Nelson Schneider - wrote on 05/14/23 at 05:35 PM CT

When the MeltedJoystick Crew first encountered Gearbox and Nerdvana Games’ D&D knock-off, Bunkers & Badasses, during the “Tiny Tina’s Assault on Dragon Keep” DLC pack for “Borderlands 2,” we all quickly agreed that it was hilariou...

Nelson Schneider - wrote on 05/07/23 at 03:41 PM CT

Back in 1993, Nintendo partnered with Disney to bring a film adaptation of their signature videogame franchise and mascot platform, “Super Mario Bros.” to theaters. The result was so disastrous and completely unlike the source material that it not only bombed at the box office, but also scared Nintendo away from movie collaborations for deca...

Nelson Schneider - wrote on 04/30/23 at 04:00 PM CT

Welcome back to another look into the near future! Spring is winding down, and as May comes upon us, the Games Industry has its last gasp in releasing solid Q1 titles to build operating revenue for the rest of the year. Unfortunately for the gamers on the receiving end of the corporate machine, those “solid titles” are more like “solid turds,” dropping from the Industry’s collective rec...

Nelson Schneider - wrote on 04/23/23 at 11:01 PM CT

This week, Netflix, the company that revolutionized the way we watch movies not once, but twice, announced that after 25 years, the iconic red envelopes and DVDs/Blu-Rays-by-mail inside them will be going away for good come Autumn.

The company...

Nelson Schneider - wrote on 04/15/23 at 03:20 PM CT

2023 has been an astounding year for boycotts, kicked off by the Fringe Leftist attempt to Cancel “Hogwarts Legacy,” which ultimately backfired and saw the game breaking sales records. Hot on the heels of that dismal failure have been two more boycotts coming from places other than the fringiest fringe of crazy politics...

Nelson Schneider - wrote on 04/08/23 at 04:01 PM CT

Sony has been losing its mind ever since Microsoft first announced its intention to purchase Activision (along with subsidiaries Blizzard and King) for $69 billion. This announcement first dropped in January of 2022, and Sony has been acting out, like a spoiled child, ever since. First they attempted to show that they are j...

Nelson Schneider - wrote on 04/02/23 at 05:06 PM CT

Welcome back to another look into the near future! The old saying is that “April Showers bring May Flowers,” but when it comes to the Games Industry, it’s either a torrential downpour of liquid fecal matter or a withering drought of nothing. It looks like we’re in for an April downpour, once again… though I doubt there’s anything in here that’s worth seining out.

Classifiable sho...

Nelson Schneider - wrote on 03/26/23 at 04:22 PM CT

It seems like everything terrible that could happen did happen in 2020. In addition to the pandemic and race riots, there was a major uptick in the usage of the hashtag #MeToo to, allegedly, give women a voice they didn’t have to speak out against those who had sexually assaulted them. Unsurprisingly, accusations came crawling ou...

Nelson Schneider - wrote on 03/19/23 at 03:31 PM CT

Microsoft has had a shockingly good few years recently with regard to positivity surrounding their gaming endeavors. Perhaps they have finally managed to shake off the stigmata of their terrible early versions of Windows and their identity as primarily an office-based software developer, as more and more people forego office PCs and just do everything on their phones. Regardless, for the first ti...

Nelson Schneider - wrote on 03/11/23 at 04:30 PM CT

It’s March, again, and that means MeltedJoystick’s favorite fur-bearing, idiosyncratic cryptid, Chris, is another year older, and another year more set in his ways. Last year, I listed a number of D&D “Monster Manual” denizens that remind me of Chris, but this year, I’m going to do a sequel to the second ‘He’s...