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Language: en
Let's start with the Electric Arts
acquisition. This one blew my mind. 55
billion for a game development company.
>> How dare you insinuate it should be
less.
>> No, I'm just I love you, Tom. I love
Kaizen. I was like 55 billion in 2025.
EA The Sims is that worth 55 bill? Like
it was just a
>> sports franchise?
>> It was surprising. This is good because
any deal in a space means that activity
is rolling, other people are looking for
it. So I I know why gaming would like
it.
>> I don't really care about it from that
perspective. I expect players to care
about this very deeply. Now, the player
community is like sort of in a weird
state. One of the things that they're
saying is, "Oh my god, yes, they've been
bought by a company, uh, a consortium of
investment houses that are in Middle
Eastern. This is going to be great. No
more garbage." Right? There's a huge
contingency of millennial gamers. The
more time I spend watching gaming
content, the more I realize how much
this is a millennial reaction. Utterly
fascinating. Uh, but millennial gamers
are up in arms about anything that has
to do with woke this that or the other.
But then people are like, well, hold on
a second. Didn't Saudi Arabia like uh
bone saw cat to pieces like in the like
distant past. Is that like aren't they
going to inject their own values into
the games? It'll be interesting to see
how this plays out. So, for sure they're
going to now inject their values or have
bumpers in the alley of like, well,
don't say things bad about us or
whatever. you will for sure see that the
bad guys in an EA game aren't going to
be Middle Eastern. Let's just say that.
Uh so they're going to point you in some
other direction. Certainly brace
yourselves for that. But um ultimately
businesses like this, especially when
you're doing it on debt, they need to
make money. And so the things that I
would expect gamers to really be
focusing on is what are they going to do
to the monetization here? Now, the
reality is as a game developer, I'm
paying a lot of attention to where games
are going in the future and games are
going mobile. Mobile gamers don't have
all the beef with the microtransactions.
So, you can expect that they're hyper
aware of that, that they're going to be
looking for ways to incorporate
microtransactions into what they view as
the future. And so, if I were them, I
would be looking at this going, "Oh,
okay. How much of our revenue do we
generate off PC gamers? Do we think
that's uh increasing or decreasing?" I
would say it's decreasing. How much are
we making off mobile? Do we think that's
going to increase or decrease? I think
they're all going to look at that and
go, that's increasing. So, I would
expect over the next 10 years for them
to begin putting more and more of their
time and attention into mobile first
things, migrating their famous
properties into mobile playable games,
either simplifying the mechanics or just
using more of the loot driven mechanics,
um, pay to win mechanics, things like
that. And so, millennial gamers,
traditional gamers, however you want to
think about it, which by the way, I'm
one of, not millennial, but traditional.
So, I play on PC and console, but I
think you're going to see a move like
that. So, if gamers are going to either
be excited or be traumatized, I would
look at it from that perspective because
these guys, like when they do
acquisitions like this, they're not
like, "I like games." They're going into
this, they're going, "Oh, I understand
this at the level of a spreadsheet." The
vast majority of the people involved in
these acquisitions don't play games.
I've never played games. Literally don't
care. They are like Warren Buffett. They
are sitting looking at a bunch of
spreadsheets and going, "Where is
something undervalued? Where do we think
we understand the future better than
somebody else? Where is there a
discrepancy between the price that the
shares are trading at versus where we
think they'll trade out in three or five
years? That's it, man. That is how they
process through this stuff. It is
totally mercenary. Now, you don't need
to be traumatized by that because one of
the most mercenary things that a company
can do is go find the young, hungry
talent that really want to make
something awesome. This is what always
makes me laugh is that remember
companies are leading from the back.
You'll get like Quest ended up
succeeding the way that it did because
we led from the front. We were for our
own reasons hellbent to build that
company and we didn't know if it would
work. That was us going h this might be
a suicide run but I really want to do
this for my own reasons and it worked.
Once it works everybody else just floods
in at the spreadsheet level. Everybody's
looking for that. Right. So the game I'm
building, Project Kaisen, I'm not
building chasing a spreadsheet. I'm
building the game I want to play. I've
got a whole thesis about what I think is
going to happen to the world. I think AI
is going to make the world so easy that
people are going to be forced to find
hard mode and they're going to find it
in simulated worlds. That isn't what I'm
building today. I'm laying the
foundation trying to figure out the game
mechanics. That's 5 10 years away. I'm
leading from the front. Maybe it'll fail
catastrophically. When you lead from the
front, you run that risk. But this
acquisition is about leading from
behind. So gamers have proven we want a
mobile game. I'm just growing up with a
mobile device. Always in my hand, always
easy. I'm not growing up in the PC era
where it's like all my friends get
together. It's just not how they play
games. Now,
>> if you want to understand where this
acquisition goes, look at it through the
lens of assets, investments,
entrepreneurship, and it's going to get
a lot clearer. They're going to try to
maximize the profits of all of those
games, and they will do it through the
ways that I just talked about. Now, I
get why like it was sad for me to watch
what happened to Star Wars, but there's
always going to be cool new [ __ ] So,
like, look, I get it. Nostalgia, all
that. Nobody's more like nostalgia
baited than me, but at the same time,
good games will continue to get made in
the way that you like good games. They
just might be super niche. I will do a
PSA to all of my millennial gamers out
there. I've watched so much of your
content. Literally at this point I've
seen well north of a hundred videos
about the state of the gaming industry
specifically from they don't call
themselves millennials but you can tell
that they are millennials uh from their
perspective and it's just all
lamentations you are making these less
fun for yourself and I would just say
find a path to like where's the joy
where's people doing cool stuff so you
can fall in love again I want that for
you uh so we'll see anyway all right so
we have that on one side of the coin and
honestly the gaming community seems to
be aligned with it. Hey, it's not
private no more. Hey, I see this is
going to open up more investment. It
hasn't been what we seen on the other
side where the Riad uh comedy festival
was announced and all these comedians
were announced to be a part of it and
immediately everybody was mad like how
can they speak to this? This is the same
country that killed the journalism. This
is going crazy. People have memes
because Pete Davidson lost his dad in
9/11. So people have memes of his dad
licking in heaven. like how dare you to
go to the country that was. So there's a
it's kind of like on one side of this
people are like okay future of gaming we
finally got the investment back they're
leading from behind we're good but then
on this side it's like comedy how dare
you do comedy in the arther thearian
regime how dare you uh open up those
relations are these on the same thing
like does this
>> everybody's going to have to decide how
do you treat somebody that has different
values than you do you try to alienate
them isolate them and say until you
think like I think [ __ ] you or do you go
all right listen I don't like a lot of
the things that they stand for I see
what they're trying to do They're trying
to modernize. I'm going to look at the
restrictions that they're putting me
under and I'm either okay with the
restrictions or I'm not. They can't make
me say something I don't believe and I
won't say something I don't believe, but
I don't need to go over there to be
antagonistic. I am running a business.
This is very good for my business. I'm
going to go or not. I believe it's Shane
Gillis that decided he wanted to take a
principal stand. Totally get that. Full
disclosure, I went to Saudi Arabia to do
uh three live interviews there. They
were doing a health expo and they wanted
to bring me in to film live from the
health expo and I went and did it. I had
no beef with it whatsoever. Fully aware
that Saudi Arabia itself had a
journalist killed, but I'm like it
wasn't like the guy running this event
is over there like wiping the blood off
the boat saw.
>> Come on in. We're good.
>> Just as I would not want to be judged
for everything that America did, nor
would I uh say that anybody coming to
America is signing off on everything
that America did. Oh, and by the way, I
want people to cooperate with us. I
think that Saudi Arabia is finally
trying to step into the 21st century
behind the scenes. I think that they are
using violence to corral like the royal
family to get everybody pointed in the
right direction to understand that we're
going to have to move away from oil, all
that. I see humans as incredibly
complicated figures. You were not going
to look at any government, any point in
history, and be like, "Oh my god, they
just did everything right."
>> Yeah.
>> I was just praising the founding
fathers, who, by the way, had slaves.
You're just never going to find it. So,
I don't know what universe people live
in. I don't have a beef with anybody
that's like, you know what, I want to
take a principled stand. That means more
to me. Yeah, go do your thing. That's
going to allow you to say things and be
taken as credible later that other
people won't be able to say. And for
people that are like, "Yeah, man.
Listen, I'm not signing off on the
government, but I've never made this
much money for this before." Oh, and by
the way, I want to go see it. Yeah,
totally. That was exactly what I did.
And I was like, my answer when asked was
uh they cannot get me to say something I
don't believe given that I've got no
problem. And so I went and did the
interviews I wanted to do. Uh said the
things I wanted to say and literally
didn't have to corral myself. We were
talking about health. So it's not like
Saudi Arabia was going to come up. No
beef for this whatsoever. These guys are
running a business. They are
entertainers. But when, let's say, your
normal fee is 25,000 for a gig and
they're going to pay you 250,000,
it's like even as like a life story,
it's just interesting. Again, they're
not being invited by the guy wiping
blood off the bone saw. And just keep in
mind how many people have American
governments killed like this week.
Instead of trying to build bridges,
people are trying to find reasons to be
holier than now. Doesn't resonate with
my belief system, but people should do
what they think is right. But I just
love how you said it. We shouldn't hold
the organizers of the festival
beholdened to the actions of the
government, assuming those aren't the
same people. Now, if you do find out,
hypothetically speaking, that the the
prince that was responsible for getting
the journalist killed is the person that
decided to throw the
>> So, here's the crazy thing. If you said,
"Listen, MBS wants to meet with you," I
would do it a thousand%.
>> A thousand%. And we can just assume he
is the guy wiping the blood off of his
bone saw. But when I think about how
important the Middle East is going to be
moving forward, they're going to be the
hub of investment dollars, I think it's
something like seven of the biggest
investment houses are in uh the Middle
East. Man, we should be looking for ways
to partner,
join each other in the 21st century, to
put that kind of stuff behind us. So NBS
strikes me as a very important figure.
And again, I think that when you hear
Dave Smith talk about Barack Obama, he's
not wrong. And he's like, "Back Obama's
a murderer. He killed all these people
with drone strikes and all that." I'm
like, "Yeah, but if Barack was like,
Tom, I really want to talk with you
about the future of America. Would you
do it?" Yes. Yes, I would very much. It
is a region of my brain where I'm like,
"This is how the world works. Leaders
may not kill with their bare hands, but
they kill a lot of people." if we don't
understand that this is how the world
works and that you both want to call out
when it's like hey we don't want to do
that at the same time that you don't go
like Mamami is saying I'm going to
arrest Netanyahu if he comes New York
it's like that that's stupid so you want
to find ways to invite these countries
into the 21st century you want to find a
way to bring them closer to your values
and not isolate them would be my take
>> where is that balance between this could
be a bridge for the future versus like
listen I'm going to keep killing your
journalists but I would like to invite a
bunch of journalists over then I'd be
like whoa whoa whoa whoa whoa I wouldn't
expect anybody to go that would be wild
but he's not and obviously there's like
evidence and all that that he was
involved and blah blah blah what's going
to be the thing that you draw the line
on is it that they did a thing ever that
we think is morally um repugnant
>> in which case. Trump's got to go. Uh,
Biden's got to go. Obama's got to go.
Clinton's got to go. Like, you literally
just run down the list of American
leaders all the way back to Washington's
got to go. Like, as far as I understand,
Washington had slave teeth in his own
mouth. Okay? He pulled the teeth.
Somebody fact check me if I'm wrong, but
he had dentures that were made from like
I think some hor's teeth, uh, some wood
if I remember right, and then some slave
teeth. That's horrific. Mhm.
>> So, but at the same time, when he had
the opportunity to become dictator for
life of America, he didn't do it. Yeah.
I'm not going to throw him out with the
bathwater. I'm not going to say his face
needs to be taken off Mount Rushmore.
When I teach that in schools, I'm going
to say, listen, despicable things were
done, but we are not going to focus on
that. What we need to focus on is what
makes this country great. What are the
values that we want to embrace? And it
is absolutely antithetical to moving
forward well to say that we're evil or
the product of evil or it it doesn't
even matter if it's factual. It just
matters that it's not useful moving
forward. Same thing if the Middle East
is going to transition off of oil and
get into tech, get into biotech
investments, get into entertainment,
whatever, and they're going to be a
driving force there. We want to have
good relationships with them. Yes, there
needs to be pressure. You can't like if
they killed a journalist now and were
like, "Okay, we just did that thing and
now we're inviting everybody over." I'd
be like, "Yo, this is way freakish."
Just to like make sure they understand I
think that that's a non-starter. I'm not
going. Cuz if they did some atrocity
right now, I'd be like, "No [ __ ]
way." All of that factors into as people
build their belief system about how do
we approach the world? For instance,
should we have invited Putin into a
negotiation? Obviously,
>> but he's killing Ukrainians. Yes. you
you have to find an off-ramp. You've got
to treat this guy like a human, even
though you think he may be committing
war crimes. Same with BB Netanyahu. Same
with Hamas. Same with Palestine. It's
like you've got to find a way to uh work
with these people. In fact, there's an
image of a guy that's in the is he in
the UN? he's in the UN or something like
that where there's footage of him
holding two decapitated heads
>> and he's now in a leadership position in
the world somebody's going to know chat
please rescue me here
>> what do you do with that
>> well if he's in a position of leadership
you got to deal with him this is one of
those where yes like when Trump brought
the South African leader into the white
house you say bro you've got farmers
being killed you guys are moving in the
wrong direction we've got to address it.
But you don't go. They're despicable.