In middle school, I was always hunting for more games to add to my collection. Spending $60 on a new title was a luxury that I could only afford once or twice a year, so I would always peruse the Xbox 360 game market for cheap or free games to play. Most of what was available were demos or knockoffs of other titles that I’d delete within a few minutes, disappointed and bored yet again. Today, that problem doesn’t exist. My middle school self would have been in a gaming paradise with all of the free-to- play titles that have been coming out — and quality ones at that. A wave of free games has taken over the industry in the last five years, with some of the biggest names in gaming joining in. Epic has been one of the biggest players in this new trend: The massive success of “Fortnite” aside, they have also recently purchased “Fall Guys” and “Rocket League,” turning them into free-to-play games as well. Even some of the biggest game franchises, such as Halo, Destiny and Call of Duty, have become, in part, free-to-play. Whether it be through the sale of battle passes, cosmetics such as skins and emotes or items like XP boosts that give the player a helping hand, these games have become what can best be termed “freemium.” This freemium model is insanely profitable for games like Fortnite, but that success has started a troubling trend within the gaming industry. The trajectory of the mobile game market over the last decade is a good, albeit simplified, metaphor for the way big-budget games have been approaching the freemium model as of late. The early 2010s saw the release of some of the most iconic mobile games, including “Angry Birds,” “Cut The Rope” and “Plants vs. Zombies.” These all began as premium titles that required a one-time purchase of a few dollars to play. Sure, there may have been extra ways to spend your money in these games, but for the most part they focused on giving you a full game experience for the price you paid up front. However, upon seeing the success of freemium titles such as “Clash of Clans” or “Candy Crush” on the mobile market, these games adjusted their gameplay models for their respective sequels. “Angry Birds 2” implemented an energy system, meaning that after five attempts players must either wait 30 minutes, watch an ad or pay for another go. “Plants vs. Zombies 2” slowed its progression system by making players collect a certain amount of stars from a series of levels before allowing them to move to the next area, unlike the first title where beating a level meant moving right onto the next one. Of course, this can be made easier by straight up paying your way to the next area, saving you from having to perfect some of the game’s particularly (and suspiciously) hard levels. Both of these games saw fundamental changes to their gameplay formulas and are arguably worse for it. It’s not fun to have to wait to play or have to pointlessly grind through a level, especially when previous titles had none of these cash-grabbing techniques. Even though they may be free to play, unlike their predecessors, core parts of these games were sacrificed in the name of a freemium model. Now we are seeing a similar shift take place in some of the gaming industry giants, with results that are just as troubling as seen in their mobile brethren. My worries about this trend started when Halo — a pillar of the Xbox brand and one of my favorite game series — announced that the multiplayer in their next title, “Halo Infinite,” would be free while the campaign would cost the standard $60. This was a departure from the way mainline Halo games had been sold for the last 20 years, with campaign and multiplayer bundled together as a single, paid package. Although the release date for “Infinite” was set for December 2021, the multiplayer portion was given a surprise release in November — smack dab in the middle of the release of “Call of Duty: Vanguard” and “Battlefield: 2042,” two major (paid) multiplayer games. This was an obvious smack in the face for the other two major franchises — Battlefield’s parent company, EA, has allegedly blamed the game’s poor reception on Halo — but since that initial moment of success it has become clear that this move to free-to-play has had a major impact on the game’s core elements. Like many of its first-person shooter compatriots, Halo is built around glory. Players are commended for their skill in each game — how well they are able to pull off things such as headshots or multikills. Traditionally these things rewarded players with postgame accommodations that would boost their player level. As their level increased, so did players’ access to cosmetics, namely different pieces of armor to equip their character with. “Halo Infinite” does away with the performance-based experience system, instead making players complete certain weekly objectives to earn XP points. Working to get to the top of the scoreboard or pulling off an insane killstreak feels empty to me now. “Infinite” seems to promote the idea that your time could be better spent focusing on specific tasks such as getting assists or dealing damage with certain weapons rather than playing the game how you want to play it. Of course, these challenges are all optional, as they only serve to unlock armor from a paid battle pass. But when matches are filled with people rushing for certain guns or just leaving the game idle so they can reach a certain number of rounds played, it feels lame to try and compete and play the game the way it’s meant to be played — or at least, the way it used to be. The Michigan Daily — michigandaily.com Arts From an eerie, middle-of- nowhere ranch created in the mind of Jordan Peele, “Nope” is born. Peele’s third film, after “Get Out” and “Us,” stars Daniel Kaluuya (“Judas and the Black Messiah”) from Peele’s first film, and Keke Palmer (“Lightyear”), a striking addition to the cast. The pair play OJ and Emerald Haywood, brother and sister horse wranglers who are descendants of the first Black animal trainer and actor in film. Human-eating UFOs, a killer chimpanzee and dead horses make their way into a confusing but intriguing plot. Somehow it feels like there’s too much and nothing going on at the same time. While the plot’s premise doesn’t deviate much from Peele’s other films, the movie itself is a slight letdown in comparison because of it. The film takes place in inland California, where OJ and Emerald train Hollywood show horses on their spacious, secluded ranch. Things begin heating up when they notice sinister, almost supernatural behavior in the skies above — frequent power outages followed by horses disappearing in plain sight. A neighboring theme park owner (Steven Yeun, “Minari”) also observes this unnatural activity. The two storylines emphasize the danger of what happens when trying to tame the beast versus letting it roam free. It feels as though Peele is trying to convey an overarching theme of how animals — or creatures — should not be manipulated for human benefit. He does this through his use of the siblings’ horses, a persistent UFO and a largely unnerving chimpanzee from the park owner’s past, all retaliating against efforts to control them. After seeing Kaluuya and Palmer introduce “Nope” live at a premiere of the film, and knowing Peele’s stellar reputation, I did my best to fully comprehend and love this movie. For two hours and 15 minutes, I stared at the screen with my brows furrowed, trying to make sense of it, but my efforts were lost in the confusion of the various plot points. A UFO as the movie’s main predator felt played out and frankly, slightly ridiculous. One of this movie’s greatest faults concerning its confusing plot is the sudden, frequent flashbacks and flash-forwards. With no transition, we travel from the Hayworth house to a memory from the park owner’s past. I was constantly trying to figure out the movie’s timeline, all to no avail. The many eerie scenes added to the fear factor, but the link between them was often faint. I was left distraught over a violent scene of the young park owner witnessing a chimpanzee brutally murdering a little girl, but the connection between that and real-time scenes of the UFO was weak. Peele left much unexplained, and a little clarity definitely could’ve helped convey the theme more strongly for an increased impact on the audience. The overall themes were illustrated well, but the plot wasn’t so much a fluid story as a collection of moments and memories. That said, the cinematography was striking. The film, shot on 65mm in IMAX, rivaled, if not surpassed, the camera work of Peele’s previous movies. I appreciated the beauty of the desert, which seemed like a stylistic choice meant to showcase the natural environment where the predators belong and should peacefully remain. I was rooting for Jordan Peele’s ‘Nope’ Wednesday, September 21, 2022 — 5 Design by Leilani Baylis-Washington ZARA MANNA Daily Arts Writer ‘The Room’: putting the cult in cult classic I had seen “The Room” a couple of times, but never in a theater full of people. I understood the absurdity of the film and how truly terrible it is — so terrible that it inspired a memoir and movie adaptation called “The Disaster Artist” that explores the movie’s troubled production. I had seen both “The Room” and “The Disaster Artist” before, tricking myself into believing that I understood the fandom that surrounded “The Room.” But I was not ready for the experience that is seeing a late- night showing in a theater jam- packed with enthusiastic fans. “The Room” stars the writer, director and executive producer Tommy Wiseau (“Best F(r)iends”) as a man named Johnny in a turbulent relationship with his fiancee Lisa (Juliette Danielle, “Dead Kansas”) and his best friend Mark (Greg Sestero, “Best F(r) iends”). Lisa has fallen out of love with Johnny and starts an affair with Mark. Much of the movie focuses on characters unrelated to the main storyline, an attempt to show a slice of life that results in a majority of the movie distracting from the main characters. One such character is Denny (Philip Haldiman, “Room Full of Spoons”), a college student who is financially supported by Johnny, and who has a violent encounter with a drug dealer, only for it to never be brought up again. It is hard to follow the plot of the movie, as characters have wild changes in their mood without warning. One notable example is Mark attempting to kill his friend Peter (Kyle Vogt, “Monarch of the Moon”), quickly followed by an apology and the two acting as if nothing happened. The unfortunate byproduct of this is a movie that is often described as the worst ever made. I learned about the bizarre traditions for group viewings of “The Room” just hours before seeing the movie, leaving me woefully unprepared for the ridiculousness. I knew maybe a handful of the many famous quotes but had no idea when scenes tied to specific traditions would occur and did not bring any spoons to throw at the screen — my years cleaning movie theaters in high school made me feel guilty about the idea of creating such a mess. These feelings of guilt were quickly alleviated when an announcement was made to throw the spoons up in the air instead of at the screen in order to not damage the screen itself, giving an indirect confirmation from the Michigan Theater staff that they understood the atmosphere of the event. Before the film, Sestero was in the lobby meeting fans and throwing around a football, a reference to the fact that Mark and Johnny will often play catch at seemingly random times throughout the movie. I felt bad for Sestero at first, worrying that he was tired of hearing the same jokes repeated endlessly, but he had a sense of humor about the situation. I expected an old man exhausted from decades talking about the same movie, but I was met with an actor who still loved to talk about his passion: making movies. His precursor Q&A is when I realized just how hardcore some fans of “The Room” are. One audience member had such a spot-on impression of Johnny that I have to believe he spent hours rehearsing it. Using his own Johnny impression that would give the audience member a run for his money, Sestero talked about how Wiseau would constantly replace the production staff and forget his own lines for hours on end. He was feeding off of the energy from the crowd, performing something similar to a stand-up comedy routine based on his experiences making the film. ZACH LOVEALL Daily Arts Writer Is the future of gaming free? HUNTER BISHOP Daily Arts Writer Design by Emily Schwartz puzzle by sudokusnydictation.com By Bonnie Eisenman ©2022 Tribune Content Agency, LLC 09/21/22 Los Angeles Times Daily Crossword Puzzle Edited by Patti Varol and Joyce Nichols Lewis 09/21/22 ANSWER TO PREVIOUS PUZZLE: Release Date: Wednesday, September 21, 2022 ACROSS 1 Thwack 5 Informed (of) 10 Compensation 14 Tuck out of view 15 Wrinkled 16 Many a univ. donor 17 365 days 18 Rub ingredient 19 HBO political satire starring Julia Louis- Dreyfus 20 Impractical way to get dressed? 23 Barack and Michelle’s eldest daughter 26 Family room 27 Impatient 28 Lives 30 Cookie fruit 31 Planning meeting for the costume department? 35 “Stop filming!” 38 Broody sorts? 39 Sir or sri 40 More than dislike 41 Donkey 42 Disappointing sign on a store selling warm-weather garments? 44 GPS display 45 Small village 46 Food cart snacks in South Asia 49 Texting letters 52 Swerves 53 Really pulls off a jacket? 56 Initial poker bet 57 Japanese noodle dish 58 Carried debt 62 Appear to be 63 “You __ kidding!” 64 Grow tiresome 65 Jekyll’s counterpart 66 Basil-based sauce 67 Yields, as a profit DOWN 1 Bashful 2 Blip on a polygraph, maybe 3 Hugo-nominated novelist Palmer 4 Continues 5 “One more thing ... ” 6 Totally beat 7 Ouzo flavoring 8 Scouting mission, briefly 9 Garden with forbidden fruit 10 Fluttering in the wind 11 Warning signal 12 Ballpark figure 13 Like cans in a recycling bin, hopefully 21 Doth own 22 Fall flat 23 Anime genre featuring giant robots 24 Wheel- connecting rods 25 NFL team whose mascot is named Roary 29 Punchline lead-in 30 __ and blood 32 “Pull up a chair” 33 Corp. computer exec 34 Fuzzy sitcom star of the 1980s 35 “The Grouchy Ladybug” writer/ illustrator 36 Out-and-out 37 Tries, as one’s patience 40 Place of origin 42 Cheerios grains 43 “__ Nagila”: Israeli folk song 44 Defiant retort 46 Cymbal sound 47 Bee product 48 Performed 49 Open up, in a way 50 Fast-spreading social media posts 51 Fragrance 54 Hip hop genre 55 “I’m __ your tricks!” 59 Pint-size 60 “Mangia!” 61 Many profs SUDOKU By Lisa Senzel & Christina Iverson ©2022 Tribune Content Agency, LLC 09/14/22 Los Angeles Times Daily Crossword Puzzle Edited by Patti Varol and Joyce Nichols Lewis 09/14/22 ANSWER TO PREVIOUS PUZZLE: Release Date: Wednesday, September 14, 2022 ACROSS 1 Spanish tennis great Nadal, familiarly 5 Upgrade, as machinery 10 Uncertain 14 Cabbage buy 15 Glazer of “The Afterparty” 16 Skating commentator Lipinski 17 Analogy words 18 Bridal path flower piece 19 Stash, as gear 20 Japanese drama 21 Cookbook contents 23 Author Rand 24 Genre for composer Terence Blanchard 26 Informal “You’re oversharing” 27 Caramel candies 29 Like some dangerous isotopes 32 Curry of the NBA 34 Bike part 35 Quintet for most starfish 38 Prefix for a lifesaving “Pen” 39 Not so big 41 Knock 42 Try to hit 44 Tell it like it isn’t 45 Speed skater Ohno 47 Act parts 49 Past the point of caring 50 Michelle of “Crazy Rich Asians” 52 Neighborhood 53 *Secretive email option 60 Uncommon 61 Assertion 62 Cookie used as a 12-Down topping 63 Admit frankly 64 Omit in speech 65 Spreadsheet unit 66 Soaks up the sun 67 Calf-roping event 68 Diet that’s high in fats and low in carbs, as illustrated by parts of the answers to the starred clues DOWN 1 Safari herbivore 2 Fabulous writer? 3 *Figure often depicted with a scythe and an hourglass 4 Hubbub 5 Ready for picking 6 __ college 7 *Pakistani-born chef who was posthumously honored with a James Beard Award 8 Up the creek 9 Story 10 Part of FWIW 11 *Serious software problem 12 Dessert from 16 Handles, familiarly 13 Signs of boredom 21 “Wicked!” 22 __ Lanka 25 Sidelines cheer 28 Fertility lab cells 30 Maker of the Deep Blue chess computer 31 Workout top 32 Bodies of water 33 __ fail 36 Timbuktu’s land 37 Predicament 39 Fine horse 40 Black bird 43 “What’s the latest?” 46 NBC symbol 48 Abby Wambach’s sport 49 Juliet’s cry 51 Winnie-the-Pooh greeting 52 Tolerate 53 Sassy kid 54 Chocolate __ cake 55 Waffle maker 56 “Kills bugs dead!” spray 57 Hockey Hall of Famer Willie 58 Hit, as with snowballs 59 “Seize the day” initialism PARKING Parking Space for Rent North State & Kingsley 734-904-0649 CLASSIFIED ADS Your classified ad here! 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