Gary Alexander Stott 🏴󠁧󠁢󠁳󠁣󠁴󠁿

I’m reading Neuromancer at the moment in which a piece of tech boasting 3MB is so coveted that it plays a significant role in the early plot.

Has anybody else in the UK noticed the mainstream news channels approaching YouTube in a different way - like clickbaity titles and thumbnails and younger presenters? They’re approaching YouTube like YouTubers now. It’s unsettling. ITV, Sky, even BBC in some ways.

Seeing mainstream news outlets become this makes me feel like the adults have left the room. Or rather, they’ve died off. Now it’s just us, and we have no idea what we’re doing.

Beat Dawnwalker. Christ, that was a depressing wrap-up at the end, and I thought I’d made good choices & done enough optional stuff for a happier outcome!

My concept for that dream game, if you’re wondering, is a similar revenge tale that plays out across centuries, with a handful of separate open world maps in different countries and time periods, where you’re pursuing your maker over time and seeing the world change around you.

Beat Dawnwalker. Christ, that was a depressing wrap-up at the end, and I thought I’d made good choices & done enough optional stuff for a happier outcome!

The combat is GREAT, though, in spite of its own issues. It’s such a great system. I can see plenty of room for building upon it too - instead of critical direction hits after a perfect block, doing animated instant kills, for example to reward good play with additional lethality and style.

Beat Dawnwalker. Christ, that was a depressing wrap-up at the end, and I thought I’d made good choices & done enough optional stuff for a happier outcome!

It’s also really stupid that they released a modern-day trailer right before the game came out which removes any tension or sense of threat around Coen’s fate. It’s doubly stupid that the exact same trailer is the game’s post-credit scene!!

Started a new Cyberpunk character. She’s a gothic gangster who beats the fuck out of people with her cybernetic fists.

Cool pink lighting shots in the seedy nightclub.

I’ve discovered an efficient way to read while burned out is to get cozy, read until reaching a convenient stopping point, then lay the book down next to you and rest for 5-10 minutes (phone break etc.) until the energy for reading returns, and jump back in. The read & recharge approach, as it were.

Setting reading targets helps. Every time I pick up a book, I try to get through a set amount of pages/chapters/percentage specific to that book based on its length/structure. If I’m going to read X, then I’m going to read 3 chapters per session etc. so I know how much progress a session will make.

I’ve discovered an efficient way to read while burned out is to get cozy, read until reaching a convenient stopping point, then lay the book down next to you and rest for 5-10 minutes (phone break etc.) until the energy for reading returns, and jump back in. The read & recharge approach, as it were.

I’ve read 21 books so far this year. You’d think that number would be much lower, reading this thread, eh? Most of that has been from dedicated single-session reading rather than through this technique, which I’ve only recently been doing.

I’ve discovered an efficient way to read while burned out is to get cozy, read until reaching a convenient stopping point, then lay the book down next to you and rest for 5-10 minutes (phone break etc.) until the energy for reading returns, and jump back in. The read & recharge approach, as it were.

Framing a reading session as a single act of focus is a mistake. Treating it more like a rest session where you make the time to get cozy, set an ambience, and just pick up and put down a book over and over again as desired seems much more manageable. Stringing micro-bouts together instead.

The funniest thing about this becoming a fabled golden goose always just out of reach is that…the first game was kind of just an interesting little game that nobody played? It wasn’t a big deal like this has become. Are they expecting to sell millions?

The thing about this is: it’s not *really* Nikki. It’s whatever she’s possessed by. And that’s functionally the horror villain of the film. We experience the film through Bear’s perspective, and the threat arrives through her/it. Also: Tim Sweeney sucks.

We can have sympathy for real-Nikki, and we ought to, but it should also be very clear that her behaviour under possession is twisted and villainous and is the source of the film’s threat. It’s the horror of obsession taken too far. It’s akin to Stephen King’s Misery.

The thing about this is: it’s not *really* Nikki. It’s whatever she’s possessed by. And that’s functionally the horror villain of the film. We experience the film through Bear’s perspective, and the threat arrives through her/it. Also: Tim Sweeney sucks.

The backlash shows that people do have media literacy - just not *enough* media literacy.

Two completely different thoughts about Blood of Dawnwalker: 1. I love that the combat creates a sense of bloodlust. You want to hit from every direction, and deflect as much as possible too, and then hit from the resulting critical directions. You want it ALL. A fast flurry of micro-rewards.

2. I feel that witchcraft kind of undermines the whole premise of the game, in that you have access to tons of powerful stuff even in human form. In the narrative sense, too - magic seems much bigger as a concept than vampires. I’m surprised they introduce it so early.

The Russian bots really did get killed by those strikes, eh? YouTube comments all seem largely sane on new videos now. Wild. And much appreciated.

For people who don’t follow the news: Ukraine recently targeted Russian data centers, which has seemingly purified large swathes of bot toxicity across the internet.