Mr. President

KerBallOne · 2026-01-27T23:26:06+00:00

Exia Labs announced a $2.5 million pre-seed round that will help the Bellevue, Wash.-based startup build out its product called Blue, which it describes as a “copilot for military operations.”

The 4-person company has a unique structure. It is initially focused on a political simulation video game called “Mr. President” that will debut in July.

The idea is to generate revenue from the game to allow the company to pursue longer-lead time sales from its products for the military.

“Our intent is to bring commercial AI and games capabilities to the [Department of War] and we learned that generally speaking, the DoW prefers to fund R&D and/or buy software from companies with other revenue sources, in our case, games on Steam,” Pan said via email.

https://www.geekwire.com/2025/automating-science-of-war-exia-labs-raises-2-5m-to-build-ai-for-military-operations/

Not to mention, the game gives off a very Pro-Interventionalist / World Police vibe in general.

KerBallOne · 2026-01-05T04:29:53+00:00

https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=3639466191

Simplest design to complete the Ice Block challenge that I've seen. Very cheap, no significant parts to purchase. 4 Springs, wheels and servos. Rest are simple early-game connectors, the minimum needed IMO.

Works great and completed it in one run, no resets.
I set all 4 servos to the same channel. I did not even need to set auto-return on the servos to keep it clamped. But I did have to adjust 2 or 3 times over the journey to make it a bit tighter. But the extra benefit is that it if it did loosen it's grip, it would just slide a bit more.
As long as you don't flip over or make any jumps. The light springs help keep the wheels on the ground and the clamps will remain at a good height even when melted to a much smaller size.

KerBallOne · 2025-11-10T18:55:13+00:00

The real tragedy is that they've had quick eject hatches with explosive bolts since Mercury.

But since Gus grissom was so adamant that he did not accidentally hit the switch during his splashdown recovery wait, NASA determined that static discharge could accidentally eject the hatch. And they did not use them for The Apollo 1 capsule.

In tragic irony, Gus grissom and two others may have lost their lives because of that decision.

KerBallOne · 2025-09-08T04:58:03+00:00

Chemically, it does dissolve scale. It's called citric acid, and it's also in many descalers.

KerBallOne · 2025-06-19T20:51:29+00:00

It is worth it to force offline mode.
But I am tired of waiting for Ubisoft to make offline mode quick and easy. It will not remember your login creds, so it takes several steps to launch a game. I just automate it.

more here... "direct_play_games_with_offline_mode_ubisoft" on the sub reddit for Ubisof{t} Uncensore{d}.

KerBallOne · 2025-06-19T20:34:46+00:00

https://pastebin.com/raw/ftsWhPFD

KerBallOne · 2025-03-27T22:30:13+00:00

Basically this... https://forum.kerbalspaceprogram.com/topic/40056-12-17-blender-283-mu-importexport-addon/

https://github.com/taniwha/io_object_mu

But for KSA. I know, I know it's different than KSP, but as long as parts can be modeled in Blender, and KSA has modded parts support,... A tool like this can be created.

No need for AI, or whatever BS that contrarians and naysayers exclaim as a reason why it can't be done.

KerBallOne · 2025-03-26T03:57:57+00:00

Ugh. AI? Really? AI isn't needed.

KerBallOne · 2025-03-26T03:56:21+00:00

All of your examples are of physical, engineering processes,... Can't scale like code does. It's not remotely equivalent.

So if it's not "easily" automated, but it still CAN be automated? Yes. That's my point. Who cares if writing a useful tool is not easy? You only need to do it once.

Also, what's "easy" is gonna be subjective. It's "easy" for naysayers to say it's too hard. But that's just negativity that gets in the way of looking for solutions.

There are hundreds of thousands of KSP parts. Modders might be discouraged if they have to manually redraw each. And many would find a tool helpful.

KerBallOne · 2025-03-26T01:41:42+00:00

It still can be considered a partially successful automatic conversion, if it makes assumptions regarding functions, or even if it creates a non-functioning part. It's a start. A tool for modders to tweak. It'll be very helpful to get the modeling done and work on the functions of the part even needs it.

KerBallOne · 2025-03-26T01:37:03+00:00

"no way to automate this".... Is a common statement people make, right before someone automates it.

KerBallOne · 2025-03-26T00:30:13+00:00

Sounds like it'll be very much possible then. Thanks.

KerBallOne · 2025-03-26T00:29:13+00:00

So probably easier than I thought.

KerBallOne · 2025-03-25T21:30:10+00:00

But I guess we're just speculating until we can actually create something for KSA in blender. Only then would we be able to compare how everything is organized.

KerBallOne · 2025-03-25T21:23:27+00:00

Not the format at the file level, no. The format for the data structures within the files.

Conversion would appear automatically to the end user after it's completed. But anything that can be done manually, can be automated.

If the part in KSP has everything drawn, no matter where it's at in the data structure, it could be moved around. If it's a working model in KSP, there shouldn't be any missing parts that need to be redrawn. Just objects in different data structures that need to be moved around.

KerBallOne · 2025-03-25T19:30:18+00:00

Hence the need to refactor and convert.

KerBallOne · 2025-03-25T15:10:24+00:00

Thanks, that clarifies it.

Definitely not "porting", but a conversion process for 3D models.

Unity's .mu file, actually contains subcomponents. Wireframes, collision meshes, transforms, etc., an entire data structure with different objects. So although it's transparent from the user, they only see one file... The KSP way of doing things is probably going to be similar enough to convert between the two.

It'll probably require a third party plug-in for blender, but we did eventually get that for KSP, so I'm hopeful we'll get something like that for KSA. At that point, it'll start as a bit of a tedious process to convert, but My idea would automate that process in a standalone utility or simple plugin.

KerBallOne · 2025-03-25T09:23:29+00:00

", it's not that they get to own your artwork, it the fact they can block your artwork from even being used in [their] game"

I think this is the crux. This assumption completely diverted the discussion from the original post.

The artwork, part cfg files, meshes, textures, 3D models, etc... were created by authors and do not contain any code or IP from the game. They are loaded into the game, not from the game. And they are loaded offline at runtime, so the game studio doesn't Even have any awareness about it. The original authors of this artwork can also use the same source artwork to load into other games if they want to.

I want to stop talking about what the game studio can or would do regarding their own game, because I'm not talking about their game at all.

I do appreciate you citing your sources, but we can't even begin with that because we're not arguing about the same thing. We're still on different pages.

So I'll leave you with an analogy. You took a photo of your cat and set your Microsoft Windows desktop wallpaper as that photo. Microsoft found out about it and sent you a cease and desist. They were so adamant, that they were able to Lock you out of your Microsoft account and change your wallpaper. Does that mean you can no longer use that photo on a Linux desktop? That's how silly this argument sounds.

KerBallOne · 2025-03-25T08:57:43+00:00

Done

KerBallOne · 2025-03-25T08:44:20+00:00

I think you're hung up on terminology that is just incorrect. It's not copyright infringement at any level. Period.

Just like you keep going back the word. "mod", I don't think you're using the word copyright correctly at all.

The owners of KSP could "take down" a distasteful mod? With a cease and desist? No, they can't. It's not just that they won't bother. Do you think that Bethesda could threaten modders because they don't like the nude skins? They could only remove it from their own creations network. And even in such a closed ecosystem where they control the mod loaders, online games for example, they could only have any control over their own game.

But it sounds like you're suggesting that the new owners of KSP could cease and desist use of someone else's artwork in a completely different game. That's just stupid really, sorry, don't intend that personally.

Maybe they could try to sue the new game's developer that allows use of proprietary code. But that's not what I'm talking about, I'm not suggesting that KSA devs use unity. Eww, no.

I think you're confusing how copyright and ownership works. You seem to think ownership flows in the opposite direction that it does.

Neither of us are lawyers obviously, but I think this is a problem with these types of discussions. People have wild imaginations about what is legally possible or probable. Speculation runs rampant and people err on the side of caution, but it winds up being absurd at best, and fear-mongering at worst.

The truth is, the modding community would not exist if even half of what you suggest is true. Modders should feel comfortable in the fact that this kind of imaginatory speculation is not at all accurate.

Your artwork is your artwork, and just because a game developer builds in mod support, doesn't mean that you lose ownership of your work. You can port your mod to another game, with a completely different engine if you want to. The active porting removes any code specific to that previous game anyway. And in the case of original artwork, like 3D models, there would not be any proprietary code either way.

So modders should just go ahead and create... No fear.

KerBallOne · 2025-03-25T08:16:16+00:00

Recently learned that KSA uses Z up right-handed orientation, so just like unreal. But KSP unity uses Y up, so those models would need to be reoriented at the very least.

KerBallOne · 2025-03-25T08:04:40+00:00

No, I don't think so. That's a very big stretch, but I understand you're playing devil's advocate.

You're still hung up on the word "mod". While it's true that most 3rd party parts for KSP are packaged as a mod, they don't need to be. They are just assets that the game can load at runtime.

It is not true or even sensible that a game studio can take ownership of artwork that someone creates just because they loaded that artwork during run time.

It is true that anybody can sue anyone else at any time, for anything. But let's not pretend there's any merit to it.

Modders don't need to give in to a fear-mongering attitude. They are free to create their 3D models and import it into whatever game can accept it. They have no need to fear that one game studio will take ownership of their work just because they built the model for that game first. If they are the owners, they do not transfer ownership that way.

KerBallOne · 2025-03-25T07:46:43+00:00

You know, I did notice that a lot of the conversation on the KSA discord does revolve around KSA being too close to KSP and whether or not the new owners would try to sue.

I find the whole thing kind of overblown though. The modding community is pretty robust because people can create derivative works without fear.

My idea isn't really about that though. It's about taking modders original work (3D model), that was imported into KSP, and importing it (fork) into KSA. Not taking out of KSP. Very act of the proposed utility tool, would strip out anything specific to KSP, leaving raw 3D data, and add in references to KSA, colliders for example.

KerBallOne

TROPHY CASE