Journal of Other Forum Analysis (Volume II, Issue 2)

[simiansmarts]

the "crazy taxi used AI tools in development" thread as surpassed the post count of the actual game announcement thread 
 
these guys are rage junkies lmao

[Besticus Maximus]

I can kind of see sense with gears and clockwork (which is the only game I'd actually be interested in) because if they have at least one exclusive in 2026 and 2027 thats a reason to buy a few more xboxes, but I'd also guess it means 2027 is when the new one is coming

[Vertigo]

Idk if it's propoganda or not, but the DEI jokes, pronouns jokes, etc being played for laughs sure sucks.

https://www.resetera.com/threads/deadline-‘scary-movie’-screams-to-franchise-paramount-comedy-record-55m-bow-‘masters-of-the-universe’-manages-29-3m-for-a-pic-that-cost-170m.1543222/

I love how mad weirdos like this are about Scary Movie

I love that you're not allowed to laugh at anything with these weirdos its all "punching down."

Maybe clicky needs to go watch some more white sissies being cucked by black guys.

[HaughtyFrank]

the "crazy taxi used AI tools in development" thread as surpassed the post count of the actual game announcement thread 
 
these guys are rage junkies lmao

Same happened with the Tomb Raider thread.

[Vertigo]

Era needs to face up to the fact that AI use in games is here to stay. These games are just too big to rely solely on humans unless you can afford for a huge turnover of staff.

[simiansmarts]

the "crazy taxi used AI tools in development" thread as surpassed the post count of the actual game announcement thread 
 
these guys are rage junkies lmao

Same happened with the Tomb Raider thread.

I just checked that again. The AI disclaimer thread is 16 pages versus the original game trailer thread at 4 pages. 
 
The AI hysteria is moral grandstanding to continue purity testing and dole out user bans in lieu of actually discussing the contents of the game itself. It's the same shit with Stellar Blade, nobody wants to talk about the game, just chudcheck 24/7  

[benji]

the "crazy taxi used AI tools in development" thread as surpassed the post count of the actual game announcement thread 
 
these guys are rage junkies lmao

Even before Era, you could look at GAF and see many of these people have no interest in video games (or many other forms of media) outside of using them as what to talk about and often really just to use as a bridge to talk about what they really want to talk about.

"How can we enjoy video games when the industry is constant misery of layoffs, sexualized women and AI? I'm this close to giving up the hobby" says the video game forum poster who has spent the last decade using the hobby purely as a justification to post and doomscroll.

Look at the YouTubers they're always referencing, people who constantly reach for pop culture like Harry Potter or Star Wars as the grounds to start building a philosophical/ideological/political "discussion" aka lecture. With their knowledge about that pop culture being the sole grant of expertise as to why they're worth listening to. The Era poster is basically the same person. I have made a ten thousand posts about Pokemon or Final Fantasy, therefore you should listen to my opinions about AI or capitalism or the secret plot to mainstream pedophilia.

[simiansmarts]

Persona 6 finally announced.

I'm.... not looking forward to the discourse.

Also I hate last-minute leaks. Seeing Spyro return would've been quite the surprise, had it not been leaked yesterday. I thought Crash and Spyro were doomed to another dark age 

Crash 4 was the banger and now the devs are getting the chance to do the same for Spyro. I think Spyro would've came out years sooner if Activision didn't lock the devs in the COD Warzone mines after Crash 4 came out.

[benji]

Crash 4 was the banger and now the devs are getting the chance to do the same for Spyro. I think Spyro would've came out years sooner if Activision didn't lock the devs in the COD Warzone mines after Crash 4 came out.

Same thing happened with Tony Hawk after 1+2. One of the benefits of the merger is that Microsoft can do this with the studios, while Activision's philosophy under Kotick was you were worthless if you didn't contribute to yearly revenue figures. Something that studios could no longer do when they need at minimum two years to do a game based on another like the Tony Hawks or Crash/Spyro remakes. Merging everyone into the Call of Duty machine ensured that every studio was "contributing" to those numbers, even if it would have been better off for the company or even Call of Duty that some of those studios were doing other things than content for Warzone.

I wouldn't be surprised if they've also told Blizzard they no longer need to have more than half the studio spending its time making sure the World of Warcraft/Diablo/Overwatch yearly revenue numbers never drop. WoW Classic partly exists because they struggled to convince Kotick the WoW numbers shouldn't be allowed to fall after 15+ years, he signed off on it because they were able to sell it as bringing back subscribers who had left.

[Uncle]

https://www.resetera.com/threads/sega-used-genai-to-work-on-crazy-taxi-world-tour.1543405/

this is the best most corporate-ass disclosure

At SEGA Corporation, we utilize generative AI as a support tool for developers, aiming to provide better content to our users and enable developers to focus more on creative tasks.

We have used such generative AI support tools during development of Crazy Taxi: World Tour. No AI was used in reference to the performers in the game.

steam doesn't require disclosure of use of AI on back-end stuff or like for coding, they only require it for visible content like textures or if you literally generate things on the fly as the game is running

so they wouldn't have said this if it wasn't in reference to textures, but they wrote it in such a way as to basically admit nothing

dumb indies are like "we used AI to generate some of the paintings on the walls in the background of level 3," but sega, no, they won't tell you which textures are AI, you just have to scrutinize every single one and seethe

[simiansmarts]

https://www.resetera.com/threads/sega-used-genai-to-work-on-crazy-taxi-world-tour.1543405/

this is the best most corporate-ass disclosure

At SEGA Corporation, we utilize generative AI as a support tool for developers, aiming to provide better content to our users and enable developers to focus more on creative tasks.

We have used such generative AI support tools during development of Crazy Taxi: World Tour. No AI was used in reference to the performers in the game.

steam doesn't require disclosure of use of AI on back-end stuff or like for coding, they only require it for visible content like textures or if you literally generate things on the fly as the game is running

so they wouldn't have said this if it wasn't in reference to textures, but they wrote it in such a way as to basically admit nothing

dumb indies are like "we used AI to generate some of the paintings on the walls in the background of level 3," but sega, no, they won't tell you which textures are AI, you just have to scrutinize every single one and seethe

THAT WOODEN CRATE TEXTURE HAS AN UNNATURAL WOOD GRAIN PATTERN!!! AI SLOP!!!!! 
 

[Potato]

 

“Why people hate AI?  ”

“Is because everyone shit talks it religiously.”  

"Why do people hate AI?"

Do they? 

The only people I see hate AI are failed artists whose meagre online earnings from furry commissions and fan art porn.

 

https://www.nytimes.com/2026/05/18/opinion/ai-boo-commencement-speeches.html

https://gizmodo.com/americans-are-starting-to-really-hate-data-centers-and-its-making-the-tech-industry-nervous-2000767088

*Insert potato dismissive and abrasive commentary, proving my point that AI evangelists failed big time by being assholes*

Mate, I don't even use AI. How am I am evangelist?

[Uncle]

https://www.nbcnews.com/news/us-news/body-missing-auburn-university-student-found-japan-rcna348792

The body of an Auburn University student who had been missing in Japan for a week has been found in a mountainous area outside of Kyoto, according to his family.

James “Weston” Higginbotham, 20, was on a family trip when he vanished, prompting a massive search by police and local volunteers. He was last seen at the Kyoto train station on May 29.

The Higginbotham family previously said that the 20-year-old went missing after an argument over artificial intelligence during a family trip and feared he could have been “emotionally distressed.”

He walked away from his parents after his mother was using ChatGPT to help find restaurants and other sights in the area, Nancy Higginbotham told NBC News. The Auburn student, who majors in biosystems engineering, is devoted to sustainable design and opposes the world’s increasing reliance on AI, she added.

Police in Kyoto said Weston Higginbotham had been missing since leaving his hotel on May 29. His mother said that her son was last known to have entered the mountainous forest area near Yamashina, Kyoto, where there are water sources but limited food.

get so mad that your mom was using AI that you wander into the woods and die

[benji]

Though I'm slagging a bit on Kotick in that post, and he is an asshole, the guy is incredibly business smart and he was looking for a buyer for Activision because he was aware enough to realize the way he built a publishing empire was no longer going to work in the industry. Bethesda and EA faced the same problem. The cycles and capital required are too big now. Kotick was a master at scheduling all the various projects so Activision was constantly putting stuff out. EA less so. What do you do these days when a game needs three years just to start? Any delay and now you've got a giant gap in your schedule and absolutely nothing to fill it with because you can't push any other project out the door.

Microsoft can eat those costs and take the hit for the year. And now they're literally so big that they often can find something else to fill the gap, even if they roll it out purely on GamePass or "early access" or whatever. They barely flinched at Redfall, a disaster of incredible proportions. They've eaten the costs of Halo for like a decade at this point, there's zero way Infinite paid for most of that back. Master Chief Collection probably did better. And they're like "well, I guess we can just make Halo 1 and Gears 1 again" at costs that are way out of bounds that nobody else could stomach. The entire Xbox division acts as if it clearly has no idea how it makes revenue and the company doesn't seem to care. And on top of this they do all of it just to send money to the IDF, purely for the love of genocide.

[HaughtyFrank]

Fuck Kotick for appearing in Moneyball 

Immersion killer

[simiansmarts]

Toys for Bob decided to become an independent developer so they wouldn't be at risk of a quick cost-cutting shutdown like the other Activision/Bethesda devs. Xbox is still publishing their next game (Spyro) but if they want to say, go to Ubisoft to work on Rayman or some other mascot character, they're free to do that too.

[Potato]

https://www.nbcnews.com/news/us-news/body-missing-auburn-university-student-found-japan-rcna348792

The body of an Auburn University student who had been missing in Japan for a week has been found in a mountainous area outside of Kyoto, according to his family.

James “Weston” Higginbotham, 20, was on a family trip when he vanished, prompting a massive search by police and local volunteers. He was last seen at the Kyoto train station on May 29.

The Higginbotham family previously said that the 20-year-old went missing after an argument over artificial intelligence during a family trip and feared he could have been “emotionally distressed.”

He walked away from his parents after his mother was using ChatGPT to help find restaurants and other sights in the area, Nancy Higginbotham told NBC News. The Auburn student, who majors in biosystems engineering, is devoted to sustainable design and opposes the world’s increasing reliance on AI, she added.

Police in Kyoto said Weston Higginbotham had been missing since leaving his hotel on May 29. His mother said that her son was last known to have entered the mountainous forest area near Yamashina, Kyoto, where there are water sources but limited food.

get so mad that your mom was using AI that you wander into the woods and die

Dying was the most sustainable practice he could have done! 

[benji]

Really, the only fans that should be mad about the Microsoft acquisition are Call of Duty fans. Because Microsoft when they bought it were like "oh yeah, we think they should be spending more time to do these" after the Raven/Treyarch kerfuffle over Black Ops Cold War. Then they realized nobody actually cares about the quality of Call of Duty so they just integrated all the tech (which Activision had started) and probably put that shit on a sports game dev cycle where they release whatever's going to be ready by the time of the year rolls around.

Kotick was still looking at the games as individual games and trying to balance the cycle to the marketing so each game was an equivalent hit revenue-wise, now Microsoft is like "yeah whatever call it Black Ops 8" and the season pass content looks like it's literally picked out of a hat. Looks no different to me from everything that NBA 2K has done for the last decade.

[simiansmarts]

the "crazy taxi used AI tools in development" thread as surpassed the post count of the actual game announcement thread 
 
these guys are rage junkies lmao

Even before Era, you could look at GAF and see many of these people have no interest in video games (or many other forms of media) outside of using them as what to talk about and often really just to use as a bridge to talk about what they really want to talk about.

"How can we enjoy video games when the industry is constant misery of layoffs, sexualized women and AI? I'm this close to giving up the hobby" says the video game forum poster who has spent the last decade using the hobby purely as a justification to post and doomscroll.

Look at the YouTubers they're always referencing, people who constantly reach for pop culture like Harry Potter or Star Wars as the grounds to start building a philosophical/ideological/political "discussion" aka lecture. With their knowledge about that pop culture being the sole grant of expertise as to why they're worth listening to. The Era poster is basically the same person. I have made a ten thousand posts about Pokemon or Final Fantasy, therefore you should listen to my opinions about AI or capitalism or the secret plot to mainstream pedophilia.

And then they'll say "the games industry is trash, I'm only going to play retro games from now on!!" but you still see them in the thread for every new game release because they have zero self-control. FOMO's a bitch.

[HaughtyFrank]

What's funny about Resetera and AI is how often they also don't seem to understand it. Like one guy was really saying the Stellar Blade trailer is AI generated

The city background at 2:29 is pure AI generated slop. Non-Euclidean concrete staircase in the sky clipping into itself going nowhere... Poorly generated balconies stacked on top of each other and blending together... No wonder it took such a short time for them to shit out a sequel.

https://www.resetera.com/threads/stellar-blade-blood-rain-announced-shift-up.1541146/post-155971723



Let me tell you, if you could actually just AI generate a complex background like this and simply plop it into your videogame then all the AI nay sayers would be fucked because every studio would do it

[Hap Shaughnessy]

https://www.resetera.com/threads/stellar-blade-blood-rain-announced-shift-up.1541146/page-2#post-155941618

User banned(3 days): Inflammatory accusations against other members

Super gross character design 🤮

Indeed, so many users dropping their masks.

And they insist with those tiny feet fetish as well, she is unwatchable.

https://www.resetera.com/threads/stellar-blade-blood-rain-announced-shift-up.1541146/page-11#post-155962162

 User banned(1 month): Trolling in regards to concerns over sexualization of minors

New protag is super cute and the combat looks so fun. Can't wait

https://www.resetera.com/threads/stellar-blade-blood-rain-announced-shift-up.1541146/page-12#post-155968195

 User banned(1 month): Dismissing concerns of sexualization of minors

SO MANY SELF REPORTING WEIRDOS LMAO

cant wait for this game, gameplay looks incredible ┗|｀O′|┛

[Let's Cyber]

If you genuinely believe someone is "sexualizing minors" in your community, why are you only giving them a month ban?!?! 

[Hap Shaughnessy]

https://www.resetera.com/threads/faye-gave-me-a-feeling-i%E2%80%99ve-never-really-had-with-a-female-lead-before.1538689/page-2#post-155822230

 User Banned (1 Week): Hostility; Concern Trolling

Maybe if you make OPs country your 51st state he can learn the proper world language (american english of course) for you guys. What pathetic takes in here, the AI circle-jerk hate has definetly gone off the rails in the recent months.

[simiansmarts]

SHE'S NOT EVEN A MINOR! THEY'RE JUST MAKING SHIT UP TO GET MAD AT BECAUSE THEY'RE OPENLY PROJECTING THEIR DEPRAVITY ON A VIDEOGAME CHARACTER!  

 

[Taco Bell Tower]

https://www.resetera.com/threads/stellar-blade-blood-rain-announced-shift-up.1541146/page-2#post-155941618

User banned(3 days): Inflammatory accusations against other members

Super gross character design 🤮

Indeed, so many users dropping their masks.

And they insist with those tiny feet fetish as well, she is unwatchable.

https://www.resetera.com/threads/stellar-blade-blood-rain-announced-shift-up.1541146/page-11#post-155962162

 User banned(1 month): Trolling in regards to concerns over sexualization of minors

New protag is super cute and the combat looks so fun. Can't wait

https://www.resetera.com/threads/stellar-blade-blood-rain-announced-shift-up.1541146/page-12#post-155968195

 User banned(1 month): Dismissing concerns of sexualization of minors

SO MANY SELF REPORTING WEIRDOS LMAO

cant wait for this game, gameplay looks incredible ┗|｀O′|┛

Kyuuji didn't type out Evie is cute but I'm curious if he did would he get one month ban since he was hyped about the combat.

[Hap Shaughnessy]

https://www.resetera.com/threads/tomb-raider-legacy-of-atlantis-is-made-with-the-help-of-genai-but-final-assets-replaced-or-refined-by-humans.1537990/page-14#post-155831842

 User banned (1 month): Trolling and whataboutisms over multiple posts. Prior ban for similar behavior.

Don't see how that changes anything I said. You're still almost doing the thing. "Almost all games will use it !". Alright. I will not buy those games.

I guess for some people we'll see how their moral stance competes with their unrelenting need to consume some new products. Personally I'll be fine.

Just for fun, do you have an iPhone or a Samsung?

[benji]

And then they'll say "the games industry is trash, I'm only going to play retro games from now on!!" but you still see them in the thread for every new game release because they have zero self-control. FOMO's a bitch.

It's like we point out about the Black Excellence Diversity Analyst. Guy never shares any Black Excellence, just bitches about the biggest mainstream titles he can. Same across the rest of the forum. Never any great trans works out there, just bitching that there's no lesbian dating in mainstream fighting games or that the biggest titles of the year haven't centered around them.

It's the same as their politics. They don't want to be real outsiders or radicals, they want to be the cool kids. And they're mad at everyone else for not just making them the cool kids.

What's funny about Resetera and AI is how often they also don't seem to understand it. Like one guy was really saying the Stellar Blade trailer is AI generated

The city background at 2:29 is pure AI generated slop. Non-Euclidean concrete staircase in the sky clipping into itself going nowhere... Poorly generated balconies stacked on top of each other and blending together... No wonder it took such a short time for them to shit out a sequel.

https://www.resetera.com/threads/stellar-blade-blood-rain-announced-shift-up.1541146/post-155971723

I don't even see what he's talking about? It seriously looks like every skybox ever.

It's weird because these guys are supposedly super nerds but you're telling me you've never noclipped into any skybox? They're tiny, their quality is always far worse than the geometry directly next to the player. They're often kitbashes of the bigger quality assets. They're never perfect at every angle ever because they aren't actual complete 3D, nobody needs to render the backsides that won't be seen, etc. Just looking at the bigger size of the screenshot you can tell it's a skybox and it's not the same assets as near the camera.

Every game ever has had camera angles they try to avoid to not reveal the flaws and if you pause and examine the details you'll see them.

[benji]

2026 guy transplanted back thirty years looking at the original Resident Evil and Final Fantasy VII backgrounds: "wait, these are just flat images not actual 3D models, even the color depth is different from the player characters, they must have used gen AI to make this slop!"

Spoiler:  (click to show)(click to hide)

Seeing Super Mario World: "wait, Bowser's not an actual animated sprite, he's a background being stretched and manipulated and when it flashes I can see this because the frame rates aren't the same? This must be genAI!"

[Daffy Duck]

I won't link it due to extreme naughty language

but

youtube video called White for 99 cents

"but because women post here" 
 

What’s amazing is the whole “women aren’t a monolith” thing they live and die by, however it’s the “Women” that complain on era that should be listened too and things cancelled based on their feelings

[Jansen]

Persona 5 is a game with actual pedophilia in it and it is constantly hailed as one of the best games of all time. Games journalism doesn't give a fuck, Atlus still operates as if everything is fine. Persona 5 crossovers is put into every thing under the sun despite the game trying to have its cake and eat it too in regards to the sexualization of a character who is a minor, never mind its other hugely problematic elements. Now we're going to be treated to its much more bigoted big brother getting a remake can't wait to see how that goes!



Nothing will happen to Pedoblade 2 aside from selling mountains of units because the world and people suck. It's infuriating and it's sickening, but I have no illusion 
of anything else happening.

I'm so tired boss