I guess it would depend on how long I was stuck on the island. If it’s forever, then the most important consideration is replayability.
In that case, one game would definitely be a good chess game. Then I’d probably pick a complex grand strategy or 4x game - Civ 6 or something from Paradox. A third pick would probably be an RPG, but that’s a tough choice. Even a big game with 200-300 hours of great content wouldn’t be worth it unless it’s got good replayability options.
Only game I really waiting for is Starfield, which now has a release date.
I wasn’t really looking forward to it, but I started playing World of Warcraft again after an almost decade-long break. The main reason is that my daughter plays, so it’s something we can do together as she is in college in another state. But I’m not enjoying all the clicking involved and my hands are not happy.
Other than that and my usual standbys, there’s not much on my radar - oh, except the Cyberpunk expansion, I will be getting that almost certainly.
I've been "debating" online since the dialup BBS days in the 1980s. One thing I can say with some confidence is that human behavior hasn't changed.
There will always be bullies, trolls, and overly-sensitive narcissists who want everyone else to conform to their particular behavioral and ideological norms.
And in the case of bullying like this, the tools are available to stop that behavior. No one is forced to watch Twitch or scroll Twitter or social media. And Twitch streamers have lots of control over their own chat spaces. I don't watch Twitch much, but every stream has rules and most streamers (and their mods) are always at the ready to ban or timeout people who don't follow the rules. This streamer could have (and should have) set rules for appropriate behavior in his chat stream and then enforced those rules. Yes, that will piss some people off, but standing up to bullies and self-righteous narcissists is the only way to disincentivize that behavior.
It seems to me that is going to evolve over time as society grapples with the various issues. And along with that the question of who gets to decide who or what is transphobic. Strident activists or the normie public? I don't think anyone knows how this will shake out over time.
There were a lot of trans-related controversies with CP2077 which basically ended when it was released and it turned out they were overblown at best.
And I think the reviews of CP2077 were good because CDPR only allowed, IIRC, PC review copies of the game - in other words, they hid how bad it was on consoles from reviewers.
I think reviews at this point for Hogwarts Legacy are almost entirely based on the PS5 and PC. It could be CP2077 terrible on Xbox One and the last-generation consoles as well.
Hogwarts Legacy does look good, but I'm going to wait and see before buying. And when it comes to JK Rowling's personal views, they do not factor at all in my decision.
That is actually an intentional playstyle - You can pick 'devouring swarm" as a race trait that prevents you from engaging in diplomacy, and when you invade and take over a planet, the existing inhabitants are "purged."
At the opposite end are fanatical pacifist egalitarians who can only engage in defensive wars and accept all races in their empire.
It's fun and does provide for diverse gameplay and a bit roll-play.
My latest Stellaris playthrough, I played as a Hive-mind race that considered all other races to be food. So I had no diplomacy options at all because, after all, one doesn't negotiate with prey. The galaxy formed alliances to try to oppose me, but they all ended up on my dinner table.
I'm actually very impressed with the level of choice and consequence in Stellaris based on the starting conditions you set, but it would be very hard to replicate in an RPG.
I haven’t played any of the Last of Us series, although it does look good.
I’m kind of burned out on the zombie apocalypse genre and didn’t even finish Dying Light 2.
But I like games with moral choices and diverging paths.
I am conflicted with how obvious those choices should be. I think back to Witcher 3 where to get one of the good endings requires picking some very specific dialog choices that are not obvious. My daughter played the game trying to be a good Gerald and supporting Ciri and she ended up with the worst ending which crushed her a bit and pissed her off when she looked to see what was necessary for a good ending.
The Paragon system was disappointing IMO because incentivized you to play either max Paragon or max Renegade when something in between would have had more interesting choices and trade offs. I think playing “good guys” who do bad things is more interesting than min-maxing good or bad.
Cyberpunk is another game that will let you burn bridges, but all that does is cut off content and end game options, it doesn’t give you different paths to explore - although there are some smaller quest lines that do that. So there is no incentive to, for example, piss off and betray Panam. A branching or parallel quest line where you ally with Saul instead would have been interesting.
It’s probably just really had from a development standpoint to put in all that extra stuff that would be required to give real choice. I’m somewhat hopeful for Starfield given how much more voiced dialog lines there are compared to previous titles - hopefully that is a proxy for more choice-based paths and content.
As for what I’ve been playing, I’ve always been a 4x fan and finally picked up Stellaris on sale. It’s really good, but an incredible time sink in terms of game length and learning complex systems. I already need a break from it.
As an often tired middle-aged Dad, I find myself mostly playing at the end of a long day and not wanting to really think too much, which is why I often play standards I've played for years.
Elden Ring does look amazing, but I doubt I have the time and - more important - the mental energy for it. That said, God of War looks way too linear and hand-holdy for me. I prefer a balance, which is why I tend to like RPGs more like Skyrim, Fallout and Cyberpunk.
So it shouldn't be surprising that the next new AAA game I'll likely get is Starfield. And I'm also excited for the Cyberpunk expansion.
Polling shows that over the past couple of decades, faith and trust in the media steadily declined generally, moreso among independents and Republicans than Democrats. Then, between 2016-2018, trust among Democrats spiked to 70% and has stayed there, trust among Republicans cratered and has stayed there, and trust among independents briefly spike and has since cratered.
The result is that only 1/3 of Americans have "a great deal or fair amount" of trust in the media, and the vast majority of those are Democrats. Everyone else has "not very much or no" trust in the media.
So the interesting question to me is "why" and what drives these numbers. Did the media suddenly change in 2016-2017 such that Democrats suddenly started trusting them a lot more and Republicans a lot less, or was the change in public/partisan perceptions? Is it a problem that perception about the media is skewed in such a nakedly partisan way?
What about the decline in media trust generally? My theory is that much of it is driven by segmentation and compromises media outlets have to take in a post-internet business environment. Fox pioneered tailoring "news" to a specific audience and still being able to make money, and many outlets have followed along. Although small in absolute terms (only about 1-2% of the population watches Fox), there are enough people who want to hear the propaganda that Fox and MSNBC sell, especially via their "opinion" shows. But their audiences are very old and are dying off.
The market conditions are such that only a few giants can exist as truly national/global outlets like the NYT and the WAPO. But much of their revenue doesn't come from "news" but from other things. There's a reason the NYT paid top dollar to purchase Wordle, for example - it's a great way to bring in more subscription dollars, like the crosswords.
That's the vibe I get too. I have very little faith in any reporting on topics tied to culture war stuff and treat all of it very skeptically until proven otherwise.
The poster child example of this was the dozen or so stories written by the NYT and other outlets about the kerfuffle on the national mall a couple of years ago between a kid in a MAGA hat, a Native American beating a drum, and some Black Israelites.
The whole thing was stupid, served no purpose, was not newsworthy, and was inaccurately reported, but it got extensively covered thanks to Twitter groupthink and outrage and succeeded in getting media outlets a lot of clicks.
One thing about the NYT and other prestige outlets that, at least from my perspective, is worth pointing out: Not everything they report is treated the same.
In other words, people treat reporting differently depending on the subject and other factors.
In my own case, I think a lot of NYT reporting is good, especially on foreign and national security developments. In contrast, I think NYT reporting on culture war topics is generally bad, especially stuff that was generated on Twitter.
Except it's not just conservatives - as noted, "liberal moderates" have 47% trust while "liberal Democrats" have 70% trust - a substantial difference between self-identified liberals.
Point being, partisanship seems to be a bigger factor than ideology.
Secondly, liberals/partisan Democrats/progressives have certainly created their own groupthink outlets as well, it's not only the right wing that's playing that game, although the right-wing has been playing it for longer.
Finally, I don't know how one would explain the huge shifts from 2016-2018 as anything other than the effect of Trump, but if you've got an alternative explanation, then I'd like to hear it.
First, Gallup in this current and historical polling does not call it the "mainstream" media, but "mass media." Whether the average American who isn't obsessed with politics believes there is a difference is anyone's guess.
Secondly, they've been tracking this since 1972. Certainly, a lot has changed in that time span with Americans generally, and the media and partisans in particular. I'm not sure you've made an effective case that their methodology is "totally worthless" but if you've got something better, then I'd be interested in seeing it.
Note that the conservative/liberal numbers differ from Republican/Democrat/Independent.
For example, 71% of liberal Democrats and 70% of moderate Democrats have a "great deal or fair amount of trust and confidence," while liberal independents are at 47% and moderate independents are at 33%.
Between 2016 and 2017, Democratic support for the media jumped by 21 points, and Republican support plummeted by 18 points. Both have roughly stayed the same since. Independents jumped into support by 12 points from 2016-2018 but have fallen since by 15 points.
I think there are a few possible explanations for this, the most obvious being a reaction by the media and partisans to Trump and coverage of Trump.
She has a tendency to do that. There was another Munk debate her side lost that had Jordan Peterson on the other side (https://munkdebates.com/debates/political-correctness). She spent almost all of her time talking about what a bad person Peterson was.
Note, especially the inflection point around 2016. Democrats spiked and stayed high. Republicans spiked down and stayed low. Independent went up and then reverted to the previous downward trend. Overall the Democratic cohort is small because in total, only 1/3 of Americans have a "significant or fair amount" of trust in the media. In contrast, 2/3 of the country has "not very much or no" trust in the media.
What is the explanation for that? Why does one ideological/political cohort have trust in the media while others, including a huge majority of Americans generally, don't?
BTW, I agree with you that the right and left and switched sides on the establishment vs. counter-culture axis, among other things.
As an fellow old guy, it does look amazing, but I just don’t have the time to sink into something like that. And I’m usually playing at the end of a day where I’m probably mentally tapped out and looking to unwind and I know this isn’t the kind of game for that. Maybe when I’m retired-retired and don’t have kids in the house and an overstuffed schedule.
On this kind of topic, the websites I read are generally science journals. I’ve read a lot of those journals on this topic which is why I was surprised about your first claim and asked for a source.
In regard to “believing” experts, I believe in the scientific process first and “experts” second. In other words, experts aren’t high priests, they need to show their work and are not immune from human cognitive defects. And in this case they have shown their work.
As I have already stated, I have no beef with the consensus view on this topic and agree the preponderance of evidence points to a zoonotic origin. In short, I don’t disagree with the experts. But the experts in this topic still characterize their assessments in terms of probabilities and not certainties. So while they may have various levels of confidence in zoonotic origin that are higher compared to a lab leak or whatever, they haven’t closed the door on the alternatives. Anyone who claims to defer to experts shouldn’t close the door either or turn scientific probabilistic assessments into rhetorical certainty.
*Comment archive for non-registered commenters assembled by email address as provided.
On “Saturday Morning Gaming: Desert Island Games”
I guess it would depend on how long I was stuck on the island. If it’s forever, then the most important consideration is replayability.
In that case, one game would definitely be a good chess game. Then I’d probably pick a complex grand strategy or 4x game - Civ 6 or something from Paradox. A third pick would probably be an RPG, but that’s a tough choice. Even a big game with 200-300 hours of great content wouldn’t be worth it unless it’s got good replayability options.
On “Saturday Morning Gaming: Coming Down the Pike”
I am too. I like these kinds of RPG's and am looking forward to one that isn't in a fantasy or post-apocalyptic setting.
I'm cautiously hopeful that Bethesda has learned from Fallout 76 and Cyberpunk and will ship a game that isn't broken.
"
Only game I really waiting for is Starfield, which now has a release date.
I wasn’t really looking forward to it, but I started playing World of Warcraft again after an almost decade-long break. The main reason is that my daughter plays, so it’s something we can do together as she is in college in another state. But I’m not enjoying all the clicking involved and my hands are not happy.
Other than that and my usual standbys, there’s not much on my radar - oh, except the Cyberpunk expansion, I will be getting that almost certainly.
On “Hogwarts Legacy: The-Game-That-Must-Not-Be-Named”
Lol!
"
I've been "debating" online since the dialup BBS days in the 1980s. One thing I can say with some confidence is that human behavior hasn't changed.
There will always be bullies, trolls, and overly-sensitive narcissists who want everyone else to conform to their particular behavioral and ideological norms.
And in the case of bullying like this, the tools are available to stop that behavior. No one is forced to watch Twitch or scroll Twitter or social media. And Twitch streamers have lots of control over their own chat spaces. I don't watch Twitch much, but every stream has rules and most streamers (and their mods) are always at the ready to ban or timeout people who don't follow the rules. This streamer could have (and should have) set rules for appropriate behavior in his chat stream and then enforced those rules. Yes, that will piss some people off, but standing up to bullies and self-righteous narcissists is the only way to disincentivize that behavior.
"
It seems to me that is going to evolve over time as society grapples with the various issues. And along with that the question of who gets to decide who or what is transphobic. Strident activists or the normie public? I don't think anyone knows how this will shake out over time.
"
There were a lot of trans-related controversies with CP2077 which basically ended when it was released and it turned out they were overblown at best.
And I think the reviews of CP2077 were good because CDPR only allowed, IIRC, PC review copies of the game - in other words, they hid how bad it was on consoles from reviewers.
I think reviews at this point for Hogwarts Legacy are almost entirely based on the PS5 and PC. It could be CP2077 terrible on Xbox One and the last-generation consoles as well.
Hogwarts Legacy does look good, but I'm going to wait and see before buying. And when it comes to JK Rowling's personal views, they do not factor at all in my decision.
On “Saturday Morning Gaming: On Sonder”
That is actually an intentional playstyle - You can pick 'devouring swarm" as a race trait that prevents you from engaging in diplomacy, and when you invade and take over a planet, the existing inhabitants are "purged."
At the opposite end are fanatical pacifist egalitarians who can only engage in defensive wars and accept all races in their empire.
It's fun and does provide for diverse gameplay and a bit roll-play.
"
My latest Stellaris playthrough, I played as a Hive-mind race that considered all other races to be food. So I had no diplomacy options at all because, after all, one doesn't negotiate with prey. The galaxy formed alliances to try to oppose me, but they all ended up on my dinner table.
I'm actually very impressed with the level of choice and consequence in Stellaris based on the starting conditions you set, but it would be very hard to replicate in an RPG.
"
I haven’t played any of the Last of Us series, although it does look good.
I’m kind of burned out on the zombie apocalypse genre and didn’t even finish Dying Light 2.
But I like games with moral choices and diverging paths.
I am conflicted with how obvious those choices should be. I think back to Witcher 3 where to get one of the good endings requires picking some very specific dialog choices that are not obvious. My daughter played the game trying to be a good Gerald and supporting Ciri and she ended up with the worst ending which crushed her a bit and pissed her off when she looked to see what was necessary for a good ending.
The Paragon system was disappointing IMO because incentivized you to play either max Paragon or max Renegade when something in between would have had more interesting choices and trade offs. I think playing “good guys” who do bad things is more interesting than min-maxing good or bad.
Cyberpunk is another game that will let you burn bridges, but all that does is cut off content and end game options, it doesn’t give you different paths to explore - although there are some smaller quest lines that do that. So there is no incentive to, for example, piss off and betray Panam. A branching or parallel quest line where you ally with Saul instead would have been interesting.
It’s probably just really had from a development standpoint to put in all that extra stuff that would be required to give real choice. I’m somewhat hopeful for Starfield given how much more voiced dialog lines there are compared to previous titles - hopefully that is a proxy for more choice-based paths and content.
As for what I’ve been playing, I’ve always been a 4x fan and finally picked up Stellaris on sale. It’s really good, but an incredible time sink in terms of game length and learning complex systems. I already need a break from it.
On “Saturday Morning Gaming: On Fun”
Thanks for the tipper!
"
I'll check that out.
Thanks to your recommendation, I've been doing Gloomhaven lately too. While I'm still learning, the scenarios are approachable chunks of content.
"
Fun is definitely subjective.
As an often tired middle-aged Dad, I find myself mostly playing at the end of a long day and not wanting to really think too much, which is why I often play standards I've played for years.
Elden Ring does look amazing, but I doubt I have the time and - more important - the mental energy for it. That said, God of War looks way too linear and hand-holdy for me. I prefer a balance, which is why I tend to like RPGs more like Skyrim, Fallout and Cyberpunk.
So it shouldn't be surprising that the next new AAA game I'll likely get is Starfield. And I'm also excited for the Cyberpunk expansion.
On “Munk Debates holds Debate over whether Mainstream Media deserves trust.”
Surprising how this thread has evolved.
I guess my final thoughts are summed up this way:
Polling shows that over the past couple of decades, faith and trust in the media steadily declined generally, moreso among independents and Republicans than Democrats. Then, between 2016-2018, trust among Democrats spiked to 70% and has stayed there, trust among Republicans cratered and has stayed there, and trust among independents briefly spike and has since cratered.
The result is that only 1/3 of Americans have "a great deal or fair amount" of trust in the media, and the vast majority of those are Democrats. Everyone else has "not very much or no" trust in the media.
So the interesting question to me is "why" and what drives these numbers. Did the media suddenly change in 2016-2017 such that Democrats suddenly started trusting them a lot more and Republicans a lot less, or was the change in public/partisan perceptions? Is it a problem that perception about the media is skewed in such a nakedly partisan way?
What about the decline in media trust generally? My theory is that much of it is driven by segmentation and compromises media outlets have to take in a post-internet business environment. Fox pioneered tailoring "news" to a specific audience and still being able to make money, and many outlets have followed along. Although small in absolute terms (only about 1-2% of the population watches Fox), there are enough people who want to hear the propaganda that Fox and MSNBC sell, especially via their "opinion" shows. But their audiences are very old and are dying off.
The market conditions are such that only a few giants can exist as truly national/global outlets like the NYT and the WAPO. But much of their revenue doesn't come from "news" but from other things. There's a reason the NYT paid top dollar to purchase Wordle, for example - it's a great way to bring in more subscription dollars, like the crosswords.
"
That's the vibe I get too. I have very little faith in any reporting on topics tied to culture war stuff and treat all of it very skeptically until proven otherwise.
The poster child example of this was the dozen or so stories written by the NYT and other outlets about the kerfuffle on the national mall a couple of years ago between a kid in a MAGA hat, a Native American beating a drum, and some Black Israelites.
The whole thing was stupid, served no purpose, was not newsworthy, and was inaccurately reported, but it got extensively covered thanks to Twitter groupthink and outrage and succeeded in getting media outlets a lot of clicks.
"
One thing about the NYT and other prestige outlets that, at least from my perspective, is worth pointing out: Not everything they report is treated the same.
In other words, people treat reporting differently depending on the subject and other factors.
In my own case, I think a lot of NYT reporting is good, especially on foreign and national security developments. In contrast, I think NYT reporting on culture war topics is generally bad, especially stuff that was generated on Twitter.
"
Except it's not just conservatives - as noted, "liberal moderates" have 47% trust while "liberal Democrats" have 70% trust - a substantial difference between self-identified liberals.
Point being, partisanship seems to be a bigger factor than ideology.
Secondly, liberals/partisan Democrats/progressives have certainly created their own groupthink outlets as well, it's not only the right wing that's playing that game, although the right-wing has been playing it for longer.
Finally, I don't know how one would explain the huge shifts from 2016-2018 as anything other than the effect of Trump, but if you've got an alternative explanation, then I'd like to hear it.
"
First, Gallup in this current and historical polling does not call it the "mainstream" media, but "mass media." Whether the average American who isn't obsessed with politics believes there is a difference is anyone's guess.
Secondly, they've been tracking this since 1972. Certainly, a lot has changed in that time span with Americans generally, and the media and partisans in particular. I'm not sure you've made an effective case that their methodology is "totally worthless" but if you've got something better, then I'd be interested in seeing it.
"
I think it's based on this polling:
https://news.gallup.com/poll/403166/americans-trust-media-remains-near-record-low.aspx
Note that the conservative/liberal numbers differ from Republican/Democrat/Independent.
For example, 71% of liberal Democrats and 70% of moderate Democrats have a "great deal or fair amount of trust and confidence," while liberal independents are at 47% and moderate independents are at 33%.
Between 2016 and 2017, Democratic support for the media jumped by 21 points, and Republican support plummeted by 18 points. Both have roughly stayed the same since. Independents jumped into support by 12 points from 2016-2018 but have fallen since by 15 points.
I think there are a few possible explanations for this, the most obvious being a reaction by the media and partisans to Trump and coverage of Trump.
"
Yeah, it was pretty bad. Stephen Fry was the only effective debater, and he carried the result IMO.
"
She has a tendency to do that. There was another Munk debate her side lost that had Jordan Peterson on the other side (https://munkdebates.com/debates/political-correctness). She spent almost all of her time talking about what a bad person Peterson was.
"
The polling indicates that everyone has less trust in the media except Democrats:
https://news.gallup.com/poll/403166/americans-trust-media-remains-near-record-low.aspx
Note, especially the inflection point around 2016. Democrats spiked and stayed high. Republicans spiked down and stayed low. Independent went up and then reverted to the previous downward trend. Overall the Democratic cohort is small because in total, only 1/3 of Americans have a "significant or fair amount" of trust in the media. In contrast, 2/3 of the country has "not very much or no" trust in the media.
What is the explanation for that? Why does one ideological/political cohort have trust in the media while others, including a huge majority of Americans generally, don't?
BTW, I agree with you that the right and left and switched sides on the establishment vs. counter-culture axis, among other things.
"
Seems to match the polling data:
https://news.gallup.com/poll/403166/americans-trust-media-remains-near-record-low.aspx
On “Saturday Morning Gaming: Elden Ring and Getting Gud”
As an fellow old guy, it does look amazing, but I just don’t have the time to sink into something like that. And I’m usually playing at the end of a day where I’m probably mentally tapped out and looking to unwind and I know this isn’t the kind of game for that. Maybe when I’m retired-retired and don’t have kids in the house and an overstuffed schedule.
On “Throughput: The COVID Lab Leak Theory Resurfaces”
On this kind of topic, the websites I read are generally science journals. I’ve read a lot of those journals on this topic which is why I was surprised about your first claim and asked for a source.
In regard to “believing” experts, I believe in the scientific process first and “experts” second. In other words, experts aren’t high priests, they need to show their work and are not immune from human cognitive defects. And in this case they have shown their work.
As I have already stated, I have no beef with the consensus view on this topic and agree the preponderance of evidence points to a zoonotic origin. In short, I don’t disagree with the experts. But the experts in this topic still characterize their assessments in terms of probabilities and not certainties. So while they may have various levels of confidence in zoonotic origin that are higher compared to a lab leak or whatever, they haven’t closed the door on the alternatives. Anyone who claims to defer to experts shouldn’t close the door either or turn scientific probabilistic assessments into rhetorical certainty.
*Comment archive for non-registered commenters assembled by email address as provided.