and not hire other artists to work it out??? This is... this is really confusing because i can't with the fact think if one of the devs or producers even care about making art without a machine learning hellfire that does damage to life on earth that most evil companies (especially USA) uses to screw themselves. And i can see why i was not surprised about the sweep winning several awards at TGA overshadowing Hollow Knight: Silksong, Hades 2 and Death Stranding 2 taking the gold home, i mean Best Art Direction doesn't cut it because of what i said before the last few segments ago for disrespecting the concept artists and Best Indie Game/Debut which if i remember this correctly there were like hundreads of people working on E33 and not 30+ so that doesn't even count as an indie game, eh... Game Awards is so controversal at times, especially Geoff.
After all the research n' sources i've rolled around throughout this post, i am definitely downright never playing this game... Look, i don't want to sound bidder about it and could take a wrong turn when bringing this up, i wanted to play this game when i heard hype and praise about it, i really did, but after what i saw... i'm still not even sure and i don't want to waste money and i still have to think harder when major red flags comes around when it comes to critically acclaimed video games.
I can't really speak more about this cuz i'm super tired, so if one of you are upset and even found out, then don't play Expedition 33 at all, one of us felt cheated and betrayed and i understand you've been burnt before and wanted a good game without any AI stuff pandered in, well... you can find something else to play that's worth your time or there's similarity to Expedition 33 then i would likely go with The Last Story (exclusively on the Wii if you have one), Final Fantasy 7 or 15, NieR:Automata™, or Metaphor: ReFantazio. That's all i can give it to ya from here n' out at least.
Well, i'll wrap this up for now, y'all have a good day and remember... support human artists.
People have been asking this question, are you tired of unskippable ads, sponsors, blatant designs and everything else that makes you miserable you can't escape from? welp... me too.
Y'know what, i'm taking you back in time introducing... "Project VORAPIS (V3)" and "StarTube", It's a classic youtube experience mixed with an extension and a userscript seperated that you can use right now, i would say between 2012-2017 if it's stable enough to get that true experience of classic Youtube without that overblown ads spreading around the site as uBlock detected there aren't much and that's a life saver not to use up all that data that can break the site (if you stay there too long), and there are some customizable settings for V3 and StarTube that you can switch between themes you would prefer (either Stargazer, Aozora, Cosmic/Epic Panda or Hitchhiker), i use Hitchhiker Late 2013 cuz i have a 1080p laptop so this one's right for me and it can just be me as well the more i get comfortable with it and with those themes the Homepage is much less bloated and more catagorized and i really missed that feature that YT had the balls to remove, you can tinker the theme with Topbar, Player, Watch/Channel Page, etc. if you'd like especially with Dark Mode on V3 in case the white background hurts your eyes, that's pretty much it and i wish i could say more about it.
Although, i wouldn't say it's perfect, there are some bugs that can break the site especially with the player and the description section, so you might wanna send feedback for them to fix one of those kinks and look forward for future updates from here and out.
Overall, it's an excelent extension/userscript combination, if you wanna go back in time to re-live classic Youtube, the link is down below and give these people who made these projects support, they truly needed kudos! <3
https://vorapis.pages.dev/
https://github.com/lightbeam24/StarTube
Oh and... uh... delete your Youtube app on your phone (if you have your Android phone at least) and stick with alternative frontend ones with no problem at all.
I'm just making the journal about Nintendo's current state right now and it's getting much worse. Every since the Switch 2 announcement and the direct... if there were enough games for me to play exclusively like Kirby Air Riders and Splatoon Raiders (by 2026), i would get the Switch 2 by Christmas, but now... i'm not so sure.
I mean... after everything i've seen so far, the high-prices has gotten out of hands including the DLCs and... the Virtual Boy nobody asked for, turning games into digital keys rather than in physical copies we owned, they bricked the Switch 2 making the console mod-proof, the union that led to an employe getting fired, the leadership doesn't understand their own audiences at all, they keep on filing lawsuits on emulators, smash tournaments, fan-games, etc. and the unhealthy culture they put through after Iwata's death and Reggie's exit they used to put a healthy relationship with their audiences and the brand. I don't think i could get my hands on a Switch 2, not now...
Back in my day, we had the new generation Nintendo re-shaped since 2004-2006, we had the Wii, the DS (+DSI/3DS), every all impress matter! All special thanks to Satoru Iwata and Reggie Fils-Amié "The true faces of Nintendo" these are the guys that re-shaped the whole company after Reggie fighting off to put Metroid Prime Demo bundled on the DS and Wii Sports bundled on the Nintendo Wii and it blew up earning their new audiences in the game, and especially Iwata showed he have a heart being a game dev and a gamer as a president of Nintendo and this hits really hard! As i think about them... they remind me of Steve Jobs from Apple Inc. when re-shaping the whole company with a mind of innovation, these two companies were the two sides of the same coin, y'know what i mean, lol...! Oh... getting off-track, um... they gave us the best games and the best consoles (for the most part) and handhelds in the family we could never take eyes off and put down especially upgrading the DS to a DSI and 3DS which are the memorable handhelds to date right up there with PSPs! Alright back to Iwata and Reggie, they keep on showing up and advertisements, directs and special announcements like... did y'all see the 3DS trailers, the Smash Bros trailer they clash into each other and especially the E3 trailer when they turned into muppets to tease the next Star Fox game and... and... DID Y'ALL SEE REGGIE'S LAZER EYES?!?! They are having fun at Nintendo, i miss those shenanigans...! But right after that... everything just starts to crumble when Iwata hit with cancer he took a leap of absense until July 2015 he passed away, it was such a shocking news to see him ill the same way Jobs had that same punch back in 2011, two legendary presidents lost their lives while leaving new leaderships turned to the worse... Reggie also stepped down following up with Doug Bowser to take his place.
Things aren't the same without these two guys, if they're still around they'd still have an healthy culture with their fans but as Reggie said during Nintendo's union that this isn't the Nintendo that he left and... he was right... this isn't the same company we knew and love, leaving us with with a bunch of business weesels compared to EA, Activision and Ubisoft but even worse, i just don't understand what's wrong with the gaming industry anymore. Xbox is still jerking themselves off, Playstation is still winning by doing absolutely nothing (with a few bangers at least), and Nintendo took their mask off and becoming greedy as ever likely as Modern Disney after all the price increases, lawsuits, digital licensing, mistreatment, every single anti-consumer practices they kick in is utterly pathetic as hell and they're making us pay them we don't own is just... just... AAAAAAGH...!!! >_<;
After all this... i'm still gonna skip out on the Switch 2, i thought this was a PS2/Wii treatment but... nope, it's just PS3 and Xbox One treatment all over again... I don't know if they're gonna turn this around after Doug retires by the end of the year to make some changes with their games n' consoles for their fans... i don't know... i miss the way Nintendo were when they were legendary, i miss the old Nintendo days, i miss Iwata, i miss Reggie, i even miss the Wii n' DS days they put the heart for their own audiences, bringing the magic to a right direction, but now that magic is gone.
Yes, i'm sharing this here, go support GLITCH, Dana Terrace and her team for making this pilot! <3