Ace T'Ken

I don’t know if it’s the one you’re thinking of, but this guy does motion comic stuff and makes fun of superheroes:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aWBpBjdp8Hg

It looks like I will be nearly the only dissenter here. I didn’t care for the game.

PROS:

• The music and sound design were completely appropriate and fit the world.
• An initially interesting story setup.
• Some of the planets have a SUPER cool premise and are a joy to explore.
• The DLC adds some much-needed (albeit mild) horror elements.

NEUTRALS:

• Achievements are implemented, but are mostly for irrelevant side activities. Do you like using a guide to figure out how to get all the achievements? Well, you will have to.

CONS:

• This is not an adventure game, this is a puzzle game first and foremost. If you are not down with figuring out hundreds of vague Dark Souls-style lore blurbs scattered all over in order to work out how to solve environmental puzzles to progress, do not get this game.
• In the same vein, if you are not down with having a loop end before you’re done exploring an area only to have to trek all the way back there and go through everything all over again in case you missed something, do not get this game. This could be partially solved by having the logs you find on a planet permanently NOT GLOW any more after you had read their chain, or maybe a ship notice letting you know there were undecyphered texts on a planet still. I had to re-tread an astounding amount of ground just to make sure I wasn’t missing something.
• When your ship directs you to a planet that you need something from, the navigation on some of them is so obtuse that I found several places I could not find again even after dozens of visits to their planets. A map or better signposting would alleviate this.
• The characters were deeply forgettable, and you are constantly inundated with dozens of gibberish alien names so unless you follow a lore guide or take notes, you’re not going to figure out who did what. And speaking of…
• The story has a veneer of “pretty good sci-fi” but is told quite poorly. You will beat the game, get the incredibly lacklustre ending that doesn’t close out the story in any way, and watch one of many lore explanation videos that will make things click into place. The fact that the lore videos have SO MANY HITS is endemic of the fact that this is a narrative poorly delivered. You will find the lore in random order. If spread over multiple sessions like I played, this will mean you will not make some absolutely needed connections.
• Many things do not make sense within the context of the world and there is no reason for them to be happening at the time except for the hand-waving “It’s a video game” excuse, which breaks immersion. Why only now is sand being moved from one planet to another at the beginning of a cycle? Why only now is one planet being broken by lava? These (and other that I can not speak about due to spoilers) are not explained - the systems have existed for ages and would have (and should have given the environments they set up) occurred before this, but because it makes for a more interesting setup, it all happens now.
• The controls are… an acquired taste at best. Look at many of the negative reviews; many state the controls as an issue. There is a reason for this, even though I did become accustomed to them over time. I swapped to a controller and it was less bad. The keyboard and mouse controls are abysmal.
• I played the final build after the DLC came out, and even this far in development, I had some severe bugs. Controls would get “stuck” and force a game restart, achievements didn’t unlock correctly, etc.
• I wound up quitting because I didn’t know what to do next and didn’t care to watch yet another video to figure it out. There were hundreds of text logs that may or may not have been useful, and no idea how to find what was missing to help me progress without consulting guides, and it became too much. I eventually realized that I was just throwing time into a hole with nothing to show for it. It genuinely felt like it wanted me to give up and I couldn’t help but oblige. I just… stopped. I hated it. I kept doing the same thing over and over and eventually felt that I wasn’t enjoying anything. I hate the very concept of repetition as a game mechanic unless executed well; this wasn’t executed well.
• Despite quitting, I have seen all the endings. The real ending is legitimately nonsense and is basically an appeal to emotion while leaving the reality of the universe behind. It abandons the premise with what can only be described as a narrative hug that does essentially nothing, but presents the veneer of “feel good.” It is nothing. It is empty. Everyone but me loves it for this, and I can’t figure out why.

CONCLUSION: Meh? I really don’t understand the adoration people have for this game. It’s a mediocre non-combat roguelike with about 3 hour of content they’ve spread over 20 hours. It feels very much like a case of style over substance. This game genuinely makes me sad. I really wanted to like it, but… ugh. It feels like work.

They are? Where? I mod a Community and I’ve never seen anything that isn’t explicitly for Admins that can see them.

For my community ( !actual_discussion@lemmy.ca ) I would adore this as long as it’s available to Mods of the community the downvotes are in and Admins of that instance only. It should absolutely not be visible for normal users.

We are hit with downvotes nearly every time we post a new thread on anything even remotely controversial so it would really help us filter out people who simply downvote to bury the thread and contribute nothing whatsoever to the discussion.

If you disagree, we want to know why and discuss that with you. It’s the entire point of our Community.

Heck, we actively made it a rule to not downvote unless the user is not adding to the discussion, and that it should not be used as a disagree button. People generally ignore this, however.

That or just add the moderator option to disable downvotes for Communities. It would be an incredibly handy toggle.

EDIT: For an example as to why it should be implemented, see this post you’re currently viewing where I give reasons, how it’s been impacting us, some alternatives, and people hit the “fuck you” button with zero discussion and that’s all. This is the problem.

A trash heap where it fucking belongs.

There isn’t a thing that you can put ketchup on that a good BBQ sauce or hot sauce isn’t better on. I will die on this hill.

Looks like what I’d want to use, but to reach broad support it needs a Windows client as well.

17276667. Thanks for the memories.

Well. My child is that age and I very much relate to the protagonist. Was not expecting a gut-punch this afternoon.

The Jaunt by Steven King

One of my favorites short sci-fi stories ever.

Boy do I have a treat for you.

Hey, wake up! The new Clippy skin just dropped!

There would be no way for them to gain that knowledge. I could believe that they potentially lost their primary language and spoke a mild amount of other languages that they had picked up by osmosis…

But I am doubtful that they would be able to have a full conversation with a native speaker.

There’s no way the human brain could just conjure up a fully functioning secondary language that the person had no exposure to.

I get it, but it doesn’t have to be just pure stats. Could have been mild ability improvements or something or maybe changed some of the effects or visual things that occurred around you. Hell, even walking speed improvement or something like a tone to help you locate hidden items.

There’s a lot they could have done considering we’re dealing with magical items! Still had a pretty good time with it overall though.

Never got into Harry Potter since I was too old. This game was really fun to just explore and I constantly felt a forward momentum. Some of the stories were good, and some were awful.

I would absolutely play a sequel just based on the well done sense of discovery alone. I just wish more of what you found was impactful instead of cosmetic.

To be clear, I didn’t say suffering, I said death and I was moreso referring to animals and how we survive.

You can cause death without causing suffering, and also the opposite.

First and foremost, let me say that I appreciate you actually engaging.

Now, if what I’m interpreting is correct (and feel free to set me straight if I’m incorrect), your argument stems from a moralistic one. Moralistic arguments are not solid stances to argue from; similar to a hardcore Christian seeing abortions as vile and evil because of a personal moral stance, you feel your moral position is better, therefore you look down on opposition. However that is a personal opinion and those aren’t convincing - certainly not for sensitive topics. Let’s approach the debate from a scientific standpoint.

Trying to stick to the logic of the situation, the crux of statements I’ve seen here seem to be “Being vegan is eliminating suffering and therefore should be the end goal.” Is that not correct? I’m not arguing in bad faith like many here or making a shitty “bacon = good” joke. I want to make sure you’re not being misinterpreted.

Other reasons I have seen in threads similar to this coming from the “angry vegan” side of things (and some responses to those) are:

• If you want to be vegan because you enjoy it? Go for it. That is inarguable. It’s no more or less valid than someone liking the colour red.

• If you want to be vegan because you feel it’s healthier? Rock on. Go you! You are probably correct if you monitor your diet. I would argue against it being better than a vegetarian diet however.

• If you want to be vegan because it’s easier on the environment? Well, for individuals? Yup! At the moment, you could make a good case that it would be better for the planet, but only because we’re overpopulated and statistically, being vegan is unsustainable if the entire planet were to switch tomorrow. A smarter case to make would be for a reduction in humans as being vegan is an extremely minor step of harm reduction compared to fewer people. Also, most food fed to livestock is not human-consumable and is often byproducts that would otherwise go to waste. Creating more food from waste is more efficient than discarding it.

• If you want to be vegan because you don’t like factory farms? Sure, I hate them too, however quitting animal products altogether is not a logical jump to make from that feeling. There are plenty of smaller suppliers you can procure from that do not have those issues; the more logical jump is to just not use bad providers no matter what the product. For example, I have raised bees and worked in a co-operative apiary. There was no abuse, and the likely alternative to us creating the hives was death for the entire bee community. Tell me how being vegan is better than creating my own honey and essentially creating hives and colonies from scratch, but using animal products in that instance.

• If you want to be vegan because it’s eliminating suffering (or death)? Again, kind of. This is simply making substitutions for suffering that you’re comfortable with. You can make an argument that it’s somehow lesser, but it’s bad logic and therefore a bad argument. You’re also applying your own morals (because again, this is a strictly moral standpoint) to other people, which is silly no matter who is doing it. From activists to religious extremists, your morals apply to you and only you. Do not try to enforce them on the outside world. You can argue for them, but getting mad at anyone with a differing view is silly and unproductive. As you said (and dismissed), you can lessen suffering or death, but you can not eliminate it. Your existence causes death. All existence does. Everything alive is only alive because it feeds off other living things who have their own way of existing. A suffering or death being a style you choose to not recognize is not only not a valid defence, it makes you just as guilty as those you attack. Your opposition also feel that their being is higher than those they ingest and they also do not recognize the deaths of those they consider lesser, they simply drew their line elsewhere.

And the way vegans are going about it in these threads isn’t helpful to your cause. Mindless emotion-driven downvoting does not change hearts or minds.

A better outreach for you would be to use the Food subs and post legit great vegetarian food and entice people that way. Doing it the way they are now will accomplish nothing of value. Well, unless they secretly work for a factory farm and want to piss people off so they eat more meat, in which case those psuedo-vegans are doing exactly what they should be in these threads which is mindlessly downvoting instead of engaging.

Feel free to ask for sources for any statements I made that aren’t related to personal preference. I can back up everything with peer-reviewed studies.

But they are scientifically accurate beliefs. They are true.

Emotionally, plant communication is awesome. Simultaneously factory farming also sucks.

Getting mad at a poster because you draw an uncharitable conclusion from the beginning of a post chain is extreme.

Understood! Wasn’t trying to be a dick, just adding clarity if needed.

What I’ve stated is not baseless. There are many sources and studies claiming how plants communicate via root systems, pheromones, and other mechanisms (some we’re discovering continually). As someone who worked in forestry (and lived on a non-corporate farm that produced mostly alfalfa), it’s somewhat more apparent once you’re there and present in that world.

To quote myself on another thread:

I trust you know how to use search, but some brief citations: https://science.howstuffworks.com/life/botany/plants-feel-pain.htm https://www.sciencetimes.com/articles/24473/20191218/a-group-of-scientists-suggest-that-plants-feel-pain.htm

You can find many more if you look. We’ve known for quite a while that trees do this, and fungi are absolutely notorious for this. Speak to a botanist (or read the articles above) and they’ll tell you that plants respond to warnings from their peers about dangers, brace for pain, and signal pain to others. To be clear they don’t seem to feel pain (but keep in mind that they said this for years about crustaceans as well, but it was simply because we didn’t know how they functioned well enough) - not understanding the pain does not mean there is no pain.

Life for some organisms means death for others. Period. You can not avoid it on a micro or macro scale, all you can do is change WHAT you kill.

Plants are cool as hell though I suppose that understanding the above means that it can fuck with the worldview of vegetarians, and nobody likes that. If you disagree, please be respectful and let me know what your reasoning is.

Most likely they’ll continue to heavily downvote me when I describe the complex communication systems plants and fungi have.