#it becomes even more intrinsic to the class. preserving histories and connection. thinking about how hope's songs are folk tales and | Explore Tumblr Posts and Blogs

ronnytherandom · 3 years

Text

I forgot to watch content all week so i wrote about games ive been playing

9/2/2021: The Truman Show

You should fear your fears but embrace them and use them to guide you into the unknown, to explore and experience what life has to offer. Fear stands between you and the fullest experience of life so you must pass through it to better yourself. Heed not the walls built about you and the chains made to hold you. Though the architects insist it will preserve your life, containment is anathema to life. Do not take in faith the benevolence of powers that be; instead trust those who would support and liberate you, guide you through fear and into life.

As best I can lay it out, I think this is the philosophy of the Truman show but there is so much more to read into it also. There is critique of systems of commodification and celebrity (i.e. capitalism) reducing human beings to a consumable good as well as encouragement to find and pursue your goals despite adversity and even sensibility which is also tied to the illusion of economic responsibility. You can’t put a camera inside a human head, you can never “know” them without being an active and intrinsic part of their life, but also there is need for reciprocation. If one half exists with ulterior motive then the entire relationship is rotten; sincere humanity is what creates real connections. Without such your world is fake. A world built around one person is a world where no one can truly live. All these actors have given up basically their entire lives for the sake of watching Truman have his life built around him by outside forces, have allowed themselves to be commodified and dehumanised for the good of one man, Christoph. The man at the top has delusions of grandeur and thinks only of his own bottom line, he cares not for his subjects but simply wants them to do as he tells them because it benefits him to commodify their lives and interactions. Even then he cannot stand to lose control and in seeking to demonstrate Truman’s “realness” he structures his life so thoroughly that eventually there’s no reality left, only a script and adverts. But the people watching still empathise with Truman because everyone in the working class understands what it is to be trapped because real life is our own Truman show and one day we must all pass through fear, step out of the dome and create a real life for ourselves outside of the system of commodification which consumes everyone’s life and removes all realness and sincerity and emotional catharsis from it.

I unreservedly love this film.

14/2/2021: Assorted Game Reviews

Horizon Zero Dawn (Unfinished due to technical issues, 45 hours inc. parts of Frozen Wilds): This game is really cool and really fun. I think it is defined by its incredible setting which somehow creates a fresh feeling post-apocalyptic environment. Said environment creates intriguing alt-future lore and some very interesting environments to explore. I love the machine designs (especially tallnecks!) and was very sad to hear one of their contributing artists passed away recently but I’m glad their work lives on in this visually stunning game. I’m a sucker for Ubisoft-style open world games simply because it tickles a certain kind of itch and somehow this non-Ubisoft game has outdone Ubisoft on their own formula, which is hilarious, but also good for me as running around this world exploring and clearing map markers is engaging fun. Not least because of the combat. I have a minor criticism here that the combat feels slightly awkward on mouse and keyboard, the arrows never seem to go where I’m aiming, but aside from that the experience of fighting is a grand one. Enemies never lose their threat and I love the weak spot system the game employs which makes every tool useful in niche circumstance and rewards curiosity. It specifically manages this in a way that I feel the Witcher series could learn from if it ever returns; by making head on assault less viable and encouraging tactical hunting. I do feel this system makes hunting robots so fun that by contrast hunting humans becomes a chore however, though I noted this improves in the dlc with the addition of humans with elemental weaknesses limited in number as they are. I cannot speak for the story in entirety but what I encountered was pretty good, though I feel as if it was only just really getting going at the point where I could not continue. I find Aloy to be a compelling and well portrayed protagonist and though I can guess about her origin and the ultimate end of the alt-future apocalypse I still want to see how it plays out on screen, so will return to this as soon as I’ve fixed it.

Rimworld (122 hours. Familiar with but do not own Royalty Expansion):

Rimworld is one of those super special games that I don’t think I have a single problem with. Fair warning it can be brutal and is heavily dependent on RNG but this allows it to create truly unique and interesting scenarios on a constant basis. In the wider perspective it could be described as formulaic, with regular cycles of managing the settlement between raids and random events, but the devils in the details. Colonist traits, health and skills dictate how you play and sometimes you’ll be forced to adapt as some colonists simply refuse to perform some tasks. The depth of health particularly amuses me, in that each little part of someone’s body is modelled in a way. If you’re in a firefight you may take a single bullet which grazes your finger and you’re fine. Alternately it could pierce your human leather cowboy hat, your skull and kill you instantly and the game will tell you exactly what happened. The risk/reward element is addictive enough, and that’s without accounting for just how cool it is to see your colony slowly expand. Establishing more and more options for crafting is fun and shows off the full range of different items in the game which is fucking extensive. Between clothing, weapons, armour, sculpture and drugs to name only a few you have the opportunity to create many varied production lines either for your colonists or to trade for money and there is a lot of fun to be had here as well as it is quite satisfying to see psychoid you have grown personally become the cocaine your colonists snort to help them stay awake on limited sleep. From an archaeologist’s perspective it is especially cool to look back over your base and see the hints of how and why structures were built and remember the history of your limitations and development through structure. I think the lore of the universe is really cool too, a very 40k-esque kind of place except with far less order, somehow. But the universe does an excellent job of feeling alive and moving constantly on both a planetary and interstellar level. You can fully believe that while you build wooden shacks to shield yourself from terrifyingly low temperatures there are simultaneously rich pieces of shit living it up on the glitterworld that’s one system over. The music does an excellent job of creating the wild west frontier atmosphere the game cultivates to great effect. Ultimately, for just being a grid with a series of different numbers attached, this game does a fantastic job of creating a compelling, brutal and very real colony management experience. I dont think I can properly put into words the grandness and scope of this one. I didnt even mention the modding scene, which is expansive and tailors to basically any need you could have. The Rim is a terrifying place but theres so much fun to be had.

Factorio (86 hours, mostly 1.1): Having completed a game of Factorio I can tell you reliably that this is one of the best games ever made, thoroughly addictive and fun. If you like numbers, logistics, TRAINS, its gonna be your thing. Not to mention its probably the only documented case of a game with no bugs (so far as official forums are concerned). Strictly speaking this games combat is not the most engrossing thing but good lord do you feel it when you acquire a flamethrower. The way each aspect of the game (production, research, logistics, combat, upgrades for everything therein) feeds into the next is a really well constructed balancing act such that you must experience the full game in order to complete it and I always appreciate this kind of design. I think its one of the best tenets of factory game design especially as its something present in Satisfactory too. Beyond all of this generalised good the game is also excellent in its intricacies, the architecture necessary to build a maximum efficiency base, the level of planning and organisation that can be employed is mind-blowing. Not to mention the mod community, factorion is already an extensive experience and some mad bastards have seen fit to complicate it further, hats off to them. This really is a great moment in gaming.

Destiny 2 (198 hours, all expansions, played some post Forsaken release, mostly Season of Arrivals onwards, spent roughly £20 on microtransactions):

This is a very interesting and enjoyable experience, but I must say it can be a bit controversial at times. What its does particularly well is moment to moment gameplay and design in all aspects. The game is stunning; between environments, cosmetics, shaders ships and ghosts there’s a vast range of incredible things to see, all rooted in the “pseudo-magi-science” aesthetic it’s got going on. The class design is excellent and you really do feel like you embody this rampaging madman / agile gunman / space wizard archetype, whichever you choose to play. The abilities, especially supers, are very satisfying. Everything has heft and power behind it which can be felt in all aspects of design; sound and animation is top notch. Movement is cool, you can feel how fast you move both on foot and in vehicles and the navigation has a little fun subtlety depending on your class jump, even if you can bounce unpredictably occasionally. But for the love of god why is the wall kick in there? It has only ever served to push me from a ledge into a bottomless pit. You're looking to remove antiquated content? Start there. Some guns are not so good to shoot but there’s such a great range of guns that are fun its like complaining about one drop in an ocean; and enemies are fun to shoot at, each faction distinct in meaningful ways and presenting an effective challenge. Speaking of oceans, that’s one way to describe the lore. I haven’t dived too deep but it keeps going down forever and everything I’ve read is intriguing. As a former Elder Scrolls lore nut this is something I could definitely sink my teeth into, though its much more of a pulpy sci-fi vibe than a pure nonsense vibe. I do think the game has a bit of a loot problem, primarily in regards to the conflict between high stats and looking good. This should never be a conflict, and yes you can apply ornaments to any purple gear but that’s not enough when I spend the entire time grinding power levels and thus must change armour and weapons on a constant basis to progress. This game needs a true transmog system and if not that, rethink how gear power level works. Perhaps rather than earning new instances of gear you always possess a version of it and the loot you acquire in missions just upgrades your instance to your current overall power level? This would serve to do away with the current upgrade system which I think is a needless additional grind. Perhaps it could be retained in using enhancement cores to empower gear as present but necessitating a whole upgrade module to keep your favourite weapon on hand is kind of painful honestly. There is also at present the issue of sunsetting gear, mildly controversial to say the least. If it’s necessary to streamline the game and make it function moving forward so be it but surely loot pools should be adjusted so you can actually get useful loot from older locations? And why sunset personal instances of gear which can be acquired at the regular power level anyway? I had to throw away my favourite bow and hunt down a new version of the exact same weapon for… what reason? I do think destination navigation leaves a little to be desired also. I get that having a physical hub world is meaningful but Destiny does not have a very extroverted community; I can count the times someone noticed me in the tower on one hand. And its not even like there’s fun activities to be found in the same sense as say Deep Rock Galactic, which really does take advantage of its hub. Perhaps for players who simply want to go about their business all of the vendors could be set into a menu system where just clicking an icon takes you to their menu from anywhere in the system rather than, per se, having to go through an entire loading screen (Which takes you to orbit and back) to reach a location which serves simply as the front for four menus. These are established player problems. As a dedicated PvE player I can say that this game is immensely fun in combat and growing in power does feel really good. It’s something I recommend getting into, there’s just some very large creases that need ironing which the Bungie should really take the time to address rather than pushing out new in game content every three months.

#the truman show #horizon zero dawn #rimworld #factorio #destiny 2 #d2 #film #movies #video games #i dont know what im doing #hzd #opinion

17 notes · View notes

bridalpearlnecklace-blog · 7 years

Text

Some time ago, I was ranting about the success of Nespresso in making the coffee market vigorous by selling coffee in capsules, writes Charles Wyndham on the portal www.polishedprices.com .

I not only paid tribute to my caffeine addiction, but also talked about what a positive impact on coffee as a product had a successful marketing campaign.

Success in the marketing of this type of product was achieved not by denying that it is an ordinary commodity, but by accentuation of those diverse differences in raw materials that allow producing a staggeringly wide range of easy-to-use products for the consumer.

The matter, however, was not limited to this.

Some time ago, leafing through the newspapers, I noticed that Dualit, an English company that produces kitchen accessories, won a patent case against Nespresso in the English High Court, which allows it to sell its Nespresso compatible capsules.

Dualit sells its coffee capsules at a significant discount in comparison with Nespresso.

I was intrigued.

Nespresso belongs to the Swiss company Nestle, which has a turnover expressed in such numbers that even telephone numbers can not compete with them in length, and the turnover of its coffee department alone is estimated at $ 4.5 billion with a yield of more than 30%.

Dualit, for its part, has a turnover of about £ 15 million or about $ 22.5 million.

Later I read that Mondelez (formerly Kraft Foods) also entered the market with its Nespresso compatible capsules.

The analogy I spent some time ago between coffee and the diamond business, in my opinion, only becomes more convincing in connection with the above, showing that the refusal to consider diamonds and diamonds as what they are in fact, that is, an ordinary commodity, suffocates Diamond business.

Nespresso is estimated to own about one-third of the market for coffee capsules, but I think its share in the premium segment of this market should be much larger.

Nespresso was not the first company to put forward this idea, and I remember that a few years ago I came across a coffee machine called Illy (I think it was a correct spelling), which was based on the same concept, but it was for sale only One blend of coffee and definitely was not conducted such an extravagant and successful marketing campaign as Nespresso does.

The Nespresso model took this concept into service and filled its successful marketing ploy with content with a very wide range of different mixtures, class cars, excellent service, etc., creating an atmosphere that simply motivates - well, at least me - to have all this equipment .

Nespresso was and remains the winner, and we still have to wait to see if it will remain with them in the future, although I see no reason why this should not be.

Speaking of the "winner", I do not mean the preservation of my market share, but the growing turnover, the overall profitability, but not necessarily the profit of the company, because, as I expect, all this emerging additional competition will promote the market growth, even if it narrows Profit producers, so that consumers receive additional bonuses, in addition to more choices.

In this case, the comparison with diamonds, I think, is striking, but not proportional.

De Beers is a company that took a product that had a very long history as an emotional symbol and also served as a means of preserving value (no matter how stupid this statement was), and through brilliant marketing turned it into mass-market products.

At some point, De Beers owned more than 80% of the market, and for the sake of reasoning let's assume that its current market share is about a third, like Nespresso.

The monopoly of De Beers undoubtedly stood the test of time, marking its centenary in 1988, but since 2000 the company is definitely experiencing an obvious decline.

This success and this decline due to De Beers or because of the product?

In addition, given the fact that De Beers abandons its traditional role as a "custodian" in the rough diamond market, I have a question whether it undermines, first, De Beers and, secondly, the product?

Concerning the second point at the beginning, we will also ask whether, in and of itself, the diminishing role of De Beers will have detrimental effects on diamonds.

I have never bought into this term "keeper", which as a term carries some noble, almost altruistic connotations.

I use the word "keeper" in this context instantly causes more associations with imprisonment, imprisonment or restriction.

I have always argued that, although there is no doubt that De Beers forced - I deliberately use the word "forced" - rather than creating a diamond market, becoming the first company to properly supply them, yet its overall impact on the market Was negative and created the basis by which the diamond industry is shrinking today, which sharply distinguishes its position from the situation with coffee and other luxury businesses that have been experiencing a boom over the past ten-odd years.

Successful monopoly requires that the main goal of the beneficiary is primarily control.

The lack of competition allowed the distorted market to develop in the direction where, in particular, raw materials are not distributed among those who maximize the price, where the banking system supporting the industry becomes lazy, because it considers the risks to be less than usual, and in general the industry becomes extremely Inefficient, hiding behind the back of the monopoly and the inevitably emerging wall of deliberately created opacity.

The absence of competition historically and with all the obviousness for all resulted in De Beers in its weak balance and profit and loss account and a clearly not working business model.

De Beers could not adapt and in fact fought and still struggles to try to preserve the illusory status quo, and is currently facing consequences.

While the tanker De Beers seemed to float calmly ahead, those who followed him in the fairway believed that they were sheltered from dangers.

The competitive advantage first of all was how to manage the relations with the monopoly, rather than how to increase the price of diamonds or the product, because the profit was made on the rapid resale of boxes with goods, on the use of goods as a means of profit elsewhere - for example, by The organization of a cheap loan, which was then used for non-diamond-related activities.

So at the present time we have an inefficient industry (an industry in which, for example, the hard-earned loan for 180 days or more, by definition, can not be effective), stuck in the quagmire of selfish interests, while the business as a whole shrinks and loses Other luxury products, including coffee.

And it is increasingly becoming a history of missed opportunities, in which there are no signs of improvement, if one also takes into account the demise of the BHP tender system, which was a beacon of transparency.

The intrinsic value inherent in diamonds is emotional, but to create this value or increase it requires a sufficient degree of rationality, true competition and transparency, which is so obviously lacking.

0 notes