There’s stuff you can buy

… Maybe it’s in the tradition of Magritte? “This is not a game.”

We don’t really teach appreciation of art enough. People unabashedly “hate watch” shows or go out to see blatant cash grabs in theatre, and buy games they don’t enjoy…

I’ve had arguments with friends who defend shows they admit have no redeeming value, and are only watching it because there’s a lot of it. Like there’s a hole in them that can only be filled with sufficient volumes of content. I can’t even talk to them anymore.

Art is in a way the study of choice. To simply make things without meaning anything by them, without doing anything on purpose except to make money, to me is little more than cheap nihilism - without adding to the conversation in the way that considered nihilism can.

A few game makers actually do contribute to the conversation of games as art, following on what came before and enriching us with new ideas. Those few should be followed closely and supported, when you find them.

They were pretty deliberate about having very similar creative aims, standing on the shoulders; they even got Yasunori Mitsuda to help with their soundtrack. The game keeps on surprising me with its self awareness, beauty, and a depth of gameplay that keeps unfolding long after you think you have the measure of it.

I would usually have said Earthbound or Chrono Trigger, but this year I’ve been playing Sea of Stars and it truly seems better. I never thought I’d say it. The writing, art, music, gameplay, movement, puzzles, characters, all are aimed in the exact same direction as what CT was trying to do and it goes farther in every way.

But it’s fun

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I am given to understand it is an article of oblique humour.

Of all the callow villainry, I wish a comparison to Baldur’s Gate 3 was the worst I’ve heard. I have seen such articles talk about Avowed in terms of Skyrim, which was released closer to Banjo Kazooie than Avowed. No irrelevant remark is beyond them, no matter how patently inane.

Factposting

His games are certainly cinematic, and as game directors go he’s certainly an auteur. I’m still not sure why he felt the need to clarify.

Okay now I might buy it just for the redemption arc.

That gave me a heartfelt pang of yearning for the good timeline.

Maybe if the book was eight times taller

Snack of Theseus

The trouble is that billionaires who remain sympathetic to Carnegie’s “gospel of wealth” are vanishing, while narcissists who see themselves as American oligarchs are proliferating. It isn’t hard to see how dynasties could be more politically powerful on a long timescale.

Many would call this a natural progression, and for my part I don’t envy whoever ends up on the other side of that debate - money being the root of all evil.

Shitting in a garden is good for the plants… Maybe this is like that?

I’ve met a few who did 😏

Bluey is Australia’s finest export, other than John Robertson.

It’s a surface book 3. I’m out of office at the moment so the comparison is from memory alone, sorry if I was significantly off.

Further wrinkle: I run it from an external SSD.