Category Archives: Lets Talk
Will Grand Theft Auto 6 Be the Best Video Game Ever?
What an image? Grand Theft Auto 6. I never thought the day would come. Seriously. Guys I beat Grand Theft Auto 5 on my Xbox 360 my freshman year of college. I beat that game so long ago I hadn’t even met my wife yet. Needless to say, I’ve been waiting for this one. I’m not much of an online multiplayer guy. So I beat the main campaign and didn’t fool around much with the online modes of the game. Meaning, GTA 5’s DLC didn’t really do much for me. With all that in mind, it’s safe to say Grand Theft Auto 6 is one of my, and I’m sure many others as well, most anticipated games of all time. So honor Grand Theft Auto 6, here’s 6 questions I have going into the reveal trailer.
#1 Will Rockstar Keep an Emphasis on Story Mode.
This may sound weird. How many people actually play the games for the single player story mode experience? Prior to Grand Theft Auto 5, I feel like the notion was no one actually beats the campaign. They treat the game like the ultimate sandbox world that it is. If you advanced in the story it was just to unlock other parts of the game map. Then, when 5 came around, people flocked to the multiplayer. Yet, I played through and beat 4 and 5. I loved both campaigns. GTA 5 was groundbreaking in my opinion with how you could switch between 3 different characters, pretty seamlessly, too. My minds been racing for a decade on how they could top the three way character dynamic of Grand Theft Auto 5’s single player experience.
#2 Will We Have the Return of Character Swapping
With that said, will Rockstar make a triumph return to the 3 character option? Or will the story mode be a more traditional one main character story? To me, a single main character is not a deal breaker. Though, I do wonder if they’ll try to push the boundaries and say do 6 characters or something wild. I’m sure there’s a sweet spot to the number of characters they would want you actively juggling between. Either way, I’m interested to see what they come up with.
#3 Where Will the Game Be Located?
When I saw the teaser image I assumed the location would be Vice City or back to Los Santos. Honestly, I was hoping for a new location. However, considering I got my start in Vice City, I would love to see an overhauled version of Vice City running on the latest hardware. So, if we aren’t getting a new location, I’m fine with revisiting Vice City.
#4 Will Old Main Characters Make A Return?
This is something I feel like they could do to help give this game “break the internet” levels of excitement. For example, will Tommy Vercetti be featured in Grand Theft Auto 6? Vice City was set sometime in the 80’s. When will 6 take place? Will any of the crew from Grand Theft Auto V be in the new game? Or will we get an entirely new cast?
#5 Will It Get a Nintendo Switch Version
Nintendo has a brand to uphold. Grand Theft Auto tends to be the furthest thing away from that brand. Still, the Switch finally did get a Grand Theft Auto game in the form of the Grand Theft Auto Trilogy. I never got around to playing this one, but I seem to remember people saying it wasn’t the best version of these games. With all that being said, will Rockstar and Nintendo strike up a working relationship to get the latest outing on Nintendo’s console.
#6 Will This Be The Best Game Ever?
A bit of a hyperbolic question, maybe. However, I think any generation of gamer over the last 20 years probably has a Grand Theft Auto game somewhere in their top 10. I know Grand Theft Auto IV was my favorite game for a long while. I assume Grand Theft Auto 6 will carry on that trend of being an industry standard for Rockstar. I think it’s safe to say the hype following Tuesday morning is going to be insane.
So if you’re into the Grand Theft Auto series maybe check out our Five Games That Did Open World Perfectly! Thank you guys for watching. Let us know if you’re excited for this one or any other games you’re eying
It’s been a while.
Last year was the best year in our blogs history. And I really wanted to build on that momentum. And while some stuff definitely happened, I still could have.
I actually got really bad sick on New Years. I was running a fever of at least 103 and shaking. And a few days later on January 4th, one of my best friends and co-workers died suddenly. It was easily the worst week of my life as an adult. And it seems shallow in comparison to those things, my graphics card in my computer died. So I’ve been without my computer for a while now. Hence, why videos and post have stopped. I really feel like the world doesn’t want it to work out. I went to record a digimon box opening and pulled the Omnimon Ghost Rare and then the SD card died.
It was a string of back luck that made me question doing all this side stuff. Maybe I should just focus on work and family. At the end of the day, I still enjoy blogging and recording, but the set backs are rough. Mostly because they require time or money I don’t have. I mean, getting a graphic card is not going to be cheap, so who knows when I’ll get my computer back.
I do have plans for some new blogs, but I’ll either have to do them on my phone or Jessica’s computer. Which I guess isn’t that big of a deal. I just really like editing these post on my computer. My phone is very much a 7 out of 10 experience.
Oh, well. If you’ve stayed following the blog after another month break, thank you for understanding! I want to announce something big tomorrow. So here’s to hoping I can actually pull it off.
That’s all for today. Have a great day!
Black Friday has Been Underwhelming…
I made a post a few days ago about how birthdays have lot their magic. This is a similar post. Black Friday was kind of boring. There were a lot sales. Don’t get me wrong. Yet I felt like none of the sales matched up with what I wanted to buy. For example, I wanted to buy the new Mario Party Super stars. Well, all the deals involved pre-owned copies, which I couldn’t find any pre owned copies. I tried to get Jessica Studio Ghibli films. The deal was buy 2 get the 3rd free. However, it was hard to find a 3rd one within my budget. I did give my mom some Christmas ideas based off those buy 2 get 1 free which was good.
I wanted to buy studio lights for my house. The deals for the ones in my budget were not great (like knocking 1 down from 80 bucks to 72 bucks.). The $999 one was marked to like 600 but I wasn’t ready to spend that money on a hobby. It was the same problem for a workout rack and bench. The deals on the ones I was comfortable spending just were not great.
Since Black Friday in person actually started on Friday this year, I didn’t really get to go shopping. I worked until 10 tonight. By the time I got to Walmart, there was nothing worth noting except the sale on Fire Emblem and Zelda BOTW, both I which I already owned.
Books A Million and Barnes and Noble completely let me down. I wanted to clean them out of some mangas, but they really aren’t running any good sales. Target probably had the best deal with some of their board games. They have Ticket to Ride and Settlers of Catan half priced. They have some other games on sale too that are worth checking out.
So yeah, there’s definitely deals to be had but a lot them were tough to make work out. I’ll be interested to see how the Cyber Monday sales go. Anyway thanks for reading and have a great night!
I Could Be A Minimalist- The Hobby of Collecting and The Burden of Consumerism.
I have been a prisoner of consumerism for years now like most of us. As someone who went to school for business and sustainability, I am well aware of this problem. I knew a day would come when I would care a little less about consumerism. As days go on, I get closer to that goal. The big reason is because I plan to move. I don’t want more clutter. I don’t want to blow my whole paycheck on comic books and video games. Another reason I am getting closer to being over the addiction of retail therapy is because I have started investing. (Currently, I have $1,600 invested since around January.).
I was okay with consumerism for about 4 years because it was new to me. It started with buying Elemental Hero Yugioh cards to build decks I wanted to as a kid. Than I moved in with my mom and found my N64 games and wanted to start collecting N64 games. Than Jessica took me to her brother’s comic book store and that awoken the trifecta. I was obsessed with card games, video games and comic books. And over a 3-5 year run, I built a collection I was truly happy with. When I pop in my copy of Pokemon Stadium 2, or when I see my Daredevil #2 on my shelf, or when I duel my wife in a card game, I am truly happy with where my collection is. The problem with collecting is that it never ends. Even when you are happy with where you are. Even when you complete your original goals. Even when your priorities change in life. I am still looking forward to new comics each week or the holiday games.
And yes. My collection is not insane. Though, I have probably hit that point where if I never added another game I could still probably never play every game in my collection. I thought that would be a wake up call but it wasn’t. That’s mostly because collecting and gaming are two different hobbies. The first one makes you excited you scored a new 3D platformer that you will play for the next 15 hours. The other makes you excited you added 20 O.G. Xbox games for a dollar a piece to your collection. So, who cares that there is no way I’ll ever play every Gamecube game I own? Who cares if I have no interest in the sports games I buy? It’s two different hobbies. Each are equally satisfying in my opinion.
I had an epiphany last week. A month or so ago I bought a copy of Skyward Sword on Switch for $60 dollars. I have played about 2 hours into it (I’m at the first dungeon.). Why haven’t I played more you ask? Because Pokemon Unite, a free to play MOBA, released in the same time window. So I have put countless hours into a Free to Play game and two hours into the game I have paid for. Something is not adding up. And this trend is pretty consistent right now. I have been playing Final Fantasy 15, a game I own, over Gamepass, a service I pay $10 a month for. My phone apps and my computer apps (Hearthstone, MTG Arena, and Bloon Tower Defense 6) are all free to play at this point. I’m playing a bunch of free games and not the ones I am putting money into. And with the way the Nintendo Switch is set up, I do not even need a T.V. to play on my Switch. Other apps I use like Pokemon Showdown are also free. Not to mention I am bumming streaming service accounts like HBO Max, Disney and Crunchyroll.
So being a gamer does not even have to be expensive in 2021. There’s my massive collection of backlog games, movies and comics that would keep me busy without having to spend another buck. And in the digital era, I don’t even have to own the clutter. Marvel comics can be bought on an app. Shoenen Jump has an app. Gamepass has hundreds of thousands of games on there for 9.99 a month. So why own this junk?
Because I like it. There’s a lot more to go into such as the fact I actually own my stuff. Digital properties are prone to being censored upon rerelease, being pulled from e-stores at any point, and the fact you do not own the assets. I like being in a house that is composed of my favorite things. Things that remind me of my childhood. Things that make me happy in a world that is generally depressing currently. I look forward to playing, reading and watching these things with my future kids and with my wife, Jessica. Jessica and I have game nights, movie nights and card nights all the time. We enjoy them.
However, space and time are two major things that are hard to get back when they are gone. And money I invest into my collection is money I cannot invest in my retirement. Those three factors heavily encourage me to slow down. Now, in a month I have added 6 Gamecube games to the collection, but I used store credit so my wallet did not feel as burdened by it. I am liking the strategy of using store credit to fund my hobby. I will continue to do that until space becomes a real issue.
So, at the end of the day, I could become a minimalist, but I probably wont until I absolutely have to. I will cut back on spending, definitely. But I still enjoy adding to my collections and chipping away at the goals. However, I am probably done spending hundreds of dollars on collectibles. For now. My money situation and life situation just make it to where it does not make sense. So I am not a prisoner to consumerism anymore. I am just enjoying life and trying to be smarter in all decision making moments. Surely, I will fail at times, but I am always improving.
PS3 Game Prices are going crazy! My thoughts.
I plan to do a more in-depth video later when I have more time. I’m sure most of you have heard about how the PS3 has gone crazy. A lot of my favorite Youtubers from Pete Dorr to SicCooper, from Radical Reggie to Metal Jesus have covered the topic. I did a little searching around eBay and some local game stores. I will continue to monitor my local game stores and update my thoughts.
In a not shell, 3 things happened. (Really 4, but mostly 3.). The first was Covid. This cannot be fully blamed even if some want to. People are at home still, but PS3 didnt spike last year. Nor did it spike during the unemployment checks of last year or the stimulus checks of this year. It may be playing a role now, but it is not to blame.
Secondly, and I think the biggest offender is Sony mentioning closing the PSN for the PS3. Check the dates, I think this was the biggest catalyst. Prices were probably trending up before, because, well that’s it goes in this hobby. But that is what throw the spotlight on the PS3. Pete tries to discount this because why would physical collectors care about digital sales. I think this grossly discounts 2 strong points. 1. It highlighted a lot of “must have” PS3 games. And what was different now about those videos than before, was people were actually looking (because of the Sony news). And 2. The threat of not being able to get patches for those games. Jessica and myself love the PS3 and we owned a lot of what we wanted (Ratchet and Clank, Red Dead, Fallout, Persona, etc), but with the PS3 thrusted into the limelight, we started looking for more out there games.
The third cause for all this is because the day has come where they arent easy to find at Gamestop. We checked our local Gamestop, they had maybe 10 PS3 games left. Sure, they are going to be everywhere if you know where to look. But they are no longer convenient. Theres a funny theory about Earthbound not being rare. It was never rare. It’s just one of those games collectors and the internet decided to turn into a myth. The same could be said for a lot of PS3 games right now. As very few are truly rare. However, when you go out, you arent going to see them anymore. At least, not nearly as much. Dont be surprised if games you were tripping over 2 years ago are considered rare now.
The 4th reason is one weve already talked about. Youtubers and bloggers rushing to tell you not to miss out. FOMO is one of the biggest influencers for people buying useless junk. I believe that is happening. Just 2 weeks ago it wasnt cool to collect for PS3, now I’m about to film a video highlighting my PS3 collection. Its just how things go.
So, that’s how we got here. Is it true PS3 games prices are crazy? Relatively speaking, possibly. But this is nothing compared to Gamecube collecting. I use Gamecube because that’s what I currently collecting for. When Covid hit, that changed everything. 10 dollar games I was putting off suddenly became 60 dollar games. From my personal experience Paper Mario and Chibi Robo are prime examples of how crazy it got. I refused to spend 60 on them just a year and half ago. Both of those games peaked out around 200 bucks. And you were lucky for retro game store to even have sports title. Everything was overpriced even if they were common. PS3 is no where near that. Retro game stores still have healthy sections that havent been raided or jacked up in prices. Maybe things are different here in the South? Ebay is certainly a lawless land. Games are doubling in price. May 3rd Sly 4 could be bought for about 30-40. Yesterday it sold for about 75-80. So avoid ebay at all cost until things quiet down.
So my thoughts are, things are mostly crazy online because theres always a fool online. Not necessarily in stores. If more fools come out easily parted with their cash, prices in person may go up as well. Until than, I dont really feel threatened down here where I am. Hopefully you guys have good hunting spots as well.
This is a topic I am interested in covering more down the road, so be on the look out. Let me know your thoughts down below. Thanks for reading and have a great day.
Should You Blog Every Day? Quality vs Quantity?
This is a question I ask myself often. I normally am reviewing anime and mangas and talking about video games. I do some top fives and other random stuff too. So that’s a run down of what I do here. I’ve attempted daily blogging before. My longest streak was about 40ish days. Outside of random streaks, I’m lucky to blog a few times a week. Sometimes I can go months without blogging. Today, let’s dive into the pros and cons of daily blogging.
Full disclosure: I don’t have the answer to this question. By the end of this post, I still probably won’t know. However, maybe we will have a better understanding or maybe you’ll gleam something useful from this.
Pro: The biggest pro is honing your craft. There’s some caveats here though. You have to be challenging yourself to get better. Often this is why I quit daily blogging. I’m no longer challenging myself. However, if you take the time to get better at it, it becomes more rewarding. You will grow your reader base and get more interaction. For some people, they are natural born writers and story tellers. Others will have to strain to get better. Some will be in the middle. That’s okay. But like any thing you want to get good at, you’re going to have to practice.
The next pro should be that it is fun. Regardless of if you are good or bad, improving or stagnate, getting views from strangers or your cat’s alt account, blogging should be fun. If you are enjoying it, then I say keep going but be mindful of burnout.
Another potential positive is turning a hobby into a side hustle. Honestly, I cannot speak from experience, but many people make money on the side by blogging. If you are informative or entertaining you can market yourself as such. I can’t give any real pointers here except stand out or perfect your role.
Cons: The biggest con in my opinion is burnout. If you are unfamiliar, this just means it stops being fun. You no longer look forward to being a blogger. I can’t say this exactly happens to me, but it is something close to it. Nevertheless, burnout can be felt in any hobby, job or most things humans do. You’ll need to take a break, approach it from a different angle, or try a different activity for a bit in order to get a new found appreciation or outlook on blogging.
What happens to me more so, is just not having time. My blogs, when done properly, are time consuming. Here I am waiting until 10pm to write this post. If I want to get it out by 11:59pm tonight, I’m probably going to compromise something such as typing accuracy or proper wording so I’m understood. When you do not give yourself time to proof read or add nice touches to paragraphs you can have grammatical errors, sound confusing, or just write something that is unimpressive or boring. Within my 24 hours I try to hit 10,000 steps, workout, upload videos to 2 Youtube channels and the blog. consume something useful for either the channels or the blog (such as watch anime to review the next day.), work, and enjoy my actual life. Sometimes quality just dips because we are being pulled in a million directions. It happens.
Another thing to consider is running out of ideas. It may sound crazy with how spontanous and random life can be, but sometimes you run out of things to blog or film or talk about. Those days it is really up to you to go seize life. This is more of a problem with my Youtube channel than my blog, but it is something to keep in mind.
So there’s 3 Pros and 3 Cons for blogging everyday. On one hand, you can improve your skills, have a blast and maybe even make some money. On the other hand, you could get burned out, lose track of time or compromise other aspects of your life, or just flat out run out of things to blog about.
I highly recommend you consider all these aspects and how you can make the good outweigh the bad. If people leave suggestions for more pros and cons, or I think of some, I may do a follow up. For those curious, this should make day 5 of my new daily streak and something like 8 out of the last 9. I’m going strong with still plenty to talk about but time crunch and management is a real weakness of mine. I’m off tomorrow. Hopefully I can write a few post to get ahead of the game.
Anyway, as always thanks for reading. If this is your first time here, consider reading some of my other works.
My anime reviews: https://dahubbz.com/category/anime-review/
My manga reviews: https://dahubbz.com/category/manga-monday/
My Top 5: https://dahubbz.com/category/top-five/
My thoughts on Video Games: https://dahubbz.com/category/video-game/
Spooky Week Recap
Oh, boy. I really wanted Spooky Week to catch fire. However, between work and school, I fell behind on Monday right from the start. I reviewed Noblesse on Sunday to start. However, I wanted to read Deathnote Volume #1 for Manga Monday. I couldn’t find my manga. So, I tried to read Demon Slayer Volume #1 on Tuesday. However, between class and school. I left my house at 10am and got home at about 9pm. So, I wasn’t able to read it.
From there, my goal was to savage it Friday. I did my Top 5 Creepiest Pokemon on Friday. I wanted to do another Anime review on Saturday. Sadly, I was not able to do that.
So, I probably wont do anything really specific until after the school semester.
Either way, maybe we will try again next year.
Thank you for reading! Have a great day!
Eevee and Pikachu Nintendo Switchs!?
Has anyone else seen this post on Serebii? That link will take you to the page where you can read about it yourself.
It looks amazing.
This was just a quick post I felt like sharing to get your guys opinions on this. Comment down below.
Thank you guy
A Hat in Time DLC comes out Thursday!
If you haven’t heard, A Hat in Time DLC comes out Thursday. Here’s some of the highlights:
A New Chapter- Of course one of the highlights is the addition of the latest chapter, Arctic Cruise. It is a brand new world to explore, which is always exciting. With that, comes brand new characters, time pieces, and hours to sink into the game.
New Game Mode “Death Wish”– I will be honest. This one is a little less obvious. It seems as if this mode wants you to play old levels with a twist or it will create small levels with challenges. These twist come in form of challenges. The one challenge seen on camera is beat the level in 8 minutes. If this is the case, than Gears for Breakfast added a whole new level of replayability.
A Hat in Time is Coming to the Switch– This is exciting for future me as I do not currently own a switch. I dont believe the release date has been announced, so keep an eye peeled.
Co-op is coming to A Hat In Time
Split screen co-op will be added for free to A Hat in Time come September 13th. This is amazing. This is coming at a time when Super Mario 64 online taught us these old retro games can be just as fun with multiplayer as singleplayer. From the trailer, it looks like they are opting for a vertical screen (line going up and down) instead of horizontal. This again, is just one of the many ways Gears added not only replayability, but a fresh spin on the original game. The best part is that this will always be free.
Important Takeaways:
The DLC launches September 13th.
The DLC will be free for 24 hours
$499 USD after 24 hours.
The Co-op feature is free anytime
Brand new stage and game mode.
Yes. I am very pumped.
Per usual, you can watch my channel for more updates and gameplay footage of A Hat in Time.
Here’s some of my recent A Hat in Time videos.
Thanks for reading! Have a great day.
A Hat in Time is apart of the Humble Monthly (3 games for $12)!
Been on the fence about A Hat in Time? For the next 17 days A Hat in Time will be included in the Humble Monthly. For $12 you will get A Hat in Time, Conan Exile, and the Escapist 2.
They are also running a deal called Pixel Perfect Platformer. Other games included in this sale are Yooka-Laylee, Rayman Origins, Limbo, and Cuphead.
Da_Hubbz 