it is unsettling how quickly a sleeve of Thin Mints stops being in the sleeve and starts being in my belly
and thus the aforementioned brutality
it was seriously like, "oh i think i've had like five of these. maybe i should put them away before..."
and the sleeve was empty
this is why, when i buy a box of cookies or a pint of ice cream, i do it with the knowledge that i have committed to consuming about 2000 calories in one sitting, or two sittings divided by a narrow span of self-loathing and denial
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TraceGNU Terry Pratchett; GNU Gus; GNU Carrie Fisher; GNU Adam WeRegistered Userregular
I would love a game that could merge Grand Strategy and Tactical all into one fluid real time map.
Distant Worlds and its expansions sort of did it.
But I'd love something based on Earth sort of like Civilization. Slowly building up your world as you go with most of the shit autonomous (with the choice for manual) and focusing on big choices (with the option to auto those choices)
I would love to be able to zoom out and see an icon for my army of say 10,000 men slowly trudging its way across the world (randomly generated or not) but then be able to zoom in and watch an army on the march going about its business.
Probably an impossibility but you never know.
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MrMisterJesus dying on the cross in pain? Morally better than us. One has to go "all in".Registered Userregular
for the record i don't think people fake it, I just think that they acquire it for reasons having to do with desperately wanting to be the masculine ideal they see sold to them in the culture
@MrMister do you really think the main drive for my consumption of whiskey is the masculine ideal of it?
certainly that aspect is fun, but it's also ridiculous.
the main drive for consuming any kind of straight liquor is that, when you have acquired the taste, it has strong, varied, interesting flavours, and the whole experience is enjoyable. the scent is deeply pleasant (people who hate drinking whiskey often ask to smell whatever i'm drinking because it's so nice), the taste of it as you roll it around in your mouth is obviously wonderful, and the lingering flavours after you swallow it from the fumes are great too. it's a whole different experience from drinking most other liquids. i'd compare it to drinking good wine, except it's easier - wine is subtle, and more prone to variation due to environmental factors like letting it "breathe" or having a bottle that's a bit off (and wine continues aging in the bottle, unlike liquor).
and the flavours aren't typical of what we crave in other food and drink indulgences - instead you get flavours that remind you more of pleasant scents that you might not otherwise find appetizing. I love the smell of leather, of campfire smoke, of old wood or fresh-cut wood or charred oak, of cut grass, etc, and to be able to drink something that tastes like those smells is really enjoyable, though you might not think it would be initially. And of course, if you're drinking a sweeter whiskey like a bourbon, you're getting those wood flavours but also more traditionally consumed flavours like caramel, maple, praline, brown sugar, toasted grains, etc.
if i were to ascribe a set of motivations, i wouldn't really include masculinity. i don't think it's a gender identity motivator. instead, i'd ascribe it to classism and wealth - part of what motivated me to try to enjoy nice liquors was the construction of a new identity as i moved into a post-graduation career and started making decent money and living a new lifestyle. I liked the idea of being someone who consumes fine things. I started caring more about interior design, about clothes and outward grooming (specifically suits, shoes, accessories, etc.), cooking meals and hosting, going to nice restaurants, making cocktails. I got a bunch of nice crystal decanters and a shelf that prominently displays my "collection" of whiskeys. This was also parallel to grad school and a similar intellectual course - what's across from my whiskey collection in the living room? A bookshelf with all my tough philosophy books just above eye level. :P
Certainly a superficial and dubious set of motivations, with its own set of problems, but not the one you pegged! And once those things have motivated you to acquire the taste, the taste is itself quite rewarding aside from those motivations (though they are perhaps necessary to give you the decision-making bias to spend $80 on a bottle of scotch).
Evil, I wouldn't deny that there's great pleasure in a fine scotch. I'm a subjectivist about aesthetic pleasures generally, and I mostly take people at their word when they describe what they like. If there's anything for me to critique here, it's not the enjoyment itself, which I don't even really think is the kind of thing susceptible to critique. Rather, it's the reasons that people go on to acquire that taste, and the social messages embedded in the practices around it. I mean, almost everything can be enjoyed if one is dogged enough in its pursuit. But there's a reason that so many friends of mine have gone after Scotch rather than, say, deciding to dedicate hours and hours to sitting through and eventually mastering modern American poetry, or mid-century Communist film, or whatever. And I think those reasons are mostly bad reasons; at best just because wanting to be cool, at worst because wanting to be cool specifically by displaying and taking advantage of certain objectionable class and gender markers.
You're also right that I was missing half the point when I focused on Scotch as a marker of masculinity. It's surely about marking class as much as it is that--though these things are not entirely disconnected, because the ideal type being pursued here is both male and definitely not poor. As you note, my missing that point though does not really detract from the overall critique, it just changes its focus slightly. I do also think that this definitely goes with the other consumables and practices you list--expensive restaurants, good furniture, leather shoes, etc. There's a yuppie package here. Again, I think it's still male-typed, but you're probably right that the conspicuous consumption involved in 'discriminating' and grown-up taste is the more significant part of it.
I basically want a game that is what Spore was not.
Autonomous evolution, socializing, tech development, nation-building, conflicts, and in a meaningful deterministic sense that does not just end up within a narrow set of boring constraints, any ways.
And you can intervene where and when you like in this sandbox.
Swear I'll build this in my spare time if it never gets produced commercially.
kedinik on
I made a game! Hotline Maui. Requires mouse and keyboard.
I've played a good 300 hours of Civ 5 (it one more turned me). I think it was much, much better than Civ 4--they cut out the bells and whistles that had accumulated over time ('because we can!') and gave an actual streamlined and sensible play experience.
However, I will also concede that no opening anywhere ever can stand up to Baba Yetu.
I got into drinking scotch thanks to my girlfriend. And the primary motivation that got her to drink scotch/whiskey over other liquors was that this way she knew how much alcohol she was having instead of it being masked in a cocktail until you're 3 drinks in.
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Podlyyou unzipped me! it's all coming back! i don't like it!Registered Userregular
edited March 2014
i have drank my fair share of islay scotches and ezra pound's cantos
I've played a good 300 hours of Civ 5 (it one more turned me). I think it was much, much better than Civ 4--they cut out the bells and whistles that had accumulated over time ('because we can!') and gave an actual streamlined and sensible play experience.
However, I will also concede that no opening anywhere ever can stand up to Baba Yetu.
Granted I didn't clearly say it, but I only intended to communicate that Babu Yetu was wonderful, hahah.
I'm inclined to think Civ 5 is ultimately the better game. They certainly trimmed out a lot of stuff that only seemed to be weighing the gameplay down.
The combat was a bit disappointingly tedious and slow in the new system, though, but I don't know that past combat was altogether better, either.
kedinik on
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CindersWhose sails were black when it was windyRegistered Userregular
I've played a good 300 hours of Civ 5 (it one more turned me). I think it was much, much better than Civ 4--they cut out the bells and whistles that had accumulated over time ('because we can!') and gave an actual streamlined and sensible play experience.
However, I will also concede that no opening anywhere ever can stand up to Baba Yetu.
And for me civ 5 is too board gamey for that type of time dedication.
for the record i don't think people fake it, I just think that they acquire it for reasons having to do with desperately wanting to be the masculine ideal they see sold to them in the culture
@MrMister do you really think the main drive for my consumption of whiskey is the masculine ideal of it?
certainly that aspect is fun, but it's also ridiculous.
the main drive for consuming any kind of straight liquor is that, when you have acquired the taste, it has strong, varied, interesting flavours, and the whole experience is enjoyable. the scent is deeply pleasant (people who hate drinking whiskey often ask to smell whatever i'm drinking because it's so nice), the taste of it as you roll it around in your mouth is obviously wonderful, and the lingering flavours after you swallow it from the fumes are great too. it's a whole different experience from drinking most other liquids. i'd compare it to drinking good wine, except it's easier - wine is subtle, and more prone to variation due to environmental factors like letting it "breathe" or having a bottle that's a bit off (and wine continues aging in the bottle, unlike liquor).
and the flavours aren't typical of what we crave in other food and drink indulgences - instead you get flavours that remind you more of pleasant scents that you might not otherwise find appetizing. I love the smell of leather, of campfire smoke, of old wood or fresh-cut wood or charred oak, of cut grass, etc, and to be able to drink something that tastes like those smells is really enjoyable, though you might not think it would be initially. And of course, if you're drinking a sweeter whiskey like a bourbon, you're getting those wood flavours but also more traditionally consumed flavours like caramel, maple, praline, brown sugar, toasted grains, etc.
if i were to ascribe a set of motivations, i wouldn't really include masculinity. i don't think it's a gender identity motivator. instead, i'd ascribe it to classism and wealth - part of what motivated me to try to enjoy nice liquors was the construction of a new identity as i moved into a post-graduation career and started making decent money and living a new lifestyle. I liked the idea of being someone who consumes fine things. I started caring more about interior design, about clothes and outward grooming (specifically suits, shoes, accessories, etc.), cooking meals and hosting, going to nice restaurants, making cocktails. I got a bunch of nice crystal decanters and a shelf that prominently displays my "collection" of whiskeys. This was also parallel to grad school and a similar intellectual course - what's across from my whiskey collection in the living room? A bookshelf with all my tough philosophy books just above eye level. :P
Certainly a superficial and dubious set of motivations, with its own set of problems, but not the one you pegged! And once those things have motivated you to acquire the taste, the taste is itself quite rewarding aside from those motivations (though they are perhaps necessary to give you the decision-making bias to spend $80 on a bottle of scotch).
Evil, I wouldn't deny that there's great pleasure in a fine scotch. I'm a subjectivist about aesthetic pleasures generally, and I mostly take people at their word when they describe what they like. If there's anything for me to critique here, it's not the enjoyment itself, which I don't even really think is the kind of thing susceptible to critique. Rather, it's the reasons that people go on to acquire that taste, and the social messages embedded in the practices around it. I mean, almost everything can be enjoyed if one is dogged enough in its pursuit. But there's a reason that so many friends of mine have gone after Scotch rather than, say, deciding to dedicate hours and hours to sitting through and eventually mastering modern American poetry, or mid-century Communist film, or whatever. And I think those reasons are mostly bad reasons; at best just because wanting to be cool, at worst because wanting to be cool specifically by displaying and taking advantage of certain objectionable class and gender markers.
You're also right that I was missing half the point when I focused on Scotch as a marker of masculinity. It's surely about marking class as much as it is that--though these things are not entirely disconnected, because the ideal type being pursued here is both male and definitely not poor. As you note, my missing that point though does not really detract from the overall critique, it just changes its focus slightly. I do also think that this definitely goes with the other consumables and practices you list--expensive restaurants, good furniture, leather shoes, etc. There's a yuppie package here. Again, I think it's still male-typed, but you're probably right that the conspicuous consumption involved in 'discriminating' and grown-up taste is the more significant part of it.
I think maybe the reason I'm disagreeing with focusing on scotch, in particular, is that I think any problematic motivations to acquire that taste/interest are a very specific subset of a much larger, much more widespread problem, and it's just particularly noticeable to you because you are not interested in it.
The problem I'm talking about is the way people create identities through consumption, i.e. the brutal machinery of capitalism in operation, and that's something that certainly does target yuppies - but also everyone else, from rich to poor. "Target" is probably the wrong word. "Consumes" or "envelops in a warm, muffling shroud," maybe.
Drinking expensive liquor is an indulgence and a pleasure, and there's nothing inherently bad about it, but it's definitely pushed forward by an enormous, vastly powerful marketing effort and a long history of alcohol-as-status-symbol. But it's difficult for me to give credence to criticism of motivations for drinking scotch as such, rather than as a gateway to a broader critique of capitalist identities.
My reaction can probably be summed up as "sure, but that's the problem with almost everything else we do, buy or enjoy, too." It hardly seems possible to escape it.
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CindersWhose sails were black when it was windyRegistered Userregular
Single-gear bikes are fine, but fixies are a pain to ride.
Safety Razors are fine, but a lot more hassle than my buzzie gillette thing, which shaves very very well for no effort.
And conspicuous consumption, and consumerist self-definition-through-shopping, are things I am very much not a fan of.
It's just stuff. It's not important or anything.
Self definition, surely not. But just stuff is communicative and you should take due consideration to have your clothes, or what have you, communicate the thing you want them to. Because they are going to communicate something whether you were being mindful or not.
Note that I said due consideration, though. If you're spending 3 days straight researching a pair of pants then you're doing it wrong.
I've played a good 300 hours of Civ 5 (it one more turned me). I think it was much, much better than Civ 4--they cut out the bells and whistles that had accumulated over time ('because we can!') and gave an actual streamlined and sensible play experience.
However, I will also concede that no opening anywhere ever can stand up to Baba Yetu.
Granted I didn't clearly say it, but I only intended to communicate that Babu Yetu was wonderful, hahah.
I'm inclined to think Civ 5 is ultimately the better game. They certainly trimmed out a lot of stuff that only seemed to be weighing the gameplay down.
The combat was a bit disappointingly tedious and slow in the new system, though, but I don't know that past combat was altogether better, either.
I like the new combat quite a bit (maybe unsurprisingly). Eliminating unit stacking was the best possible decision. Now there are fronts and terrain actually matters a lot. It's infinitely more tactical and less 'shit out a stack of 30 swordsmen and march it 1 square at a time until it walked over every city.'
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Podlyyou unzipped me! it's all coming back! i don't like it!Registered Userregular
I've played a good 300 hours of Civ 5 (it one more turned me). I think it was much, much better than Civ 4--they cut out the bells and whistles that had accumulated over time ('because we can!') and gave an actual streamlined and sensible play experience.
However, I will also concede that no opening anywhere ever can stand up to Baba Yetu.
And for me civ 5 is too board gamey for that type of time dedication.
I don't know what exactly is causing it but yeah. It's just not pulling me in. Maybe I need to speed up the game. But I feel like that is playing wrong.
Single-gear bikes are fine, but fixies are a pain to ride.
Safety Razors are fine, but a lot more hassle than my buzzie gillette thing, which shaves very very well for no effort.
And conspicuous consumption, and consumerist self-definition-through-shopping, are things I am very much not a fan of.
It's just stuff. It's not important or anything.
Self definition, surely not. But just stuff is communicative and you should take due consideration to have your clothes, or what have you, communicate the thing you want them to. Because they are going to communicate something whether you were being mindful or not.
Note that I said due consideration, though. If you're spending 3 days straight researching a pair of pants then you're doing it wrong.
yes 3 days is not nearly enough and your peer group will surely needle you with cruel, subtle barbs for your poorly researched and gauche selection
KageraImitating the worst people. Since 2004Registered Userregular
Man that baba yetu video made me excited for the future of mankind. The first people to visit a different system and wake up to an alien star. That would be a moment worth most anything.
My neck, my back, my FUPA and my crack.
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MrMisterJesus dying on the cross in pain? Morally better than us. One has to go "all in".Registered Userregular
for the record i don't think people fake it, I just think that they acquire it for reasons having to do with desperately wanting to be the masculine ideal they see sold to them in the culture
@MrMister do you really think the main drive for my consumption of whiskey is the masculine ideal of it?
certainly that aspect is fun, but it's also ridiculous.
the main drive for consuming any kind of straight liquor is that, when you have acquired the taste, it has strong, varied, interesting flavours, and the whole experience is enjoyable. the scent is deeply pleasant (people who hate drinking whiskey often ask to smell whatever i'm drinking because it's so nice), the taste of it as you roll it around in your mouth is obviously wonderful, and the lingering flavours after you swallow it from the fumes are great too. it's a whole different experience from drinking most other liquids. i'd compare it to drinking good wine, except it's easier - wine is subtle, and more prone to variation due to environmental factors like letting it "breathe" or having a bottle that's a bit off (and wine continues aging in the bottle, unlike liquor).
and the flavours aren't typical of what we crave in other food and drink indulgences - instead you get flavours that remind you more of pleasant scents that you might not otherwise find appetizing. I love the smell of leather, of campfire smoke, of old wood or fresh-cut wood or charred oak, of cut grass, etc, and to be able to drink something that tastes like those smells is really enjoyable, though you might not think it would be initially. And of course, if you're drinking a sweeter whiskey like a bourbon, you're getting those wood flavours but also more traditionally consumed flavours like caramel, maple, praline, brown sugar, toasted grains, etc.
if i were to ascribe a set of motivations, i wouldn't really include masculinity. i don't think it's a gender identity motivator. instead, i'd ascribe it to classism and wealth - part of what motivated me to try to enjoy nice liquors was the construction of a new identity as i moved into a post-graduation career and started making decent money and living a new lifestyle. I liked the idea of being someone who consumes fine things. I started caring more about interior design, about clothes and outward grooming (specifically suits, shoes, accessories, etc.), cooking meals and hosting, going to nice restaurants, making cocktails. I got a bunch of nice crystal decanters and a shelf that prominently displays my "collection" of whiskeys. This was also parallel to grad school and a similar intellectual course - what's across from my whiskey collection in the living room? A bookshelf with all my tough philosophy books just above eye level. :P
Certainly a superficial and dubious set of motivations, with its own set of problems, but not the one you pegged! And once those things have motivated you to acquire the taste, the taste is itself quite rewarding aside from those motivations (though they are perhaps necessary to give you the decision-making bias to spend $80 on a bottle of scotch).
Evil, I wouldn't deny that there's great pleasure in a fine scotch. I'm a subjectivist about aesthetic pleasures generally, and I mostly take people at their word when they describe what they like. If there's anything for me to critique here, it's not the enjoyment itself, which I don't even really think is the kind of thing susceptible to critique. Rather, it's the reasons that people go on to acquire that taste, and the social messages embedded in the practices around it. I mean, almost everything can be enjoyed if one is dogged enough in its pursuit. But there's a reason that so many friends of mine have gone after Scotch rather than, say, deciding to dedicate hours and hours to sitting through and eventually mastering modern American poetry, or mid-century Communist film, or whatever. And I think those reasons are mostly bad reasons; at best just because wanting to be cool, at worst because wanting to be cool specifically by displaying and taking advantage of certain objectionable class and gender markers.
You're also right that I was missing half the point when I focused on Scotch as a marker of masculinity. It's surely about marking class as much as it is that--though these things are not entirely disconnected, because the ideal type being pursued here is both male and definitely not poor. As you note, my missing that point though does not really detract from the overall critique, it just changes its focus slightly. I do also think that this definitely goes with the other consumables and practices you list--expensive restaurants, good furniture, leather shoes, etc. There's a yuppie package here. Again, I think it's still male-typed, but you're probably right that the conspicuous consumption involved in 'discriminating' and grown-up taste is the more significant part of it.
I think maybe the reason I'm disagreeing with focusing on scotch, in particular, is that I think any problematic motivations to acquire that taste/interest are a very specific subset of a much larger, much more widespread problem, and it's just particularly noticeable to you because you are not interested in it.
The problem I'm talking about is the way people create identities through consumption, i.e. the brutal machinery of capitalism in operation, and that's something that certainly does target yuppies - but also everyone else, from rich to poor. "Target" is probably the wrong word. "Consumes" or "envelops in a warm, muffling shroud," maybe.
Drinking expensive liquor is an indulgence and a pleasure, and there's nothing inherently bad about it, but it's definitely pushed forward by an enormous, vastly powerful marketing effort and a long history of alcohol-as-status-symbol. But it's difficult for me to give credence to criticism of motivations for drinking scotch as such, rather than as a gateway to a broader critique of capitalist identities.
My reaction can probably be summed up as "sure, but that's the problem with almost everything else we do, buy or enjoy, too." It hardly seems possible to escape it.
I think the problem is indeed widespread, but I guess I disagree if you think it's so widespread that there's no point in really noticing or talking about it -- cause whatcha gonna do?
Even if we accept that creating identities through consumption is inevitable, we can still think about which ones we create and whether they could be better or worse.
Also, I don't really think that it's actually inevitable, at least not in its fullest degree. At the very least we can moderate ourselves and think about our choices and what they really mean. Maybe we won't all go and live on a commune today, or tomorrow, but at the very least we might think a second thought about what we're really doing when we show off our crystal decanters, and maybe we'll even decide to eschew the decanters altogether.
I've played a good 300 hours of Civ 5 (it one more turned me). I think it was much, much better than Civ 4--they cut out the bells and whistles that had accumulated over time ('because we can!') and gave an actual streamlined and sensible play experience.
However, I will also concede that no opening anywhere ever can stand up to Baba Yetu.
Granted I didn't clearly say it, but I only intended to communicate that Babu Yetu was wonderful, hahah.
I'm inclined to think Civ 5 is ultimately the better game. They certainly trimmed out a lot of stuff that only seemed to be weighing the gameplay down.
The combat was a bit disappointingly tedious and slow in the new system, though, but I don't know that past combat was altogether better, either.
I like the new combat quite a bit (maybe unsurprisingly). Eliminating unit stacking was the best possible decision. Now there are fronts and terrain actually matters a lot. It's infinitely more tactical and less 'shit out a stack of 30 swordsmen and march it 1 square at a time until it walked over every city.'
I agree with you in theory, but in my experience this just ended up meaning in practice: funnel larger armies into a choke point with half a dozen artillery waiting for them; it will take forever but it will be no less cheesy than anything else has ever been.
I made a game! Hotline Maui. Requires mouse and keyboard.
Posts
and thus the aforementioned brutality
just a story about a farmer getting angry at his lazy slave and his stupid grandfather
smyth is unbearably dry but still the probably the best resource
http://www.perseus.tufts.edu/hopper/text?doc=Perseus:text:1999.04.0007:smythp=1
This is why I keep mine at the office. The tagalongs in the pantry never stood a chance.
it was seriously like, "oh i think i've had like five of these. maybe i should put them away before..."
and the sleeve was empty
i am really really bad at paying attention to things.
like. really bad.
i tried that but they disappear just as quickly
in this case that may be a gift
it's weird I remember days going by in the older Civ games.
but this one i'm just like
mm...hmm..oh hey my phone!
this is why, when i buy a box of cookies or a pint of ice cream, i do it with the knowledge that i have committed to consuming about 2000 calories in one sitting, or two sittings divided by a narrow span of self-loathing and denial
i feel like reposting this.
I thought it was fine, but it's no The Game That Started With Baba Yetu:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IJiHDmyhE1A&feature=kp
Distant Worlds and its expansions sort of did it.
But I'd love something based on Earth sort of like Civilization. Slowly building up your world as you go with most of the shit autonomous (with the choice for manual) and focusing on big choices (with the option to auto those choices)
I would love to be able to zoom out and see an icon for my army of say 10,000 men slowly trudging its way across the world (randomly generated or not) but then be able to zoom in and watch an army on the march going about its business.
Probably an impossibility but you never know.
Evil, I wouldn't deny that there's great pleasure in a fine scotch. I'm a subjectivist about aesthetic pleasures generally, and I mostly take people at their word when they describe what they like. If there's anything for me to critique here, it's not the enjoyment itself, which I don't even really think is the kind of thing susceptible to critique. Rather, it's the reasons that people go on to acquire that taste, and the social messages embedded in the practices around it. I mean, almost everything can be enjoyed if one is dogged enough in its pursuit. But there's a reason that so many friends of mine have gone after Scotch rather than, say, deciding to dedicate hours and hours to sitting through and eventually mastering modern American poetry, or mid-century Communist film, or whatever. And I think those reasons are mostly bad reasons; at best just because wanting to be cool, at worst because wanting to be cool specifically by displaying and taking advantage of certain objectionable class and gender markers.
You're also right that I was missing half the point when I focused on Scotch as a marker of masculinity. It's surely about marking class as much as it is that--though these things are not entirely disconnected, because the ideal type being pursued here is both male and definitely not poor. As you note, my missing that point though does not really detract from the overall critique, it just changes its focus slightly. I do also think that this definitely goes with the other consumables and practices you list--expensive restaurants, good furniture, leather shoes, etc. There's a yuppie package here. Again, I think it's still male-typed, but you're probably right that the conspicuous consumption involved in 'discriminating' and grown-up taste is the more significant part of it.
Autonomous evolution, socializing, tech development, nation-building, conflicts, and in a meaningful deterministic sense that does not just end up within a narrow set of boring constraints, any ways.
And you can intervene where and when you like in this sandbox.
Swear I'll build this in my spare time if it never gets produced commercially.
now that game. i spent some time with
maybe.
Safety Razors are fine, but a lot more hassle than my buzzie gillette thing, which shaves very very well for no effort.
And conspicuous consumption, and consumerist self-definition-through-shopping, are things I am very much not a fan of.
It's just stuff. It's not important or anything.
I've played a good 300 hours of Civ 5 (it one more turned me). I think it was much, much better than Civ 4--they cut out the bells and whistles that had accumulated over time ('because we can!') and gave an actual streamlined and sensible play experience.
However, I will also concede that no opening anywhere ever can stand up to Baba Yetu.
i transcend gender
get
dunked
on
Granted I didn't clearly say it, but I only intended to communicate that Babu Yetu was wonderful, hahah.
I'm inclined to think Civ 5 is ultimately the better game. They certainly trimmed out a lot of stuff that only seemed to be weighing the gameplay down.
The combat was a bit disappointingly tedious and slow in the new system, though, but I don't know that past combat was altogether better, either.
And for me civ 5 is too board gamey for that type of time dedication.
I think maybe the reason I'm disagreeing with focusing on scotch, in particular, is that I think any problematic motivations to acquire that taste/interest are a very specific subset of a much larger, much more widespread problem, and it's just particularly noticeable to you because you are not interested in it.
The problem I'm talking about is the way people create identities through consumption, i.e. the brutal machinery of capitalism in operation, and that's something that certainly does target yuppies - but also everyone else, from rich to poor. "Target" is probably the wrong word. "Consumes" or "envelops in a warm, muffling shroud," maybe.
Drinking expensive liquor is an indulgence and a pleasure, and there's nothing inherently bad about it, but it's definitely pushed forward by an enormous, vastly powerful marketing effort and a long history of alcohol-as-status-symbol. But it's difficult for me to give credence to criticism of motivations for drinking scotch as such, rather than as a gateway to a broader critique of capitalist identities.
My reaction can probably be summed up as "sure, but that's the problem with almost everything else we do, buy or enjoy, too." It hardly seems possible to escape it.
Fuck yo stereotype drinks
rigorously enforced naive obedience to base desire + cheeseburgers
Self definition, surely not. But just stuff is communicative and you should take due consideration to have your clothes, or what have you, communicate the thing you want them to. Because they are going to communicate something whether you were being mindful or not.
Note that I said due consideration, though. If you're spending 3 days straight researching a pair of pants then you're doing it wrong.
YOU TRANSCEND NOTHING PODLY
I like the new combat quite a bit (maybe unsurprisingly). Eliminating unit stacking was the best possible decision. Now there are fronts and terrain actually matters a lot. It's infinitely more tactical and less 'shit out a stack of 30 swordsmen and march it 1 square at a time until it walked over every city.'
Dicaeopolis comes down the hill.
Dicaeopolis is tired of this shit.
I don't know what exactly is causing it but yeah. It's just not pulling me in. Maybe I need to speed up the game. But I feel like that is playing wrong.
yes 3 days is not nearly enough and your peer group will surely needle you with cruel, subtle barbs for your poorly researched and gauche selection
(@organichu)
and the gengars who are guiding me" -- W.S. Merwin
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kfhbAUrtoP8&feature=kp
I think the problem is indeed widespread, but I guess I disagree if you think it's so widespread that there's no point in really noticing or talking about it -- cause whatcha gonna do?
Even if we accept that creating identities through consumption is inevitable, we can still think about which ones we create and whether they could be better or worse.
Also, I don't really think that it's actually inevitable, at least not in its fullest degree. At the very least we can moderate ourselves and think about our choices and what they really mean. Maybe we won't all go and live on a commune today, or tomorrow, but at the very least we might think a second thought about what we're really doing when we show off our crystal decanters, and maybe we'll even decide to eschew the decanters altogether.
I agree with you in theory, but in my experience this just ended up meaning in practice: funnel larger armies into a choke point with half a dozen artillery waiting for them; it will take forever but it will be no less cheesy than anything else has ever been.
i want to put your entire body in my mouth