I started and finished Stray today. It’s a bit short (5.5 hours) and imo not really replayable, but I had a really nice time with it. I found it akin to Outer Wilds in the sense that you get to discover the lore as you progress in the world. I recommend picking it up if you get it on sale (the full price is a bit much for the duration).

Amended title: Rental giant to take a huge step back in climate change fight and generate more GHG to protect their bottom line.

In a capitalistic world where your right to stay alive is determined by the money you make, replacing himan jobs by machine ones is a real problem.

If what was happening was “ok so the machines are gonna do that so you’re gonna have a lot more free time but you still get your wages”, I for one would be happy.

But what’s happening is more along the lines of “well I hope you didn’t just get a mortgage because here’s the door hahaha don’t be sad think lf the extra money the shareholders are going to make” and it’s a real problem.

Just because it’s logical that shitty bosses take shitty decisions which impact negatively other person’s lives doesn’t mean we can’t be upset and vocal about it.

meatspace name I laughed reading this, it has a strong SMBC vibe :)

I’ve been playing a bit of CS2 for the past weeks. It takes me way back (I played with high-school friends 20 years ago till 1.6) and I definitely suck, but I’m having fun. It still lacks fun community servers imo, but I hope to see more of them soon.

My favorite game of 2023 was Outer Wilds. I got completely immersed inside and spent a lot of quality time uncovering the storyline. I tried playing the DLC but I did not enjoy it very much, text made more sense than images for me.

The game I spent most hours on in 2023 was probably DOS2, doing both solo and coop playthroughs. Will probably be replaced by BG3 in 2024 :)

I’m a big fan of women kicking ass, and videogames are usually designed to make my character kick a lot af asses. So female-looking character is great for me !

Yes I agree, I just wanted to point out that IMO Starcraft 2 was not the first pc game with a good matchmaking system.

I remember good matchmaking in Warcraft 3 for srandard matches.

And I also remember having lots of fun on custom servers for CS, Half-Life, D2 etc. and not at all feeling like matchmaking was a required feature.

Indeed I have, why ?

Thanks !

Funny thing: on your screenshot, it looks like the Play Offline button is greyed out. But it’s just a visual thing and you can totally click on it, right ?

Looks like a nice ARPG, but it seems to integrate an “always online” bullshit requirement, can someone who actually has it confirm or rectify ?

Just finished Firewatch, and I’m a few hours in Outer Wilds. I enjoy having no way to really fail, and discovering the story bit by bit.

Started Torchlight 2 in coop with a friend living abroad, it’s fun to see a non-blizzard Diablo with a Warcraft 3 aesthetic. Still trying to figure out which mods we want in the long run.

And almost at the end of It Takes Two in couch coop with a friend, we’ve laughed a lot so far !

Off-topic only, has nothing to do with the content related to CP2077 and the muskrat

So, based on some comments here, it looks like I came across as trying to ban language, to forbid words, to restrict your free speech.

As stated in my original post, this was and still is not my intention. I have not attacked personally the persones using “cunt”, nor have I said no one should say that.

I just shared a reflexion, because that’s why I sign up on social media platforms.

I am happy that some people felt safe enough in this community to explain why they think my views are incorrect, I actually learned some things thanks to you.

I’m not trying to ban the “cunt” word from language - and if I was, it would be so laughable to think I could have that kind of influence.

I just believe that the words we use have an effect on people. And I think it’s worth it to sometimes pause and wonder which words we are using and if we can use better ones.

I’m not going to engage further on this topic in this channel, it’s probably not the most appropriate space.

You are right, I should not have assumed that.

And I should actually not have used this description, because vulvas are not exclusive to people Assigned Female At Birth, as another commenter pointed out.

Thank your for your very interesting opinion.

Thank your for your very interesting opinion.

Thank your for your very interesting opinion.

You are absolutely right, I should have thought of it. Thanks for the correction !

Thanks for this educational post, TIL I learned something interesting (and sad/infuriating).

Sir Lora stuff ?

Off-topic below.

Btw, I saw some posters here still use the slur “cunt”.

It’s my understanding that depending on which country you’re from (eg Australia or UK) this slur might not carry a sexist connotation in the mainstream culture, so I don’t think any of you used it with the intent of being sexist.

Nevertheless, in the feminist circles I belong to, uskng a word that describes the genitalia of AFAB as a slur carries a sexist charge whether it was the intent or not. So we try to create new slur reflexes for ourselves and tend to use other words that do not carry an offensive charge towards a discriminated category.

Please do not take this as a personal attack or an attempt to tell you how to speak, I just think we can do better as a community if everyone spots the stuff they are the more sensitive to and explains to the others why they see a problem.

On-topic. Elon, please get lost in outer space in one of your stupid rockets.

Thanks for sharing ! Looks like the usual “small white male feeling powerful because he’s the boss” bullshit more than a problem specific to the gaming industry.

Anyway, unionizing should protect them better from these kind of abuse, which is good :)

This was very informative, thanks !

I never wondered about the conditions of videogames workers, but I’m really happy that they get better thanks to this movement !

Yeah, I’ve got the same thing with playing previous games in the series. This summer I’ve tried playing BG1 and then BG2 prior to BG3’s release - and I did not go very far (did not like the UI).

So, I’m not a specialist in any field relevant to the things we are discussing. I have opinions, which arise from a lot of factors most of which create a confirmation bias that reinforces my opinions. This is why I’m grateful when people who disagree chose to engage in conversation to explain me how I was mistaken, so thank you for that.

Situational stuff I think is relevant I’m a white privileged person (parents paid for my education, never got hungry one day in my life), I’m perceived as male in public space and most of my social circles (the unsafe ones). So I’ve had it easier than most my whole life, and I have no first hand experience of being part of a group that has to live through daily violence from a racist culture. Your post gives me the impression that you have that experience, and that really sucks - this should not happen to anyone.

The point I was trying to express I think calling them monsters is a way of dehumanizing them, of distancing ourselves from them. Doing that, we become blind to how they became who they are today : at least some of them were probably once people we could have known and not hated. We also become blind to the possibility that one or several of our friends, family, neighbors, colleagues… which we don’t hate right now could go down the same paths.

I’m also convinced that their actions must be punished, and that we need to try and prevent them from harming people. This can be done legally, but sometimes the law is not enough.

The points you made - I agree with almost everything. I agree with almost everything you wrote. I seems to me that the only disagreement we have is about calling them monsters or not.

Thought experiment for you then. How do you resolve the issue that arises when a person or group of persons live just down the street from you who claim that the core belief of their very being is that people “like you” shouldn’t exist, or should, at the very least, go away, preferably across a large body of water.

I really with I had a good answer to this question, because I’ve been struggling with it for some time. Best I could come up with was :

• harmful and hateful actions need to be stopped, so alerting law enforcement when possible (usually fails because legal system and law enforcement harbour a lot of racism), alerting public opinion to raise support, offering safer alternatives to the people targeted, demonstrating support to decrease risks/increase security - anything short of direct fighting which terrifies me
• hate speech needs to be opposed, and that’s where I feel I have the best impact and where I feel kind of safe - thanks to my privileges and part of my education, I’m quite good at making racist opinions difficult to maintain publicly outside of far-right circles
• it’s important to support targeted groups, to let them know they can have allies, they can ask for help - in my country, if you only have the dominant media (mostly racist right) and the hate groups talking to you, you can easily feel like you are alone and no one cares

I feel like this is well summed up by the sign you posted : we need to be there and to take action to protect targeted groups and people.

I agree that there are problematic systemic conditions that give rise to far right ideologies like white supremacy and it’s close extension, fascism. We definitely need to address them. But these conditions are not just the result of modern sociological paradigms, they have specific historical origins and are passed down through culture and tradition, and that is not something you can defeat through just argument and social ostracism

I completely agree with you. I even believe it’s too late for some people - we will never be able to bring them back to more a more tolerant/empathetic view of the world.

I think the first thing to be done is to prevent hateful actions/speeches by making them socially and legally inacceptable (and sometimes violence is needed to achieve that) because the most important thing is to protect the people who endure the hate. And at the same time but on a different scale we need to adress systemic conditions and problematic culture and tradition.

you sometimes just need to force the monsters out.

That’s the only point where I disagree with you : I’d say we need to force the people who act like monsters out, as I’ve tried to explain in the beginnning of my comment.

We can try to do all the other preventative measures first and we should, but some peoples’ ideaologies are so deeply engrained into their identities, there is no convincing. For some, there’s no talking to them, they don’t engage in dialogue genuinely, they twist Democratic forums, insisting on being heard while advocating for policies that ultimately aim to marginalize and silence others, constantly playing the victim while insisting the strength of their ideas on the sole basis of their opinion being fact.

Completely agree.

A simple saying sums up my feelings on the far right and their fascist dreams. It was popularized during Trump’s Muslim ban

I’m so grateful people like you exist and stand up. I don’t know you personnally, but seeing people like you and the ones in the picture helped me get out of my privileged apathy and start trying to make things better.

Well, I find that really sad.

Whatever mistake they make, I think people living with constant fear of the threat posed by a totalitarian regime known for its violence against its own people deserve our sympathy.

They are people.

Calling them monsters and dehumanizing them separates “them” from “us” and prevents us feom trying to understand how a real person, with intellect, feelings, a family, a social life etc. can get to the point where they do such things. If we don’t collectively at least try and understand it, we have zero chance of preventing it from happening again.

That being said, I’m not at all making excuses for their actions, which I find seriously violent, disgusting and worrying.

Thanks ! That’s one step I still have to take - dive into IRC and its ecosystem(s).

Tha’ts actually what I do. But there are some games I’m not sure I’ll enjoy and they don’t have a free demo to test, so I’m trying them on the seas. Also, 10+ yo games that are still 15,20, sometimes 30€ are not going to get my money, even when much cheaper and on sale, because come on.

Thanks for your reply and insight.

My Steam-avoidance/aversion is not about compatibility but more about DRM/vendor lock-in. When I buy games, I usually by them at GOG or any other “you own the game you bought” provider.

Also, when it’s about inde games, I have not problem buying them - I easily support projects this way or via crowdfunding. The games I’m interest in Jolly Rogering, as you put it, are bigger games - I want to play them a bit before spending 70€ for the whole thing + expansions package.

Thank you, I’ll check them out.

Thank you, I’ll check them out.

Thank you for the resouce, I will have a look !

I agree with you on the cause, and that there are few and outdated versions on generalist torrent sites.

Thanks for your answer, but I’m really not interested in buying on Steam. I should have been more precise : I can easily find linux-native games lists, but I’m having trouble finding them on the high seas. I agree with @Aram1s@lemm.ee’s explanation of why they are not very present.

It’s not just right now : this president has been here since 2017 and most of the core ministers are the same since then.

They have been cracking down on civil liberties from the start, but they make it more and more obvious since 2022 (because there is no re-election possible after 2 terms). Using anti-terrorist special legislatilns against environmental and himan rights activists, making demonstrations repression ever more violent…

At the same time, to guarantee that pseudo-centrist (actually right wing) keep getting elected, they have worked to make the far right more powerful. This way, in every election, they can end up being the “rational” choice.

Me too, been using it for a few weeks now and it works great for me. That being said, I don’t have that many photos/videos, so I don’t know how it handles large content collections.

Yep. Our current constitution was designed by De Gaulle, who was military and not too big on parliament power. From the official presidential website “Élysée” (name of the palace where presidential powet resides in France) : While it is based on the Constitution of 1946, the 1958 Constitution is different, as its purpose was to strengthen executive power and stabilize the government, making it more difficult for the Assembly to overthrow.

More of a personal/situates POV, my previous comment was a bit rashly worded.

From where I stand, it’s yet again another useless trend generating e-waste.

Like “oh look with 5g you’ll be able to load netflix and pornhub in 10k very ultra mega high hd on your tiny phone screens, you really need it and you need to ditch uour old phone before its end of life and to buy a 5g one”.

They even tried to sell it as philantropic " thanks to 5g, poor people in poor countries [insert picture with black people here] will have access to good doctors from good places for surgeries [insert white old dude in a white coat picture here]".

And it opens a whole new field of connected items which sounds really nice in terms of corporate/state spying.