A few weeks back I got a copy of Anno 117, and was really looking forward to playing it. I've been on a city-building and management streak lately, and was excited at the prospect of spending some time with a Roman one that also featured the Anno series' quaint obsession with city-building narrative campaigns.

So I started it up, dabbled in the sandbox mode for a bit, found out I was probably better off playing the campaign instead (it’s got a gentler, longer tutorial) and settled in for what I thought was going to be a month or two of good times. The game looked great on my new PC, and in terms of city-building it seemed like one of the better ones I've played recently. Its production queues require some tricky planning to get right, and the 4X/RTS stuff layered over the top--like controlling army units, exploring uncharted islands and having diplomatic relations with neighbouring islands--was all pretty interesting.

Over the weekend, I hit a loading screen (pictured above) I hadn't noticed before and something immediately felt off. The game's other loading screens had also been weird, but I'd assumed that was because they appeared simply unfinished, raw sketches of an idea for an eventual, more-polished loading screen, in much the way many of Civ VII's were at launch. But this one in particular wasn't that; it was clearly AI-generated. People's arms were gone, hands were strange, outfits warped in unnatural ways, the entire composition was wacky. I'm not the only one to have picked up on this, either; after jumping online to see if anyone else had noticed, I found that so many had noticed and posted about it that Ubisoft had issued a public statement defending it:

This image was a placeholder asset that unintentionally slipped through our review process...With Anno 117: Pax Romana being our most ambitious Anno yet, we’ve assembled the largest team of artists ever for the franchise and to help meet the project's unique scope, they use AI tools for iterations, prototyping, and exploration. Every element players will experience in the final game reflects the team’s craft, artistry, and creative vision.

After reading this I immediately stopped playing, and won't be back. This is 2D art, for a series dating back to the 90s and which has made it through seven previous games using 100% human-made art just fine, and you're telling us that somehow AI is needed now? Are we honestly supposed to take Ubisoft at its word that this dogshit image was the only one? And that it just magically slipped through multiple layers of supervision before appearing in a shipped product?

In addition to the above statement Ubisoft have shown an updated version of the art, which will be added to Anno 117's next update, but the public-facing damage has already been done. As I've said with The Alters previously, once players can see one instance of AI being used, how do we know it hasn't been used throughout?

I’m Getting Real Tired Of Not Being Able To Trust That A Video Game Doesn’t Have AI Crap In It - Aftermath

It sucks that players are having to scour every asset and line of dialogue

AftermathLuke Plunkett

And just like I said with The Alters, I'll say again here: the presence of this stuff inside a game (and in such an obvious case) sends a very clear message to your fans and customers that you do not give a shit. You don't care that this technology is threatening art jobs (and beyond), that it's dehumanising the medium, that it's creating slop that makes your own product look like garbage to the degree that it's causing people playing what had seemed an otherwise good video game to jump online and re-enact the Jose Mourinho headphones meme.

All of that for a piece of loading screen art! Something that older games in the series, like 2019's Anno 1800, were especially noted for. Gah!

DENVER — Popular YouTuber and streamer Cryst0ball’s newest Marvel movie review is not looking positive as he appears to be facepalming in the thumbnail.

“Look. There’s no way he has that expression and likes it. Maybe if he had his eyes popping out cartoonishly as his jaw unhinged, it would be more open to interpretation, but this is a dead giveaway his reaction is not one of approval,” longtime fan Abby Moretti stated. “I can’t judge on a thumbnail alone, but I will know once I have time in my schedule to put the video on in the background while I play Pokémon.”

Other YouTuber reviewers weighed in on it.

“Yup, that’s the classic face of disappointment right there. I personally chose to give the Home Alone face for my thumbnail but we each have our own feelings,” movie YouTuber Crit1calWatcher explained. “Alongside my own analysis of it and why it failed, I will also be uploading a reaction video to Cryst0ball’s review to let people know what I agreed and disagreed with. He is also welcome to come on my Twitch channel where we can debate our differences.”

YouTube CEO Neal Mohan was pleased with Cryst0ball’s thumbnail.

“Yess… good… feed my beast…” Neal claimed in a breath that sounded like wind passing through a hollow tree. “The clicks demand your face in the thumbnail… the clicks demand you express a reaction so cartoonish that it would make 90s Jim Carrey tell you to take it down a notch… insert an ambiguous title that says something like ‘THEY REALLY DID THAT’… the clicks demand you create a controversy to be discussed by other YouTubers…. Only then we will let you reach more people…. feed…”

Cryst0ball’s video on the latest Marvel film is two hours and forty-two minutes, making it just a bit longer than the film itself. At press time, viewers reported that watching it without YouTube Premium includes ads for a “technically legal” gambling site every twelve minutes.

The post Not Good: Thumbnail Of YouTuber’s Movie Review Has Them Facepalming appeared first on Palette Swap.

To celebrate the launch of our new website, we're currently running a sale on Reader-tier memberships for new subscribers: sign up and you'll get a whole month of Aftermath, a blog about video games and so much more, for just $1.

A single American dollar! I'm not even going to bother doing the usual comparisons with stuff like a cup of coffee, because it's a buck. That buck will let you kick the tyres on what it's like being a subscriber to a reader-supported, worker-owned website. You'll get access to every blog (no more registration or paywalls), as well as the ability to join the community by commenting under posts. You can also catch up on all the stories we've written over our first two years, from exhaustive features to opinion pieces to freelance posts to news and so much more.

After the first month your subscription will renew at the normal rate for the Reader tier, which is $7. If you like it, stick around! And if you like it a lot, you can even upgrade to our Member tier, which in addition to everything you've already got also includes an invitation to our community Discord, merch discounts and a private, full-text RSS feed.

Click here to redeem the offer, and if you do, thank you so much for your support. This site and everything we do simply isn't possible without the help of readers like you!

Click below to redeem the offer and get your first month of Aftermath for just $1

REDEEM OFFER

HOLLYWOOD — Illumination Studios premiered the first-ever trailer for The Super Mario Galaxy Movie in a Nintendo Direct this morning, which included an unexpected segment where Mario turned to the camera and called the late Charlie Kirk a hero and an American patriot.

“That line was at the request of Chris [Pratt], who returns as the voice of Mario,” explained producer Christopher Meledandri. “Trust us—we really didn’t want to touch this whole thing with a ten-foot pole, but, well, he insisted. After explaining that he wouldn’t return to the role unless we included this scene, he said ‘good luck finding someone else who can do a pitch-perfect Luigi voice.’”

The scene in question, which featured an American flag flown behind Mario with his right hand placed over his heart, raised a lot of eyebrows following its release.

“I wish I could say I was surprised, but… I’m not,” read a post on Bluesky. “Pratt really hasn’t been shy about expressing his political opinions. And look, I’m usually able to ignore it when I get to watch my favorite characters going on fun adventures up on the big screen, but when it’s this overt… I think I’ll just stick to the Sonic movies from now on. Shadow shows a great example of responsible gun ownership.”

Shigeru Miyamoto, creator of Mario and co-producer of the film, was reportedly not taking the response all too well.

“La-la-la-la I do not know what you are talking about,” said Miyamoto with his fingers jammed in his ears. “I really can’t handle this kind of heat. Can’t you guys be upset about game key cards, or our games being overpriced? Maybe we could make the Switch 2 no longer backwards compatible with Switch 1 games? Could you guys please be angry about something else? We have so many other options!”

At press time, an extended trailer was released in which Jack Black’s Bowser turned to the screen and said it wasn’t okay to joke about presidents being shot at, either.

The post Mario Pays Abrupt Tribute to the Late Charlie Kirk in Mario Galaxy Movie Trailer appeared first on Palette Swap.

CARY, N.C. — A player of the recent Simpsons Fortnite crossover insisted that the event peaked around day nine or ten and hasn’t been very good since, sources sick of hearing about it confirmed. 

“I can’t believe people are still playing that Springfield event,” said local gamer Drew Landers. “Sure, it started as a clever and subversive example of how enriching content updates can be to a video game while still being critical of this landscape of constant corporate merging. But these days, it feels like a shell of its former self, having slowly devolved into the very thing it used to skewer. Have you seen those latest drops they revealed? Worst. Battle Pass. Ever.” 

Defenders of the crossover pushed back against the criticism. 

“Sure, it came out of the gate really strong,” said Jerry Tucker, who said he was still enjoying the event.  “But I think people who dismiss it entirely now either haven’t checked it out in a while, or have rose-colored glasses for their memories of when they first got into The Simpsons [Fortnite event] back in early November. Just turn your brain off and have fun, it’s a game! Also, you have to admit, even if you don’t love the models, they look a hell of a lot better than the ones from Family Guy.” 

Simpsons creator Matt Groening said he anticipated the crossover not pleasing everybody. 

“When you’ve created the longest-running television show in television history, as well as allegedly appeared in the Epstein files, you’re going to learn that you can’t please everybody,” Groening said. “The truth is, The Simpsons has been violently merchandised in every way imaginable since 1990. I don’t understand why Fortnite would be the final straw for anyone. Hey, also, would you not print that thing I said about the Epstein files?”

As of press time, Landers was overheard claiming that the Futurama stuff in Fortnite is better anyway.

The post Fortnite Fan Says Simpsons Crossover Hasn’t Been Good Since Day 10 appeared first on Palette Swap.

SAN FRANCISCO — In the midst of several new changes coming to Discord, the company announced that it would be introducing tumbleweeds that blow past dormant servers.

“Finally! I’ve been waiting for this for ages,” user Damian McNabb said in the comment section of the announcement. “There’s a few servers that I’m in that I don’t wanna leave, because it would just be too awkward. I’ve been in one since 2019 that was supposed to be for planning a weekly D&D night. Needless to say, it hasn’t been touched in half a decade. Now, at least there’s a fun reason to go back to it.”

Other users aren’t as thrilled at the added changes.

“First, they do this dumb Patreon integration, now suddenly there’s all these weeds everywhere on my screen,” Brandon Olson, another frequent user of the app said. “I go to my DM’s, and I can barely read anything because there’s practically a sandstorm happening all over my screen. I’m sure there’s a lot for me to read under there. Probably just a bug in the system. Yeah, that’s it. It must be.”

Discord product manager Jeremy Belling elaborated on the tumbleweeds and other incoming changes.

“Lots of people have been worried about the changes we’ll be making ahead of going public, and I’m hoping this will help assuage them,” Belling said. “Sure, we’re introducing advertising on the mobile app, but those will be a little fun too. This is just another way to show we aren’t like other companies. We’re your friends. Friends you will soon be able to buy shares of on Wall Street. Maybe you guys can boost us like you did with GameStop. It’s what friends would do for each other, after all.”

Discord announced another new update that would charge users a nightly cover fee to enter servers that are deemed very active.

The post Discord Adds Tumbleweeds That Occasionally Blow by Abandoned Servers appeared first on Palette Swap.