Oh, no! The Big Corporation’s proprietary LLMs are plugging the Big Corporation’s other products as official sources?! Who could have possibly seen this coming!

“… well, I guess they must’ve been Heretics!”

Pff, typical Mon-keigh behaviour… You wouldn’t see the noble Children of Asuryan behaving so barbarously!

… I mean, sure, one of our Farseers went a bit off after too many Soul Communions and drove an entire flotilla straight into a Warp Storm yelling that it was the everflowing love of Mother Isha that one time, but never this!

Actually serves pretty well if one’s goal were to further destabilise things. People have already been convinced that illegal immigrants are to blame for all economic problems (even though it is easier to prove the extreme opposite through a cursory search on the internet), maybe if the downward slope is gentle enough, people won’t start doubting the efficacy of the initially applied solution. Maybe the point was to get them to the next level, get them angry at something else after everything is done with the false problem.

I just don’t see Trump actually wanting what’s his version of “best” for the country. I think he’s on a power play, and the country’s just the kindling.

Maybe I’m talking complete nonsense, but this feels like a… logical escalation. To what, I cannot fathom, although we’ve seen similar movements preclude Totalitarian/Authoritarian regime solidification periods before, where the desperate masses clung to the wrong solution.

Musk being best buds with the President of the USA is legit friggin’ scary, speaking as a foreigner.

Then you remember that Trump, and it becomes terrifying.

It’s just like any other hobby, you have to see and decide for yourself! All I can say as a person who’s been playing video games for 27 years and loves them for both their mechanics and their artistic potential is that so far it has been time well spent!

To start, i’d first think about what kind of games tempt you most. You have a wide array of genres from which to choose, like cerebral real-time strategy or 4x games (Explore, Expand, Exploit, Exterminate), narrative and player expression centric role-playing games, action-packed shooters, or agile and clever platformers.

Then, you can use storefronts like Steam or Epic and run general searches based on genres - I’d recommend sorting according to top sellers/most purchased, as score-based sorting isn’t always reliable.

At the end of it all, however, the most important factor is whatever tempts you in any way. Steam (this is what I use most of the time) offers Demos for a lot of games nowadays, so you should be able to try pretty much whatever tempts you! Be it flashy graphics, an interesting story hook, or just sheer bloodlust, everything is valid!

I’ll leave a list of games I think would serve as a gentle introduction to this hobby below - they’re also not resource intensive, so you should be able to play them on any consumer laptop (or smartphone, some of them!):

• Stardew Valley - management-like game, you have to administrate a farm. But there’s a lot of extra complexity I won’t spoil

• Cloudpunk - combination of cyberpunk delivery person simulator and role-playing game, I’ve found it both relaxing and gripping!

• Cultist Simulator - it’s technically a card game, but what you actually do is balance having a socially acceptable life with investigating incomprehensible forces and leading a cult

• Star Wars: Knights of The Old Republic I and II - these two are meat-and-potatoes role-playing games with really solid stories, well-written and presented characters, a neat progression system which sees you unlocking awesome Force powers and/or other valuable perks, and the combat, I find, is the perfect mix of engaging and lenient

• Rocket League - this is as a taste of faster-paced action, basic multiplayer interactions, and relatively high-end graphis - it’s football with cars, but awesome!

As an extra note, you may notice I’ve left links from everywhere. That’s because you’ll have to select a game storefront (it’s a whole thing nowadays, but you really don’t need to interact with that side of the hobby if you don’t want to…). The storefronts share most of their libraries of games, but there are a few exceptions, so it’s best to check them all out before sticking with one. Some examples of such:

• Steam is the most popular and is good, but you can’t run games without running Steam, plus it periodically needs to connect to the internet. Things are fairly priced, the community features are nice, the community is ok, frequent sales. They also offer a no-questions full refund if you choose to do so within two hours of play time, so that’s a way to try out games without Demos.

• GOG (Good Old Games) is basically Steam, less meaty. However, the main strongpoint is that, beyond installing the game through their platform, that game then exists as its own independent entity, not requiring any periodic validation through an internet connection (unless the game itself is online), no shady 3rd party software installed alongside the game to “protect it from piracy,” etc. The games are as yours as they could possibly be in a digital-only environment.

• Epic wants to be Steam’s direct rival, so their storefront has many of the same features, but it’s not as popular within the community. I honestly have no opinion about them.

Other than that, all I can say is try to explore the hobby, check out gaming outlets, watch Lets-Plays on YouTube, and you can always lean on the online community for suggestions and tips! Also applicable to myself!

Slap them even without the million Euros! Slap them with luke-warm fish! Just slap them! Repeatedly!

Honestly, considering how much of a clown Alex Jones was, they have their work cut out for them if they want to compete at comedic levels!

Either way, this may be the best news I’ve heard all year, thank you!

Thank you, always good to have more lists! Been reading up on things like this for a while, among other things, and I’ve already noticed some unfamiliar names in your post!

May whatever deity who may or may not be active hear you and decide that it’d be fun to watch!

We have the potential for far better, yes.

The real question is, will enough people want for us to get better…

I am becoming convinced that trying to establish a generally applicable age limit is the wrong way to go about these types of things, but instead we must focus on identifying the specific developmental markers which represent each phase and focus on those. We should teach parents to “read” their children’s progress and determine dynamically, based on both general data and individual empirical observations. Some children may not be ready for Social Media even at 16, while others who have more natural social inclinations may be hampered by a delayed introduction of these realities.

We’ve been treating the subject of children like they’re a bulk product, but they’re just as individually specific as any other human being. They just lack a fully defined brain structure and the contextualisation and understanding which come from life experience, but I doubt anyone could argue they don’t have a personality or cognitive uniqueness.

Note: I am not talking about the age of consent! That one should always be a thing!

I AM SHREDDING THESE FILTHY WAVES FOR THE EMPEROR, BROTHERS!

I’m here for this! I’m not sure if I’m too stoned, or not stoned enough to even be able to fully comprehend the question, but I’m 100% here for this!

I have 2.1k hours in Warframe and it seems that counter’s not gonna stop any time soon… Took a two-year break after some grind-heavy new content, returned to catch up with the updates and it’s all I’ve been playing for 5 days now.

Edit: on second thought, I don’t really know if the MMORPG classification fits Warframe, but I have no idea what else to call it, to be honest…

But outside is where all the problems are, don’t you understand?!

Honestly, I wear a pair of old skinny jeans, the kind with a bit of lycra, bamboo-based socks because fluffy but not cumbersome, and T-shirt with thicc hoodie. This is in 21-22°C.

In anticipation of the funny looks, I’m super-serious about the jeans! They’re nice and soft at this point, and they do a pretty good job at keeping my legs from freezing off! Pretty much wear jeans all year.

And the biggest advantage is that nobody can tell I’m essentially wearing my equivalent for pajamas!

Thoroughly agreed, that’s what I call everything not viewed as immediately societally productive. More of a sarcastic reversal of the main complaint I’ve received throughout my life while just living it.

It really does take a while… Had a 9-month breakdown during the Pandemic, that one was exclusively for mental health care. I literally locked myself in my apartment and did nothing but eat, sleep, play vidya, get high, and have weekly therapy sessions for the entire duration.

It took 8 months to stop being anxious about not being stressed out. Used to wake up every morning with that sharp fear that I’d missed my daily meetings, then it would slowly turn into an “oh, shit, I’m not being Productive” jumble of self-loathing and panic.

Agreed, expressed it incorrectly, the burnout is nowhere near the main reason for my taking time off. I needed to take a break from Adult Stuff. I mean, last time I did anything even remotely resembling a vacation/holiday was in 2014, now I’m taking my time.

Also, thank you so much for your kind words! Honestly, burnouts are just part of the routine at this point, I’ll be back on my feet in two-three months tops!

Nothing! I’m super-serious, and I plan on doing exactly that for the following 6 months (quit my job, taking a break to address burnout and reorient): nothing.

By that, I mean I’ll allow myself to get as much sleep as I humanly can, try to feed myself healthier food (and more regularly), develop my hobbies (mini painting, playing the bass, sketching, writing), re-establish a semblance of a social life by exploring the city and its options, spending more time with friends… Pretty much just living life. No goals, no quotas, no deadlines, no performance metrics, no side-hustle, no Work™.