I believe the NX is going to be somewhat similar to the Wii U, but with a portable Gamepad. I am thinking that the portable gamepad will essentially be able to play a low res version of the game on the go, or a fully high res version of the game when connected to the actual console. I really don't believe you will have a handheld unit that basically just hooks up to your TV.

Cartridges actually make a lot of sense. They will likely be some sort of proprietary flash memory (similar to an SD card), and will likely be able to hold any amount of data needed. Flash memory is also very fast, and would eliminate the need for installs completely. This would be a huge selling point for anyone that has put a disc in an XBox One and then had to wait an hour or more to even come close to playing the game.

The only part that I can't figure out if the above is correct, is how updates will work. Will they download to and alter the cartridge / flash memory? Part of me wants to say no, but I guess if you basically had a partition of the flash memory dedicated to just telling the system what the game was, then it could essentially safely wipe the entire memory unit if needed and re-download the entire game again. This would obviously be an extreme example, with most updates just replacing certain files.

Also, I wonder if the handheld unit will be able to play 3DS / DS games....

Diversity isn't a pillar of game development, it is a pillar of society.

The job of a game developer is to make a great game. Diversity, is not a game mechanic or element of game design. Diversity is a "sub-pillar" of Story. It should be natural, not forced. It should be a reflection of whatever society is in your story.

What diversity should NOT be, is something you can use to make headlines. Diversity should not be a "pillar" of marketing. If you start to make a game and say, "Hey, we really need a [insert race] guy in this game," you may be going for diversity, but it is actual extremely racist. Just because you are attempting to do a good thing, it does not mean that it isn't still racist (particularly if you are doing it for marketing, then you are absolute scum). The same applies to gender. If you decide to add a female character, just for the sake of having a female character, then it is sexism.

And when you change or add characters simply for the sake of diversity, not only does the game usually suffer, but so do the characters you are trying to create and represent. Most of the time these characters feel forced and out of place. Many times they are shallow and consist of nothing but stereotypes. That is offensive. And while the media and many people may let developers off the hook for it because at least they tried, it is actually worse than if they had done nothing.

Games need to tell a VARIETY of stories. However, tell the story you are telling, with the characters that naturally fit in that story. If your story features a female lead, great. I can't wait to play Horizon : Zero Dawn. I am excited to play THAT character. She is interesting, seems like she has a great story. I also really enjoyed the latest Tomb Raider games (well the first one, have not gotten to the second yet). If the story features a black male / female lead, great. The new Mafia game looks great. The bits of the main characters story I have heard sound interesting and seem to fit the character (and seem to be mostly stereotype free). Feel free to have gay main characters if you want. I'm good with that. Just make sure their character works and make sense.

However, don't force characters into games. If you go out of your comfort zone with a character, then a lot of care has to be taken to do the character right. For example, what I have seen of Watch Dogs 2's character so far does NOT have me excited. He seems to have this gangster / thug / hipster vibe to him that I really don't want to play any more than I wanted to play the guy in the first game. He seems to be shallow and just a huge stereotype. They even shared a quote at one point, saying they wanted to tell a story of diversity or something along those lines, and that is how you end up with a character like that.

You have people on both sides of these issues that seem to have part of the idea right, but are too set on sticking to their side to see that the answer is somewhere in the middle. You have the people proclaiming everyone as SJW's and non white non male lead as being all part of a liberal agenda. You have people on the other side trying to add diversity to games simply for the sake of it being there, not understanding that doing so can be incredibly sexist / racist. The reality is that there should be more diversity in games but it needs to happen naturally and the stories need to support it. Praising developers for simply having a certain type of character and for trumpeting diversity simply for the sake of diversity is wrong. You aren't doing anything positive for anyone. You are making the situation worse. Praise developers for creating great diverse stories, not for simply changing the color of a characters skin.

Sold.

Hopefully the emulation is done well. And while the list of games does not include every game I would have liked to have seen, it is actually a far better list of games than I thought it would be. No filler. All solid games.

"we just really haven't had time to really think through the details of it because we're so focused on getting the show made."

Yes, you are focused on getting the show made. Not making it great or telling the same great stories of seasons 1-4, but getting it done. They want to get it done and over with, and it shows. Badly...

@battlestreak: I flat out told my 2 pcs not to upgrade. Cancelled it every time it showed up, and on the one, went so far as to delete the data it downloaded to do the install. They both still upgraded on their own. The only successful way I heard of anyone avoiding it (after I did some searching after my PCs upgraded on their own), was to edit the registry, which most people even in the IT field try to avoid doing whenever possible and should NEVER be done by the average user.

This whole thing was absolute BS on Microsoft's part. As far as never hearing of Windows 10, yeah that was probably BS, but Microsoft forced the upgrades through.

Luckily it was just EA, but kind of annoying to be watching the stream on a bit of a delay and have it suddenly cut out only to then show a live video of a dark room.

I realize it was a live stream, but at a point leave the video up at least until the next event starts, or leave the video up like you do with the Lobby. Don't just take it down less than an hour after it has ended.

I had hope for this because it seemed a bit darker and a little more serious than Episode VII.... Sometimes I wonder if this is all because of Disney having ownership over the franchise....

@habeasdata: Yeah, in a way it's faster. The down side is some of it is just badly written this season, with characters doing things that do not make sense for their character, and very little mystery in where things are going. This is probably because they no longer have the books to work from, but I would think these writers would at least understand the series by now. This season most characters are basically just going in circles.

Arya is working so hard to become a faceless man, and yet does not seem to be that devoted to it. She has the willpower to be beaten up constantly and even be blind, and yet she sees someone on her list, and she has to get her revenge. She goes to a play, decides someone is a good person, and decides to go against everything she has been working toward?

Cersei should be killing everyone and getting her revenge on, and yet she is kinda just hanging out.

The list goes on but I really need to get back to work. I basically just miss old Game of Thrones. I miss the political maneuvering, the complicated plot points, the dramatic confrontations / battles, and the character development. I miss not knowing exactly what is going to happen where as now I am basically just waiting for it to happen. I miss Tyrion being Tyrion, and Jon being Jon. I miss watching Arya's character develop. I miss wanting to see Cersei / Joffery get murdered (Yes, I want Ramsey gone, but mostly because he sucks as a villain). I miss getting to watch characters achieve something (Dany is the only one that achieved anything, and yet the whole fire thing felt extremely convenient...I am still not sure I believe it should have been that easy). This does not feel like the show I feel in love with (maybe we need to see other people Game of Thrones....maybe...).

@mo123567: To me, what was strange is that she made a speech. She was talking to Dario about what she wanted to do, he basically said don't do that, keep going with what you are doing here. And she basically says, wait here a second, goes and finds Drogon, misplaces her horse, and flies back and makes this big speech to...convince people to fight for her? To convince them to cross the sea? They are already devoted to her supposedly after the fire thing, and they were not disagreeing with her. She makes the speech to her army but it seems to basically be a response to a conversation she had with Dario. It is really odd.

The speech just does not feel like it was justified. They did not show her army having any real doubts about what she was doing. It is not as if she said "hey guys I want to do this" and they all freaked out. They just watched her walk out of fire and basically think she is a god. She does not need to convince them.

@habeasdata: Agreed. This was probably my least favorite episode of...well the series really. Extremely slow and sloppy. Dany's speech feels like it comes out of nowhere. She has had some really bad ass moments throughout the series but that speech felt extremely forced into the show.

So much time spent at Horn Hill for really no development. Arya can't decide who she is....

The Kings Landing seen was interesting, but with the rest of the episode being so slow, I found myself a little let down that something larger didn't happen.

Also, a minor complaint as a book reader. While I was excited to find out for sure who Cold Hands was, it was a little anti climactic in the show. This makes sense for the show, as it isn't a big reveal since he has not been in the show until now. But having read the books and having spent so much time guessing at the identity of Cold Hands, to have the show go "Look at this mysterious character!" only to reveal who he was a few seconds later..... I didn't even get to finish being excited that Cold Hands finally made it into the show.

It feels like it is going to be just like last season where it was 7 or 8 episodes of build up and 2-3 episodes of action (to the point that episode 9 felt like it had to rush the action along).