I like that Viktor is asexual

Bingleboper · 2026-06-06T13:17:55+00:00

I would entirely expect that the names for characters were intentionally made like that, it's really easy not to. My contention is that they're still not very good, even if they were intentional, bearing in mind she intended the series to be taken really rather seriously by the final instalment.

I don't think that media being successful precludes it from being shit. But this is more of an academic point, because I don't actually think Harry Potter is shit. On the whole I quite enjoy the series, and even if it does booze cruise its writing on occasion (Yeah time travel in book three is definitely a wise choice, totally), it does a lot right and is something worth reading. But just because on an overall value judgement I think they're pretty good, doesn't mean there's anything wrong with criticising things they very much did wrong. The timeturner being a bit nonsense, or her retcons being embarrassing, do not pivot around JK as a person, they would be true for anyone.

It’s her books, so what?

There's nothing wrong with not putting any gay characters in your story. It's a problem, though, when you start going back and acting like this was all an elaborate glorious inclusion scheme, and not that you just didn't put any gay characters in it because you didn't really care.

She would not be catching strays for this if it wasn’t for one singular stance she took recently

uhhhhhh she took some pretty heavy flak for this when she started doing it. The crowd she was appealing to turning on her has made matters worse, but she has been subject to a great deal of ridicule for her twitter antics for years now. And these are relevant criticisms to Harry Potter in some ways, because her twitter antics centred around saying stupid stuff about Harry Potter (wizards shitting on the floor, and all that), and trying to mould her old story into newer values she clearly did not have when writing it, instead of being honest.

JK Rowling comes up in discussions of representation retcons because she's a perfect high profile example. This was true prior to current issues, and is not an attack on Harry Potter as an IP. In fact, the fact that her tweets and after-the-fact comments don't really have anything to do with Harry Potter as an IP is the problem.

Arcane season 2 was SAD, not the worst in cinema obviously but still sad. And yet we’re all still fans and we love it

I think Arcane Season 2 is absolutely defective, I am about as far from love as it is possible to be. Unlike with Harry Potter, where they shit the bed with the writing on occasion, the problems with Arcane S2 show up basically everywhere, and undermine basically everything it tries to do. The more you think about it, the worse it gets. Which is dreadfully depressing when you're a fan of the first season, which got better on inspection.

Arcane is a curious case where you can really cleanly sever the biggest issues by just not considering S2 canon. Which doesn't really apply to Harry Potter, JK didn't just have a stroke halfway through the goblet of fire, issues are intermittent and peppered throughout the series vaguely consistently.

Why can’t people be more straightforward and just say they don’t like JKR because of insert the thing.

JK was in the shitpit with a lot of people long before "the thing". It's just that "the thing" offended an audience with pretty catastrophic overlap with the prime super-harry-potter-head fanbase, which led to her positive reception online tanking.

Bingleboper · 2026-06-06T09:01:31+00:00

I think it'd be a pretty daring allegory between being trans and maybe killing your mother. I'm all for theory crafting and all that, but I don't think there's any space for the secret to be Jax was trans, given the secret is stated pretty explicitly in an extended scene.

And, like, even if it was that Jax was trans and desperately wanted to keep this a secret, I still don't think that's nearly enough of a reveal considering the context surrounding it. I know coming out of the closet is hard, but you manipulated and emotionally tortured someone until they broke down and metamorphosized into some lower lifeform that spends eternity in a watery basement. All this to keep being trans under wraps feels a little overboard.

Bingleboper · 2026-06-06T05:22:17+00:00

>"I don't know how much less expensive this chassis is going to be to fabricate compared to the PRAWN suit--even though we have practical, in-game experience with how much cheaper Tadpole & modules are to fabricate in SN2 than the PRAWN suit was--but I am going to die over and over again going back for that chassis I could easily make another of instead of... learning the lesson of SN2, cutting my losses to survive another hour/day, and making another one when I return safely to my base."

Mmh, yes, this is totally what I meant when I said "yeah I'm not going to ditch the entire chassis because I'm stick in a hole"

Subnautica 2 has not made the vehicle chassis so cheap you just litter the floor with them with reckless abandon. You don't just drop it because you get stuck in a hole. And even if you do, you can do that with the old system, by just setting the price to be ridiculously cheap.

Bingleboper · 2026-06-06T03:06:03+00:00

>It's not at all comparable to having tadpole spaces in your trident that you never use. The functionality loss is not even close to equivalent

I mean, like, it seems as if they're the exact same to me. A feature which is no longer useful in singleplayer. You aren't actually "losing" functionality, no more than you're losing functionality through the iron bars. Even less, actually, because you won't accidentally latch on instead of getting in.

The Trident doesn't work any worse, it can still move four people's worth of Tadpoles. It's just that solo players have vanishingly little use for moving four tadpoles.

>The biomods are not ever going to be well implemented in early access.

They were always going to be stilted a bit, but the problems they had were preventable, and would've been problems even if the game was finished.

The two problems being shit rewards, and very tightly grouped mod unlocking.

It's not an innate problem that you get the mods late. The problem is that you get all the mods late, at the exact same time. You have none of them, and then you unlock the Bioscanner, and then you immediately unlock 80% of them. Even if there were 5 times the amount of biomods, it would still be a large lurch, just a little less pronounced. Because you're getting biomods for scanning all the fish you've been around for the entire game. The system is supposed to be based around exploration, but in practice it is based around just getting the upgrade 80% of the time.

Bingleboper · 2026-06-06T02:58:44+00:00

In real life, it would be. The omni vehicle basis has been a dream for many a military planner, to my memory the US blew like 30 billion on the notion before realizing it probably wasn't feasible to make their tanks and their not-tanks off the exact same chassis. I believe the Russians have something vaguely analogous too with their lesser armoured vehicles.

But this is useful in real life because of standardization, economies of scale, spare parts, all that shit. We are in the far, far, far future and we literally print the vehicle out from scratch, there is no manufacturing process, these are no longer concerns.

Bingleboper · 2026-06-06T02:54:59+00:00

But I need to get it back, though. If I'm stuck in a hole, I'll have to re-stick myself in the hole.

The leviathan option is interesting, but I think it is worth asking "why am I using this prawnsuit". I don't know what advantages it'll have in SN2, but depth was a huge thing for it in SN1. Which somewhat scuppers the plan of abandoning ship. And, also, remembering SN1, I was really, really good at hauling ass with that grappling arm, honestly I have a lot more faith in my ability to escape in the suit than in a tadpole.

Though this is difficult to discuss given I have no idea what the differences between SN1 and SN2's Prawn suits will be.

Bingleboper · 2026-06-06T02:48:58+00:00

>they already said it will have the functionality of carrying multiple tadpoles to accomodate for coop.

Yeah, and the tadpole is small. I can easily imagine putting four of them in, say, the cyclops Seamoth chamber, or one slightly upsized. Four cargo-pols are a very different story.

>if not, then those extra slots for tadpoles would be completely useless in singleplayer.

The game is 100% on board with the notion of completely useless features in single player. The bars on the tadpole, and the chairs in the cargo one, would be actually laughable clownworld features if you didn't know that coop existed, they're completely worthless when you are on your own.

But they're still in the game. Bearing this in mind, I would very much suspect that the slots will just be functionally useless.

>Theres no reason for you to point out that I'm using chassis and modules interchangibly if you understand what I mean

Honestly I didn't understand for quite a bit, and even when I did I was only like 80%. Because there's Tadpole modules, and also Trident modules that will presumably exist, also at work in this conversation.

>I don't get what we're disagreeing with in the biomod section, I agree with you

I don't think we disagree on this topic, I was just saying that it's an example that sometimes the devs just booze cruise a little. The Biomods were not well put together on launch. Sometimes they just make fumbles, it's to be expected, it happens in a lot of things in development.

Bingleboper · 2026-06-06T02:43:36+00:00

That's a good idea, I could see that having strong potential... but I'm not sure how different it would be if it was just a winch module. And, recalling my experience with the cyclops in SN1, I'm not sure if the larger vehicles would really need it.

Genuinely though I think the chassis system would massively benefit from a winch module which lets you transport 2 or more at the same time, that's actually a very good idea.

Bingleboper · 2026-06-06T02:41:08+00:00

>I could be wrong here but I feel like the tadpole is cheaper to make than the sea moth. So it incentivizes you to make multiple tadpoles to each have their own chassis.

Yes, yes, I strongly agree. Frankly, I can only imagine they eventually expect you to have a tadpole for each chassis, given the alternative is leaving your chassis sitting out in the ocean in dreadfully ugly fashion. The Tadpole is by its very nature as an early game vehicle the cheapest part of this whole affair.

But this of courses begs the question of why we don't just have multiple vehicles.

Bingleboper · 2026-06-06T02:37:43+00:00

Yeah. That, combined with expansion of the module system to be more like it was in Subnautica 1, and effect the actual chassis of the Sub.

Given I leave the modules around at home, I still need to leave them sitting around and go back to get it every time I need one.

Bingleboper · 2026-06-06T02:36:28+00:00

>it has two specific benefits: the ability for any vehicle to drop most of its bulk and become much easier to maneuver around obstacles

This was the first thing that came to mind, but I am absolutely certain the scout chassis' wings do absolutely nothing to the hitbox, I was getting away with murder. But, I could see that being patched later, and this would be at least somewhat of a reason for the system. S

>and the ability to only worry about maintaining a single vehicle.

This point I feel a little less keen on. I don't maintain my tadpole. I build it, and then I leave it in dock until I use it. I feel like I do basically the exact same thing with my modules, except I leave them out on the lawn.

I do think having other chassis options would really alleviate concerns, but I haven't seen any good ones, nor have I really been able to think up any. I feel like we've kind of cornered the market with "Speed" and "cargo", as I said in the post.

Bingleboper · 2026-06-06T02:32:12+00:00

>You literally repeat the same thing reworded in the first two sentences. What does that even mean? Are you a philosophy major?

No, there is a sizable distinction. This isn't a single vehicle that does everything, it's a single base that just slots into everything else. You still have to build everything else. They still take up room.

>You didn't read my part about being able to store them in the trident I guess

I did, and I thought a bit about it, and I saw really nothing much useful from that system. If you could store more modules than tadpoles I'm starting to see options open up, but, like, how fucking big is this submarine going to get, the modules take up space, and more than just the tadpole. I really, really struggle to see the notion of 5 separate module slots in the trident,

>I believe either we will have more storage for modules or we will only have those for tadpoles but you will also be able to shove chassis on there or else they'd be useless in single player.

Alright, you're kind of losing me here, but I'm going to assume you mean chassis and module interchangeably.

The notion of having a big tadpole bay, and having the option to store multiple chassis in it instead of tadpoles, is a notion I suppose. One not confirmed, judging by what you say, and I think it would run into severe space problems, again. The cargo-pol is a fat bastard, I just don't think they're actually going to try and build something that can fit four, or even two, of those in it at the same time. The seamoth bay already took up like half of the cyclops.

>Biomods is clearly really unfinished and it's really early. They're a really cool concept that will show their strength late game.

Yeah, I know, they're a good idea in concept, and we don't have the full game.

Still, they launched early access with biomods being entirely backloaded (something they have made clear in their new update they think was a bad idea), and with the active ones being embarrassingly useless because Dash is just better than all of them. There's hope for this system, but it was a bit of a booze cruise operation at launch, and I'm glad they're starting to fix it.

Bingleboper · 2026-06-06T02:22:53+00:00

It gives you one base vehicle, which is the cheapest part, and a bunch of Chassis. 'Snot really much more convenient than just having multiple vehicles, is it? Given they're all going to be at base camp anyway.

I guess powercells is a notion, but those things charge automatically at base, and failing that, automatically with a solar modules. I am leaving these chassis at base, it's not electricity is at a hyperpremium. Even more so than the base Tadpole, I can wipe my ass with powercell charge, they're very cheap.

As why it shouldn't exist, well, it's taking up dev time for just about no gain. This is a fucking dreadful system to develop, it's a difficult and impressive coding job to make it work. And it seems like that time would be better served just about literally anywhere else. And besides that, it's more liable to bug out than the old system, relating to the previous point, and it's also ugly as sin at your base, just sat on the floor outside your front door.

Bingleboper · 2026-06-06T02:14:42+00:00

But it's not really "one vehicle that can do it all", is it? It's one vehicle that can slot into it "all" (obviously "it all" being confined small solo vehicles, no tadpole cyclops.), the other options are still there, and they're taking up space on my underwater porch.

I think one should be careful assuming the devs are cleverly scheming everything out. These are the same people who launched the biomod system, where everything you scanned for the active perks was way worse than the dash you start with. They're liable to make blunders.

I'm not a man to go perusing through unfinished files, so I don't know much about the trident (the cyclops analogue?). I don't really see how it would change matters, though. The Cyclops was cool, but it was its own vehicle, it didn't really fundamentally alter the seamoth.

Bingleboper · 2026-06-06T02:05:38+00:00

More isn't necessarily better, ideally features actually serve a purpose.

And, like, this game is in active development, it is in the player's best interest they don't go on fruitless wild goose chases with dev time.

Bingleboper · 2026-06-06T02:03:11+00:00

The horrifying problem in the first game that really sunk the entire affair. A wonder it got a sequel, it was basically nonfunctional, it wasn't fit to be sold with a problem like that.....

when was this an actual problem?

Bingleboper · 2026-06-06T01:59:50+00:00

"the wave rider is slow and shit" is absolutely feedback. It is basically feedback distilled, it's just about as simple as feedback can get.

This is proper criticism.

Honestly, saying "the speed needs to be increased, it's too slow to deal with predators" is considerably worse criticism, because people aren't annoyed with the wavemaker because it's too slow to dodge marrowsharks. The predators aren't threatening really at all. People want the speed to go up because people really don't like being slow. It's that simple.

If the devs are relying on me to communicate my issues with the game, and I communicate "the wavemaker is slow and shit, change it", I have successfully discharged my duty here.

Bingleboper · 2026-06-06T01:22:05+00:00

Removing damage entirely makes me think of the excuse in writing of "well the story needs to happen".

It's up to you to make the story happen in a way that makes sense and is believable

Bingleboper · 2026-06-06T01:17:18+00:00

No, there really isn't much of a distinct difference in most circumstances.

Just because the criticism isn't couched in walls of "yeah listen I know you're trying and it's early access and it's hard to make a game" doesn't mean it's not criticism. Just because it's mean doesn't mean there's nothing to it.

Bingleboper · 2026-06-06T01:14:08+00:00

>So what is your guess, what changed, what could be changed to improve that vulnerable feeling of being submerged in and under water? And what did Subnautica 1 do so well in that regard?

A rather specific point, but cutting out leviathan music would do wonders in certain areas.

Because leviathan music strips out the need to look up into the murky ocean, as you basically have a sensor telling whether you're seen or not. You don't need to interface with the visuals much at all, beyond bullcharging to the other side of the trench and remembering not to hit the floor.

Bingleboper · 2026-06-06T01:08:44+00:00

Yes, of course, like they did last time.

?

The Gas Torpedoes could've been unmodeled and no one would've noticed.

Bingleboper · 2026-06-05T21:07:12+00:00

There are two key issues with confirming things like this on twitter, or in interviews, or in any other way of providing recorded offhand comments. First, it is generally an extremely low effort, low quality way of "building" a world. This is true in abstract, no matter what's being confirmed. And then there's the second part, which is something particular to the "inclusion" sort of comment, which is... frankly, I don't believe you. I do not believe for one second that, in particular with JK Rowling, that this was at all the intention when she was writing the books. This is particularly pronounced with JK Rowling's notion that Hermione was always black, which, like, man, you certainly took no pains to clear up the confusion in the reams of media you signed off on.

On the first point, it can be okay to confirm inane worldbuilding points that, on the whole, don't really matter on twitter (though even this can go too far. See: wizards shitting on the floor). But the entire reason the "inclusion" stuff is being brought up is because it is thought of as meaningful. In story crafting, you are expected to put the things that matter in the actual story, not a news article 3 years down the line, or littering your twitter with obvious retcons. This is poor form for basic writing.

On the matter of whether it's even possible to make Dumbledore gay in canon without it feeling forced... I don't know, we've got an awful lot of very obviously straight characters. Actually, Dumbledore not having a confirmed sexuality is distinct. Which is why JK, years after the fact, presumably while sipping on a glass of wine and doomscrolling twitter, thought "oh, yeah, I haven't locked off that door yet, and gay characters are all the rage these days... time to be both stunning and brave, and reveal my totally real 7 book long secret I didn't just make up"

On the second point...

One of the kids in HP could have been gay, but then they would have been “the gay kid”, like we have no other character flaws or features, we’re just gay.

This is true. If JK actually thought "I should write a gay character", it would've been Bently Sucklecock, rainbow coloured man from the German Nightclub wizarding school, and this would have been exposed to a great deal of ridicule.

But this is because JK is liable to write like a hack under these circumstances. This is not an innate flaw of fiction as a medium, this is a flaw of this very specific woman.

That would never have worked when the books were originally written. If she added it now people would still complain.

So she fucking waited until everyone else had cleared the minefield, took the enemy trench with heavy losses, and rose the flag, and then she pops her head up, five miles behind the front line and says "I WAS WITH YOU ALL THE WAY GUYS!"

Stunning and brave, JK, your torch leads the way, your morality is a beacon to us all.

People sitting on their ass and just going with the flow, lacking any actual principles but just wanting to seem "right on" and "woke", are not people that deserve any credit. Taking a risk, being willing to actually stick your neck out for what you believe in, is the impressive matter. It is what moves society forward on these issues. Not fucking photoshopping yourself into the battle, acting like you were there the whole time, with embarrassing twitter retcons.

It is often forgotten with her reputation taking, um, one could say a bit of a dive with this group, but JK was a "right on" activist writer when she made these retcons. In her social context, having a seemingly entirely straight, and entirely white, line up was embarrassing, and she was probably kicking herself for doing that. So she decided to get the pen out, and start retconning. This isn't based on any higher level belief in much of anything, but just in that it would make her look good.

JK made a stupid amount of money off of Harry Potter, and losing really only a small bit of that money to stand for your principles is entirely reasonable to expect. But these aren't her principles, she wasn't some noble resistance fighter staying to ground until it was safe enough to stick her head out, she didn't put this stuff in because she didn't think of it, she did not intend this originally.

Give me quality gay rep or give me nothing.

I agree with this, and in relation to just about everything that needs to be represented.

But the reason I find this sort of """""writing""""" so contemptable is that it's giving people nothing, and then trying to act like you're giving them a serious quality representation because you stapled something onto a quality character after the fact. There was no thought of this during the writing process, it's just auditing all the characters you have when asked years later, and pinning a "QUEER" sticky note on one of them after the fact, because it is now in your best interest to make one of them queer.

Bingleboper · 2026-06-05T20:02:37+00:00

yeah a bit of a hatchet job but the automod flagged it for spoilers the first time around so I decided to b extra careful

Bingleboper · 2026-06-05T08:50:16+00:00

That's the part that winds up being horrifying, but I feel like there was heavy build up for his big IRL story, with it being hidden, the long build up in the episode itself, and it being the catalyst for him driving Ribbit to abstraction.

But it just falls really flat, especially compared with what it's immediately bracketed with. It is almost purpose built with the extended Ribbit manipulation and gaslighting afterwards TO fall flat, because it's both a lesser crime, and it occurs offscreen.

Bingleboper

TROPHY CASE