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Dinurth posted:Few quick knee-jerk things (I'll add more when I have more time). Photo's gone, but isn't on the .doc CV I send out. I've fiddled a bit but I don't really know what to do with the rest, I'll add that I've done PM training at IBM, the certificates show on LinkedIn. I might drop my temp stint with Sega since that overlaps with my master's degree so I don't need to explain the gap. If I could go back to the PC role with Sony I would, or the PM role that I should have been able to work towards if I could have stayed (video services hit saturation and I was a contractor so I wasn't renewed) so I'd like to leverage what I did there into a field I like, there's games and the broadcasters and devs I interacted with as part of that Sony role. It's similar to what I had at Frontier where I was working between teams, solving problems, being the guy who knows who you need to talk to, who's busy, who's free. Edit: answering my own question, I've filled out more details on my production team role with Frontier. BizarroAzrael fucked around with this message at 23:41 on Jun 24, 2020 |
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Jun 24, 2020 23:37
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BizarroAzrael posted:Photo's gone, but isn't on the .doc CV I send out. So I think what you have overall is pretty good here, it would be enough for me at least to give you a phone screen. What kind of jobs/seniority are you applying for - have you managed any phone screens?
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Jun 25, 2020 00:25
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devilmouse posted:Wait a second. There's an intermediary update missing here! Last the thread heard, you were going to talk to the CEO. Now it's been a month since you quit!? Oh yeah! I didn't give this thread an update but I will right now. (Also woah, I can literally go through the start of my posting in this thread and it's my entire career, that's scary amount of info, but ah well. Hope it helps someone if they care to look lol) So I ended up speaking to the CEO and the VP of Creative at my last company in hopes to try and change the work environment for the better. Unfortunately it seems they have no intention of getting rid of the people who I considered Bad Employees and basically your typical bullies, gatekeepers, and egotistical assholes. When I went to these higher-ups with my complaints it felt like this phrase both of them said to me which was insane to me: "I'm not shocked to hear this is happening, but I'm surprised to hear you've had to go through it. We're sorry."...and that's about it. No attempts at change, no attempts at solutions, no accountability for the people responsible for making it an unfriendly work environment. It's pretty sad because I had faith that things would change for the better, but they value these people that have been at the company for 5-12 years and they are essentially reliant on them because those individuals have made themselves indispensable to the company despite being complete assholes to the people around them on a daily basis. How they do this you might ask? Well it all revolves around nepotism. It seems at this company, if you're buddy buddy with the right people it doesn't matter how you act or how you treat your peers. And apparently this isn't the first time they've lost a good employee. When I left the lead animator sent me a message on LinkedIn and apologized and said "You're not the first talented artist we've lost because of all of this". It just made me realize that I made the right decision to leave. I could feel these leads and managers basically coercing me out of the company because I didn't jive with their nepotism and I wasn't just always a Yes man. They didn't like that I tried to innovate, they didn't like that I was ambitious and wanted more responsibility, I have a feeling they might've been intimidated or jealous by a newcomer like me? Who loving knows. I don't care anymore lol. It's just a shame honestly, because they're one of the few companies in Boston, and they know that. Most of these rear end in a top hat people that are sticking there, this company was their very first video game job. Which probably means they have no loving clue how a truly inclusive, fun, friendly, efficient, and diversified studio actually functions (I've been to a few that work really well!). This company's ethos described and aspired for all these good things (humbleness, inclusivity, diversity, etc) but they completely FAILED the CurtTest (lol wut) Oh also, when we transitioned to WFH I was able to get a weeks worth of work done in about 8-12 hours. Easy weeks. They are so inefficient and lazy it blew my mind, it felt like they wanted me to try and slow down lmfao. What a bunch of loving idiots. So I've started a corporation that's going to be a streaming and vod platform (think competitor to Twitch/Youtube Live/Mixer, etc). I've been planning it for the past few years and I just now finally have time to focus on it and make it come to fruition. After I quit my job I actually started doing a bunch of heavy duty housework for my goirlfriend's grandmother just to get exercise and sun and it's been AMAZING. I forgot how much I love working with my hands and creating things from barely anything. If anybody else has any questions let me know. Now that I'm out of the industry I'm a completely open book, even posted my salaries on twitter. Fuckit. For anybody curious this was my path through companies (I did a lot of freelance/contract work inbetween these) over 10ish years: Trion Worlds -> The Workshop Entertainment -> Gearbox Software -> Motiga -> Bungie -> Valkyrie Entertainment -> Harmonix Music -> quit the industry. Some of those companies were absolutely amazing, others were complete dogshit.  Fishbus posted:Holy smokes, i can't believe the last time i posted here was 7 years ago. I've been through 3 companies in that time. Hell yeah Fishbus!!! Welcome to the funemployed gang  it's a blast isn't it? Finally so much time to focus on the stuff we love doing. I mean, I used to love making video games, but my god there are some awful awful fuckers in this industry (as I know there are in any industry). Don't get me wrong there are some truly friendly, talented, and humble people in this industry that I LOVE working alongside, but they are few and far inbetween because the loudest and most egotistical of the bunch are the most outspoken and represented. drat shame.
ceebee fucked around with this message at 14:59 on Jun 25, 2020 |
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Jun 25, 2020 14:19
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BizarroAzrael posted:Photo's gone, but isn't on the .doc CV I send out. I would mention some sort of development process. Did you manage sprints? Run a Kanban board? etc. You represented a video service team, and because of that you should be super explicit with other teams you worked with, especially if it involves Design or any of the other day to day dev teams. As an example, if I'm hiring for a Design Production role, and I have 10 resumes, I'm going to favor Design, Eng, Art over video services. This goes for publishing side roles as well, show that you've worked with marketing, etc. The largest issue I have with the PC entry is that it feels like a fairly generic description of production. Add some more personal history and pizzazz imo. Did you help deliver a huge project? Big E3 Trailers? I would also review the Interviewed bit. Interviewing is super messy and different at all companies, so it's not super relevant. Mentoring is good though.
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Jun 25, 2020 14:50
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I was just told by someone at Unity to talk to somebody else at Unity about something, but now Unity are saying I should be talking to Microsoft who will then talk to Unity, but I'm pretty sure what I'm supposed to be doing is talking to our IT who will talk to Microsoft who will talk to Unity who will then get back to Microsoft who will get back to IT who will get back to me. It's a great system. Truly stupendous.
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Jul 1, 2020 16:53
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more falafel please posted:I got my (manual) sit-stand riser and aeron-knockoff chair delivered when I had to get more devkits (there's 7 of them now) delivered. But my producer told me not to tell anyone else that I got my riser or chair, so I have to have it lowered whenever I'm on calls That seems nuts. In Germany it doesn't seem to be a hassle to get a doctor's note that says you need a standing desk and then your office gets you one, but maybe I've just been in a good environment.
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Jul 17, 2020 20:43
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cgeq posted:That seems nuts. In Germany it doesn't seem to be a hassle to get a doctor's note that says you need a standing desk and then your office gets you one, but maybe I've just been in a good environment. A lot of people in my office have them, but no one took them home for WFH. I had to get a bunch of devkits picked up from the office, so I asked if I could get my riser while they were at it.
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Jul 17, 2020 21:05
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Just bumping to see if anyone is aware of any production vacancies. I'm in the UK but will consider abroad, I'm sure it's all much the same just at the moment. I don't really want to put the word out that I'm looking on LinkedIn since people at my current employer will see. My last jobs have come from a reference though, so maybe I should just go for it?
BizarroAzrael fucked around with this message at 21:57 on Aug 20, 2020 |
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Aug 20, 2020 21:53
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BizarroAzrael posted:Just bumping to see if anyone is aware of any production vacancies. I'm in the UK but will consider abroad, I'm sure it's all much the same just at the moment. I don't really want to put the word out that I'm looking on LinkedIn since people at my current employer will see. My last jobs have come from a reference though, so maybe I should just go for it? Edit with more content, I know we spoke about things a few years ago now, we've grown a lot since then, especially since the Sumo acquisition. If you want to chat about it hit up my PMs. Akuma fucked around with this message at 11:22 on Aug 21, 2020 |
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Aug 21, 2020 11:13
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BizarroAzrael posted:Just bumping to see if anyone is aware of any production vacancies. I'm in the UK but will consider abroad, I'm sure it's all much the same just at the moment. I don't really want to put the word out that I'm looking on LinkedIn since people at my current employer will see. My last jobs have come from a reference though, so maybe I should just go for it? Since production means a different thing in basically other company, can you clarify exactly what responsibilities you're looking for? We've had a few PM reqs open, but they're on the central/publishing arm rather than the game studios arm of the company.
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Aug 24, 2020 10:57
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SweetBro posted:Since production means a different thing in basically other company, can you clarify exactly what responsibilities you're looking for? We've had a few PM reqs open, but they're on the central/publishing arm rather than the game studios arm of the company. That actually sounds really good for me, for my last job I spent 3 years as a project coordinator with Sony, so I was dealing with comms with loads of external partners. I was also handling raising bugs and tasks, did the standups and sprint planning sessions, liaised with other teams like business development, established work priorities, maintained documentation. I sort of acted as first line support for queries to the team and represented them to everyone else.
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Aug 24, 2020 12:55
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BizarroAzrael posted:That actually sounds really good for me, for my last job I spent 3 years as a project coordinator with Sony, so I was dealing with comms with loads of external partners. I was also handling raising bugs and tasks, did the standups and sprint planning sessions, liaised with other teams like business development, established work priorities, maintained documentation. I sort of acted as first line support for queries to the team and represented them to everyone else. Cool. I'll DM you the link to our posting. As a note, I'm just a developer so I have no influence on the hiring process, though I will note that the particular reqs I'm sending you have been open for over a year now. In other words so long as you're remotely qualified you're likely to get the job. The caveat is that they will probably expect you to eventually relocate to somewhere around SF.
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Aug 24, 2020 15:22
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I'm getting a call later in the week from a studio about a QA leadership position, not an interview I don't think just the initial conversation I assume with HR. Thing is they listed another role I think I'd like to be considered for and is probably better paying etc. Should I just forget about it, contact them about my interest, raise it in that conversation?
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Oct 5, 2020 14:37
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The hardest part of getting a job often is just getting to talk to someone, so sure, take the call, and then say "hey I don't want this job, I want that job". It's worth a shot.
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Oct 5, 2020 15:07
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TooMuchAbstraction posted:The hardest part of getting a job often is just getting to talk to someone, so sure, take the call, and then say "hey I don't want this job, I want that job". It's worth a shot. Well the original QA position was poverty wages so I said I was more interested in their release manager job. For some reason despite having read my CV they felt they needed to explain that ACTUALLY pay in games QA is that much lower. They say to apply to that and reject it two days later. No feedback, because of course there isn't. I'm really not in a good place, I saw a listing go up fresh for a new studio, I apply about 5 days later after someone senior I know there blanks my reaching out to them on Linkedin first, less than a fortnight later the person I tried to contact sends me the email saying they already interviewed and filled the position! It's galling to have worked in this industry so long and it count for so little.
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Oct 20, 2020 15:51
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Anyone in the UK looking for a QA job, of any level? If so, hit me up via PMs or let me know in here if you don't have em!
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Feb 11, 2021 12:00
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How cautious should I be if I'm considering a job offer from a startupand am leaving an existing full-time position? It's the sort of thing I want to be doing and it's a full-time position with better money than I currently get, but I have a mortgage now and though I'd like to believe it's not a great risk like that, I can't ignore it. They've actually made a couple of games over the last decade, nothing huge but they''ve kept going. Would be nice if there were just something I could point at and tell my dad it's fine. I can ask mutuals about them over LinkedIn but I figure I had best be careful about what I say about it.
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Feb 25, 2021 00:36
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"What is the company's current runway?"
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Feb 25, 2021 00:41
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BizarroAzrael posted:How cautious should I be if I'm considering a job offer from a startupand am leaving an existing full-time position? It's the sort of thing I want to be doing and it's a full-time position with better money than I currently get, but I have a mortgage now and though I'd like to believe it's not a great risk like that, I can't ignore it. They've actually made a couple of games over the last decade, nothing huge but they''ve kept going. Would be nice if there were just something I could point at and tell my dad it's fine. A startup but they've been going for a decade? Sounds like they are doing better than 90% of small game studio startups. Also what mutata said.
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Feb 25, 2021 00:50
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Also, I would want to know how much of payroll is tied to one project at a given time. If most of the devs are on one project and it loses funding, they probably need to lay people off to keep the lights on. If no more than say, 1/3 is on one project, it's much easier to shuffle people around or sign short term work.
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Feb 25, 2021 02:09
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I think this is their first time expanding beyond the founders and some contract artists. It sounds like they have investors, and I know they are well connected in the industry and established. Edit; there's actually multiple projects of varying scale. It's okay to ask how long they can survive without external income? BizarroAzrael fucked around with this message at 02:13 on Feb 25, 2021 |
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Feb 25, 2021 02:10
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BizarroAzrael posted:I think this is their first time expanding beyond the founders and some contract artists. It sounds like they have investors, and I know they are well connected in the industry and established. I mean, they're asking you to trust that they won't leave you high and dry.
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Feb 25, 2021 02:39
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BizarroAzrael posted:I think this is their first time expanding beyond the founders and some contract artists. It sounds like they have investors, and I know they are well connected in the industry and established. That is what "runway" means and it is a perfectly valid and expected question. How long can the company continue to make payroll with zero revenue? How much money is in the bank and what is the plan for it? When and how will revenue begin? Hard numbers please.
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Feb 25, 2021 02:45
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I answer questions about this all the time in interviews. Candidates will hem and haw about how to ask about our finances and I have a pretty standard way of talking about it. "here's where our money is coming from, here are are investors, they're involved like this, if everything went south today and we stopped making any revenue, here's how long we'd be in business, here's the contingency plans in that case, here's what I worry about re: stability, here's what I don't worry about re: stability" If they won't give you some version of the above, be very dubious no matter how connected / well-known they are.
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Feb 25, 2021 16:42
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I do the informal chat section of the interview, and stability comes up a lot. The anecdote I use is how last January one of our major projects lost its publisher suddenly, and the mood in the meeting was "dang, I hope we still get to make that. Well, back to work" because there was never the slightest bit of danger that we would have to lay people off. We ended up resigning that project with another publisher, but that was after 6 months. We kept a skeleton crew working on new content for it to tweak the pitch direction, and shuffled everyone else to paying projects. I wouldn't want to hitch my wagon to a company that I couldn't trust to still be working for in a year or two, especially if they're asking me to move to a new city.
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Feb 25, 2021 17:19
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devilmouse posted:I answer questions about this all the time in interviews. Candidates will hem and haw about how to ask about our finances and I have a pretty standard way of talking about it. This is exactly what I'm looking for when I bring it up in interviews. I've found that most companies will offer this info to candidates they are serious about and if they don't have that info or are unwilling to share it then that's good info to have (eg pass).
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Feb 25, 2021 17:28
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I start every interview by asking what the first game they ever played was and intellectually it makes total sense that this would be the case but the answers have become more and more recent to today when some kid said Tom Clancy's Rainbow Six Vegas and I was not prepared for it.
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Apr 16, 2021 18:46
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Akuma posted:I start every interview by asking what the first game they ever played was and intellectually it makes total sense that this would be the case but the answers have become more and more recent to today when some kid said Tom Clancy's Rainbow Six Vegas and I was not prepared for it. I think alley cat. gently caress the dogfood level. I've literally always been bad at stealth games. 
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Apr 16, 2021 19:04
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I literally can't remember but the first videogame I remember playing was a janky Commodore 64 port of Donkey Kong. I remember being really confused when other versions of the game I saw didn't have the pie factory level.
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Apr 16, 2021 20:25
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My first game ever was definitely Donkey Kong, but I played it with an old Atari Joystick but in my memory it had the arcade graphics. When I look at the atari ports of donkey kong, they don't look as good, but now I can't remember for sure if it actually looked better or if I just altered my memory when I saw donkey kong again later on as a child. The same atari joysticks work in a few different consoles so its hard to know for sure what system I played it on.
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Apr 16, 2021 20:32
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The first video game I ever played was SMB1/Duck Hunt, followed closely by Jaws for NES, at a friends house, when I was like 5. I didn't really understand controllers, though, so "played" may be a strong term.
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Apr 16, 2021 20:33
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Akuma posted:I start every interview by asking what the first game they ever played was and intellectually it makes total sense that this would be the case but the answers have become more and more recent to today when some kid said Tom Clancy's Rainbow Six Vegas and I was not prepared for it. Nodding and grinning as they say "Rainbow Six" expecting it to be followed by "Rogue Spear" or something fading into existential horror at "Vegas".
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Apr 16, 2021 20:42
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DancingMachine posted:Nodding and grinning as they say "Rainbow Six" expecting it to be followed by "Rogue Spear" or something fading into existential horror at "Vegas". The fact that people are answering it in here it's great, it's a good ice breaker and a fun conversation. TooMuchAbstraction they don't all have the pie factory level?? Edit: oh I remember another one, I also ask how they got into programming and last year somebody said Roblox and I fell out of my chair Somebody asked me that back today and I said my start was doom mods in 1993 and she gave me this smile that made me feel 100 years old despite a lot of people in here probably thinking this makes me the youngster Akuma fucked around with this message at 21:03 on Apr 16, 2021 |
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Apr 16, 2021 20:57
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Akuma posted:I start every interview by asking what the first game they ever played was and intellectually it makes total sense that this would be the case but the answers have become more and more recent to today when some kid said Tom Clancy's Rainbow Six Vegas and I was not prepared for it. Something similar; one of the last questions I always ask is "What's your favorite game of all time and why in 3 words". Pretty sure my first game was River Raid on the Atari 2600. Anyway - actual game job related - I'm looking for a mid-senior level Producer. If you are one, or know one, hit me up!
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Apr 16, 2021 20:59
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Dinurth posted:Something similar; one of the last questions I always ask is "What's your favorite game of all time and why in 3 words". A co-worker of mine had a cool Chrono Trigger tattoo so I told him "that's my second favorite game of all time!" to which he asked "what's your favorite?" To which I said, "Dark Souls!". And then he said "oh, you're one of those" which gave me a weird vibe. :|
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Apr 16, 2021 21:08
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It is right and good to shun anyone who says their favorite game is Dark Souls and not Demon's Souls 
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Apr 16, 2021 21:56
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ZombieApostate posted:It is right and good to shun anyone who says their favorite game is Dark Souls and not Demon's Souls On PS3
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Apr 16, 2021 22:07
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Akuma posted:TooMuchAbstraction they don't all have the pie factory level?? The NES one sure doesn't! It has the zigzag ladder section, then the level with elevators, then the one where you remove rivets, then it repeats.
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Apr 16, 2021 22:13
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So I should look forward to 10-15 years from now when my current 8 year old responds, "Pokemon Leaf Green" and blows someone mind? (I was working on an iOS Emulator when they were old enough to start to play games.)
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Apr 17, 2021 00:32
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No, it's gonna be something worse, like Pokemon Go.
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Apr 17, 2021 00:40
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