I debated whether or not to put this in Serious, but I figured it wasn't super serious business technically so....

With movie theaters shuttered for a while, there's been a lot of talk about whether or not they were even viable even before lock-downs became common place and the virus has certainly gave it a blow to the knees. Big companies like AMC are rumored to be filing for bankruptcy and several big titles have made their way to VoD in time frames where they should've still been in theaters had they been open.

Disney's Onward is now on Disney+ after only a small window of being in theaters before the lock down really went into place; but the biggest movie in the discussion is Trolls 2. That movie went instantly to VoD via Amazon Prime and despite Amazon being very stingy with their revenue numbers, it's estimated that it already made back its initial investment in only a few days. The fact that this was a family movie only further creates problems for the theater business. Most families will look at streaming as a much cheaper alternative for getting to see the same movie.

Big studios like Disney, Universal, & Paramount would immediately cut out the middle-man theater business if straight-to-streaming was proven to be a viable alternative and Trolls World Tour has been a perfect example of that being the case. I don't know how to feel about this. One the one hand, most of the movies I go to see nowadays are Fathom Events, either anime screenings, classic re-releases, or art-studio plays. Those have a higher premium ticket price than the already high ticket price for a standard movie in most locations. I'm easily looking at $30 for just myself when I also take concessions into account, although using various reward programs has helped alleviate the price somewhat.

On the other hand, I'm also one of those snobbish art critics who considers seeing my Chinese cartoons on the big screen with the sticky gum on the floor and hearing the crowd go nuts at whatever bullshit happens on screen as an authentic movie-going experience. Certain movies have become social events (Hence I guess why its called Fathom Events) and you just can't recreate that experience from the comfort of your home. Going to the movies is also a social experience, I think the last time I went to see a movie by myself was Pacific Rim 2 and needless to say ignoring the fact that it was a garbage movie, it was also a lonesome experience and I've always gone with somebody to see a movie afterwards.

In my personal opinion, family movies will begin to get phased out of theaters regardless of when society reopens. It simply makes too much sense for both the consumer (budget-focused families) and the producers (cutting out the middlemen) to maximize efficiency and cost. But big KINOPLEX 9K theaters will still be around for generic Marvel capeshit #843 and college-dropout director films that are thinly veiled pornos disguised as Neo-Noir NC17 art films.

What are your thoughts?

North Korean rumor mill is in full swing with news on their leader's health. As of right now there's supposedly a Chinese news channel claiming Kim Jong-Un is dead.

Anyone else playing this? I never really touched my copy of Vanilla 5 after I got halfway through Madarame's Palace but I've just cleared Junya's Palace and I'm still not burned out or anything despite only having Royal for two days.

I can still see the combat changes like ammo for your guns replenishing after every fight and that helps tremendously with the grinding. All the reviews I read just state the same thing; how it made an already perfect game even better, and unanimous praise all around I can definitely see it. I know there was some complaints about rereleasing 5 on the same system and Japanese players asked why I couldn't have just been an expansion DLC, but with the way the entire system feeling overhauled I don't see why not to rerelease it as Royal when Persona 3 did the same thing with FES.

Against my better judgement I went ahead and preordered the game because I'm a sucker for steelbooks and art books. From what I've been seeing I still don't know how to feel about everything. I never really liked Midgar in the original FFVII and was happy to leave it when I did, but everything I see in the trailers does look fun and enjoyable.

However I also saw a part of the ending and from what people who have the game already are saying, they're adding more of the expanded universe stuff into the game, like they want to reimagine the game now that they can. I don't mind the expanded story of VII but Cloud is definitely weak in comparison to his original release self.

Anyways, what is everyone's thoughts on the VII Remake?

This book fucking sucks. Talk about a bunch of ideas/beliefs that haven’t aged well. the more I read it the more I’m confused at how Marxism was taken seriously.

In chapter 2 he talks about how the ruling class only wants marriage so that they can turn their wives into working serfs. It’s funny that around sixty years later in a conservative America that the wife working was a revolutionary idea, completely at odds with what he claimed.

Or how a middle-class person doesn’t exist at all in his mind. In his point of view it’s just hopping between being some caricature of a fat cat or literally starving on the streets.

I get that I have to take into account the time period and location he was in, but all of his notions of how society would turn out is ending up false and is backed by nothing but his own opinion.

I play Yugioh at work with a friend of mine but he works in Tomorrowland and our shift times rarely match up so we don’t get to duel often if ever. Never the less I’ve been back into the game and I’ve been wanting to play more.

There’s a game shop about 20 minutes away that does Yugioh nights every Tuesday at 7, but not only have I been bogged down by situations preventing me from going (like tonight I’m at an auto care and they’re raking longer than normal) I’ve been a little anxious going in general.

Does anyone go to card game events? If so, what was it like for you guys?

Per Maverick and Das, I'm updating you all on the situation with that one girl that caused quite a bit of grief for me last year and what ultimately ended up happening since I haven't updated anyone on the matter since April of last year.

TL;DR: Bitch left our location and tried to get me fired on a lie. It fucking fails and she loses her dream job/location to me and now has to work around me every day knowing she lost.

EDIT: Never mind, it appears I was mistaken in thinking some people would have gotten over the fact that I failed to heed their advice and refuse to accept me admitting my mistake in ignoring them. You can't please everybody.

>When you buy a $20 box set and you end up pulling a $40 card you needed for your deck.


>When you get ANOTHER $20 box set and you pull the one card that's broken the meta in the span of only a few days.


Yugioh is the best it's been at since I got back into it. Other than the first card above, most "meta" and top tier cards are plummeting in price and that includes their rarity. A prismatic-secret rare copy of Sky Striker - Mobilize Engage! is only like six bucks on TCG player. This is great for me.

Now if only I had the courage to go to locals.

Edit: future proofing

PURE. CINEMATIC. MASTERPIECE.

Behold such quality work in the art of motion pictures:

Several Zoomers are reporting bugs in WoW classic that are not in fact bugs, but normal features working as intended.

As we’ve discussed before, the nature of WoW Classic sometimes invokes different memories for different players, and this leads to certain misconceptions for some about what is or isn’t working as intended.

The following is a list of commonly-reported gameplay in WoW Classic that is not actually a bug, and is working as we expect it to:

Tauren’s hitboxes and their melee reach is slightly larger than other races.
Being critically struck while using /sit to sit does not cause abilities like Enrage, Blood Craze, and Reckoning to activate.
Using the “Automatic Quest Tracking” option does not auto-track newly accepted quests. (It instead will start to track an existing quest once progress towards an objective is started.)
Warrior health Regeneration is working at the expected rate.
Quests objectives and points of interests are not tracked on the map or minimap.
Completed quests are marked on the minimap with a dot. (and not a “?”)
Feared players and NPCs run fast.
Standing on top of other players while facing away allows spells and attacks to be used.
Creature respawn rates are much slower than in Battle for Azeroth.
NPCs which offer multiple quests may inconsistently display them as a dot or a “!” on the available quests list. They were inconsistent in 1.12, and we’ve reproduced the exact inconsistency they had back then.
Quests that are too low level for do not show up as a “!” in the game world.
Available quests do not display a “!” on the minimap.
On level up, the message: “Your skill in Protection increased to 15” was added in 1.12.1, and we’re intending to keep that.
We appreciate all of your feedback!

You think you do, but you don't.

So I have an interview on Wednesday for The NBA Experience, some new attraction opening up at Disney Springs to replace Quest. However I have resigned this interview to be practice for another one I have in two weeks for Star Wars Land. I would still like this one to go well though, because a full time job is a full time job and there's no guarantee that the Star Wars one is going to work out even if I can show them I have extensive knowledge of the IP. My only problem is I don't have any knowledge of the NBA at all and while I can just look up basic stuff with simple Google searches, they're probably going to want more in depth/personal opinions on the subject.

What are some things you guys know/opinions you all have on the NBA?

Are they even relevant anymore? WoW Classic seems to be all they have left that isn't a fucking meme.

My beard is full enough for work but hardly full enough for a real "professional" look and I got a call for another promotion interview on Wednesday, meaning if I want to look good for the interview I have to chop the whole thing off after I spent the last two weeks growing it out.

Console me.

My last interview was only 15 minutes, lots of silence and quick short responses, and a half blank resume.

This one was 35-40 minutes, long detailed stories, a full page resume on resume paper, and both interviewers telling me I did exceptionally well, looked sharp, provided great answers/questions, and that I had the experience they wanted. Basically telling me I had the job without actually telling me that because they went through the whole "We have other candidates we have to interview as well" spiel and that they'll give me their answer soon.