Lurker > DarkBuster22904

I dunno, the last time we did a giant space dick waving contest, we ended up developing some pretty cool tech and shit along the way.

The runoff innovation from space programs has always been pretty great, and one of its best benefits. A lot of things needed to make stuff like this possible end up having myriad uses.

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Tenlaar posted...

How about the development costs for big games being double or even triple what is was just ten years ago? You ever going to explain why that doesn't matter either?

if their profits have increased accordingly, then it doesn't matter.

this shift to high-development cost, massively open world, high fidelity games wasn't done out of some deep seated artistic passion. they made the move because it fuckin makes money.

something that, again, they're more than happy to brag to their shareholders about.

so it doesn't fucking matter. games cost more, they also make more, accordingly

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LeadPipeCinche posted...

But they aren't jacking up the price and a few of us already proved it to you. As long as YOU aren't buying $100 Madden (with dlc that's OPTIONAL) who cares if someone else does if YOU are fine with $60 MADDEN (I don't know if you play it, first game I thought of as example).

Except they are. Games being $80 forty years ago does not matter any more than 18 inch black and white tvs being the equivalent of $2000 in the 50s does. They have been steady at $60 for years. So a rise to $70 is a rise.

And I dont care who buys what with Madden. Ill buy it for $60 if I so choose. But if madden is going to come out every year, and be ostensibly the same game year on year, using the same engine, and using the same fucking assets that were being used in 2019, I resent being told the game is "so expensive to make" that they need to raise the price by $10.

They want to raise the price? go ahead. just be honest and tell me its because you know the market demand is there so you can get away with charging more. Don't come wringing your hat pretending that you're strapped for cash; not when you brag at every investor meeting about all the billions of dollars of profit you're making, laying off thousands of employees, and shelling out hundreds of millions in bonuses to some of the most overpaid CEOs on the planet.

I dont care about the price raising. I care that they're pedalling bullshit about rising costs making it necessary.

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Tenlaar posted...

FF7 cost 60m in development. FF7R cost 200m in development.

And they recouped 150% of that cost within a week. Far more by now.

These developers are far from needing to panhandle for more.

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LeadPipeCinche posted...

NOBODY is forcing you to buy the dlc.
Try again or ask your mom to keep buying the games for you.

I didn't say they were forcing anybody to buy it.

but people ARE buying it. and they're making money hand over fist with it.

That being the case, these "super expensive to make" games are making ludicrous amounts of money.

Which eliminates it as an excuse to jack up the base price. If the industry was hemorrhaging money, I'd perhaps understand. But its not. from where I'm sitting, its making more money than ever before, without petulantly raising the price of the base game just because they can.

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s0nicfan posted...

I had a rich in-law who once suggested the best thing to do was buy $20k worth of land somewhere underdeveloped in a state I like in the hopes that by the time I retire it's been built up and I can build a house on the land and retire there or sell it for millions.

Meet them halfway and spend $50 on a foot of land to become a Scottish Lord

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Squall28 posted...

Dad:Volunteer to be the fall guy for management. You'll get brownie points.

I refuse to believe this one is real...

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I like to mess with them sometimes, when I'm bored.

Every second they spend with me is a second they aren't spending scamming someone more vulnerable. A tiny victory, but every little bit helps.

And after years of working tech support in my younger days, my acting fools them pretty well. Kept one tied up for about two hours, once (I was just doing some household chores while leading the dude around in circles. Decent background entertainment)

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DespondentDeity posted...

Games are cheaper than ever while development costs are high than ever

DarkBuster22904 posted...

Games do not cost $60.

Not when you factor in day 1 dlc, Silver Editions, Gold Editions, ultimate editions, ultimater editions, season passes, second season passes, dlc not on the season passes, battle passes, and microtransactions. All things that we were told "needed" to happen because of how expensive to make games are. All this in addition to ads creeping into full priced games, product placement, mountain dew/dorito/pizza roll crossover deals, assets being reused across yearly releases (you can straight up find 2019 logos in 2021 year sports titles for fuck's sake), and the fact that all of these companies are constantly bragging about their exponential hand-over fist profit growth year on year. Before they lay off thousands of employees to push that growth even higher when they don't need to.

Sorry. I fail to see a compelling reason why the base price needs to be $70, when there are so many additional revenue streams per game and while the industry is bragging about how much money it's making year-on-year. fuck that.

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ViewtifulGrave posted...

Yup. This isnt new.

Neat. And back in the 50s, a crappy. tiny black and white TV cost the equivalent of $2000+.

What's your point?

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1337toothbrush posted...

I'm going to need evidence of this average, because it's believable for huge blockbusters, but not for most games and one problem is that games are generally being set to the same base price.

and even then, its not like a ton of these games are struggling to break even, or even turn a tidy profit.

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"You'll never get a job applying online. You gotta pound the pavement. Go in, ask to speak to the manager, and hand him your resume personally."

Fuck that. Horribly embarassing, and never worked. You know, the whole time, that doing that is a fucking waste of time and that you've guaranteed you're getting no job by doing that.

Oh, also "go to the best college you possibly can. Don't worry about the cost, we've got it covered. And if it comes down to it and you have to take loans, we'll help you pay them back."

They, in fact, did not have it covered after year 2. And after year 4. I found out that the second part was bullshit, too.

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EndOfDiscOne posted...

Was going to say, I thought game prices have been practically unchanged since the early 90s. And games today have far more content. Gamers sure do like to complain.

Games do not cost $60.

Not when you factor in day 1 dlc, Silver Editions, Gold Editions, ultimate editions, ultimater editions, season passes, second season passes, dlc not on the season passes, battle passes, and microtransactions. All things that we were told "needed" to happen because of how expensive to make games are. All this in addition to ads creeping into full priced games, product placement, mountain dew/dorito/pizza roll crossover deals, assets being reused across yearly releases (you can straight up find 2019 logos in 2021 year sports titles for fuck's sake), and the fact that all of these companies are constantly bragging about their exponential hand-over fist profit growth year on year. Before they lay off thousands of employees to push that growth even higher when they don't need to.

Sorry. I fail to see a compelling reason why the base price needs to be $70, when there are so many additional revenue streams per game and while the industry is bragging about how much money it's making year-on-year. fuck that.

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honestly its not surprising.

whether you think the game is "too woke" or not, whether you hate Abby or not, or take the Joel thing in stride or not, the fact is that game journalists closed ranks SUPER hard around this game, for reasons that I do not believe are based on the merits of the game itself. It was always going to sweep awards.

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SazhAndFrocobo posted...

The second game had a special edition that came with a Raiho plush.

can confirm. picked up this baby a few months t
ago



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Im pissed about this game. I managed to find a factory sealed collector's edition of vs King Abaddon a few months back. But I cannot for the life of me find a physical copy of Soulless Army.

I know they cost an arm and a leg, these days, but its one of the very few pieces in my SMT collection I haven't been able to acquire, yet

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I dont think its collectibles. Its nostalgia.

Bear with me; I'm going to be speaking more as a game/console collector, rather than figurines or cards or anything. But I feel the same principles will apply.

People have been locked up at home for over a year. In that time, events have been cancelled, social lives have been dampened, facilities have been closed, and people have fallen DEEP into entertainment media. Movies, TV, gaming, all popular before, but people have had little alternative but to fall into that sinkhole for a long while. Even now that things are reopening,, a year's worth of damage has been done.

At the same time, new media releases have slowed to a snail's pace. New shows/seasons were delayed, movies announced a year and a half ago are JUST starting to come out, and its not like last year was rife with new game releases. We got a good amount,, sure,, but it was still fairly slow. And with a lack of new media to engage with, in an uncertain and scary time/atmosphere... people are retreating to the familiarity of things they used to love.

So they dig out their old N64 from the attic. Or their Ps2. Their gameboy. and they dive back into these things from a combination of boredom and comfort-seeking.

Pokemon is a big one. Hugely popular, lots of childhood sentiment, plenty of media to go back to cards, games. The perfect media comfort food. What's more, people who were holding back due to the social stigma of being an adult pokemon fan... well, they don't need to anymore, as there is no social life to maintain an "image" for, anymore. And as more people flock back, the supply stream gets strained. Cards. Older generation games. The things people loved as kids. Those are what are skyrocketing in value.

Not that nostalgia is the only factor. Persona 5 Royal came out right when covid hit, and was massively popular. What happened almost immediately after? Every post-PS2 SMT game explodes in value and disappears from shelves.

FFVII:R comes out at the same time (itself a shameless nostalgia grab)? Classic JRPGs triple in value almost overnight.

The stimulus checks certainly haven't helped the situation.

Tl;dr - if you lock people up at home for a year, don't be surprised when they start digging around in the attic and rediscovering things they loved.

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holy shit, Nancy. fucking retire already.

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Im convinced the defense is just playing a long game and will get a conviction overturned on appeal.

Sadly they have a decent enough case that the whole situation was such a well-publicized shitshow that the jury was unduly biased before ever setting foot in the courtroom.

Dunno of it'll work, but it may well be their strategy. Fact is that getting a truly unbiased jury in this case is borderline impossible

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Cerealmilk posted...

Fuckin biden weighing in on it before the decision

Imagine if trump did some shit like that. Dems would be fuming.

"We're going to see a decision. Its about a really terrible thing. Truly terrible. But the police, the police are good guys. We have to remember that, whatever happens. Very good people. Brave people. And these rioters, we'll need those police to deal with them. And they should go to jail."

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A gun ban would be absolutely devastating if implemented.

First off, do you want civil war? Because that's how you get civil war. We have exactly enough "much guns much freemdomz" winners in this country to take a revocation of the second ammendment as an open call to war.

It may not be an organized war. To call it a war at all may be giving it too much credit. But the headlines the next day would be "Tens of thousands dead nationwide in bullet-ridden standoffs with gun collection agents." They may lose against the military, but many will try. they see it as a God given duty to try. A blanket ban would quickly turn bloody if it came to enforcement.

"Well, incentivize it! Start a buyback program!"

yeah, because the people you're worried about having guns are totally going to give e them all to the government for $50 and an ice cream sandwich, or whatever asinine incentive they put in place. Hell, the people you really WANT to disarm are the ones who won't hand them over at any price.

"well, it works in england/australia!"

Yeah. because those countries never had a gun culture to start with. They didnt have a country that literally built up a national identity of based on owning guns and fighting off their oppressors with them. They didnt immortalize it 200 years ago as rule #2 in the Rules of Freedom.

The US also doesn't have the benefit of being a (relatively) small island nation, able to pretty effectively regulate what goes in and out of it. idk if you've noticed, but we've got a bit of a problem with the cartels. and if there's one thing the cartels like as much as their fuckin drugs, its their fuckin guns. prepare for THAT market to explode. Unless you crack down on borders, of course, which is a hot button issue in and of itself.

"Well those gun nut people are dumb!"

Thank you for your observation. Now that you're mad and shaking your fist about it, they will start being less dumb.

"well we have to do SOMETHING!"

I agree. But a ban ain't it, chief. It'd never work, not with the culture we have. And hate the culture all you like, its there. the issue has to be eroded, deescalated before elimination becomes possible. Regulate away; we need it. But a ban will inevitably end bloodily.

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littlebro07 posted...

I remember when I was a teenager and my dream job was game developer I really wanted to work at Bungie or Blizzard.

Activision ruined both of them

Bioware for me.

Fuck EA, man...

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I dont want this to happen purely because it'd sell well, and fuck giving MTG money to donate to anything SHE would want to donate to

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fantastic. nothing more satisfying than seeing shits like this getting put in their place.

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Trickfinger posted...

Money itself is meaningless, except we just agree that it holds value.

Manchildren in here living up to their name.

We heard you the first time.

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Back in the day I was retail (2017) I had a gentleman come in with a broken portable cd player. Wanted us to fix it for him.

After it took my poor coworker more than 5 seconds to diagnose the problem, the due exploded, called him a fucking idiot who didn't know what he was doing, and shout that he (can't wait for Trump to round up your whole shitty snowflake generation and gas the hell out of you all like the FUCKING JEWS."

Management did not throw him out. He stormed around the store for a good 15 minutes before buying a coke and a candy bar and leaving.

In all fairness, that coworker WAS a fucking idiot. But he hadn't even had a chance to show it, yet :(

...but yeah. super glad to have my cushy corporate IT job, now

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Scott Pilgrim. The only movie where Captain Marvel's ex beats the shit out of Superman, Captain America, and Santa Claus, for the right to sleep with Huntress instead of Kevin McCallister's bedwetting cousin.

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Or it could just be that big corporations just do not want a union in 2021. Big corporations are corrupt organizations that funnel money upwards to enable the executives to make 7-8 figure salaries while they do nothing to protect the workers. There is a reason income has been on the decline in America. If I was given to option to work for an anti-union corporation I would decline, I don't want to be abused to make someone else rich.

Thats better

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mech dragon posted...

Why did you prioritize Karens over your own staff?

Sounds like he didn't. Sounds like corporate did, and what corporate says, happens.

So, he told them "I doesn't give a shit, dont make corporate force me to give a shit."

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nice

I ordered the ultimate KO edition, so I'm apparently waiting till Q4 for mine. Apparently the roadie case is taking some time to produce

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so long as they don't use Kathy's death as an excuse to appease Benson-Stabler shippers

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VigorouslySwish posted...

Its dumb as shit and proof that people will spend money on literally anything

Correction:

It's proof that people will spend money on literally nothing.

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"I'm feeling it, Spongebob!"

"Patrick, that's not a ride."

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I think we can all agree riots are breaking out, regardless.

If people will riot over sports teams, win or lose, you can sure as shit bet they'll be rioting here, win or lose.

Hope everyone out there stays safe, and hope this vicious killer scumbag gets the verdict he deserves.

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Can we all agree that Chozen is the best character?

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Depends on what level of "not pulling their weight" they're playing at.

If they're hanging back and doing generally a shit job of engaging, or running headlong into attacks, or healing right in the path of oncoming fire, or something, yeah, they stick out.

Otherwise, I dunno. Don't care, either. So long as the monster dies, doesn't much matter to me either way.

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Payzmaykr posted...

They can get in line behind Warner Brothers studios. I am 100% boycotting the Fantastic Beasts series (which I was following) over this.

Factoring in this issue, the controversies surrounding Rowling over the last year, and the general consensus that Crimes of Grindelwald was mediocre-to-crap, I'm genuinely surprised they'd still go through with it

Movie 3 is perfectly set to be box office poison

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s0nicfan posted...

I'll take it a step further. If Depp hadn't obsessively recorded everything that occurred in his house even he wouldn't have had a shot at defending himself. It's taken an overwhelming amount of evidence to convince the general public that maybe he is telling the truth, and even then you still have a ton of people who will throw out a "both sides" and say "well I guess they're both just terrible people."

I agree.

This whole situation is a damning indictment of the failings of the "believe all women" mentality.

Anyone claiming that false allegations are non-issues because of their rarity needs to be referred back to this case. Because if THIS is the standard of what's required to get "justice" (in quotes because the man's career is still in absolute shambles) in a case like this, is it any wonder false allegations are as "rare" as they are? How can we possibly gauge how often the systems in play are abused by shitty people if these are the standards to bring just a single case to light?

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Clutch posted...

Are you implying that the film industry is better or worse?

I will say that the music industry has a long, long, long history of forgiving artists for being genuinely shitty and fucked up people.

Film does too, but there at least seems to be a sense of shame in it, there. The music industry almost celebrates it. revels in it. Perhaps because there's a greater disconnect, as the medium makes it a bit harder to put a face to a song by virtue of being a primarily auditory medium.

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ZannoL posted...

Its crazy how she thought she could ruin a mans life and walk away unscathed.

The truth always comes out eventually.

She thought so because she COULD.

Let's be real here. we're dealing with multimillionaires here, one of whom (Depp) has one of the most die-hard fanbases on the planet. If the target had been literally anyone else even slightly less well liked, she would have pulled it off. Depp had both the resources to keep the fight going, and a public that was more willing than most to hear him out. That's more than can be said for damn near anyone else.

The truth does not always come out. And even when it does, its not always heard

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bobbaaay posted...

What_

I worked in retail for ten years before getting my current job. We've used this term since like '10, and it's always strictly meant a middle-aged white woman who's classist, appeals to authority, and is self important. All four aspects were necessary components. Karens can't be defiant. They follow rules to a fault. They'll see someone talking on the clock or sitting down and report them. They'll see someone not rotating something and report them. They'll find a bad product and they'll point it out.
They aren't rebels: they're authoritarian. They're also not into anything even remotely alternative -- so anyone associating Karens with essential oils, naturopathy, homeopathy, organic foods movements, etc. is patently wrong, too.

Karen's only follow one set of rules: their own. And they expect, nay, demand, that the rest of the world follow their rules, too. they ARE defiant, while simultaneously being authoritarian. They call managers more often than not in an attempt to rewrite the existing rules to their own benefit.

Being defiant is an almost necessary component to a Karen.

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bobbaaay posted...

Why do people use the term Karen so loosely nowadays? As dumb as she is, she's defying authority -- Karens are classist and appeal to authority. Being an anti-masker is the furthest thing from Karening.

I dunno. I always associated 'Karen' with 'bitchy, better-than-you middle class to upper class white woman.' Very likely to call a manager, but not necessarily.

This chicken fits the bill just fine.

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Trumble posted...

Yep, sounds about right. I don't so much mind people who genuinely don't understand tech, but some people I'm convinced are being wilfully ignorant.

The internal culture of the company I was with probably didn't help either. Not in a scummy / toxic way, just that I basically couldn't rely on anyone else to get stuff done, which was fine when I was living near head office and could always just step in and do shit myself if no one else would, but that stopped working as soon as I moved to remote working (which was long before covid).

Oh there's tons of people who are willfully ignorant. People wear "I'm not a computer person" like a badge of honor, and I don't understand why.

This isnt the 80s or 90s anymore, where not really knowing what your computer was doing was understandable. They are so fundamental to our lives and businesses that there's no longer an excuse. And their connection to the internet and people's access to back-end systems and confidential information makes the "im not techy" argument tantamount to saying you don't understand cars, stoves, or sharp things.

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Trumble posted...

Nope, only ever encountered them in IT. My retail work in the past was taught hands-on, except for checkout which was basically taught on a real checkout but put into a "training" mode.

Been a long time tho. Thinking about moving back into retail... basically flipped out and quit my IT job a couple of weeks ago, I don't want to touch the fucking industry again. People talk about how retail customers are annoying but honestly, I'd rather deal with the kind of customers I'd encountered in retail than the kind of customers I'd encountered in IT any day. Sure, the pay in IT is a bit higher, but not enough so to be worth it for me.

IT is a fun trajectory.

You start off genuinely enjoying solving problems and helping/teaching the people who are willing to learn.

Then you start to really hate the nasty people. Fair enough. Natural.

Then you start to really hate the lazy people. Definition of what constitutes "lazy" gets broader and broader with every call. But I mean, come on, surely you tried SOMETHING before calling me, right? A power cycle, at least?

Then before you know it, you hate everybody. Every contact. Fuck off. Turn it off and on again, asshole, its literally not hard. Fuck. Off.

So glad I got off the frontline of IT and don't do anything customer facing anymore. Job straight up took years off my life.

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I'm waiting for the Complete Story set that'll launch with the PS9 is 2042, about a year after the final part.

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OK boomer

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Well, the rise of social media has given rise to the steady erosion of online privacy, encouraged social echo chambers which inherrently inspire radicalization, allowed such echo chambers to spread misinformation totally unchecked, and ignited a modern rendition of classical "mob rule." Its at the very least correlated with documented widespread declines in overall mental health, and extracts a hefty amount of social energy and attention.

Its also inspired new methods of social connection and encouraged communication on a worldwide level in an unprecedented way. Its allowed for faster spread of information than any other platform, even online. Its provided careers and livelihoods to a not-insignificant number of people. Its directly led to the exposure and crackdown of many vile people and events throughout the world.

These are all just things I'm rattling off the top of my head, but the pro/con list is exhaustive on both ends. Social media has really completely reinvented how people engage with the world, and I think its still too young to say one way or the other whether that's good or bad long term. Its a monumental shift. I will say that some of its negatives need to be reigned in for us to really see its full potential.

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the correct course of action is to do away with the "lifetime appointment" bullshit.

But that'll happen around the same time as congress imposes term limits on itself, so...

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Verdekal posted...

They tell him his fear will lead to a clouded future, anger hate and suffering.

Well considering all the kid has been through, and almost getting murdered, I'd say the kid has all the right to be scared!!

Sure, but that doesnt necessarily speak to what they're talking about.

If a kid watched his family get murdered, he has a right to be angry, obviously. But that doesnt change the fact that letting that anger control him could very well lead to developing an unhealthy, destructive idealization of vengeance. A natural reaction, maybe, but still not a good one. Thats what I take their assessment as. He IS fearful. Maybe he should be. But letting his fear control him will lead to natural consequences.

Granted, I dont think the jedi were right. They should really be fostering recovery and growth from these negative emotions, rather than just repressing them. Its ironic, because the jedi are, themselves, controlled by fear. Their aversion to any sort of strong emotion comes from their fear of falling.

A fear that is, unfortunately, not without merit. What is star wars if not a manifesto on the destruction that happens any time so much as a single powerful person embraces the dark side.

Regardless, they weren't saying "you're afraid, so your life is gonna suck and be evil." They're saying "you're afraid; if you don't one day learn how to deal with that, it can lead to some bad places." which isn't altogether bad advice.

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https://youtu.be/RAA1xgTTw9w

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