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Cake day: June 15th, 2023

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  • I was worried the remaster would take some of this away, but it looked just as good.

    The PS2 version looks great after upping the internal res (not sure how much other stuff like filtering/other technicals has an effect). I haven’t compared it, but like most remasters I’m going to just say the data bloat is probably not worth potential fidelity improvements. That and I’d guess any design issues are still baked in, thus similar experience.

    EDIT: In Okami’s case I don’t know if the data size is due to uncompressed files or just due to higher-res pre-rendered videos, but either seems wasteful to me. What is live-rendered and what is pre-rendered just seems arbitrary to me, I’d get if it weren’t viable on older hardware but you’d think a remaster could handle it mostly in-engine.



  • Are you challenging me?

    For the most part, it’s not hard to find them if they’re doing the things I said and you pay attention while they do it. Look at how many titles a publisher has on Steam, see if they have a wikipedia page and if so if there’s monetary info involved. Recognizing a dev/publisher might also be part of it.

    Also with self-publishing never being easier, some of my skepticism starts there. Another is games seeming somewhat shovelware-esque or like they’re trying to ride the wave of some other successful game/trend and that’s why targeting consoles early-on is likely important to them for the money.


    I originally wasn’t, but off the top of my head some of the stronger examples:

    Just because something is cute pixels that does not mean it’s indie. A good introduction to this is the existing discussion of Dave the Diver and its ties to Nexon. EDIT: Also, lootbox controversy with Nexon and Maplestory

    One involving unpaid marketing and crowdfunding/early-access: tinyBuild. ~$473m IPO. Publisher of Hello Neighbor, which also has some controversy around it on quality (also mobile games with micro-transactions, because kid audience). While searching on this, I also saw someone angry about them doing testing on Steam and then a post-launch Epic exclusivity. EDIT: Also one of their games not having all content available on GOG.

    The game Roots of Pacha had a license dispute (I do not know the cause, but the dev did end up getting the Steam rights) their original publisher had at least 6 different accounts on Imgur (and they also did the crowdfunding/EA thing too, and no it was not like 1 game per account either and some of those accounts are mysteriously gone now). Same publisher was in the news about controversy over boob physics, and I don’t doubt it was either suggested by the CEO for the headlines or just marketing clicks if controversy hadn’t have happened.


    Even if people don’t care about stuff like this enough to stop buying the games, I hope they at least try to not enable or reward blatant self-promotion (particularly the more dipping and questionable practices involved) on the fediverse


  • And don’t confuse high budget indie studios with AAA game developers

    On the other hand, there are a lot of publishers out there who really shouldn’t have things called indie when they’re involved.

    The ones who have struck gold (perhaps multiple times) and are already worth multiple millions, publicly traded or even owned largely by investment firms. Some like this still footing everything on the players (crowdfunding and then early access) and on top of all of that going onto places like Imgur and Reddit and doing unpaid marketing there (doesn’t seem great for the actual devs, and then there are things like multiple accounts/sockpuppets/deleting+reposting etc).

    And even without the unpaid marketing stuff, a publisher has a lot of ways to screw over developers and/or players usually with the goal of money in some form.


  • My napkin guess is that this is some sort of specific process/tactic, either it only allows 1 2 levels of reclassification at a time or that was all that could be agreed on (with multiple agencies, likely the DEA limiting the pace). So either avoiding the Senate or the tiniest of steps that pretty much anybody will allow/defend. Slow-and-steady could be the plan, assuming Biden wins again and actually follows up.

    Well that and it probably really helps with the turning-a-blind-eye, like the difference between ignoring/acquitting a hit-and-run fender-bender versus ignoring/acquitting the act of treating a no-traffic intersection (in clear conditions) like a 4-way stop. Maybe it will be enough to reduce hostility and move the relevant overton window over time while avoiding pushback.

    EDIT: Looking at it more, this seems to be the department of HHS pressuring the DEA on clear medical use. As others say, the lower restriction might help further medical study which could in-turn result in further reclassification.


  • Reminder on Stockholm syndrome:

    According to accounts by Kristin Enmark (one of the hostages): the police were acting incompetently, with little care for the hostages’ safety.

    She had criticized the police for pointing guns at the convicts while the hostages were in the line of fire, and she had told news outlets that one of the captors tried to protect the hostages from being caught in the crossfire

    but the prime minister [Palme] told her that she would have to content herself with dying at her post rather than Palme giving in to the captors’ demands.

    Ultimately, Enmark explained she was more afraid of the police, whose attitude seemed to be a much larger, direct threat to her life than the robbers.

    Which could possibly be relevant here, particularly the civil war part.




  • Aside from cost there’s also the issue of law, requiring people die of natural causes beforehand means most people will turn to soup before their brain can have any hope of being preserved.


    I have cynicism for lots of things involved here, but if I had the option from some shady person who seems like they are capable and vaguely aligned with me I’d probably take the chance especially if we could make some sort of a post-revival agreement. What a brain (put into a small machine and ideally alongside symbiotic systems) can do for the people who are still alive. Probably with my brain in a jar living in VR until the details are worked out.

    And if it doesn’t work out that way, well… That’s gooood soup!




  • @pbpza I vaguely align with this, but don’t really have much capability or hope now. Even having difficulties furthering my (admittedly niche) interests here on the fediverse (federation problems, not many comments).

    I am not quite sure what makes this a co-op and not some other community, conservancy, union, club/meetup etc. if it’s remote?

    Sidenote, not much in the way of actual projects but you’ll see me in db0’s project (closed PRs 1-3, 2 bits of character art w/animation). I am interested in polygonal art (both 2D and 3D) but have not found a good workflow for me. I would probably rather work solo (if I can do anything) and for programming I want to use nim-lang which limits my options. Might want to use Raylib, but 3D vertex colors was the last thing I tried and those didn’t work for me (I could maybe do a simpler 2D polygon style, I have a format/loader started but it needs a lot more work with implementation to be viable). 2/3 of my threads showing my simple 3D art are visible on your instance.

    I have life issues too, a change of living conditions would be nice but I don’t know if I could pull my own weight plus I am just not really a sociable person. I can think of a lot of ways that might make me useful, but probably not substantial enough especially as I probably couldn’t sustain any of it as a strict daily job.





  • My thought as well, the video Tom Scott did on the mountain town that has bespoke electric vehicles (and strict usage on them for needed business) comes to mind (R2oD1ZHNMFE). I don’t know how much is law and how much is companies not caring to cater to that market (even with designs that they sell in Europe), but Kei-like vehicles can still be affordable without being fully unsafe (but the issue of safety is more about the market making larger-and-larger trucks and SUVs, and lack of viable car alternatives paired with high speed limits).

    Higher cost really is not a fix. Other concerns like privacy seem like policy could mesh well with low-end (no internet connection, just-a-radio, common off-the-shelf parts, standards+no DRM etc). It would be nice for the option to exist in this space that US car companies are not trying to fill anyway.

    @Fiivemacs



  • The bigger issue IMO would be that not everyone has quality sleep, so they might not have a long uninterrupted time in REM to properly dream.

    Personally even when I’m in the right state to experience dreams (the type that I do remember) they usually aren’t very vivid, for the above reason or possibly something else. I also have aphantasia so it may be related (or other brain/life stuff). Once I did have a colorful-yet-still(ish) dream related to then-recent photography.

    @Hegar


  • I don’t mind the idea, I’m in the US but I’ve got a 250w ebike w/the EU speed limit* just because it was cheaper… plus faster is less efficient and human power means I get less blob-like so it’s a win-win.

    Then again, it does have a twist throttle and I use this most often to slowly approach** or accelerate out of a stop sign (esp. crossing a road). Sometimes I’ve used it so I didn’t need to pedal in the sun (I cannot really sweat). I’ve needed to use it twice when my chain fell off and I didn’t have gloves with me. But generally my legs are contributing something… I wouldn’t mind some sort of different throttle programming, but really I don’t think my bike is one that is an issue at all w/throttle and throttle programming definitely wouldn’t cover all of these scenarios.

    Another thing is if I come to a stop and have forgotten to change gears, throttle is a save there too thanks to it not using the chain for its gearing. Or it can just mean less gear-changing in general.

    *= 25 km/h (~15mph). I have not changed it, plus my bike (with me riding it at least) is not even quickly hitting this speed, most of the time I was going ~10mph. To hit motor cutoff speed on flat ground I’d probably need to be be in highest gear+PAS and be really putting a lot of effort in (including leaning down for less drag, I normally ride in a relaxed position).

    **= cadence sensor does not allow it w/o brake usage