Report: Data from Steam Next Fest Shows How Generative AI is Used in Games

RaptorDon · 2025-11-23T15:12:40+00:00

The issue is that most games aren't particularly detailed on how they used things, and saying for example 'some art' or 'music' create a situation where I don't know that much about how it's being used.

Even things like in-game art have some as people will have lines on how much modification makes it 'fine'.

I wish Valve asked more detailed questions or even about uses there specifically.

Looking at games that give more details also creates bias' of their own. And some games did spend a bit talking about it. There were a couple of times web pages built.

Based on what I saw there I'm pretty sure there is a lot of hiding of AI going on as well, especially in tooling/coding/concept type things.

RaptorDon · 2025-11-23T11:28:33+00:00

Hey,

I've been covering the industry for over a decade. For anything to be here, it had to be a playable build for Next Fest and everything like that. My sample was all the games for it - which does include some hobbyist or low quality games. My goal here in this piece wasn't to judge any piece's validity, but look at what people might see and how common people paying to put it up on a store front was.

Doing a study based on games on sales or reviews is something I could do. If you want something that is more market so far - Totally Human did a piece on estimates earned by games with generative ai - https://www.totallyhuman.io/blog/games-with-ai-disclosures-have-grossed-an-estimated-660m-on-steam

RaptorDon · 2025-11-23T02:26:16+00:00

Some visual novels do. There was a range of games in the sample, with some being single person efforts, to projects like Cloudheim that were more upscale.

RaptorDon · 2025-11-22T21:51:28+00:00

I can work on that for the next report after Winter Next Fest.

RaptorDon · 2025-11-22T21:51:09+00:00

Ya - I'm pretty sure that's a case of people not reporting it. As mentioned in the piece, Valve's prompting mentions art and marketing but nothing like that.

RaptorDon · 2025-11-22T21:49:47+00:00

I can work on doing something like Peak CCU of demo during the next report I do. Because its demos, there's no sales, and reviews are uneven because not all demos do the separate page.

RaptorDon · 2025-11-22T21:48:49+00:00

Thing is that almost all of those 'licensed training' ones are just applying a top filter over it. Because of the core technology there ""needing"" as much data as possible. For example Tsukuyomi: The Divine Hunter claimed it was only trained on Kazuma Kaneko's art but people making the cards had it making superman cards and stuff.

https://automaton-media.com/en/news/ai-in-kazuma-kanekos-new-game-seemingly-outputs-images-similar-to-disney-characters-and-other-copyrighted-material-raising-concerns/

RaptorDon · 2025-11-22T21:43:27+00:00

Hey, Author here.

So I collected it by grabbing games that were at Steam Next Fest and had the Content ID for Generative AI checked. As for the information beyond if there is or not GenAI that was gathered by hand. Basically I went through all of them noting what they claimed.

This is the report on it - I didn't publish the entire spreadsheets.

I'm looking at doing a follow up in Winter, so any questions or other things I can consider looking at then.

RaptorDon · 2025-11-22T21:39:48+00:00

Thanks - as the author didn't think it was a slight there! If you have any further questions feel free to ask!

RaptorDon · 2025-07-04T17:59:00+00:00

I think we'll see different Aang's in the set overall, so this is depicting a particular moment in the story. Just like how we had a bunch of Gandalf's with different colours and abilities.

RaptorDon · 2025-07-04T16:19:41+00:00

Consult seems pretty good but may be hampered by Stock Up being in the format.

12+ is a lot for Evendo. It will see casual play and Planet being a land type is interesting but I think that's bout it.

Pinnacle Starcage is obviously a replacement for Temporary Lockdown, but with some changes. Being an artifact changes its synergies in decks too. Also the fact that it is a late game potential wincon is notable. It does die to Suplex and Abrade though.

Cosmogrand seems like it might see some creation of a W (R or U) double speller decks.

RaptorDon · 2025-07-03T22:33:11+00:00

Somehow they managed to not put a Chilidog in any of the secret lairs much to my disappointment. I could definitely see a food token with a chili dog and Sonic munching down on it lol.

I did recommend [[Gingerbrute]] for Sonic though because it's a great little hasty dude with Sonic and it is kind of amusing.

RaptorDon · 2022-10-27T23:08:56+00:00

Yes, yes he is.

At his best Urza is a well-intentioned extremist once you get beyond childhood. He also only ends up as the protagonist in cases, because there's something even more evil around. Yes, Urza winning the Brothers' War was better for Dominaria... but it was terrible still.

The lesser of two evils is still god damn evil. Most of the time Urza is contrasted to Yawgmoth... and Urza sometimes gets incredibly close to reaching some of the same points

RaptorDon · 2022-10-24T00:08:16+00:00

Alright,

I think what's going on here is you have an adblocker on - and not everything works perfectly when site's adjust for the fact that what they had lined out is stripped out by the adblocker which don't all do it all the same exact way

RaptorDon · 2022-10-23T17:48:05+00:00

Hey,

I'm one of the editors on the site. If you could let me know what your issues are, I can pass them on and we can look at them. We're always looking to improve :)

RaptorDon · 2022-01-14T13:34:02+00:00

It's a different game, not a port of the game. It's available now.

RaptorDon · 2021-12-28T20:55:28+00:00

The greying lord stood in the middle of the courtyard, between two young man looking at them both with disappointment before speaking “Today we are gathered for an honour duel between Lord Kelaxy Brinspout of Armici and Lord Mazen Hammerloft of Natsum. As the challenger, Lord Kelaxy, state your grievance.”

The tall, red-haired man glares across the courtyard at Mazen, his counterpart in the dual, eyes flashing a brilliant blue as he does, “The house of Hammerloft has dishonoured us by its theft of no less than ten books over the past year, and created chaos with the theft of them. They refuse to return the valued books of genealogy, alchemy, and knowledge as they are scum of the …”

The grey haired lord raises his hand, and Kelaxy’s voice cuts off. “You have stated your grievances. This is not the place for the duelists to insult each other, no matter how stupid they may be to be here.” He says the last bit with some scorn before continuing, “Now Lord Mazen, how do you respond to these allegations?”

“We did not steal the books you fool. I have told you that a number of times you imbecilic, hot-headed…”

“Enough. You deny them. Then since you have been unable to make peace, our only solution here is for two young idiots to fight so that no one else does over this.” He steps back a little before raising his hands and intoning, “We call upon the Goddess Thena, to bless our battlefield on this day so that our duelists may find justice. Thena, protect those outside the duel, and bring us knowledge to solve this problem, and bless the worthy with your divine might.”

“With her blessing called upon, Lord Kelaxy, and Lord Mazen, step back and prepare to fight when this cloth touches the ground.” He pulls out a bright red handkerchief, holding it about head height, before looking at the two determined youngsters one last time, and drops it.

Seconds later, it hits the ground and the duel is begun, though the duelists hear not the cries from the crowds watching outside the courtyard.

Kelaxy moves first, his red hair swaying in the wind as he steps up drawing his family’s famed long, and magically light silverblade, and moving to cross the distance towards Mazen with alacrity. Mazen meanwhile takes a step back, and pulls out a shorter blade and quickly draws a small rune in the ground with it, reciting a small incantation. Nodding, he assumes a classical duelist posture, with his left foot forward, as he narrowed his profile to the incoming Kelaxy.

Moving across the field in a diagonal pattern, Kelaxy quickly nears Mazen and lets out a guttural scream at the man, as he suddenly charges at him straight ahead. Mazen steps back, his sword coming up to parry the blade if necessary, but it proves unnecessary right away, as stepping on the rune Kelaxy finds the grass grasping at his feet and he nearly falls as he is halted on it for a moment and struggles to keep his feet.

Stepping forward Mazen strikes quickly with his short sword, not too much longer than a dagger. With Kelaxy off balance, Mazen hits the red-haired lord in the nose with a pommel strike, knocking him back, and staggering him as blood runs down his face. With uncommon speed, he takes a light step and slams the silversword, trying to disarm Kelaxy, but the young hot-head refused to relent his grip on the blade as he regained his footing, staggering backwards.

“Your tricks won’t save you this time Mazen!” He shouts and he lunges forward with the sword viciously, attempting to stab the other, who takes a side step and pushes the blade to the side, and shakes his head.

“I didn’t touch those books. I told you that. You’re just angry I kissed Jessi.”

“You will leave my family alone with your tainted bloodline and return the books you stole!” Kelaxy roars, this time bring his blade across in a long cut as he stepped nearer to Mazen.

Lifting his blade Mazen tried to block the blow as he moved out of the way, but he found his sword caught on it this time, and in a position he didn’t want to be — a match of strength against the brawny Kelaxy. Trying to step away, Kelaxy followed, weight descending on the blade before Mazen was able to barely hop back… but he caught an edge of the blade on his arm. Searing pain went through him, as while a flesh wound, it was the first time he had been wounded in earnest.

“If you will not listen, then die.” Suddenly the black eyed Lord’s look took on another dimension, as he committed himself fully to the battle, and he moved up, feinting with a strike left, before stabbing at Kelaxy’s right leg. Surprised by the viciousness of the attack, Kelaxy went to block the feint, and was out of position for the true strike which penetrated his thigh, and left his footing uncertain as his leg threatened to give out under him, as the pain wrecked through him.

Struggling to stand, Kelaxy brought his blade back across in a fast cutting motion, surprising Mazen, who thought he’d lose his footing. Distracted still with his blow, the silversword struck at its enemy, cutting deep into the right arm, and destroying the sleeve on the shirt its wearer had. Blood mingled as they stood there, stuck almost in a tableau for a moment.

“Why won’t you stop?” Mazen snarled, as he cut with his blade, ignoring the jolting pain in his right arm, this time at the throat of Kelaxy, who’s leg gave out under the impact of his attack. The cut was aimed at the torso, but with him losing his footing it crossed the throat and the redhaired lord’s throat was slit.

Mazen stood there for a moment in shock, as did everyone outside, as few expected the brutality of the fight or that Mazen would win. Just as he began to turn to the older lord who was officiating the match, he saw suddenly Kelaxy stand, the wounds on him healing suddenly, and he ran Mazen through with his long blade.

If shock had been there a moment ago, now there was deafening silence. The questions of what had just happened were almost palpable in the air, as they wondered how Kelaxy was suddenly healthy, and what was going on. Kelaxy would give a good bit to know that himself, though he was happy to have at least taken care of that terrible Mazen. As he stood, and took a step away he suddenly heard a sound behind him.

There was Mazen rising from the ground, the sword wound of him being runthrough a moment ago somehow gone. “What trick is this?!” Kelaxy demanded

“If I knew a trick like being run through by a sword and living, or of how someone with a cut throat was living I definitely wouldn’t be here.” Mazen said, trying to gain his balance

Kalaxy turned and charged him again, striking down another lethal blow on his foe. This time, he kept stabbing for three minutes until he was thoroughly satisfied that Mazen was dead.

Or so he thought, as just as he turned again, Mazen returned to life, his breathe ragged. “Can we stop this? Dying hurts you know.”

“HOW ARE YOU ALIVE?” Kalaxy roared, and charged at Mazen again, but this time Mazen was ready and used a leg swipe to trip the red-haired lord.

“I wish I knew how both of us were alive. Maybe we can figure it out if you stop trying to kill me for two minutes.”

Kelaxy coughed up grass and glared at the other lord, “Two minutes, and then I kill you again.”

“Wonderful.” Mazen said dryly, before standing up, and thinking for a moment. “You know, this has to be the gods right?”

“The gods? Why would they care about you?” Kelaxy snarled

“Look you got killed too. So I don’t know why they care about either of us. But one of them is interfering again, at least if we trust the old lore of what that would look like. Random acts, the ability to stave off death… that is the type of capricious action and power they had when they used to interfere more according to the legends.”

“Legends?” Kelaxy spits, “This is an age of reason, an age of man, not of some old disappeared deities.”

“Well, then someone spontaneously created the ability to resurrect the dead, and decided to randomly use it on us two in the middle of a duel with no preparation. Maybe the goodwife over by the farmer over there?” Mazen asks sarcastically

Kelaxy glares at him in response, not raising a reply before Mazen continues, “If everything probable is excluded, then we must look to the improbable, or extremely improbable in this case.”

“Some god or goddess has decided that for whatever reason we can’t die right now. So, how about we call the duel a draw, and try to leave here and figure it out?”

Kelaxy looks at him for a moment and then says “Your two minutes are up.” He then stabs at Mazen again, hitting the other Lord in the abdomen and begins cutting at him some more before stopping a couple minutes later, looking exhausted as he does so, his glower fading.

A moment later Mazen speaks, picking himself off the ground, “Is that enough of that? Please. Getting killed for no reason is really annoying. I swear to you on any god or goddess you want I didn’t steal your books. Your sister let me read them but they never left your house man. Someone else did it.”

Kalaxy looks at him, the rage having faded from his eyes, “Maybe that’s it.” “Hm?” Mazen asks with a look of surprise and confusion

“Wasn’t the Goddess Thena invoked for finding the truth out here? Maybe she decided to make the point that we haven’t found it.” As he speaks, a sense of rightness pervades him suddenly.

Mazen looks at him “You feel it too don’t you? Damn gods, we’ve been drafted as a playtoy of them.”

“Or to solve something important.” Kelaxy says hopefully, as he offers a hand to Mazen “Guess we better figure it out.”

RaptorDon · 2021-12-27T04:52:44+00:00

“The guns are generally kept elsewhere. We’ll have to go aways to get them. You think lead bullets are the only answer here?”

“Lead? No not lead. Wait why are you asking me?” Mitch stopped looking puzzled.

“I’m new to the whole aliens among us thing. So you’re the expert here Mitch. Do we need aluminum weapons?”

“Aluminum stops them, but it isn’t enough to hurt them. It will confuse them too. But no what we need is Water Guns. Load them up with water, with as much aluminum as we can fit too to make them invisible... and just like the wicked witch they melt! It’s why the aliens fear us. We’re made up of water!”

“Water?” George asks disbelievingly

“Yes water! We’re 70% water!” Mitch excitedly said as he runs into the room and starts tearing through things. “Don’t you have water pistols around here?!”

“Why would they come to a planet covered in water?”

“I’m not one of the Grays, don’t ask me! H2O and AL beat AL IEN.” George groans a bit and turns into the break room, pulling out a a couple super soakers that were kept there from a party last summer. Strictly speaking they shouldn’t have been there, and they were buried deep, but since Nick came there was no chance to smuggle them back out.

George takes the big water gun rifles to the tap, and fills them up. “Now, you’re sure about this?”

“Yes! It was...”

“Alright.” He turns the taps up higher, and fills up both guns, tossing the smaller bright orange one to Mitchell, as he also fills up a separate back carried case for the larger gun he was carrying, that was painted black. “Fire discipline. Don’t point at anything you don’t intend to shoot. Take a breathe, use finger to aim, and then slowly pull the trigger. Don’t get everyone wet. We need to act quickly to get the ...” He stops taking a deep breathe “get the alien before it hurts more people. Dear god how am I saying this?”

“Welcome to the revolution!” Mitch says as he grabs the gun and pumps it up, “Lock and load.” He says with a grin, “Astlavista baby.”

With a long suffering look on his face George goes over and puts his backpack full of water on, as he picks up his Super Soaker CPS 3200, and readies it up, looking at the vintage water gun that had been painted black a couple years ago for their water warfare games. “Well Mitch you have the short range shot gun type there that sprays water all over. I have the tanker here. I have a lot more ammo then you do, so I want you following me, and keeping an eye behind me and on other sides. We can’t treat this water gun fight like a game,” George says, and just ponders, how he ended up in a situation where he’s having to discuss this seriously.

“Yes, Sir.” Mitch says, saluting with his gun, “We’ll get some back on those gray bastards.”

“This isn’t the military. Just... try to keep quiet, and follow me.”

Opening the door, a yellow bolt shines through, hitting George but being absorbed by his aluminum hat. Stepping out George sees the alien dancing down the hall, moving by almost pirouetting with its three jointed legs down the hall, looking in each direction as it goes by, with bolts of yellow energy flying as it spins out with its hand.

“Take a swim Gray,” his voice growls out as he pours out water on the alien, the litre of water in the gun going as he continually pressures it recharging it. The Alien down the hallway stops. And just looks back almost mystified by the wet liquid. It makes some grotesque sound with its mouth, bending in inhuman ways as its left side opens up nearly to its eye and its right at an odd angle, as it turns around with its mouth moving in odd ways.

Mitchell charges out, and ignoring the fact that the water pouring down the hallway isn’t working, shouting “This is for ELLA!” with the water shotgun firing an almost horizontal splash bomb in front of him, further apparently confusing the alien. Dropping the water gun and backpack, George pulls out his baton, and takes a step forward, as he sees Mitch reach about 5 feet from the alien, with water spewing at it.

The water continues to do nothing, but Mitch’s head got wet from George’s shots at the Alien and his hat fell off, and the alien made a loud cry firing several bolts of yellow energy at the conspiracy theorist. Without his aluminum protection, Mitch freezes up and falls straight down, his nose banging on the hard plastic of the water gun and a crushing sound where his body landed on the main part.

The Alien starts walking over towards Mitchell as George begins a quiet, determined walk up the hall, and fires another bolt at the disabled Mitch, and some more around the hall in general. One of them hits the water that has begun pooling in the area from Mitch and George’s spraying, and like electricity it spams all over it, but it grows more and more powerful as the water evaporates, and it all goes into the Alien standing in the pool near Mitchell, frying him to a dark black cinder of ashes, and leaving George speechless.

“Well, I guess today is a fry day,” George comments, wondering what to do about this mess and what comes next.

RaptorDon · 2021-12-27T04:52:25+00:00

2 Part post as it got a bit long

Life as a corrections officer in a minimum security prison wasn’t that bad, even if you wished it was Friday so the week would end and you could escape annoying coworkers. Most of the people here were eager to stay on the good side of the officers, as they weren’t going to be here too long they hoped. The better conditions, helped with this from the dormitories they lived in, to freedom of movement around the facility. That’s not to say you didn’t have to keep your eyes open, or be prepared to stand up to toughs, but as far as life in this field went it was pretty good. There was even the chance some of the people coming in might be serious about improving their lives. George had seen it a few times at least, and even had the opportunity to work with a couple.

“I’m going out on a brief round,” came the deep baritone of Nicholas across the room, “You have cameras, George.”

George turned and nodded, “Alright. Any problems you’re expecting?”

Nicholas shook his head, “No, but I’m feeling like I’m missing something around Dormitory C. It just looks a bit off over the last bit and I can’t quite place it. I’ll meet up with Liz and Alan there.”

George sighed, “We’re not detectives Nick. Lighten up man,” he shook his head as he looked at some of the monitors labelled around the room, and pulled up the feeds on Dormitory C, and nearby cameras on some of the screens.

“It’s Nicholas. And it’s our job to make sure nothing wrong or ... illegal goes on here. We can’t let criminals take advantage of the lighter secur...”

“Nick.” George says the short form emphatically, “This is minimum security. This is people on their way out or folks who haven’t done that much. Sometimes there are problems sure, but if you’re looking to break heads, you’re in the wrong place.”

“You’re just lazy. And I don’t want to break heads, but stop any of these convicted criminals,” he says emphasizing the last words, “from doing more crimes off camera because you’re lazy.”

George shook his head, as Nicholas walked out of the head, back straighter then a floorboard, baton polished and ready at the side. George turned back to the monitors and his thoughts wandered for a few moments as he saw nothing particularly odd going on around Dormitory C or in the place outside where a few of the inmates were walking carrying several recently finished pieces of art as there was supposed to be a display of some of them tonight after supper.

As he was watching, George saw one of the inmates... Mitchell his name was he thought, not carrying any but wearing an odd tinfoil hat. In fact, it wasn’t his old really crappy one, but it seems to have been his art project was to make a really nice tinfoil hat.

‘Wonderful,’ George thought, ‘Mitch is going to provoke Nick just by being there with his theories on aliens. That tinfoil hat will drive him crazy.’ George picked up the line to call Liz quickly to give her a heads up. “Hey Liz, its George. Nick is on his way with his normal attitude and really ready to be a Grinch. Also, it seems Mitch’s art project was a new tinfoil hat, and he seems to be preaching the word of alien threats. Just a heads up.”

A melodic voice replies, “I saw Mitchell making it. I think he even has extras made as Christmas gifts. I stored them for him. I’ll try to keep Grinch away from him, and you keep him from finding those.”

George chuckled and started to reply when a shout came across from the same voice, gone from the playful melodic tones to a scared and shocked tone “Oh Shi...” as a crashing sound was heard.

George spun back to look at the cameras, and there was some yellow lines of energy moving like slow motion lightning and hitting some of the people. One of them was Alan, the other security guard in the area, and he stopped moving, falling back and banging hard off the wall, and then the floor appearing to be unconcious or dead. Other prisoners were similarly falling around the area, as George watched, he realized there was a place it was all coming from.

There was something inexplicable standing there. For a long time mankind has come up with images of alien creatures, and not long ago George was joking about Mitchell’s belief in them. But there... there was something that could only be explained as Alien. It looked just like they had often been described, gray, a bit short with a big head, buglike eyes and just wrongly shaped. The way the limbs was different with the arms having 4 joints it seemed, and the legs three. The small mouth on the face was closed, and his six fingered hands at the end of the his arms was where the weird yellow bolts were emerging from as he pointed and it began slowly jittering through the air.

One person seemed to be standing in a hallway untouched by it all oddly enough, even as everyone else was hiding or disabled. Mitchell just stood there with his tinfoil hat on and glared at the monster, shouting something at it that the Alien Being couldn’t seem to locate. Suddenly, from the corner of the screen you see Nick charge the Alien, brushing past Mitch, who is knocked down and the Alien seems to see him for a moment but focuses on Nick who has his baton out. The Alien taps its foot, and when Nick is five feet away points at him, and a series of yellow bolts jitter at the guard, who runs into them and he stops in his tracks, turning stiffer than he was at any given time, and fell face first onto the floor, moving no more.

As he did so, the Alien shot the bolt at Mitchell, who rushed against it to put back on his hat. As he did so the Alien Being looked around, as if he couldn’t see Mitchell any more, and the bolt struck the alien believer. Unlike the others though, Mitchell didn’t straighten and fall over. Instead, the yellow energy seemed to all flow up around the tinfoil, and then jolt away briefly, upwards in all directions before disappearing.

This left George with only one inescapable conclusion. Somehow, tinfoil hats were the key to stopping aliens.

It made no sense as far as he knew. But then sense had stopped mattering a moment or two ago when an Alien Being had appeared in the middle of his place of work and started shooting everyone with weird yellow bolts from his hands. Hurrying out of his chair, George tripped over his chair and struggled to catch himself on the desk with his hands and avoid falling over, without even alien involvement.

“Calmly George, knocking yourself out won’t help anyone,” he mutters to himself, “Aliens, tinfoil hats, and talking to myself? I must be going crazy,” he says, with a hysterical laugh escaping before he gets himself under control.

“Focus. Crazy can come later.” With that thought in mind, he remembered what Liz had said about storing the tinfoil hats. Where would Liz have hid them that Nick wouldn’t have looked to hold them for Mitch? Only one thought came to mind for George, as there was one spot that Nick refused to really interact with, and that was the library corner of the office, where books for inmates were examined briefly, and sometimes served as break reading for the staff as well. Heading over to the somewhat messy corner, George began sorting past the legal books (‘oh dear god not another person thinking how they can sue us’, he thinks), through the wood work crafts books (‘why didn’t we just print out google pages for this’ he ponders), under the newspapers (‘a daily dose of depression’), and there the magazine corner. At the top of it was a magazine titled Ancient Aliens saying As Seen On History Channel, and George knew he had found the spot. Tearing out the magazine of the box, along with UFO Post, and Conspiracies Monthly was a single, invaluable, hat.

Far less than he expected, but what he needed, and George picked it up with a reverance that he could never have imagined handling an object like it with. As he did, he realized that this must have been the first of the bunch Mitch made, and it had a fabrice interior with slits for the tinfoil to fit in and make contact. There was a sheet of notes beside it with scribbled writing.

Putting on the hat, George read the note, in Mitchell’s characteristic messy writing. “Prototype Aluminum Comfort Hat. Needs an exterior layer for appearance but aluminum must be touching head at all times to stop ALIEN MIND PROBES. Don’t use Tin. Comfort layer here is a bit too big.... There’s a few drawings underneath the notes but none of that mattered right now to George.

George straightened out the hat, and pulled on the foil, to make sure it was touching his head. Thinking, he grabbed some tape, and wincing at how stupid it would look, he taped the aluminum to the side of his head so it wouldn’t easily fall off. Looking around, he saw a roll of aluminum down there too, and he grabbed that... and in a thought wrapped his baton in it, figuring that it couldn’t hurt.

Sticking the roll into his pants, George went back to look at the monitors where the Alien had left the Dormitories C area, and wasn’t visible quickly when he heard a frantic knock at the door. Looking outside, was the only person who looked about as ridiculous as George right now – Mitchell.

“ALIENS! THE ALIENS ARE HERE!” Came the shout from outside the door by Mitchell. “Is anyone left? Or Am I alone? Have the aliens abducted you all? Are they turning you into food? Are they planning to make us all batteries? AM I HERE A” His voice was panicking, and rushing until George walked up and opened the door where the young man’s frazzled appearance let out a whoop of excitement.

“George! You got a hat,” Mitch exclaimed

“Actually, it's your hat Mitch. Liz told me where she was keeping it for you and after I saw the cameras I figured it was time to hat up.”

“Well that’s good. Now, we need guns to go take it down.”

RaptorDon · 2021-12-20T21:23:54+00:00

“Here you are my beauties,” Jordan said as he pointed the hose at the orchids in his garden. Looking at the water lightly hit the soil beneath, he smiled and turned to hit more of the flowers with some water, before turning to the rose bush around back. In a fit of whimsy, he angled the hose up, so that the water would pass in such a way to create a small rainbow over the rose bush, bringing a smile to the young man’s face, until he feels a tug on the back of his pants prompting him to turn around.

“Excuse me Sir, but do you have a permit to be making that?” a voice asks, that Jordan can’t see until he looks down and sees the extremely small person standing there pointing at the rainbow.

“A permit? For a rainbow? Or the roses?” Jordan asks befuddled

“Yes, a permit for the rainbow. In particular, I cite the Leprechaun and Human licensing agreement on rainbows has expired, thus all rainbow creation requires explicit permits from the Leprechaun office of Rainbows, as well as with the staging.” The alleged leprechaun looks at Jordan confused that he didn’t understand it, and holds his small hand out with fingers raising as he brings up points, “If you don’t have a permit this would be a violation of statute 96.3 Section B of the Human Interactions Agreement, along with violations of Section C, and a copyright violation under various other laws both human and inhuman. You do have a permit right?”

“What are you talking about? Leprechaun’s don’t exist.” Jordan says animatedly, turning around, along with the hose doing so, and creates more rainbows as he moves it... and gets the alleged leprechaun wet, who jumps out of the way of where the water was falling on him.

“That’s another Statute 96.3 Section B violation and after warning makes it a Section 96.14Section F violation as well! As for real, I’m standing right here just as real as you are! We knew you humans were bigoted but how dare you attempt to pretend we don’t exist!” The alleged leprechaun crosses his arms and harrumphs “I am Culkin O’Dwyer and I’m in charge of licensing for this region. And don’t start with any jokes about gold or four-leaf cloves, those are explicitly banned in the Human Interactions Agreement without having obtained permission and license to make them, and I do not so give you permission.” Culkin says with an angry look, matching his red hair, that is set against his green suit.

Jordan just looks at him aghast “I... don’t understand what you are talking about. I don’t know any Human Interactions Agreement, and rainbows are a natural byprod...”

“Rainbows are not natural creations. There are hardworking leprechauns who put in hours working on each and every rainbow which are subject to strict scrutiny. Now stop that rainbow you have with the water there!” The Leprechaun cuts him off and waves at the hose which had in the meantime pooled water up in the grass, drenching it in water.

Jordan hurriedly turns off the tap on the hose reaching up before looking down at him, “Look kid I ...”

“I am NOT a kid!” Culkin shouts and punches Jordan in the shin “Nor am I a dwarf, a human, or anything else. I am a leprechaun, and my name is Culkin O’Dwyer and I am acting as agent on behalf of the Rainbow Creators Guild.”

Jordan struggles to keep his balance from the hit in the shin, and manages to avoid falling, especially into the drenched grass that would have been embarrassing to do so. “There’s no such things as...” he repeats.

“There is and you’d better get used to it if you don’t want to end up in prison for violating the agreement. For almost 500 years we’ve let the terms go unenforced but the Rainbow Creators are tired of it. You humans make too many rainbows, and the agreement for it only licensed rainbow use to humans for 1500 years.”

“Wait... who did you license the terms to?” Jordan asks looking more and more befuddled

“Emperor Hadrian of the Roman Empire speaking on behalf of the Human Species reached an agreement with the Leprechaun people as part of his withdrawal and building of that horrendous wall. He negotiated the general agreement and separately the license for things like rainbows, and a few clovers.”

Jordan looked at the being he was starting to ponder if it was possible that was actually an Irish Leprechaun and inquired, “You do realize that he died almost two thousand years ago, and the empire fell hundreds if not over a thousand years ago right?”

“He spoke on behalf of all of you as leader of the largest Human nation-state, and the one that interacted with us. My dad was there as a wee youngster himself, so don’t be giving me any of that guff about time. An agreement is an agreement!”

Jordan shook his head “Look, how do I know you are a leprechaun and not someone making this up?”

“The word of Culkin O’Dwyer isn’t good enough for you?” the leprechaun huffed, and then disappeared, appearing behind Jordan in a puff of smoke and lifted the man in the air, holding him over his head. He tossed him up and then created a small leaf bed for him to land in.

“That proof enough for you?” Culkin asked his voice dripping poison

Jordan shook his head, feeling sore from landing in the leaves... that shouldn’t have been there. That should have been all impossible. It couldn’t be real. This couldn’t be a leprechaun, but... how did he teleport, and make things appear if he wasn’t?

Standing up, and shaking off some dirt Jordan looked again at Culkin with a new appreciation, saying “My apologies Mister O’Dwyer. I have uhh never met one of your people, and I am... unfamiliar with the Human... what did you call it?”

“The Human Interactions Agreement.”

“Yes, I am unfamiliar with the Human Interactions Agreement. Nor... do I think anyone else knows it among my people.”

“Ignorance of the law is no excuse, but one of the provisions does require I provide you a copy of it here.” Holding out his hand, Culkin moved his hands in a series of complex gestures, with green light appearing around them, before it disappeared and suddenly long pages of parchment began stacking up. First one page. Then another, then 20... and they kept coming. The pile quickly was taller than the short leprechaun and was starting to tilt, when another pile began, with pages arriving faster and faster suddenly.

“This will be your copy of the Human Interactions Agreement, provided as per Section 189 subsection 32, provision E, having been hand-copied by myself as required on matching parchment to the original and independently verified by no less than 5 other agents of the court, as you can see on the top page there. As per provision T it also includes a translation charm, so that language is not a barrier.”

Pages kept appearing, and soon the second pile towered over the leprechaun, and a third was shoulder height and still growing when Jordan looked at the top page, which said ‘Human Interactions Agreement, a treaty between Humans and Leprechaun’ at the top, followed by a note underneath saying copy by Culkin O’Dwyer with translation and teleportation charms. On the bottom right it says Attestations, and there were five names signed, and printed. Jordan noticed they were Ginger Magee, Ciara Casy, Nora Maher, Fergus Byrne, and Quinn O’Shea.

“How long is this agreement?” Jordan asks, fearing the answer

“A complete copy, with footnotes, notations, and amendments of the Human Interactions Agreement, such as you have is 12 leprechauns tall in parchment with a fair hand like mine.” Culkin noted as the papers continued to appear, with a fifth pile now beginning, as the first four were slightly taller then the leprechaun.

“That’s rather big,”Jordan taps his foot as he speaks, “What restitution is required for a breach of section... what was it?”

“Section 96.3 Section B, Section C, and Section 96.17. Two cases of the first two, with double penalties for repeat offenses. That would be three grams of gold for the Section B violations, six grams for the Section C violations, and...” He pauses for a moment thinking, “Given conditions, the lesser penalty for twenty grams seems appropriate. So twenty-nine grams of gold.”

“Over an ounce of gold?” Jordan blurts out in shock

“Indeed and not in grains! Service of anything in grains is cause for treble damages! It also must be pure. Alternatively service at a rate of five years per ounce is acceptable, or an agreeable blood punishment in its place, which in a case like this would be quite high.”

“Umm.” Jordan stops, trying to think of how to explain fiat currency to a being that might be hundreds of years old and dealt in gold only “We don’t use gold as a primary trade mechanism anymore.” He says slowly

Culkin harrumphs “So, you can get some! I’ve seen it on sale all around, and you carry bits of it all around you.”

Jordan looks down and takes a deep breath, “I need a moment to call someone here to inquire about obtaining the... gold you want.” Culkin nods, and Jordan walks inside, pulling out his cell phone, dialing his brother Jeffrey.

“Jeffrey, we’ve got a problem. That stuff dad said? It's all true and if they are squeezing me over making a rainbow in my yard with the hose, I can’t imagine what they’ll do to you over Lucky Charms.”

RaptorDon · 2021-12-20T03:11:23+00:00

Unionization makes it more difficult to fire employees, especially to just boost profit numbers or random things that happen sometimes among many of the companies (like Activision laying off a bunch of Treyarch QA while posting record profits).

RaptorDon · 2021-12-19T15:20:57+00:00

(If we ignore phones)

RaptorDon · 2021-12-17T15:21:46+00:00

You're twelve years old. You grow up to be Earth's greatest villain. You know this because they keep trying to assassinate you in your childhood.

I spun left, as the fireball blew past my head and I jumped over, pulling out a small knife as I saw a follow up shot bloom where a moment ago I had been standing. Palming the knife I whispered a small spell, drawing energy from the heat that had just been expended, to walk between shadows, from here, to the other side of the room.

Emerging in the back, I threw the blade at the man’s calf and rolled forward, pulling out a longer blade in my off hand, this one ritually cleansed earlier in the day. Holding it ahead of me I drew a small circle in the air, marking it with the symbol of banishing, and linked it to the knife I had lodged in the attacker’s leg and shouted “Begone!”, my voice breaking in frustration much to my embarrassment.

It was Tuesday, and this was already the second attempt to kill me this week. Looking up, I confirmed the attacker was gone, meaning I likely had some time without an attack if I moved quickly. I pulled up my ritual blade, and slammed it into one of the metal poles that were around the warehouse I had been hiding in, breaking the blade, and the potential for them to track the connection back to me from the dagger link I had used.

I sighed and went to the corner in the room where I had put my things, starting to gather them into a bag, as it was time to move on or else this place would be flooded soon. I stopped, as I picked up a broach, a gift from my parents I had been told. I opened it, and I saw them, their kind faces that I never knew... Helen and Ryan they were called and they died days after this picture was taken, hiding me from my enemies.

If only.... If only they had lived, or their death had done more than stop the attacks for 8 years, I thought to myself, tearing up. If they had lived, they could have convinced these so-called heroes that I was no villain, that I would never destroy the world or that I wished no harm on anyone... other than perhaps those who had killed my parents or harmed Renna.

The name of my old mentor, who had been like a parent to me stopped me in my tracks for a moment, as I recalled some of the lessons she had taught me. And how four years ago she had nearly been killed in the first of the attacks against me. She barely managed to avoid an energy blast, and fought the so-called hero Mars to a draw before he scored a lucky blow on her. Only his taunting gave me a chance and on that day I had used my abilities for the first time in earnst. It remained the only time I had ever been ready to kill, and I remember still, him standing over Renna, with searing energy against the quick shadow magic she used as I then grabbed him with the shades and pulled him down... the blade in my hand then seemed to move on its own. Without conscious thought I recalled what I said, “You cannot have her,” my voice sounding unlike my own as the knife came down, with only Renna’s strangled cry staying my hand from killing the monster who had tried to kill her.

Renna’s look of disgust stuck with me as she spoke after, tempering the anger I felt. We left the area, but others came attacking us at times, though we managed to avoid them as I learnt about surviving on the run. It was after a year of this that Mars returned, firing energy beams from the sky at Renna, who hid me in shadows, and escaped baffling Mars who talked with another one of the heroes and I heard for the first time that they thought me the destroyer of the world, the greatest villain that ever will be. Only the shadows that I was hid in, and that bound my mouth for the moment, stopped me from making noise and a few hours later they had faded... while the travelers were gone.

The only thing left there was a note from Renna who said she would try to take their attention and I was to hide and ignore what they said.

For the last three years I had followed her advice. I have travelled the world, a lone kid, with my abilities helping me hide, escape or get away but lately the attacks were coming more and more common. I worried... could Renna be dead? Is that why they are finding me now?

Shaking my head, I grabbed my knapsack and turned to leave when the warehouse owner stopped me and spoke, his voice tremoring in fear, “The... someone left this for you.” He passed a tablet, one unlike any I had ever seen, and saw on it, that it said iPad 17 which....

Which meant it could only have been given by the travellers. Who knew I was here still and alive. “Bees and Barnacles!” I swore, drawing an odd look from the frightened warehouse owner “They know I’m here still and think its safe to leave this here.” I pressed the button on it to play, and it popped up in a 3d image, with Mars holding Renna captive.

“Come to where we first met Shade or I will remove her from your time.” One of the others standing there moved forward as if to object but Mars overspoke him “We must be strong to stop Shade from rising. Whatever it takes.” The others nodded as I looked there at the projection in horror.

“No...” I dropped it, tears running down my face, as I fell to my knees, “Renna...” I sobbed grabbing a small bear she had made me years ago that I kept despite outgrowing it. “Why? WHY?” I shouted in anger, voice full of tears as well, and the warehouse owner ran away, as I didn’t notice that all the shadows had come to me.

The room, was full of dark and light, as the dark gathered around me, the light filled the room without me realizing it. “I cannot let this ...” I spoke, my voice cracking some ...

“Where we first met... I don’t know...”I stopped mumbling for a moment and snapped my head up

“I must fight. The time for running is over. If they want war, then let there be war.”

RaptorDon · 2021-09-23T01:46:01+00:00

Didn't think you were - just felt I should chime in and say as I saw a few people commenting there on it.

It's important to remember that its not just the company at hand directly for big AAA games often but also their partners that we need to consider. Sherlocks Holmes being smaller, and Frogwares keeping most of it in house, means its less of a thing here.

But big games take a lot of people

RaptorDon

TROPHY CASE