I thought the game looked ok, but why would I pay $70 for a game that can disappear from my library whenever Ubisoft feels like it? They’ve demonstrated that they’re willing to permanently take games away from paying customers, so I’m not willing to spend more than the cost of a rental on one of their games.

Probably my biggest piece of advice is to use cruise control (if you have it) and go a tiny bit slower than the general flow of traffic, like 1-2 mph. Don’t be a pylon, but stick with the flow of traffic and lean toward letting others pass you. Generally avoid driving aggressively because following closely or making frequent passes is stressful and tiring, which adds up quickly on long drives. Take your time, relax, and enjoy it.

Speaking of the enshittification of YouTube, the TV app update from a week or two ago has been a life saver. When I look at my subscriptions now, all new content is hidden by a row of months-old shorts. I know there’s new stuff down below, but I can only see the top edge of the thumbnail, so I never see anything that would encourage me to impulse watch. I pretty much have to seek out specific videod or find them around the internet like the old days. It’s been pretty nice, actually.

I actually enjoyed the first two Crew games and probably would have checked out Motorfest by now if they didn’t remove the first game from my library. But now, why should I ever buy another Ubisoft game when I don’t know how long they’ll bless me with the ability to play the games I’ve paid for? They even included expiration dates for their game keys and they’re acting like those dates were completely meaningless. So, even if they try to add an end of life date for future purchases, how would I know they’re not lying like they did with these original keys?

Worst weekly drop in only 5 years? Buckle up, we’re not stopping until we set the 100 year record!

I don’t really care for them anymore. I think they’re still very well crafted games from a passionate team, but I haven’t really felt great about a FF game since 10. Ignoring the MMOs:

12 was decent but the story was pretty dry in the first half and Vaan was just not a compelling protagonist at all.

13 was reasonably fun to play after finding the “rhythm” I think they intended from the combat, but I never loved the story or any of the characters aside from Sazh.

15 had a lot of potential in the story, I actually liked the “dudes on a road trip” concept, but that awful sword hanging mechanic was always so unreliable that it eventually killed my progress in its tracks.

After that, I skipped 16 entirely.

The 7 sequel was actually really good, but everything I liked about it came directly from the original or built on top of it in a transparent way. The spooky ghosts and action combat were changes I strongly disliked and endured just to see the extended original story, but I thought they were huge steps back. It was a very good game that constantly had me wishing they just stuck to expanding the original story which is plenty convoluted on its own.

I still haven’t played the 7 sequel part 2, but I expect I’ll feel pretty much the same - in awe of the world and expanded story but constantly annoyed by spooky ghosts and mediocre action combat.

I really think the 7 sequels show that the Final Fantasy franchise has a place in the modern JRPG scene, but they would benefit from a return to form. I’d love to see the next FF game sporting a fast paced Persona-style turn based combat system combined with maybe an Akira-style dystopian techno-futuristic setting. All the parts are in there somewhere, they just need to figure out how to put them together in the right order.