AV_Gamer

@lonelyspacepanda: Sam Bankman-Fried was a so-called genius who created a crypto company, FTX. He claimed that all the money he was making, he'd donate to different charities to show that rich people should work to help the poor and unfortunate. He was called a great, trustworthy guy because of this. A lot of celebrities and even financial insiders were telling people to invest in FTX because of this. I could go on, but you know the result. The situation with Open Hand and Jirard have a lot of similarities to me. The only difference is that Bankman-Fried was eventually proven a fraud and convicted for it, and there was a lot more money at stake. I'm not saying the same thing will happen to Jirard. Only time will tell about that. And it has nothing to do with internet drama. Jirard put himself in this situation, which at least you accept. I hope he is innocent at the end of the day, but I'm not going blindly say he is, until he is officially declared so by the upcoming investigation that will likely happen, which Jirard himself has pointed out.

Hate to pile on, but I agree with the two post above. Regardless of what motives you think they may have had, Karl and Muta did end up calling out and bringing attention to a legitimate problem, which likely would not have been acted on if they remained silent. And Jirard is not out of the woods yet. Just because he made an (agreed lawyer advised) video explaining himself and giving his so-called evidence, doesn't mean he is suddenly innocent. Many fraudsters, under lawyer advisement, released an "official" statement, claiming no wrong doing, only for the evidence to eventually show that they did do something illegal. Will this be the case with Jirard, time will tell. But like the old saying goes: Where there is smoke, there is fire. I hope, for his sake, it really was him just being in over his head. Sometimes people give their support to a group, ignorant of the fact the group or company is a house of cards. That happened recently with FTX.

It was mostly okay, but the award Cyperpunk 2077 got was complete BS, and I like that game just fine.

The only good thing from the video was him stepping down from his role, and Indieland no longer fundraising for Open Hand. Whether Jirard was really trying to pull a fast one and got caught before he could pocket the money, or he really was ignorant to how things were working behind the scenes, we may never know, unless more investigations happen. I don't think this story is over yet.

As the others have said, it's up to the creators to make a good bait and switch, not the audience. One good example is The Usual Suspects. The movie was suspenseful and entertaining all the way up to the surprise plot twist. Other good examples are films like Gone Girl and A Perfect Getaway, because the big twist happens in the middle of those films. But prior to those twist, the films were entertaining. Metal Gear Solid 2 was entertaining before the big twist about The Patriots. And given that Kojima base his video game development off of blockbuster films, this wasn't a surprise.

I haven't played this game yet, despite it being on Game Pass. But I will, as I still like the characters and the universe the game takes place in. But overall, I agree that Atlus is running the well dry with the Phantom Thieves and need to move on to Persona 6 already. The problem is, like with GTA Online, once something starts making a lot of money, it's hard for these developers to let that go and take another chance, even if it's just a sequel to their own successful series. Love it or hate it, Persona 5 has done more for Atlus than Persona's 3 and 4 have ever done. Hence, why we are getting all of these spinoffs.

Hi-Fi Rush got its due. Considering, a large part of that game was the audio and sound design. So it wasn't forgotten.

I have nothing against Mike. If the issue is that he is a tag along with Jeff Grubb and didn't earn his place, then it's a weak argument. This has been going on since Giantbomb's inception. People were never just random hires. The person was already known, or friends of one of the OGs and got their shot. Possibly, Jess is the only example of someone who actively reached out and got hired, and it didn't last long. With that said, of course, I won't say no if any of the old hires returned, starting with Jess and Jason. Though, given what happened, they likely won't return even if given the chance, and wouldn't blame them.

Interesting story. A popular online gamer accused of fraud, and a white supremacist reporter breaking the news. I only remember the guy as one of the host of X-Play before they went belly up, again. It seems things worked itself out in the end, but I don't think people will be trusting this Jirard again guy anytime soon. I just hope that the story of Grubb and Lucy standing by him isn't true, if he really did commit a crime.

I never believed in buying video media outside a streaming service, because you can still get the Blu-Ray or DVD. However, with video games, it doesn't matter if you get the disc or not, you still have to download files and have an active account with, in this case Sony, to play those games. But yeah, this could be foreshadowing to something like this happening with video games in the future. Which is why you have many people trying to preserve video games as much as possible.