Also, not an ad block, but in the world of content blocking I really like "shut up" which removes comments from news sites, YouTube, and the like. Great for sanity.

If you don’t sign off pissed at the world and hoping for a meteor strike, where you even really on the internet?

Meteor Strike is coincidentally the Baba is You level I had the most trouble with. (Other than The Return of Scenic Pond which I literally don't know how I solved).

Also, not an ad block, but in the world of content blocking I really like "shut up" which removes comments from news sites, YouTube, and the like. Great for sanity.

If you don’t sign off pissed at the world and hoping for a meteor strike, were you even really on the internet?

What’s the best ad block these days? Is it still uBlock?

I use that along with Firefox’s default Facebook killer.

I'm using Ka-Block most of the time. If I'm using a more cooperative browser I also will install privacy badger.

Also, not an ad block, but in the world of content blocking I really like "shut up" which removes comments from news sites, YouTube, and the like. Great for sanity.

I use Duck Duck Go, for the record.

I use that along with Firefox’s default Facebook killer.

As does everywhere else...

No Ads on Switch.

No Ads on PS4 or PS3 dashboard.

No Ads when I open a game from GOG. You can even set Steam to never display popups and go straight to your library.

The Xbox is the only place where you have to see Ads. Unless you count the product placement in Death Stranding :-p

I'm only half joking. I honestly don't think of them as ads at all. Ads to me are annoying things that pop up telling me I should get male enhancement or a new set of clogs while surfing the internet. If I'm on my Xbox to play games and the xbox tells me there is a weekend sale on a game and it shows me what game it is? That's amazing to me. I never would have known otherwise and I have played games that I normally never would have bought and played otherwise.

These sort of notifications (or "ads") I lump up with every other notification that Xbox tells me about. Game finished downloading? Thanks Xbox. Movie clip finishing uploading? Thanks Xbox. A favorited friend is online? Thanks Xbox!

Ads to me are unwanted and usually random companies telling me that I should buy their product for no reason other than my heart is beating. Xbox is a gaming platform that is telling you there are cheap games or brand new games to be bought if you want them.

But I guess you are a purest so everything that I just said doesn't mean anything to you. So, carry on your merry way.

Something does not cease to be an ad because you personally find it interesting, and that way lies the defense of every modern tech company that takes your privacy away and sells it to the highest bidder while claiming they are doing you a favor by making ads "more relevant."

Yeah, but there are a heck of a lot advertisements out in the world and I'm not even talking about the electronic or billboard version. People are walking advertisements, and I don't even mean what is on their clothing, I mean how they wear their clothing is advertising their body. That is just one example. Advertisements don't have to be something that sells you something. If I could "ad block" half the women on the street with their *** hanging out I would. Is that a violation of my privacy? No, I chose to walk outside. Yeah, yeah, I know independent people vs corporations.

I guess to get off my tangent, I treat everything on a scale because nothing is black and white in the world. Ads either help me or annoy me, that is my personally opinion. I choose to label "ads" as things that annoy me. I was specifically talking to Cody to say that there are many "ads" on the Xbox, but most of the time, personally, they are notifications to me because I am glad that Xbox told me there is a sale on or a game just came out.

"Stealing privacy" is another bag of worms we could get into but that's a larger issue that wasn't my original point.

Of course there’s no ads on Bing. It would be like putting a billboard at the bottom of the ocean.

Heh, It's a shame really. Bing is way better than Google.

They give you the exact same results, but I personally like the Bing UI much better.

Plus they pay you for using it, I haven't paid for Xbox Gold or Gamepass since 2011 lol, I just get it with Bing rewards points.

There are probably more examples I can't think of right now, but my point should be clear with that much.

Yes none of that is good, but these examples would go away if their respective games were simply exclusives forever. I don't really see the problem with traditional exclusives (Last of Us 2 is only on PS4 for example).

I'm bummed Tell Me Why isn't on Playstation, but not bummed enough to go buy an Xbox.

The only bit of exclusivity I've seen hurt gaming has come through Destiny:

I can't think of a single "partial exclusivity" deal that wasn't terrible for players.

I'm just not really that familiar with other partial exclusivity deals.

Well, tell me if any of this sounds good for players.

Timed exclusive DLC. (Map packs for Call of Duty)

Timed exclusive in-game content. (Guns and missions in Destiny)

Timed exclusive games. (Tomb Raider on XB1, Yakuza on Series X, FF7R on PS4)

Permanent exclusive in game content. (Missions in Assassin's Creed)

There are probably more examples I can't think of right now, but my point should be clear with that much.

Just speculate: if a AAA game costs 1 unit to develop (let's call it 50 people full time for 3 years, whatever, 150 man-years), is it like a 10% effort to do what you (and BlackTiger) have described? Like, 1 unit to make on XBox, 1.05 units to port to PC, 1.15 units to port to PS, 1.20 units to port to switch).

Just some napkin math here, but a quick google indicates the development cost of Destiny was around $140M. If it’s 5% more to port a game to another platform that’s $7M! In reality though, the cost to port to another platform isn’t that simple to calculate. Depending on the game, relying on platform-specific features might significantly speed up development time and it’s much more likely to have a big impact on smaller games than it does on larger games. Maybe it’s like 5% more for a AAA game, but for an indie it might be 25%-50% for example. Something like Unreal engine can smooth out the cross-platform differences but it requires a engine-specific knowledge rather than general programming knowledge and making the engine do what your game needs to do might be more difficult than just writing your own engine code depending on the game.

(I could also run a proxy filter on the edge of my network to block the Game console ads, if we want to start making these sorts of loopholes).

The only bit of exclusivity I've seen hurt gaming has come through Destiny:

I can't think of a single "partial exclusivity" deal that wasn't terrible for players.

I'm just not really that familiar with other partial exclusivity deals.

Just want to pause here on the irony of enlisting this name in your argument against supporting companies that are putting ads into your experience…

Are you sure about that? There's this invention called an ad blocker. Try one sometime. I whitelist NOTHING.

As does everywhere else...

No Ads on Switch.

No Ads on PS4 or PS3 dashboard.

No Ads when I open a game from GOG. You can even set Steam to never display popups and go straight to your library.

The Xbox is the only place where you have to see Ads. Unless you count the product placement in Death Stranding :-p

I'm only half joking. I honestly don't think of them as ads at all. Ads to me are annoying things that pop up telling me I should get male enhancement or a new set of clogs while surfing the internet. If I'm on my Xbox to play games and the xbox tells me there is a weekend sale on a game and it shows me what game it is? That's amazing to me. I never would have known otherwise and I have played games that I normally never would have bought and played otherwise.

These sort of notifications (or "ads") I lump up with every other notification that Xbox tells me about. Game finished downloading? Thanks Xbox. Movie clip finishing uploading? Thanks Xbox. A favorited friend is online? Thanks Xbox!

Ads to me are unwanted and usually random companies telling me that I should buy their product for no reason other than my heart is beating. Xbox is a gaming platform that is telling you there are cheap games or brand new games to be bought if you want them.

But I guess you are a purest so everything that I just said doesn't mean anything to you. So, carry on your merry way.

Something does not cease to be an ad because you personally find it interesting, and that way lies the defense of every modern tech company that takes your privacy away and sells it to the highest bidder while claiming they are doing you a favor by making ads "more relevant."

Ads to me are unwanted and usually random companies telling me that I should buy their product for no reason other than my heart is beating.

I've never, in my entire xbox existence ever seen an ad that wasn't a game ad.
Where did you even get that picture from?

Google.

Just want to pause here on the irony of enlisting this name in your argument against supporting companies that are putting ads into your experience…

The only bit of exclusivity I've seen hurt gaming has come through Destiny:

I can't think of a single "partial exclusivity" deal that wasn't terrible for players.

I want a future in which people choose platforms by preference (i.e. which controller, which games service, where friends are, etc) rather than exclusives. I know exclusives help get games funded, but I feel like exclusivity - while beneficial in some narrow scopes - has had an adverse impact on gaming in general.

The only bit of exclusivity I've seen hurt gaming has come through Destiny:

1. Exclusive content on one of the game's platforms despite no technical reason for this.
2. No interoperability of multiplayer between platforms.

But the irony is, neither of these would have been an issue if Destiny had say, been a PS4 exclusive in the first place.